Page 37 of RomeAntically Challenged
“Fuck you,” Emmitt said a little too loud, because a fire hydrant of a woman in a maroon track suit and matching visor across the gymnasium, with sound amplifiers for ears, skewered him with a look.
He’d been on the receiving end of that look most of his life. Growing up, he wasn’t a bad kid so much as curious to a fault. After his mom passed, that curiosity became an impulsive thirst to challenge each line in the sand, find out how deeply they were drawn, and question how much disruption would result from crossing those lines.
Not much had changed over the years. Emmitt was just bigger now, and the lines he challenged came with far greater repercussions. The bigger the story, the higher the risk, the more alive he felt.
If someone had asked him six months ago, he’d have sworn it was enough. But something had shifted. Even before China, the rush that had fueled him was growing more fleeting, until half the time he felt as if he was running on empty.
The only way he was going to get his life back was to satisfy that thirst. First though, he needed to reflect on how he’d reached this point. Understand why all the things that used to come easy felt as if they were slipping away.
“What did I do wrong?” he asked, knowing he was announcing open season on himself.
“Let’s start with you approaching Paisley in front of her friends,” Levi said, his last few words dying beneath Gray’s laughter.
“Levi told me you waited for her on the campus lawn, but I didn’t know you approached her.” Gray let out a low whistle. “Rookie move, man. Rookie move.”
“Says the guy who didn’t tell me about any fucking rules. How can I make a rookie move when I didn’t even know the game had switched?” he asked, pressing a finger to his ear because someone’s playlist was blaring through the gym’s sound system.
“He’s got a point, Gray. You didn’t explain, so you can’t blame,” Levi said as if it were the theme to an after-school special. “But I’m still confused, and this is really why I called you, Gray. Approaching usually doesn’t bring on aYou’re Ruining My Lifeepisode.”
“No,” he agreed. “She’s been prickly all week, but she seemed happy today when I dropped her off at school. What else did you do?”
“Why does it have to be something I did? I said hi, she was with some punk, I was excited to tell her we were working on the dance together, then I gave her a hug and—”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Levi interrupted.
“Never, ever initiate physical contact in public,” Gray added, and Emmitt once again felt like the odd dad out. He also felt a headache coming on—and this one he couldn’t blame on Gray’s nagging.
“I hugged her because I haven’t seen her in two months. Then I tried again because she looked upset. That’s what dads do,” he said. “She was smiling while chatting up that guy, but even from the lawn I could tell something was up. So I thought I’d do something to make that forced smile of hers real and offered to take her to get smoothies. And before you blame me for that, it was not my fault.” Emmitt turned his head away from the gym door, but the movement made him wince. A normal reaction, his doctor had assured him, for someone who’d suffered extensive head trauma. “How was I not informed that Smoothie Social has closed down?”
The laughing and ribbing immediately stopped, and a tense silence vibrated through the phoneline. A silence that told Emmitt everything he needed to know. Paisley’s reaction this afternoon wasn’t about rules, and it wasn’t about the hug.
He pressed his palm to his forehead. “Hasn’t anybody talked to Paisley to see if she’s upset by the closing?” he asked. “How she feels about her and her mom’s favorite hangout being gone?”
“I totally blanked on the closing. I am so sorry,” Levi said, and Emmitt could hear the regret in his friend’s voice. “I’ve been so focused on getting her out of her room and interacting with people, I didn’t even think... That’s it. I didn’t think.”
“We’ve all been dealing with a lot, and you guys are juggling work, Paisley, and figuring out how to function without Michelle,” Emmitt admitted, gratitude thick in his voice. “My intense travel schedule hasn’t helped.”
“It’s your job,” Gray said. “We all have to keep moving forward, but I’m just not moving as fast as you guys. And if someone else were telling me this sob story, I’d call bullshit. But the last time I tried to talk to Paisley about Michelle, she holed up in her room for five days. Only came out to eat.”
Gray released a breath big enough to hold all the problems of the world, and everything inside Emmitt stilled.
“The truth is, I’m scared,” Gray said, emotion choking his words. Levi didn’t say anything, but he didn’t need to. The gravity of those two words weighed heavily on all of them.
The hell of it was, they were doing everything right, everything they had done before to make Paisley feel safe, happy, and loved. But now it clearly wasn’t working and none of them knew why.
More concerning, none of them knew how to help.
Emmitt scanned the growing group of kids and parents in the gym and immediately zeroed in on his little girl. Only she wasn’t so little, and she seemed to be as confused about that as he was. But what broke his heart was that the daughter who used to cuddle up in his lap and talk about anything and everything was doing her best to pretend he wasn’t there.
“We have a dinner date tonight—I’ll talk to her and fix it,” he said, and the guys laughed.
“Let us know how that works out for you,” Levi said. And the last thing Emmitt heard as he disconnected was loud, patronizing laughter—in stereo.
Chapter 11
It was official. Annie was in.
She’d never been “in” before, and she had to admit it felt good.
