Page 143 of Family Bonds- Emma & Warren

“I need some coffee,” she said. “I haven’t been to bed yet. Can you give me a minute? I have to gather my thoughts and bring them back to this world.”

“Fine,” he said, following her to the kitchen. “You haven’t slept at all?”

“I got up at four yesterday morning and then fell asleep in the afternoon. I went to take a nap, and it was about six hours later. So I got up around seven last night maybe, I don’t know. I wasn’t tired and got to work. I lost track of time.”

“I don’t know how you can live like that,” he said.

“It’s how I do,” she said. “I can’t change for you. I already felt like shit that you just sat around while I worked.”

“So that is why you told me not to come back here?” he asked. “Because you felt bad even though I told you I didn’t have a problem with it. Or doyouhave an issue with it?”

“Are we going to fight?” she asked, turning with the brewed coffee in her hand. “Because I’m not up to capacity to match you by the looks of it.”

“I want to know why you never told me my father reached out. I thought we told each other things,” he said.

“Really?” she asked, throwing her hand in the air. Not the one holding the coffee because that would have made a mess, but it was enough to spill some on the counter. “You didn’t tell me he was reaching out to you!”

“Because I wasn’t responding. I don’t want him tainting my life anymore.”

“He can’t do that if you don’t allow it, Warren.”

“It’s not as easy as you think to just say the words or write them down and then they magically happen or disappear.”

Her lips twisted. “I don’t need you jumping on that bandwagon with everyone else.”

“It’s the truth,” he said. “Whether or not you want to hear it.”

“I don’t want to hear it,” she said. “Because you know what?” She put her coffee down and marched up to him. “I’m in the same realm as you and it hurts. You know what hurts? Thatyou’renot honest with me.”

“Because I didn’t tell you that someone from my past reached out to me that I haven’t talked to for years and don’t care to? Do you know how many people text me that I don’t reply to?”

“No,” she said, shoving him but he didn’t budge. She’d never lost her cool that much. “Because you’re thinking of playing longer than the end of your contract. I don’t know if I can do it. I don’t know if I can watch you get hurt like that again.”

She started to cry. She never cried.

She went to hit his chest, knowing that it wouldn’t make a difference. He wouldn’t feel it.

He grabbed her hands. “Lies,” he said. “If you’d been honest with me and said Mike called you too, I would have told you that wasn’t the truth. He called you around Thanksgiving, didn’t he? That’s when you changed. I know it.”

“He told me that you were distracted. I know how you feel about those things. I saw it in the game you got hurt. You weren’t on that day. Something was off. I noticed. Don’t lie to me. It was me and my family and everything going on. And I’m betting it was your father added to it.”

“It wasonlymy father,” he said “Not you or your family. I promise you that.”

“You should have talked to me about it,” she said.

“There was nothing to be said or done,” he said. “I was dealing with it.”

“Not well,” she said.

“And by the looks of you, you’re not dealing well with things either but rather than talking to me, you pushed me away. Why?”

“How do you know Mike called me?”

“Because things weren’t adding up,” he said. “I asked him and he hedged enough for me to put it together. Emma, I’ve never lied to you. I’m done at the end of next year. Shit, I might be done now.”

“What?” she asked, looking up. He had tears in his eyes too. “What is wrong? What are you telling me? Are you more injured than we know?”

“No,” he said. “I don’t know. I’m not released yet and I went to see my own specialist. It’s not that I don’t trust the team doctors.”