The Space In Between(61)

“Are you sure?” I asked. It would be a dream come true to go down to South Carolina and take care of my mom for a while.
“Get the f*ck out of my office before I change my damn mind.” Kyle threw the papers at me. I stood up, pulled him into a hug, and thanked him.





I VISITED MY mom every day and every night when I got back to South Carolina. Some days she thought I was her brother. Other days, a complete stranger. On the worst days, she saw me as my father. And on the best days, she called me Cooper.
Today I was Cooper, and she actually knew where she was. The nurses told me it had happened before, but by the next day, she would fade back to the late 1990’s. But I held on to it. We talked about life. How Iris and I had gone our own separate ways. I thought it would be best to plant a few new memories into her mind to try to help her remember. To unscramble the fog. I told her about Iris and the divorce. I told her about the paparazzi. I told her about Andrea.
She cried when she realized what had happened to her, and I sat there with her until she fell asleep. I went home, rested, and came back the next day.
“Cooper, she’s asking for you,” Ms. Wells informed me. Her soft smile gave me hope that Mom was having a good day.
When I entered the room, I heard soft sniffles. Mom was facing the window, staring out. I walked over to her and placed my hands on her shoulders.
“Mom, what’s wrong?” I asked. As she turned around, I wiped the tears falling from her eyes. In her hands, she was holding a photo album, one of the many I had left with her in hopes that it would spark some memory.
Her small hands caressed my cheek and she gave me a short grin. “I’ve missed so much.”
“It’s all right.”
She looked away, almost ashamed she’d let herself get so lost. How could she be ashamed? It wasn’t her fault. I kept telling her it was all right. But I wasn’t sure she believed me.
Walking over to her bed, she pulled out an old, broken down book. It must have been in the box of photo albums I dropped off. I saw the ribbon hanging from it and knew exactly what it was. It was the book I made for Andrea years ago when I was eleven. I sat down on her bed, flipping through it. Looking at how happy Andrea and I looked together. Mom sat next to me, resting her head on my shoulder and said, “Don’t make the mistake I made, Cooper. Don’t waste your life.”



Chapter Forty-One

SPRING HAD COME, and I still missed him. Ladasha came and sat on the front porch with me.
“Why don’t you call him?”
“It’s not that easy, Ladasha.” I thought about some of the horrifying things I’d said to Cooper. They replayed in my head over and over again. I didn’t know how to face him. I wanted nothing more than to call him and tell him what was going on in my mind—that the idea of going on another day without him was unbearable. But I couldn’t. I didn’t deserve the right to talk to him.
“Why not?” she asked.
“You don’t understand, Ladasha. I said some terrible things.”
“Yeah I know. You told him he would be a bad father. You believed the lies those magazines made up. You turned on him in a second because his crazy ex-wife had him followed.” Reminding me of all the terrible things I did made me feel even worse.
Her voice softened. “You spent the past few months mourning over someone who cheated and lied to you. You listened to his songs and your voicemail over and over again. You sprayed his cologne just to hold on.”
“Are you trying to make me feel worse? Because it's working.”
“The truth is you're afraid of losing someone again so you pushed him away before you could be hurt. You’re afraid that he too, might lie to you and hurt you. He never judged you for your past, and the fact that you threw his in his face, the shit that wasn't even true, is wrong. The way I see it, y'all are both f*cked up. Might as well be f*cked up together.”
“Why do you even care? You got your happy ending. You have your future, so stay the hell out of my business.”
Ladasha moved in closer and grabbed me by the chin, “You're acting like a bitch.”
“Don't talk to me like that.”
“I'm your best friend. I can talk to you however the hell I want. Wake up, Andrea. And don't try to push me away because I'm like cockroaches in the ghetto. I'll keep popping up, unwelcome.”
I let out a small chuckle as she wrapped her arms around me. “I got a call from a few dance studios…which is weird because I don’t remember applying to any, and you only told me about one.” Ladasha’s grin informed me that she had been going behind my back, pretending to be me. “They want me to come in and audition, dance for them.”
Her face lit up with joy as she heard the news. “Does that mean we can go home now?”





“I CANNOT BELIEVE this is happening again. Walter, say something!” Ladasha and I sat in my bedroom as we listened to my dad, once again, try to convince my mom to let me, once again, go back to New York City. I stood up, walked over to my bedroom walls, and began to remove the photos of Derrick and me from the space. I was ready to move on. I was ready to let go. And I was ready to retry New York City.
This time was different though. This time I wasn’t looking to go and become lost. No, I was going to find myself. I was going to make something of myself. Well, at least I was planning on it, if my mom would stop tearing up.
“Mom…” I looked at her as I entered the living room.