“The Rock only gets more fabulous with age,” I reply.
“I love The Rock!” Diego looks up from his phone with a massive grin. “Baywatchis my favorite movie. He’s so good. And he keeps getting better.”
I hook a thumb toward my chest. “ThisRock, Estevez. TheCooperRock.”
Brooks throws a stuffed Baby Ash at me. “Don’t talk about yourself in third person. It’ll make you strike out again.”
I catch the stuffy and cuddle it like I was cuddling Miles a couple hours ago. Cutest baby on the face of the planet. Fight me. Miles, I mean. My nephew. My very real, human nephew. Ash is now a close second for cutest baby, and I’m pissed at what management is doing to her at the end of this year.
“Disrespecting the baby dragon mascot will makeyoustrike out,” I say.
“TJ says your mom says you’re having bad dreams,” Max pipes up.
“I’m not having bad dreams.”
“Being trapped in a bubble with a cat chasing you and trying to pop the bubble while you’re floating ten thousand feet in the air doesn’t ring a bell?”
“Nope.” Jesus. She’s ratting me outagain.
“My abuela interprets dreams,” Emilio says. “Want me to ask her what it means?”
“Being trapped in a bubble is a metaphor for feeling trapped in life,” Diego says, peering at his phone. “And being suspended in air without a parachute or wings means you’re afraid you’re going to fall. Cooper’s having performance anxiety because the pressure’s getting to him.”
“Your phone tell you that?” I deadpan.
“My sister has bad dreams, so I learned how to help her understand them.” He smiles, angels invent new melodies on their harps, self-cleaning glitter spontaneously erupts from the sky, and everyone in the locker room smiles too.
Even Max, who had a very rocky start with Diego’s optimism this year. “You ever have bad dreams, D?”
“Never. Except I did once dream that Waverly Sweet wrote a song about me and it included the wordmustardsix times. That’s as close to bad as it gets.”
“What’s Waverly up to today?” Emilio asks.
Every molecule in my body tenses, and it takes superhuman effort to not look super interested in the answer. Or into how I missed that Diego isthatobsessed with the woman I’d like to date if I could find the freakingtime.
I know what Waverly’s up to. She’s going on a national morning talk show to hype up Aspen’s album and tour, and then she has a charity lunch in New York for a pet foundation, followed by recording another one of her webcast episodes, and then she’s doing a photo shoot for the makeup line she’s launching next week, followed by a quick dinner with her management team to discuss tour schedules two or three years out, and then she has a writing session with one of her favorite music producers.
I have all of these songs in my head and snippets on my phone and no time to get them out, she told me on text last night.I don’t write well after a full day, but if I don’t hook up with Emily tomorrow night, it’ll be three more weeks before our paths cross, and that’s like a year in songwriting time for me.
And she’s butting heads with her aunt.It’s just this publicity thingorWe disagree about a song on my next albumorShe didn’t like the dress I had made for the Queen Tribute Concert.
You ask me, her aunt needs to pop an edible and go spend a week at an all-inclusive getting her knots unwound.
“Waverly hosted a puppy prom.” Diego flashes his phone out at the clubhouse at large, and we allawwover a picture of Waverly lying on the floor with dogs crawling all over her. She’s in a princess crown, and the dogs are wearing bowties and tutus.
And now I’m irritated all over again.
She didn’t send me pictures of that.
Why didn’t she send me pictures?
“Dude, my prom didnotlook like that,” Brooks says.
“Wish mine had,” Emilio chimes in.
“She got twenty-four dogs adopted yesterday.” The pride in Diego’s voice makes my shoulders twitch. “She was there with her boyfriend.”
“What?”
