Chapter 21

21

Coach (Emmett)

What the hell was wrong with me?

You feel like mine.

That’s the best I could come up with? If I got any lamer, someone would have to put me down.

Bodhi and I were a pending disaster, two cars on a course of collision. I should stop it. The responsibility was mine.

But he was too.

Lame or not, I meant the words. From the minute he stepped into my orbit, months and months ago when he was flinging insults and causing chaos, I’d felt it.

It was worse now.

Denying something that strong seemed futile, and I wasn’t one to fight against the inevitable, even when what I thought was my path had now changed.

Is that what we are? Inevitable . It felt like it.

Yes, I kept saying that. Felt. English teachers, scholars, writers of compelling words would be shaking their heads at the lackluster description. Show, not tell. But for a man who was particularly good at turning off his feelings and pushing away everything and everyone (except Landry), being blindsided with inescapable emotion was sort of like experiencing firsthand just how big the galaxy truly was.

It was blowing my mind.

I was a lot of things, but even mind blown, I was not stupid. I understood a relationship with him was wrong and would explode my life. Probably his too. I also knew that Bodhi was inexorable. We were not two cars on a collision course but a speeding train with no brakes.

Not stopping until we crash.

Where did that leave me?

Trying to figure out a way to minimize the casualties the crash would undoubtedly incur.

My first concern was Landry. Her entire life, I’d kept my demons away from her as much as possible. They had no place near my baby girl. I didn’t want her to ever think she was the fallout or some kind of mistake.

I was a father first. A man second. And to be transparent, I didn’t want her to know what kind of man that was.

For a long time, I’d been running from myself. Over twenty years. I guess this had been inevitable too. Maybe Bodhi was my karma. The universe’s way of forcing me out of hiding and to own up to who I was.

Even knowing this, it didn’t stop me from wanting him. I wanted him so goddamn much that I’d protect him so, when debris from the crash littered the ground, Bodhi could walk away and take everyone else with him.