Page 3 of Winging it with My Ex
When I was being transferred from my old team, I had four different offers from four different teams, and I picked the Bobcats because, well, I still love Hadley. I’ve missed her. Her scent, her laughter, her warmth, and most of all, I miss her grounding me. Maybe my life wouldn’t have gone sideways if I’d been smart enough to ask her to go with me.
If thirty-two-year-old me were to advise seventeen-year-old me, I’d tell him to swallow his pride, tell Hadley the truth, and figure things out from there.
“Vivi—”
“Nope!” She snaps and spins to leave.
I grab her arm. “Vivi—please!”
Maybe it’s the desperation in my voice or divine intervention, but she stops and looks at me. Her eyes narrow, and her jaw flexes. “What?” The “t” is so sharp it could give me a life-threatening injury.
“Could you just…” I guess I’ve hit my wits’ end because the next words out of my mouth are so unplanned, even I’m shocked by the revelation. “I need help. I know I screwed up. I know I hurt her, but I was hurting too. I just… I love her, Vivian. I’ve never stopped. If you’ll just let me explain…”
Her posture softens. She stares at me for what feels like an eternity plus thirty years.
I throw my hands in the air. I can’t win. My last team? I couldn’t win. My coach, my family? Same story. Now Hadley? One more battle I’m losing.
I turn to slide into my car, and Vivi goes, “Wait.”
When I face her, I’m not hiding anything. I’m sure my face looks how I feel. Defeated. “I can’t take anymore.”
Her eyebrows squinch up.
“Stop looking at me like that. Like you’re trying to decide if I’m lying or not.”
She shrugs. “Well… how do I know you aren’t? Did you really think I wouldn’t go through all your social media before you got here? I’m good at my job because I’m thorough.”
Okay, she had me there. I was seventeen, free from my family’s chaos, and I made mistakes. But I cleaned up fast—until Dad died. Then I unraveled again. Missing that camp was just another failure.
“Just have coffee with me. That’s all I ask. Let me explain. Okay?”
Vivi cocks her jaw, and her eyes narrow. “Fine, but I’m getting a ride in that car, and we’re going to the good coffee shop with the expensive muffins. I’m getting two. One for Hadley.”
“Will she eat it if she knows I paid?”
“Who’s gonna tell her?”
I glance at the school’s windows. “Isn’t she going to see you getting in my car?” There is no way Hadley isn’t watching us right now.
She waves me off. “Nah, she called Superintendent Metcalf the second I left her office. If I know Hadley, and I do, she’s using everything in her toolkit of charm to talk Leah out of letting you coach the Icebreakers.”
I fidget with my sobriety coin in my pocket—a nervous habit since Dad died—turning it over between my fingers. Nine months of better choices. Nine months of facing my problems instead of trying to drown them.
“Think she’ll win?”
Vivi grins wide. “Depends on how good the coffee is and what you’ve got to say.”
I laugh. “All right.”
Maybe that dark cloud that showed up a year ago is finally shrinking. I can only hope and pray that it is. I need a break. A big break. At this point, I’m willing to juice a field of four-leaf clovers and chug it if it means my luck will turn around.
three
. . .
hadley
The sun is shining.
