It was what he’d said to me yesterday, though, so it couldn’t have beencompletelyhopeless. Since I had, in fact, seen him around.
Cooper’s lips twitched, and there was that sparkle in his eyes again. He was laughingatme, which I should have hated, but I didn’t. A smile tugged at my lips, too.
“Guess you will,” he said with a final wave, walking back toward the mechanic’s shop.
I took my phone out and opened up my conversation with Avery.
Felix: For the sake of argument, what if I’ve found a dick I think I want to ride?
6
COOPER
“You got it! High five,”Felix enthused, offering his hand to Benji, who was grinning from ear to ear. Benji slapped their hands together, bursting into beautiful, bubbling laughter.
After being late last time, I’d made a point of being early to pick up Benji from classthistime. It wasn’t unusual for parents to watch the end of a lesson, but I’d been so determined not to be late that I was the first—and only—one here.
I’d never spent much time in the pristine studio, all white walls and pale, perfect, polished floors, with the huge mirror taking up a whole wall so I couldn’t completely avoid seeing the awkward way I was perched on end of the too-short bench that ran along the opposite wall. Thankfully, no one was paying me any attention.
Felix had glanced at me when I came in, and we’d exchanged a nod, but he hadn’t looked at me again since.
That was fine by me. When he looked at me, I felt… something. Something that made my skin feel a size too small, or like maybe he could see through it.
Talking with him the other day had felt good, though. Peaceful. I hadn’t really had time to talk at length with an adult not directly related to me since I moved here. We hadn’t exactly had a soul-baring, deep and meaningful conversation, but I’d told him things I had no one else to say to. He’d listened. Really listened, as though he cared what I was saying.
“Now show me again,” Felix said, stepping back. “Everyone,” he added. “Positions.”
Benji was an angel—and I’d fist fight anyone who said otherwise in front of me or him—but I knew enough about kids his age to know that the way the other five of them rushed to the barre along with him said something about Felix. He wasgoodwith kids.
I’d heard more about him in the two days since Monday’s dance class than I had about anything else. Benji was enchanted.
Secretly, I got that. There was something enchanting about him.
I watched as he took the kids through the positions—Benji had showed me a hundred times, so I knew what they were doing. First position, second position, and so on. Felix walked along the row at the barre, tapping on kids to correct them as they held each position in turn, murmuring praise as they followed his instructions.
Other parents started filtering in within a few minutes—faces I knew to nod at in the street, but no one I’d ever really talked to. I should have, I supposed, for Benji’s sake. This was a part of his life.
I just… didn’t know what to say to them. I was, for a start, the only man who ever showed up here. Aside from that, I wasn’t necessarily great at talking to anyone.
Which was why Felix stood out so much. I was still awkward with him, but it didn’t seem to matter so much.
“Do you think he’s single?”
I started at the whisper and turned to see a woman I recognized as Sarah’s mom sitting beside me, a broad, conspiratorial grin on her face.
“Who?” I asked, though I realized the next second who she meant.
She raised an eyebrow, jerking her head toward Felix. “Who do you think?”
I think he’s gay, I didn’t say. I had no idea whether or not that was common knowledge, and I didn’t want to out him. Besides, he’d mentioned an ex-boyfriend, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t into women, too.
“Uhh. Couldn’t say,” I said. I was supposed to be playing along, probably.
“Anna,” the woman said, offering her hand. “You’re Benji’s uncle, yeah? Laura’s brother?”
I shook Anna’s hand and nodded on autopilot, feeling as though I was in freefall at the mention of Laura’s name.
“Uh, yeah.” I paused to swallow past a lump in my throat. “Yeah, how did you…?”
