Page 55 of Finding London

I decide to ignore Cooper’s effort to goad me into proving that I’m not afraid by trying the dating thing with London again. I answer simply, “Relationships aren’t my deal.” I pause and slap Cooper on the arm. “Speaking of, when are you going to ask Maggie to marry you? You know she’s waiting.”

“I know that you’re trying to change the subject, and this time, I’ll allow it. But we will be revisiting London at some point.”

“Yeah, whatever.” I chuckle. “Maggie?”

Cooper lets out a breath. “I don’t know, man. I’m going to. It’s not like I’m not ready or anything. I just need to get my ass to a jewelry store and then come up with some romantic-as-shit way to ask her. I already feel committed to Maggie. She knows she’s my forever. The ring and marriage just seem like an annoying nuisance, just some hoop I have to jump through to make something that’s already a done deal official.”

I shake my head and laugh. “Regardless of whether or not you find it annoying, I’m telling you that Maggie doesn’t. Girls live for all that.”

“Says the guy who can’t make it past two dates.”

“Fuck you.”

“Fuck you,” he retorts.

“Blow me, asshole.”

“I’ll pass. Thanks for the offer,” he says with a smirk.

“Maggie deserves the whole deal…the nuisance.”

Cooper nods. “Of course she does. I’m just a lazy prick. I’ll do it soon, okay? Does that make you happy, Loïc ‘I Went on Two Dates and Now I’m the Love Expert’ Berkeley?”

“Just because I suck at execution in that department doesn’t mean I don’t know the rules.”

“But you would figure it out if you just gave it more time.”

“Cooper, enough.”

“All right, I’ll drop it for now.” He changes the subject. “So, love expert”—the tone of Cooper’s voice rises an octave in mock excitement—“do you think I should go with a round diamond or square, tear-drop, or maybe cushion cut?”

“Ha. So, you have been looking into rings?”

“Of course I have. There are just so many choices. It’s tiring.” Cooper drops his shoulders in a dramatic display of exhaustion.

“I think you can handle it.” I chuckle.

“Yeah, yeah.”

Toss.

Catch.

Toss.

Catch.

My wrist bends back before the baseball spins into the air above my face. Right before it hits the ceiling, I watch as it starts to descend, falling back toward my bed. I catch it again before it hits my chest.

I’ve been lying in bed, throwing this ball for hours, it seems. This week has been brutal. I’m more fucked in the head than I care to admit. London has me all sorts of confused.

The walls I’ve put up, the bullshit I’ve been feeding myself about not letting anyone in for the past eight years since I lost Sarah—it’s all starting to be too much. It was easy before London, but she’s changed me. She’s different. She makes me different. She makes me happy.

I don’t know. Sometimes, I let myself wonder if it’s all meant to be, even as much as I don’t believe in that shit. But, just maybe, with London, it is.

Her freaking name is London. That has to be a sign, right?

Maybe it’s time I pay my birth name some respect and show an ounce of strength and courage to fight for the life I want. Closing oneself off and hiding from the world is the cowardly move. It’s the easy path.

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