Chapter 7 #2
Haddie swallowed a knot in her throat. “You mean my grandmonster? You already know all there is to know.” She did her best to keep her voice even.
Emma nodded slowly. “Yeah, your grandmonster,” she began gently. “I know you’re grieving that loss in your own way. But you’re also grieving the loss of a perfectly good job at a perfectly good school in a city I know you loved, and I don’t quite get how they’re all connected.”
Haddie felt all the color drain from her face.
“Hads,” Emma continued when Haddie still hadn’t formed a response. “I don’t want you to feel pressured to talk about anything you’re not ready to talk about. But I’m here whenever you are, okay?”
Haddie pressed her lips together and nodded. “I just want to move on, Ems. Here, in my new life with you and Matteo, and my very unexpected new roommate.”
Emma gasped, clapped, and bounced once in her seat all at the same time. “Are you two in love? Did he propose with a giant Toblerone? Are you going to be my sister-in-law?”
Haddie snort-laughed, at once aghast but also grateful that Emma knew exactly what she needed in this particular moment—ridiculous suspicions that were laughably off the mark.
“Not even the tiniest bit close, my friend. In fact, I’m pretty sure any lingering attraction I had toward him has effectively been squashed like a sidewalk overrun with cicadas.
” So what if the man brushed his teeth before bed wearing nothing but a pair of sleep pants and a self-assuredness that silently said, I know you like the view?
She could still appreciate such a view and at the same time unappreciate his lack of empathy for the school’s soccer program.
Emma winced. “Thank you for the nightmare-inducing analogy.”
“You’re welcome.” And then she told Emma everything—from meeting Tommy at the back-to-school event to being impressed at how much Levi wore his affection for his friend on his sleeve to the same man shrugging off the notion that the soccer program’s budget was not being cut.
No, no, no. The program was being dismantled altogether because the teams never made it that far in their conferences, and the program was more of a money suck than a money draw for the district.
“So, you know…” Haddie continued. “Bye-bye to the one thing you might love or that you might be good at, kids. This here’s a football town!”
Emma narrowed her eyes at her friend. “Principal Crawford’s email did not say ‘This here’s a football town.’”
Haddie threw her arms in the air. “It might as well have. Because that’s how it sounded in my head, and…ugh! Levi just washed his hands of the whole situation and said, ‘What’s done is done.’”
Emma nodded, adding, “Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm,” for emphasis. “And how did that make you feel?”
Haddie groaned. “You know you’re not actually a therapist, right?”
Her friend shrugged. “I’m getting into character. But also, how did it make you feel when he said that? I mean, you two have been living together for almost two weeks now. As friends, right?”
Haddie backhanded her friend on the shoulder. “Yes as friends! How many times are you going to ask me that before you believe me?”
Emma pouted. “I don’t know. You’re hot. He’s hot.
You’re my best friend, and he’s my fiancé’s brother.
How amazing would it be if you and Levi really did fall in love?
You could buy the house next door to ours.
I don’t think it’s for sale, but Matteo and I could turn our place into a frat house long enough to drive them away.
I’d totally do that for you. And then we can grow old together like we were meant to. ”
Haddie pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes and then let out a long exhale. “Ems. I love you. Truly, I do. But Levi Rourke and me? Never gonna happen.” Even though it almost had and Haddie still thought about that almost-had at least once a day.
“Right… Right…” Emma replied. “Because that thing he said about cutting the soccer program made you feel…?”
“Betrayed, okay?” Haddie blurted out. “It made me feel betrayed. He knows how excited I am about coaching these kids and how much it means to me, but this year for him is just a quick little detour until he gets back to what he actually wants to be doing. Ems, this job and these kids are it for me if Coach Crawford doesn’t let me go before I make tenure.
How am I supposed to tell them that whatever happens this year, it doesn’t matter because the program is over before the season even begins.
” Her eyes widened. “Oh wait. I can’t because Coach Crawford said we need to keep everything under wraps until the school board approves his decisions, which he’s confident they will. ”
She blew out a breath. “You want to know what’s even shittier than being betrayed?
Being the betrayer. I’m the betrayer, Ems.” Haddie felt that hot prick behind her eyes again as her throat grew tight.
This was exactly why she’d left Chicago, to say goodbye to the hard stuff.
Yet here she was, walking right back into it less than a month after starting her life over from scratch.
Emma shrugged, undeterred. “Well… What if you said to hell with Principal Crawford’s budget cuts and Levi’s lack of support and fought for what you think is important?”
Haddie loved being a teacher. And now she also loved being a coach.
But she was as fish out of water as someone could be.
She had no idea how to stand up to a guy who basically lorded over the entire, tiny little school district like it was his and his alone.
“I wouldn’t even know where to begin,” she admitted.
“You don’t have to figure it out this minute,” Emma told her, draping her legs over Haddie’s and then flicking on the announcer’s microphone sitting on the desk. “You’ll think of something in that über-creative brain of yours, and whatever it is, count me in to help.”
Haddie tilted her forehead against her friend’s. “Thank you,” she told Emma with a sigh. But her soft words were amplified by the microphone, pushed out onto the field so that Matteo, even with his earbuds still in, glanced up at them as he rounded the track. “But…why the mic?”
Emma leaned back, flashing her a mischievous grin. “Thought we might serenade my husband-to-be and embarrass the hell out of him.”
Haddie’s expression brightened. She didn’t have to solve her problem tonight. It was enough to have Emma on her side, even if she wasn’t sure what came next as far as school was concerned. Embarrassing Matteo, on the other hand…
“Is the mic wireless?” Haddie asked.
Emma nodded.
“‘Can’t Take My Eyes Off You,’ Heath Ledger à la Ten Things I Hate about You?” she added.
Emma jumped up, pulling the microphone from its stand, not wasting a second as she started in on the lyrics about Matteo being too good to be true.
And together, she and Haddie danced down the bleachers, turning Matteo’s water break either into his worst nightmare or—as Haddie liked to think—yet another reminder of how lucky he was that Emma said yes.
Maybe happily ever after wasn’t something Haddie would ever find for herself, but it comforted her to know it was out there for people who knew how to be brave with their hearts. People she’d never understand but could admire from a distance. People like Emma.
Levi was already tucked away in his room by the time Haddie returned, so she got ready for bed and climbed beneath the covers. Several minutes of tossing and turning were interrupted by a text notification on her phone.
Haddie grabbed the phone, expecting a few more wise words from Emma, and gasped when she saw the text preview on her lock screen.
Mr. Tux: Awake?
Her heart leaped like she was a kid opening a Christmas gift to find something better than what she could have even imagined that she wanted…which was why she fought every urge to reply, even after the phone buzzed a second time in her hand.
Mr. Tux: Is it weird that we still barely know each other, and I already hate fighting with you?
“I hate fighting with you too,” Haddie whispered. But she hated even more what that implied. That they cared about each other and about their friendship enough that they could already hurt and disappoint each other.
Mr. Tux: If you’re reading and not responding, don’t tell me. My ego’s still kinda fragile. So I’m just gonna tell myself you fell asleep as soon as your head hit the pillow.
Haddie couldn’t help herself. She tapped the empty text box, typing and deleting the word Hey but not knowing what the hell to say next until she finally sighed and dropped her phone facedown on her chest.
It buzzed, making her rib cage vibrate. Or maybe it was just her heart stuttering in her chest.
Mr. Tux: Message received, Birthday Girl. Sleep well.