Weekend Goal

Chapter 18: Lost in History

It's funny how things just sometimes fall into place when you're not expecting them too. I mean, who would've thought that Willow would give up the captain's armband so easily? I had no idea that Cooper was at the meeting - I wish Sanne had given me a head's up - or that we'd all figure out a plan to try and make things work at the club as quickly we did.

And I sure as hell didn't think Cooper would spend the night at my place.

"Can we call in at the shop?" Cooper asked as I drove back towards my place.

I don't know why he bought so many bottles of wine when he was going to be drinking alone. He sat on one sofa knocking back glasses of wine, and I sat on the other in my pyjamas stuffing my face with chocolate - it wasn't a good moment for me - but the Toblerone was on offer.

"Are you sure you don't want a glass?" he asked even though I'd already declined twice. "How come you stopped drinking? Not knocked up again, are you?"

I hated the way he said that. "No. It's just that wine makes me sad. And I've had enough of being sad," I told him. The last time I drank wine, I was at my cousin's baby shower, and I'd burst into tears during the game of baby bingo.

"Do you ever think about that?" Cooper asked me.

I didn't answer him; instead, I poured the dark red liquid from the bottle into the spare glass that Cooper had grabbed from the kitchen just in case. If we were going down this route, I knew I'd end up crying anyway, so I may as well just say to hell with it and drink the wine. "Sometimes," I said before taking a sip, "do you?"

"Sometimes . . . It would've been weird, right?"

"Do you think this plan is going to work?" I asked, changing the subject. "Maybe I could have a chat with Bobby, tell him we have a plan, maybe buy us a bit more time; he'll say yes, I know he will."

"What good will talking to your step-dad do? He doesn't even like me."

"He does like you," I say, even though I'm pretty sure he doesn't actually like Cooper.

I don't care about the club right now. I don't want to talk about it," Cooper says. "Would it have been weird? Me, a dad. Could you imagine? Us having a baby, that would've been so weird, wouldn't it?"

All I could think is that I don't want to talk about this; I've been trying so hard to forget all about it since it happened. And we haven't spoken about it, not once. Maybe we should.

"Do you still love him, Mateo?" Cooper asks suddenly out of the blue.

What! I don't think we ever loved each other, not really. We'd had a brief relationship when we were teenagers that had resulted in Jacob. I'm pretty sure there was no love there, not on his part at least.

"But what would you say if he told you that he loved you? And asked you to move out there, be a family; I know that's what you've always wanted."

Fuck! I down the glass of wine and pour myself another. Mateo would never declare his undying love for me or ask me to move in with him. I've thought about it over the years, of course, I have. And the times I've found myself in his bed I've tried to convince myself that in some weird way he loves me, but he doesn't - I'm not stupid - how could he love someone like me when he married a model? "Cooper, I think you've had too much wine, that's never happened . . . it's not going to happen."

"What about Jude? He's in love with you too."

I poured myself another glass of wine. "Huh, seems like everyone loves me, yeah, everyone except the one person I wanted to love me."

"It wasn't like that," Cooper said, swigging from the bottle.

"How do you remember it then? Because if my memory serves me right, you asked me out on a date and it was fun, so we had another and another. I introduced you to my son, you practically moved and then next thing I know I'm pregnant for the second time by some guy I met at the football club. And you were telling me how great it was going to be; we were going to be a family and one day you wanted to marry me. I couldn't believe it, someone like you, wanted to be with me. You didn't care about the fact that I already had a kid with someone else or that I was three years older and it was nice Cooper, and everything was good."