Class Act: A Coach/Student Romance

LIGHT FILTERED THROUGH MY eyelashes, and I squinted against the harshness and clamped my eyes shut. Why did it feel as if I hadn’t opened my eyes in days? A hand slipped into mine, soft and slender.

Emery.

I squeezed it as I tried to remember what had happened, but forcing myself to think only made my head hurt. I relaxed and listened to the soft, steady beeping behind me.

What was that? It sounded like one of those machines in a hospital. Hospital? Why was I in the hospital? I lifted my arm, but a heavy weight pulled it back down. A cast. Just like when I was ten and had broken my wrist. The same heaviness was around my left leg.

Beeeep!

A car hurtled toward me, and I stepped back, closing my hand over the ring box, but the car was going too fast. I braced for impact.

“Abe, Abe, open your eyes.”

Not Emery.

Teresa?

My heart skipped a beat. Had Emery just been a fantasy? Had I dreamed of him? The ache in my heart was worse than the throbbing in my body. He had to be real. The delightfulness of his laughter, how he curled up into my lap, the way he kissed me until we were both out of breath. Had nothing been real?

I’d rather live in my fantasy where I would see him again.

“Abe, please. We’re worried sick about you.”

I frowned and slowly blinked my wife’s face into focus. Or my soon-to-be ex-wife.

“Thank god, Abe.” Teresa smiled. “It’s been a week. Why must you scare everyone like that?”

I swallowed past the dryness of my throat. “E-Emery.”

Her smile fell. “Does he have to be the first one you think about after coming out of your coma?”

He was real, then. Emery was real. The tension seeped out of my body, and I closed my eyes.

“Water.”

She brought a cup of water over with a straw and elevated the head end of the bed so I could drink. When I didn’t feel like I was an extension of the Sahara, I lay back against the pillows. Snippets of the accident were coming back to me.

“How bad is it?” I asked.

“Could have been worse. They had to operate and repair some damage to internal organs. You have three broken ribs, and your arm and leg are broken. You were in an induced coma for the past week.”

One week. I closed my fingers around the sheet. “How’s he taking it?”

“You want me to talk to you about the person who ruined our marriage?”

“Please, Teresa,” I mumbled. “You don’t understand. I’m all he has. If something were to happen to me, he would be devastated.”

“He is.” She got up and walked over to the window. She peered through the half-opened blinds, letting a ray of sunshine into the room. “Don’t worry. He’ll probably be here soon.” She checked her watch. “He was here last night. I sent him home to get some rest and promised him I’d sit with you today.”

I let out a sigh. “Thank you.”

She chuckled softly. “Don’t thank me yet. For the first three days, seeing him here made me so mad. I refused to let him have any contact with you.”

“What made you change your mind?”

“It doesn’t matter. The doctor should be here any minute to check on you.”

No sooner had the words left her mouth than the door opened, and a middle-aged man came in with a bright smile.

“Mr. Cooper, I’m Dr. Fisher. You had us worried. How are you feeling?”

“Like I’ve been hit by a truck and loaded up with a ton of drugs.” I grimaced.

“Thanks to those drugs, you’re not feeling the full brunt of your injuries.” He raised the sheet and trailed something along the bottom of my foot. It tickled, and I moved my foot. “Good, I guess I don’t need to ask you if you felt that. There was some trauma to your spine, but not as serious as the injuries to your thorax.”

“Will there be any lasting effects?”

“Too soon to tell. It all depends on how well you respond to therapy once you are up and about. It’s going to take time to heal.”

Not exactly what I wanted to hear, but it was better than being dead.

The doctor checked me over and made notes on a chart, then left. Teresa stayed by my side the entire time.

“Thank you,” I said.

“For what?”

“Being here. You didn’t have to be.”

“Yeah, well, I wasn’t the one who wanted to give up on twenty years of marriage.” I closed my eyes. “Don’t worry. I’m not here to rehash our divorce. No matter the animosity between us, you’re still Mandy’s father. There’s no way I could have walked away and pretended that this had nothing to do with me.”

“I appreciate it.”

I wanted to ask her more about Emery and how he was coping, but I bit my tongue. She’d mentioned keeping him away for three days. My poor baby must have been going crazy.

“I want to hate him,” she said, her back to me. “And to hate you too. But seeing how traumatized he was by what happened to you made it impossible. We all shared the same burden—fear of losing you, but despite what he tells you, don’t make the mistake of thinking we’re suddenly friends.”

“You might not want to think the same, but I refuse to see you as the enemy.”

“You should. Like I said, for three days, I watched him bawl his eyes out. He didn’t eat, sleep, or shower because he was worried about you and I wouldn’t allow him to see you. I’m surprised he didn’t tell you I got him fired at the restaurant.”

“What do you mean?” Teresa was the customer who’d bullied him that night and gotten him fired? Why hadn’t he told me?

A short tap and the door opened. A head full of curls poked around the door. Emery. The vise around my heart loosened, and for the first time since I opened my eyes, I felt like I was really breathing.

“Abe?” he dropped his school bag to the floor. “Abe, you’re awake!”

He ran up to me, leaned over the bed, and pressed his lips to mine. I brushed his hair back from his face. My poor boy. He was so pale. Paler than usual. Could someone lose so much weight in just one week it was noticeable?

“I was so scared,” he said with a shaky breath. “You scared me. Did you see the doctor? What did he say? You’re going to get better, right?” He took my hand in his and pressed my palm to his cheek. “Abe, I missed you so much.”

“I know, sweetheart.” I looked at our joined hands and my heart nearly stopped. The ring. He was wearing the ring I’d bought for him when the disaster happened. “Emery.” I turned over his hand. “Where did you get this?”

“Teresa gave it to me. They took it from you when they brought you to the hospital.”

I turned to thank Teresa, but she was gone. “You’re wearing it. Does this mean…?”

He nodded, sobbing. “Of course I’ll m-m-marry you, but you can’t ever scare m-m-me like that again, Abe. Do you hear me?”

“I can’t control some things, love.”

“You’d better. You can’t do that to me again.” He kissed my nose and cheeks. “If Teresa wasn’t here bossing me around, I wouldn’t have known what to do with myself. Your ex-wife’s scary, Abe.”

I chuckled, then winced. Pain lanced through my ribs. “Shit.”

He gasped. “Are you okay? Should I get the doctor?”

“I’ll be fine. I just need to remember not to laugh. Sit beside me and tell me what happened.”

“Well, Mandy and I went to the movies with her friends…”

Emery filled me in on all the details of everything that had happened. Teresa barring him from my room didn’t sit well with me, but at least she’d caved. I would let it go. Being angry with her would only prolong the cycle of resentment.

“She made me go to school yesterday and today.” Emery pouted. “Threatened that she would kick me out of your room again if I didn’t do what she said. I don’t even know why I bothered. I haven’t learned a thing since you’ve been here, Abe. How was I supposed to concentrate?”

“Poor baby.” He put his hand in mine. “I’m going to make sure this doesn’t happen again. After I filed for divorce, I should have made you my emergency contact. I’m sorry I didn’t think to change the names.”

“I kept imagining…”

“What?”

He shook his head. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

But I knew what he’d been about to say. He’d imagined me being dead.

“I wouldn’t have had a say.” His eyelashes glistened with tears. “And that worried me so much. Not being able to tell you I love you one last time.”

“Baby, if you keep crying, you’re going to mess up your eyeliner.”

He snorted. “What eyeliner? My hand wasn’t steady enough not to poke my eye out if I’d tried. I was too worried about you.”

“It’s going to take me some time to fully recover.”

“I’ll help you through it.”

“You’ll go to school and concentrate on your lessons.”

“But who—”

“Don’t argue. Do as I say.”

He sighed. “Fine. I’ll concentrate on my lessons. As much as I can, but if you really want me not to worry, you’ll get better quickly.”

I chuckled. “You drive a hard bargain.”

I’d love to keep talking to Emery, but I couldn’t keep my eyes open. Exhaustion left me drained.

“Go to sleep,” Emery said. “I’ll be here when you wake up.”

I squeezed his hand. “When I woke up, I thought you were just a fantasy. I’m glad you’re not, Emmy.”

***

I woke up several times, not long enough to talk but enough for me to glimpse Emery. I was probably being selfish not sending him home to rest, but I liked that when I opened my eyes, his face was the first thing I spotted. He sat hunched over a notebook, doing homework. Thank god he wasn’t forsaking his studies.

Hushed chatter woke me up. I blinked open my eyes. Mandy sat in the chair where Emery always sat, my hand in hers. Lynn was talking to Emery. I assured Mandy I was fine. My daughter was a mess, but I was happy to have her back.

“We were so worried.” She wiped the tears from her cheeks. “And poor Emery was—”

“Mandy, don’t tell him,” Emery chimed in.

“You definitely should tell me.” I winked at her.

Mandy did exactly that. She filled me in on things Emery had kept from me, such as his anxiety attack and him fainting. Now I understood why his face looked so pale and thin. He’d been worried sick—so sick he hadn’t been eating properly.

“Yup, you need to get better soon so he can stop worrying,” Lynn said. “If I had any doubt about how he felt about you, Abe, I would have none now. That boy loves you something fierce.”

“He already knows that,” Emery said.

Yes, I did. I didn’t doubt him at all, but at least the important people in our lives saw for themselves that Emery reciprocated my feelings.

“What happened anyway?” Lynn asked. “You getting hit by a car is just wild.”

“Emery went out with Mandy, so I thought it was the perfect opportunity to pick up the engagement ring I’d been looking at. That night, I planned to ask him to marry me. I was crossing the street back to my car when I got struck. It was my fault. I was too busy looking at the ring and not paying attention to the traffic.”

We chatted until the nurse arrived and announced that I needed to rest and that only one person could stay in the room. Mandy and Emery looked at each other, and I couldn’t decide for them either.

Mandy hugged Emery. “You stay, but keep me up to date.”

“Are you sure?”

Mandy rolled her eyes. “You know you don’t mean to ask me that.”

Emery’s face turned red. “I’ve just been so worried, and I don’t want to leave him yet.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it. You love him. Just take care of him.”

When she left, Emery sat next to me with a sigh.

“Are you finished with your homework?” I closed my eyes. Why was I so damn exhausted? Hadn’t I been sleeping for a week?

“Not quite.”

“What are you waiting for?”

“For you to fall asleep. I can do it then.”

“Promise me you’ll get something to eat when I’m asleep.”

“I will.”

“Good boy.”

So sleepy. I could stare at him all evening. If only I could keep my eyes open.

“Abe.”

“Hmm?”

“You have to pull through this. How else am I going to keep my promise about taking care of you when we’re older?”

“Do you love me?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“That’s all that matters. We’ll take care of each other.”

He clenched my hand tighter, and I squeezed back.