The Grumpy Player Next Door: Copper Valley Fireballs #3

by Grant, Pippa

I roll my eyes. “Fun, Cooper. Fun relieves pressure. I would be happy to have fun with Max, and after the stupid garden gnomes, despite the fact that he did it with garden gnomes, I thought he was having fun back. And weren’t we having fun at Scuttle Putt last night? He was having fun. He called me his sister. He challenged me to the hurricane hole, and you know as well as I do that it was pure luck that I sank that shot, but he couldn’t handle losing to—”

  “Just lay off, okay?”

  “Rawk! Land ahoy, motherfuckers! Rawk!”

  We both glance up at Long Beak Silver, who’s sitting on a lamppost.

  “Go walk the plank, you miserable old bird,” Cooper snaps.

  “Rawk! I hate you and your mother’s left tit too!” The parrot lifts one leg, falls off the lamppost, plummets toward the ground, but catches himself and swoops away before he turns himself into a colorful splat on the ground.

  “I seriously hate that talking chicken,” I mutter. “Why won’t he walk the plank for me?”

  “Probably because you call him a talking chicken. And also because you break into people’s houses and replace their shower curtains with giant ugly pictures of yourself.”

  “That was for you, for the record. I wouldn’t have done it if he hadn’t pulled out the garden gnomes. The garden gnomes, Cooper.”

  We reach the tables, and Yiannis Florakis, who owns the Mediterranean deli, Port of Athena, near the spa, flags us down. “Cooper, I made your special baklava. And dolma! Grape leaves cure any hangover.”

  Yiannis finishes his pitch with a grin.

  He’s been in Shipwreck for two years and is still impressed with Cooper. I’ve assured him many times he’ll get tired of my brother, but a lot of the newcomers haven’t yet.

  I attribute that to Cooper not being here as often as the rest of us.

  Until a few years ago, our family—aunts, uncles, and cousins—owned most of the town. But more and more people from the city have moved out here to work remotely or try a slower-paced life, which means our little town is expanding with new residents enamored with our local celebrities.

  And by local celebrities, I unfortunately mostly mean just my brother, whom I elbow out of the way to get a sample of the dolma before his appetite wreaks havoc on what’s left here. “Oh my god, Yiannis, this is delicious.”

  He gives me the stink eye. “I was saving that for Cooper.”

  I smile at him. “Guess Cooper’ll have to come into the deli this week to try them for himself. Again.”

  “Bring all the baseball players,” Yiannis tells him. “And you tell me if you’re having a party. Free food for a picture.”

  Cooper snags the baklava before I can get to that too. “Thanks, Yiannis. Will do.” He nudges me down the row. “I need you to invite Max to stay for Thanksgiving and promise him you’ll behave yourself.”

  “Right. If I do that, he’ll think I’m plotting special ingredients in the gravy.”

  “The laxative kind of special ingredient?”

  “The pot kind of special ingredient.”

  He gives me the side eye of don’t. “Not funny, TJ.”

  That would’ve been funny any other year. Especially since he snuck pot into the cranberry sauce last year and got Nana high as a kite, which was basically the best entertainment we’ve had in Shipwreck since the loose goats interrupted that destination wedding here a few years ago.

  It’s also why the town council voted to ask all the restaurants on Blackbeard Avenue to open for a progressive dinner for Thanksgiving this year.

  So we can all enjoy drunk, high Nana if it happens again.

  And probably also so that we’re making sure we include as many new people in town as possible.

  I nudge Cooper. “So spill. What’s got you so worried about Max? Trevor’s the one everyone else is freaking out over.” Can’t blame them. Trevor’s looking at his career being over.

  His jaw clenches and he looks quickly around the park like he’s afraid of who’s listening to us.

  “What?” I press.

  “You remember Mr. Atherton?”

  “High school geometry?”

  “Yeah.”

  I don’t think there’s anyone who went to school with us who doesn’t. Mr. Atherton took a leave of absence midway through my freshman year—Cooper’s junior year, when Grady had already left home for culinary school—for what was rumored to be a nervous breakdown. No one said depression back then. “You think Max is gonna be like Mr. Atherton?”

  “I think there’s a lot that you never know about another person, and you need to lighten the fuck up on Max, okay?”

  We get to the next table, and I spot the man in question himself hanging out under a barren oak tree at the end of the next row. He’s angled away from me, but not enough that I can’t see his face, and not enough that I can’t see that he’s sneaking a piece of Anchovies pizza to Goatstradamus too.

  He was so funny last night.

  Relaxed. Happy.

  Attractive.

  And if Cooper’s trying to tell me that Max is dealing with a mental heath struggle, then yeah, I need to lighten up. “I’ve been trying to annoy both of you for years.”

  “A few times a season when the stakes weren’t so high. Not every day. Just lay off, okay?”

  Heat creeps into my chest.

  No, not heat.

  Embarrassment. Shame. Guilt.

  “He laughs when Marisol or Tanesha tease him,” I grumble.

  Cooper’s jaw ticks again.

  Comparing myself to Marisol and Tanesha isn’t fair. Marisol’s engaged to the Fireballs’ right fielder, and Tanesha’s married to the Fireballs’ left fielder. They’re spoken for.

  They’re safe.

  But any of the single guys on the team who flirt with me have to pass the Cooper test.

  And if anyone knows first-hand what Cooper’s willing to do if he feels like I’m in danger, regardless of the variety of danger, it’s Max.

  “You know it’s ridiculous to pretend I’m some wallflower who has to be saved from ruining herself, right?” I tell him. “I knew what I was doing with Chance.”

  “Okay, Mrs. Ben Woods.”

  My entire body twitches. Our parents give us the space we need to make our own mistakes, and they don’t weaponize guilt, but they’re excellent at Tillie Jean, we hate seeing you upset, and this on-again, off-again thing you have with Ben doesn’t seem to be making you happy. What can we do? when one of us has been dumb for too long.

  And no, I haven’t dated anyone seriously since.

  I haven’t even followed through with hooking up with any of the guys I’ve tried to meet on dating apps when I’m in the city.

  It just never feels right. There’s something wrong with each of them.

  Definitely the universe telling me not to waste my time. “You are so lucky I barely have the energy to walk right now, much less kick your ass.”

  “One, he was a shitty catcher and needed to go anyway. Two, I’m not trying to rule your life, TJ. But I know you, and I know them, and yeah, I have opinions, and yeah, they impact my job. Quit making Max uncomfortable. Nothing good comes at the end, okay?”

  I sigh.

  He’s not pulling the I’m worldly now that I live in a big city and travel for my cool job and just come to little ol’ Shipwreck in the off-season card.

  He’s pulling the people have demons you don’t know about and I don’t want you or anyone else to get hurt if I can give you a little more information card.

  And the truth is, Cooper wouldn’t interfere with my personal life if he wasn’t worried. He’s watched me make enough questionable choices in life without comment for me to know that he’s not just being an ass right now.

  Chance Schwartz was a womanizer. I was well aware that if we lasted more than two days, he would’ve slept with other women on the road while sleeping with me when he was home.

  And I was fooling myself in thinking I’d be okay with that.

  I wasn’t.r />
  But I wanted something. Something I couldn’t get in Shipwreck, something I couldn’t get from my relationship with Ben, something I couldn’t get from my family and friends, no matter how much I love them and take joy in being with them.

  We pause at Mom’s table, and she hands Cooper a steaming mug of hot chocolate. “Oh, here, honey, take another to Max. Poor thing looks tired.”

  I reach for a coffee.

  She lifts a brow, and I take the water bottle she hands me instead.

  “Tillie Jean!” Mackenzie waves, and Coco Puff barks, sending an echo of his collar’s translated “I love big sloppy kisses and hugs!” around the park.

  Cooper slides me a look.

  “Best behavior.” I lift a pinky. “Promise.”

  “It’s not all you, TJ. I know it’s not. But it’s…”

  “Complicated,” I finish for him.

  “Yeah.”

  “Then really, there are far worse things that I could be than like a sister to him, hm?”

  Cooper twitches, but he also nods. “Far worse.”

  We reach the spot at the edge of the park that we dig up every summer, looking for pirate treasure during the pirate festival, and I attack Henri with a hug. “Hey, you. Did you get your next book turned in? How was your book signing?”

  We chat for a few minutes, and when I look up, Max is gone.

  I don’t like that.

  So several hours later, when I get home after hanging out with my friends all day, I head to his house and knock on the door.

  He doesn’t answer.

  I knock again.

  Still no answer.

  Could he be out with Cooper and the guys? Of course.

  Any one of them could’ve given him a ride, and they would’ve had to, since his SUV is still in the drive. Or he could’ve walked somewhere.

  But the three goats lounging in his front yard, munching on cabbage and asparagus spears, suggests he’s at least been home to toss out food for the strays.

  So I head to his side window.

  The one I crawled through yesterday.

  And I peer inside.

  Huh. Look at that. Max is hanging out in his living room.

  I rap on the window.

  He leaps sixty-five feet in the air, then turns a glare on me.

  A woman who didn’t grow up with Grady and Cooper might take the hint. But I’m not that woman, so instead, I pop the screen out and press on the glass just right to make the window lift from the outside.

  Max’s glare gets glarier. “Go. The fuck. Away.”

  “I wasn’t just valedictorian of my high school class. I was also Miss Shipwreck my sophomore year, which was basically unheard of for anyone younger than a junior since Nana pulled off the same feat like three hundred years ago.” Yes, Nana will forgive me for the exaggeration. “And I was Homecoming Queen and Prom Queen and voted most likely to succeed and best hair in my senior yearbook. Plus, my banana pudding won best in fair when I was fourteen, and while I’m not at Grady’s level, I can pretty much guarantee I’ll get a blue ribbon in desserts anytime I enter.”

  “I’m calling the sheriff.”

  “My cousin Chester will probably answer the call. Won’t be the first time he’s ticketed me. Probably not the last either. I was sometimes a spoiled shit when I was little, and I probably deserve it. But my point isn’t that I’m perfect. My point is, I left home to start college at Virginia Tech, where I intended to become a graphic designer, and not just any graphic designer, but a world-famous, make-a-billion-dollars graphic designer wanted by every company in the world. I like art, even if I don’t like computers, and who cares if you do a job you hate for eight hours a day if it means you can do whatever you want the rest of the time, right?”

  “Stop talking.”

  “But two weeks into the semester, I overdosed on espresso shots and ended up in the emergency room with an irregular heartbeat that nearly put me into shock and scared the ever-loving fuck out of my roommates. I dropped out, came home, and spent the next month basically melting down since I was a complete and total failure for the first time in my life, and not because I OD’d on caffeine—I mean, let’s be real, who does that?—but because I didn’t even last two weeks at college, which meant I didn’t give it a fair shot and I was a chicken, right?”

  I pause.

  He’s still giving me the growly bear look, but he’s not telling me to shut up and go away anymore.

  “And then I started dating Ben Woods while working at Crusty Nut to find myself, and I was safe here, and I moved in with my Great-Aunt Matilda to help watch over her so she could stay home longer while her body was giving out on her, and I didn’t need anything because my family really has owned this town forever and it means certain comforts get passed down generation to generation, and I was on this path to being my parents, and my parents are pretty damn awesome, so that was great too.”

  He rolls his eyes.

  “Except for the part where I felt like everyone was whispering about me. I was valedictorian and Queen Everything and I could paint and still do a handstand and basically everything I touched turned to gold, so obviously I should go off and be this big important person who did big important things and was super successful and rich and perfect forever instead of staying in Shipwreck and working for a family business, because really, what kind of mark was that to leave on the world when I had all these brains and talents?”

  “You are exceptionally annoying.”

  “Hush. If you’re going to be my big brother, you need to know my big secret.”

  “Which is?”

  “I ended up going to see a therapist in Sarcasm—do not tell my family I went to Sarcasm—because the weight of everyone’s expectations was utterly crushing me, and I felt guilty for liking working for my dad. Like I was a failure for not trying to find what else would make me happy when there was nothing holding me back from opportunity. Like I was hiding from the world in a safe place instead of getting out and experiencing what else there is. But it turns out, Crusty Nut and Shipwreck and my family do make me happy. I don’t have to have a big title or a big job or make a ton of money to leave my mark on the world. I don’t have to marry the guy who’s conveniently there but not all that attractive to me down deep in the pit of my soul. I can travel—and I do—but I love coming home, and this is where I choose to stay, happily. Some day that might change, and if it does, I’ll know I can trust myself to take a leap.”

  Max isn’t growly-bearing me anymore, but he’s not smiling either. “If you’re trying to tell me you know pressure—”

  “I know my kind of pressure, Max. I don’t know yours. I know what makes me happy. And I don’t have to apologize for it or live up to anyone else’s expectations. And I won’t apologize for it. Neither should anyone. I mean, provided it’s not illegal or immoral, you know? But I still slide backwards sometimes and have to consciously remind myself that I define my happiness, not anyone else, which is why I got so irritated with you at the bar the other night when you asked about the valedictorian thing. That was my problem. Not yours. I’m not perfect. I’m irrationally freaked out by garden gnomes. I feel completely inconsequential and worthless every time I hear Cooper made a huge donation to his favorite charity, since I can’t afford to do the same, even though I know it’s an irrational reaction. I got offered a painting commission once by a bigwig in Copper Valley, and I turned it down because I was afraid that I couldn’t live up to expectations. And I started the paint night at The Grog when Dita recommended a book club and I couldn’t bear the thought of reading the classics and pretending I really got them, so I distracted everyone with something that put me in charge instead.”

  I pause and look at him again.

  He’s just lounging on his couch, in a T-shirt and jeans, watching me with those fascinating brown eyes, his facial tics telling me I’m hitting a nerve but he’s not going to call me on it.

  “Anyway,” I say, “I just wanted you to know that
I’m not perfect, and if you need anything, I’m next door.”

  His gaze drops to the floor for a second before he lifts his eyes back to mine. “I didn’t leave last night because you got a hole in one.”

  “Why not? Cooper has before.” I smile.

  He doesn’t. “I don’t get drunk.”

  Warning alarms go off in my head. Did I call him drunk? He was drunk.

  Wasn’t he?

  And he was funny and relatable and irritating with the way he kept insisting that I was his sister, but also exactly what I’ve wished he’d be around me for longer than I can admit even to myself.

  I don’t mind self-reflection.

  But it’s interesting to realize I’ve been missing my own signals for so long.

  “That was my old man.” He looks past me, or maybe at the wall next to me. “He had demons. Fought ’em with booze. The only reason I’m here is because he was a warning of what not to be. I worked my ass off to get out of his house and never be like him.”

  And here I am, with an awesome family and everything handed to me on a silver platter.

  It’s not that I’ve never struggled or had to work hard. But I definitely had a head start. So much makes sense now. “Does baseball make you happy?”

  I get the most honest what the fuck is wrong with you? face he’s ever sent my way. “I fucking love baseball.”

  It’s hard not to smile, and not because he’s funny, but because I’m getting warm and glowy in my chest at seeing what I suspect is raw, unfiltered Max. “Just checking.”

  He leans back and looks away again. “But I didn’t know if it loved me,” he mutters.

  “How so?”

  Max Cole has his own demons. I think I’ve always known it, but it’s never quite as clear as it is when watching him silently wrestle with himself.

  And the man is definitely wrestling with himself. He opens his mouth. Snaps it shut with his growly bear face. Shakes his head a little like he’s lecturing himself on whatever it is he’s thinking of doing. Shoots me a side eye. Mutters to himself.

  And finally pulls himself off the couch, stalks across the room like he’s a tiger and I’m a gazelle and he’s going to have a nice little snack of Tillie Jean that’ll leave him sated and ready to lay out in the forty-five-degree weather, getting a tan. The man never wears long sleeves more than three minutes.