The Shippers(36)

Forgetting to be unhappy sounded okay.

Then I asked, like this might be the deciding factor, “Do you actually think I look ‘genuinely hot,’ or are you just saying that to cheer me up?”

At that, Cooper pulled back to look me over and make an official assessment.

Was it my imagination, or could I feel the sweep of his eyes over my skin?

“I actually think you look genuinely hot,” Cooper said.

“Even in this jacket?”

“Especially in that jacket.”

That helped. A little. I turned to face the lunch buffet like I might start walking.

But then I hesitated.

“Today was a disaster,” I said. “I’m worse off than I was before.”

“Not entirely,” Cooper said. “At least Finn knows who you are now.”

“Not in a good way.”

“All publicity is good publicity,” Cooper said.

Was that true? “I didn’t know it was possible to get so enraged about mini golf,” I said.

Cooper shrugged. “You don’t become captain of every varsity team by liking to lose.”

“Thank you for being as bad at mini golf as I am,” I said.

“You’re welcome.”

Everybody was still watching me. Time to do—anything. On instinct, I waved and smiled like we were on a parade float.

Then, before we took our first step, Cooper reached down and clasped my hand.

Then he said, “Be the unicorn.”

And this time, I knew what he meant.



* * *



LATER—AFTER I’D CHANGED into sweatpants and flip-flops back in Cooper’s luxury suite and then stalled as long as I could—it was time for me to go back to my official cabin and begin the journey of rooming with Harmony.

Cooper carried my suitcase back down the stairs for me on a trek that felt distinctly like descending into the underworld.

“Come back anytime,” Cooper said as we reached my floor, like he felt guilty that his fate was better than mine. “My balcony is your balcony.”

But it wasn’t his fault I had to room in a sex dungeon.

I decided to focus on the positive. “Thank you for the pep talk, by the way. And for all the nice things you said about me—to everyone. And for hoarding all the Oreo cupcakes off the dessert tray.”

“My pleasure,” Cooper said. Then, as we peered down the hallway in the direction of Harmony’s lair, he added, “You don’t have to do this, by the way.”

I sighed and started walking the final hundred feet toward the cabin.

What choice did I have?

Cooper followed and kept talking. “You can just stay with me.”

“I can’t stay with you,” I said.

“Because there’s only one bed in my room?”

“Among many other reasons.”

“We slept in the same bed sometimes as kids.”

“Yeah. As kids.”

“It wouldn’t be that weird, is all I’m saying.”

“It would be weird enough.”

But as we pulled up to the door of Harmony’s room, we got a new comparison point for weird.

Because Harmony’s lei was on the doorknob, and she was … putting it to good use.

Loudly. Gymnastically. To be clear: Anyone walking by would know with certainty that Harmony’s lei was not, in any way, going to waste.

We stood there a second, averting our eyes from everything, before Cooper finally said, “Sounds like it might be a while.”

I closed my eyes, fully defeated.

Then Cooper asked, earnestly, “Would you like to … wait here?”

I kept my eyes closed and shook my head.

“Come on, then,” Cooper said, like that was that.

He grabbed my suitcase and walked it back the way we’d just come.

And as I watched him go down the hall, I saw the future clearly.

The immediate future, anyway.

Maybe Cooper had mysteriously stopped talking to me for four years and never told me why. And maybe he’d RSVPed no to my wedding and to this one before showing up last minute to both. And maybe teaming up with him felt exactly like old times—but better. And maybe he was being far too nice to me. And maybe this whole day with Cooper had made me miss him worse, somehow, now that we were together again. And maybe he’d brought a whole steamer trunk of gabardine vests.

And maybe I had more questions about Cooper now than answers.

But one thing was clear.

He was rescuing me from the underworld right now.

He was rescuing me, and taking me back to his room—and we were going to share his balcony, and his one bed, and all the contents of his mini-fridge, until he kicked me out. And I really didn’t have any other options.

And it was actually okay.

Because after this long, mortifying, soul-crushing day … Cooper’s cabin turned out to be the only place I wanted to go.

And so when he turned, saw I hadn’t moved, and said, “Hey! Let’s rock! Those stairs aren’t going to climb themselves!”—what happened next was easy.

I just did exactly what I wanted, and I followed him home.





Thirteen


THAT’S HOW COOPER and I became roommates.