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EMMETT

I t’s closing in on Halloween and I’m still not entirely sure what I want to be. We’re planning on bringing the kids trick-or-treating in the neighborhood, and then hitting up Lulu’s afterward while Juniper and Elara have a little sleepover.

The main problem being I’m not going to ask Heidi to ditch her friends on a holiday, especially not Halloween. She’s been at every single outing they’ve had in the past.

It just so happens that the answer comes in the form of a phone call from my mom a week before.

“When are we going to see you next, honey?” my mom asks. She and my dad had moved out to California for dad’s job four years ago. Although they’ve missed out on significant moments of Juniper’s life, it’s not realistic for me to expect them to stay close when my dad had such a great opportunity out there.

I’ve always figured things out on my own, and they were great help when I needed extra hands around the house at first.

“You can come see me whenever you want,” I tell her. “It’s football season though, you know I’m not going to be able to get out there to see you guys that much until February.” Well, hopefully until February, if everything goes well. “I think we play the Lightning in a couple of weeks but it’s not like I can stay longer than the team.” We’ll be back on the team plane a couple of hours after the game.

“What if I come visit you?” she asks hopefully.

“Mom, I’ve told you that you can come whenever you want.”

“So if I have plane tickets for Wednesday, you’ll be able to pick me up?”

“Are you looking at plane tickets right now?”

“Yep. And they’re purchased. I’ll be in Maryland around eleven pm.”

With a sigh I tell her I’ll be there to pick her up, even though I’m usually in bed by then. I know Juniper is going to love having her here.

We talk a little longer about dad’s work schedule, some projects he’s working on—a new software that will help optimize wind turbines, and what mom has been doing to stay busy—apparently Pilates—before I give the phone to Juniper so she can hear the news.

But my mind is immediately back on Heidi, who has been hanging around a lot more lately.

Sure, she’s bonding a ton with Juniper, but I’m also back to avoiding her like the plague. I miss our morning runs, but that means we have to talk at some point. She still shows up early and goes for runs herself.

I want to join her every single time.

We haven’t had any moments in the weeks since the last one, and part of me is upset about it. Part of me wants it, and wants it badly.

The other part wants nothing at all, which is a sad way to live.

But I keep reminding myself that I need to focus on the people in my life right now, which just happens to mean pushing her out.

I can’t lose something I don’t have.

But that isn’t true.

Whether I like it or not, Heidi has wormed her way into my heart. Friends or not, she means something to me even if I don’t want to admit it. She doesn’t need me in her life. She doesn’t need my worry, and I can’t definitively say that I’d want to marry her in the future.

No one, not her, not someone from a damn dating app, no one deserves someone who can’t see a solid future with them. I don’t know how much of myself I can give, or whether my anxiety is going to be too much.

Heidi deserves more than that. And she deserves someone who will commit to her.

“Dad!” Juniper calls.

“What’s up, Bug?”

“Have our costumes come in yet?” she asks hopefully.

I checked the tracking number this morning and they’re supposed to come tomorrow. “Not yet, but almost.”

“What are we being again?”

“You wanted to be Jabba this year and you wanted me to be Salacious B. Crumb, remember?”

“Oh yeah. Grandma, dad’s going to be my pet!”

Rolling my eyes, I nearly throw myself onto the couch, watching as Juniper explains her vision to my mother and trying hard to tune out all the excuses swirling in my mind of why I need to stay far, far away from the pretty redhead.

“You have a nanny now?” My mom fixes her hair in the light of the vanity mirror in my car.

Her flight got in a bit late, and I’m exhausted. We’re facing one of our best, toughest division rivals this weekend and practices have been really tough.

“Yeah. Juniper is at that age I think. I don’t know. She’s been a little tough.”

Mom sits back with a sigh. “Kids will go through that. It’s good for her to have someone else around.”

“Mom.” I know where this is going.

“Speaking of, how’s your dating life going?”

I roll my eyes, my knuckles whitening around my steering wheel. “Who the hell phrases it like that anymore?” I chuckle, but it’s more for self-preservation than anything.

Her eyes meet mine, shocked. “What’s wrong with that phrasing?”

Slowing at the stoplight, I make quotes in the air. “ How’s your dating life going? Mom. Come on.”

“I just want to make sure my son is happy!”

“I’m happiest when I’m not asked about my dating life.” Between the guys and my mother, I hear about it at least once a week. The answer is always the same, but sometimes I like to spice it up and lie to the boys.

“I am happy, mom,” I lie. It’s the same lie I’ve been telling everyone for years.

She glances at me from the corner of her eye with a “humph,” making it clear she doesn’t really believe me. “So, who’s the nanny?”

This question shouldn’t send a shot of pain through me, but it does.

“She’s a friend of Leo’s. She was a nanny for Briar’s daughter for a while so Juniper already knew her.”

My mom nods beside me.

“Well,” she says after a couple beats too long. “I’m excited to meet her.”

“How’s Theodore doing?” Cooper asks, scratching his ass.

I roll my eyes. “He’s fine. Why.”

“Nothing. Just asking. Wasn’t sure how the ‘burbs were treating him.”

I blink at him. “The ‘burbs?”

Cooper pouts. “Yeah. The burbs. The suburbs. He’s a little man of the suburbs.”

Rolling my eyes, I continue to get ready for practice.

Leo walks in a few minutes later looking sheepish. “How have things been?” he asks awkwardly, retrieving his cleats from his locker.

I glance at him quickly, wondering where he’s going with this. I’ve had enough grilling to last a lifetime the last few days.

“I mean, it’s going fine. Why?”

“I was just wondering,” he shrugs.

“Leo.”

“How’s Heidi?”

I groan. “Why is this a thing we’re talking about? I feel like you’ve asked a million times in the last week.”

Leo shrinks back, almost wincing at my words. Looking across the locker room I watch as Owen’s eyes find his, and he immediately ends his conversation with one of our linemen and saunters over like some kind of criminal who knows he’s about to be caught.

“How’s it going?” He smiles.

“Get to the point you fuckwits,” I demand, looking around at the three men surrounding me.

“We were just wondering how things were. How you’re feeling. How you’re holding up. That kind of thing,” Leo says. He looks constipated as the words leave his mouth, and it takes me a second to realize it’s because he’s trying to hold back a small smile.

I stare at him blankly and watch as Cooper and Owen’s eyes shift to Leo.

Several awkward, terrible seconds later, Leo claps his hands in front of him. “I’ve been sworn to secrecy,” he says, lifting his hands up in front of him.

“Then why even start to grill me? You guys know you’re absolutely terrible at this right?”

Cooper looks down at his feet, his lips pressed together while Owen looks equally suspicious.

A few more awkward seconds later and Leo stands up quickly, nearly knocking down the chair that was sitting next to the bench. Grabbing my arm, he pulls me around the corner.

“What the fuck?”

“Do you like her.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, do you like Heidi?”

Closing my eyes, it takes every single ounce of self-restraint I have in order to not strangle him. I’m bigger than him, too. It could be done easily.

“I don’t have time for this,” I say simply instead, turning to head back. Leo catches my arm.

“She likes you, man. Please don’t tell her I told you anything. I’m serious when I say I’ve been sworn to secrecy but,” he pauses, “you know how I get about secrets! She’s a good person, and you know I want what’s best for you.”

“You have no idea where I’m at with things,” I snap. “I’m not in a place where I can have feelings for someone, man. You know that. I’m not going to hurt her.”

Leo purses his lips, his eyes downcast. “I just don’t know if this is something you want to let get by you, you know?”

I do know.

“You ready to go, Bug?” I call as I put on my full costume.

“Yes!”

Juniper peeks in from around the corner, the giant Jabba costume fully inflated, the soft hum of the fan in the back going at full force. “Leo and Elara will be here soon,” I tell her, grabbing her pillowcase.

As a kid my parents used to give me a large pillowcase for my Halloween candy, and when McKenna and I got together I found out she did too. It’s something so small that I continue to do just to feel a little more connection to her.

The doorbell goes off, and I wedge myself through my door in order to answer it only to find my mom beat me to it.

“You ready?” Leo yells, his green arms outstretched.

The man is covered in green with little green ears popping out of the top of his head. The man loves a good bald-cap Halloween costume.

“Where’s donkey?” I ask.

He steps aside for Elara, who barrels through the door to hug Juniper.

“And the Princess?”

“She stayed home. She’s getting ready for tonight,” he shrugs. Ever since last Halloween, Leo hasn’t been able to shut up about getting together and trick-or-treating again. He couldn’t care less about the drinking after.

“Got it.”

“Heidi here?” he asks, waving at my mom in the kitchen.

“No, she’s getting ready for tonight too. Mom is going to watch the kids so I figure right after we get back from doing our rounds we’ll head to Lulu’s?”

We leave about thirty minutes later as the sun is going down. My mom comes with us and she spends the entire time talking to Leo about how his injury healed up since the end of last season—swimmingly—and how he and Briar are doing.

The girls skip ahead of us without a care in the world. They stop at every driveway, pushing and shoving each other as they see who can run the fastest to the door; Elara in her donkey costume or Juniper in her Jabba costume.

At the end of it all, it was about a tie. Juniper frequently grabbed at Elara’s tail, pulling her back and gaining yards.

When the kids were officially home, out of their costumes with candy scatted all around them on the family room floor, Leo and I head out to the bar.

The place is completely packed by the time we get there, but I presume it’s been like that for the last few hours, if not since they first opened today.

“I assume everyone’s in the back,” Leo mumbles, pulling me through the crowd.

The back is almost just as crammed, but we’re quickly able to find Briar, Isla, Heidi and the other girls as they dance in their usual corner.

“Hey!” Heidi greets, her smile lighting up the whole damn room.

And she looks good. Really, really good in her… Squidward costume? My mind rewinds back to the first Halloween I saw her, when she was the star fish, and it all makes a little more sense.

She’s one of us.

Happiness blooms inside of me and I desperately want to go to her. To touch her. To maybe tell her that I want to see where something goes.

But I don’t.

Because that would be hard.

“Hey!” I tell her before I can stop myself. “Can we actually talk for a second?”

Her brows furrow but she nods, following me with her fruity drink in hand. “Everything okay? Elara and Juniper good?”

I nod. “All good. I, well, I just wanted to touch base on you after everything that happened in the garage.”

She looks around. “That was a while ago, Emmett.”

I nod, instantly starting to feel like absolute shit. “Yeah, I just, I don’t know. We’ve been around each other a lot more lately for whatever reason and I just wanted to make sure you were feeling okay.”

Her green eyes search mine, and I can tell that she’s desperately trying to figure out what I’m going on about. “Can you just tell me why you’re really asking me this?”

I blow out a puff of air. “I’m just not in a place for anything to you know,” I wince, “happen. I think you’re amazing, I just think you deserve a lot better.”

I watch as several different emotions cross her face at once, and after a moment, all that’s left is embarrassment.

Heidi looks at her feet before tucking a phantom hair behind her ear. “I know that,” she whispers.

“I think what we have going here is really great,” I add, trying to make things better but making things a million times worse instead.

“Yeah,” she graces me with an awkward, stale smile.

“Great.” My heart pounds in my chest as it dawns on me what a giant piece of shit I am. I want to immediately rescind my words, but I know it’s too late. There’s no coming back from it.

“If you don’t mind,” she whispers, unable to meet my eyes. She gently pushes me just slightly so she can wedge herself away and disappears into the room.