Chapter 42
FORTY-TWO
SUTTON
Week number—I’ve lost track at this point—of the semester, and I’m reminded why Dr. Manning warned me that an independent study isn’t for those weak of heart.
You can do this. You have what it takes.
I repeat the affirmation as I rush into the psych building.
I’m running behind for my slotted ‘class’ time with Dr. Manning.
Most of my work is self-led; however, we meet twice a week.
Even if the two hours are spent with minimal chatting and my nose deep into an article or headphones playing podcasts or TED Talks.
Dr. Manning isn’t in her office when I get there, but the door is propped open, so I let myself in.
I pull the stain stick out of my tote and attempt to get the red-brown splotch courtesy of Jaxon scaring me this morning while I was making breakfast out of my white shirt.
It’s one of my favorites. Mom had taken one of Meave’s art pieces and digitized it into shirts for us.
Letting out a frustrated sigh, I give up and tuck the shirt back into my overalls. I pull out my laptop to check my student email. The amount of junk I’ve subscribed to for a student discount is lowkey disgusting and not worth the dollar or two off.
Sorting between junk and moving emails into their color-coordinated folders, I open an email regarding my upcoming, and only, internship interview.
I’m lucky to even have this one.
The independent study wasn’t the only undertaking. Finding an internship that would read between my transcript was important. I wasn’t a sports psychology major by title till this semester, but when you comb through my coursework, it’s all there. I’ve connected every dot possible.
Transferring would have been easier.
But Lakeland University is home.
I know I have another year left, but I wouldn’t change a thing.
Dr. Manning comes in with a stack of paper binder clipped together in one arm. An orchid delicately balanced in the other. “Can you take this?” she huffs out.
She turns the plant in my direction. I rush to stand and configure my hands to take the unexpectedly heavy potted plant from her. I set it on the windowsill next to a dying succulent.
“Should I ask?”
“Maybe when you graduate.”
We both sit down, and I let out an awkward laugh. Then another when I notice the title page to the stack of paper.
“Is that my paper?” I sit up straighter, giving myself an ample view of her mahogany desk. “You printed it? And read it already?”
“My older eyes prefer printed paper.” Her older eyes are thirty-six. She pushes her red-rim glasses up the bridge of her nose. “Only the first six pages.”
“They emailed me about my interview,” I nervously tell her.
“Are you ready?”
Am I?
I think so, but that sentiment doesn’t make me confident. For most, this interview is probably one in a dozen. For me, it’s my only one. As much as I want it, I think I need it more. It’s the final percentage of reassurance that I can do this. I can be a sports psychologist.
“You are,” she answers for me. Dr. Manning must see something I don’t, but I latch onto her faith in me.
We spend the remainder of the two hours practicing interview questions.
Walking outside, it’s the time of year when the Midwest comes down with the biggest case of decision fatigue. It never knows which season it wants to be. Some days start winter and end summer. While others, like today, are full-blown spring.
Sixty degrees out, and you’d think it was the middle of July and not mid-March.
The psych building is right off the lawn.
From Dr. Manning’s office, I could already see clumps of students forming.
Studying, reading, sunbathing, throwing a football, or my favorite, people watching.
There’s barely any green space left. Students overflow onto the brick walkways, cutting paths across what resembles a watering hole.
Leaning against a trash can out front, Cooper is waiting for me with a coffee.
His smile fading, brown eyes softening when they land on Zach holding the door for me—which isn’t uncommon.
We have similar majors with a majority of our classes being in the same building.
The plastic cup in Cooper’s hand curves in on itself.
“Hey, Carmichael.”
“Zach,” he grits between his teeth before forcing a smile when I level him with a look and mouth your jealousy is showing.
“You’re girl”—the semi-sour bite to those words are almost gone, but Cooper still picks up on them—“was only explaining a part of our lecture I didn’t understand, promise.” I roll my eyes, knowing he’s joking. “Good luck tonight, the team is coming after batting practice.”
“Cool,” Cooper mumbles, body language doesn’t loosen. I step away from Zach and slide an arm around his waist.
“See ya, Sutton.” Zach walks around us, disappearing into the mass of students changing classes.
He’s kind, and when we have bumped into each other has been nothing but a friend.
Respectful. Earlier this week he told me a girl from our Cognitive Psychology class asked him out.
We shared an awkward laugh when I suggested not to take her to the same place we went.
I snatch the decadent liquid from my boyfriend’s hand, spinning in front of him and jabbing a finger into his spectacularly hard chest all in one movement.
“What was that?”
“What was what?” He rubs at the spot after removing my finger. Interlacing our hands.
“Zach and I are friends.”
“He’s also the guy you had a crush on for what…the better part of the past year?”
“Okay, and?” I take a sip of my chai latte. It’s perfect. I arch a brow at him, awaiting a response. “Who got the girl?” I egg on an answer.
He huffs like a little girl. And I think he even stomps a foot?
“I expected more of a cocky response. Maybe some bragging.”
“I’m internally applauding myself.” Cooper wraps an arm around my waist and pulls me to him and kisses my temple. “But there was no competition. You were always mine.”
Unfortunately, he’s right. But I don’t tell him that.
Instead, I keep poking the bear.
“If I remember correctly, I believe you were the one pining after me, like a dog on a leash. Wouldn’t that make you always mine?”
“Woof,” he keeps barking in my ear, walking me to my next class.
Everyone came in for the game this evening.
Mom had an oncoming migraine, so she and Dad went back to the hotel an hour or so ago. Cooper is with his parents, Molly, and Jordan—the women’s conference tournament is next week in Columbus.
We all grabbed a late lunch together after Cooper’s morning skate and my classes. I don’t know why I thought it would be awkward, us holding hands in front of them, or the gentle touches and kisses to my temple.
Meave was the interrogator, asking about his intentions with me. I had half expected Dad to be the one with burning questions, but I think seeing us together was a relief. Sure, he’s known Cooper his entire life, but I know his top priority is seeing us healthy and happy.
Cooper makes me happy. So happy.
I don’t know how I was ever repulsed by him. Repulsed. In love. What’s the difference?
Meave and I were lying on my bed gossiping when Elliot got back from teaching, and we started getting ready for the game.
A new playlist—all remixes, definitely dance-worthy songs—she created fills the apartment from the speaker in the living room.
She’s standing in front of my mirror putting on mascara, using the brush as a microphone between upstrokes. I’m sitting on the counter with Meave carefully painting my face. From the corner of my eye, I take a quick look at her work, finding the start of a number taking up the majority of my cheek.
“Wait.” I stop her with a hand around her wrist. “That should be a two, not a three. Cooper is twenty.”
“No, he’s not,” she says, dumbfounded, puzzled confusion pinching her brow.
Elliot stops, too, turning to face me. “He’s thirty-six.”
“I know what my boyfriend’s hockey number is. He’s always been twenty.”
They both shake their head.
“Are you positive about that?”
I push off the counter and head across the hall to my bedroom. Laid out on my bed is a pair of light denim, patchwork overalls that Meave made for me.
“See—” My words tumble back down my throat. Rubbing a thumb over the glittery varsity numbers on the pocket, I see thirty-six, not twenty. “No.”
I drop them and storm into my closet, the door smashing into the wall. His practice jersey that he gave me to wear is hang drying.
I flip the hanger around.
“Thirty-six,” I whisper to myself. “How have I completely missed this?”
He’s always been twenty. Since we were kids.
Recalling memories, I can see it now. The varsity print letters I told myself were twenty are now replaced with thirty-six. Us in his bedroom, how he collapsed on the floor and crawled to me. He traced them on my back before I changed.
I walk back out of the closet to find my sister and roommate sitting on my bed, cross-legged and biting their tongues.
“He changed his jersey number. When? Why thirty-six? What was wrong with twenty?” My words come out slow, as I keep trying to catch up.
They make eye contact.
“Well…” Meave starts.
“You see…” Elliot chimes in.
“You both knew?”
“Knew is an extremely loose term for inferring.” Elliot gives me a placating smile, dragging her long bubble braid over her shoulder.
“When you think about it, it’s quite romantic—” They talk over and around each other. I don’t know who says what.
“But makes a little sense in a weird way. I haven’t asked to confirm though.”
“Same,” Meave agrees.
“Would you two mind clueing me in?” I demand, fisting the damp jersey.
“Sutton. Babe, you are light-years ahead of us when it comes to being book smart, supposedly an obsessively observant athlete. Think. About. It. Do. The. Math.”
I stare blankly at them. Was that a backhanded insult?
“Thirty-six minus twenty.” Meave circles her hand, encouraging my intellectual skills.
“Sixteen,” I answer, then repeat, “Sixteen. Sixteen. Sixtee—you’ve got to be kidding me. That’s my number.”
Meave makes an explosive hand motion from one side of her head, complete with a sound effect. Elliot shrugs.
“When did he do it?”
My sister nudges Elliot to tell me. “After you decided to stop playing.”
They give me my minute—okay, it might be more like twenty minutes of disbelief before reminding me we need to leave.
Meave finishes painting my face with thirty-six. The last stroke of her brush has my stomach somersaulting.
He changed his number for me.
He changed his number for me when I wasn’t able to play.
He’s…he’s been playing for me. All these years and I…I never noticed.
I change, a stupid, partially naive, smile on my face the entire time. How many other things has Cooper done for me all this time?
The overalls I put on are epic, and for an actual minute, I’m jealous of how talented my sister is.
Besides his—or should I be calling it ours?
—number stitched into the pocket, there are patches on the legs.
An outline of a bear with a star and hockey stick print, Lakeland ironed one in navy blue and silver.
My left back pocket has a twenty and a thirty-six.
What must be an old shirt is now the other pocket.
Everything about them is perfect.
We meet up with the rest of our families at the rink, but don’t sit with them. We aren’t even sitting in the student section but adjacent, closer to the plexiglass per Cooper’s request.
When the Bears take the ice, Cooper is next to last. In front of Beck. The somersault my stomach was doing earlier is nothing compared to the free fall it’s actively doing. It’s him making his pre-game heart hands that catch my heart, free-falling in love with him.