“Man, that’s great.”

“If you can believe it, Bridget’s even been on her best behavior.” I grimace. “I mean, it helps that she’s in New York and not here. Who knows if our truce will hold once she moves back out west for the summer? But for now, I think we’re in the best place we’ve been in a long time. What happened with Simone was a wake-up call for us both.”

“Sounds like everything is lining up,” August says, hesitating before going on. “So does that mean you and Lotus . . .”

“Soon.” I smile, even though it hurts to even hear her name. “I think really soon.”

“That’s what I like to hear. You guys deserve it.” August daps me up and turns to go. “Okay. I promised Iris I’d be home right after practice, so I’mma roll out. See you on the plane.”

Tomorrow’s game is the first of a pretty brutal road trip. Four games before we return to San Diego. That means a week away from home. I’ll have some quality time with Simone, though, when I drive her up to this dance camp in Laguna Beach today. At least she’ll be gone for a good part of my time away and will feel the impact less.

I’m clicking “the tank” unlocked when a guy with a mic approaches me. I haven’t had to worry about tabloids for a while, but I know a reporter when I see one.

“Glad, hey!” he yells, his phone thrust toward me to record. “You excited the Baller Bae season is ending?”

“I don’t discuss my personal life,” I auto reply. “You got a question about basketball, get a media credential and show up at a press conference after the game. Otherwise, no comment.”

I climb into the car and start the engine.

“And what about Lotus?” he yells right as my foot hovers over the accelerator. “That girl you were dating this summer?”

I grit my teeth and try to talk myself out of engaging, but it’s a battle lost. I roll down my window and try to ignore the satisfaction in the creep’s eyes.

“What about her?”

“Well, rumor is that she’s dating that photographer again,” he says in a rush. “Bridget claimed she was cheating on you with him. What do you have to—”

I roll up my window and pull off.

Son of a bitch. That’s what I get for giving him the time of day.

My finger twitches over the button on my steering wheel that would dial her. We’ve talked some. It wouldn’t be completely out of the norm for me to call. We’ve kept each other abreast of our lives.

“Fuck it.”

I hit the button.

“Kenan?”

Her voice in my car makes me want to blow off my road trip and go get her. Fly to New York and bring her home with me.

“Yeah, it’s me.” Obviously, it’s you, dumbass. “Uh, how you doing?”

“Good.” She pauses, clears her throat. “I got your card yesterday. So you a poet now?”

My own laughter almost catches me off guard. This summer, I forgot how much time I spend alone. How little I actually talk to people most of the time because I laughed, I talked, I felt more freely myself with Lotus than I ever have with anyone else.

“Not a poet exactly,” I say when our laughter trails off. “A little something I had on my mind.”

“I liked it,” she says, her voice husky.

There’s so much I want to say to her. So much she’s missed, even though we’ve talked occasionally. But mostly I just want to know . . . “Um, so this reporter approached me after practice.”

“Okay.”

“He mentioned something about the girl I was seeing this summer dating that photographer again.” I leave the unspoken question suspended over the thousands of miles separating us.

“Oh.” She’s quiet for a moment. “I have no idea where he got that.”

I need to focus and make sure I’m clear on what she’s saying. I pull over to the parking lot of a gas station and lean back in my seat, waiting for her to elaborate. She doesn’t.

“Yeah, I don’t know either,” I finally say. “Because you know we said . . .”

I don’t say what we said, but she knows we aren’t dating other people. I trust her. It hadn’t even occurred to me until that reporter planted his poison.

“Yeah, we said . . .” She huffs a quick laugh. “You didn’t think . . . I wouldn’t. Kenan, I haven’t.”

I release a relieved exhale and nod, even though she can’t see me. Why can’t she see me? I should have FaceTimed. God, I want to see her.

“You haven’t . . .” She starts, stops. “Well, we said . . .”

“Yeah, we said—no,” I rush to assure her. “I’m living like a monk.”

She laughs, and I hear relief in her voice, too. “My monk.”

“Your monk. Completely.”

Her breath catches, and she sighs. I want to taste that sigh. If I could kiss her, I’d know what she was thinking. I’d know what was in her heart just from the press of our lips.

“I miss you, Kenan,” she says, her voice breaking. “So bad.”

I clench the steering wheel and clamp my teeth together until my jaw aches. “I don’t want to do this anymore, Lotus. I think we can . . . Simone’s so much better. We have her diagnosis. She’s on the right meds. My mom is holding it down for me during the season.” A rough chuckle rumbles from my chest. “Mama’s even got Simone’s hair looking good.”

“That’s awesome,” Lotus says, a smile in her voice.

“I told my mom about you.”

A short pause. “You did? What’d you tell her?”

“That I’m in love with you.”

Her breath hitches again, so I must be doing something right.

“I told her I want to marry you one day.”

She didn’t let me say it the last time I saw her—that I wanted her to be my wife—but I say it now before she sees it coming, before she can stop me.

“You told her that?” Her voice wavers and squeaks sweetly at the end.

“Yeah, and you know what she asked me?”

“What?”

“When she could expect more grandkids. With only one, she claims to need a back-up.”

Lotus’s laugh cracks open and a sob spills out. “I love you, Kenan Ross, and I will gladly marry you and have all the grandkids your mama can babysit when the time is right.”

When the time is right.

Right.

“What I’m saying is that the time is soon, Lotus.”

“Talk to Dr. Packer, and we’ll go from there. We don’t want to undo all the things we sacrificed already.”

“She thinks you’re amazing, by the way,” I tell her, an unstoppable grin on my face.

“Why?”

“Because she thinks you did the right thing,” I say, sobering. “In our case, she thinks it was best for Simone. All of it. Not everyone is that committed to putting their kids’ needs before their own.”

“But you were.”

“No, you were. I wouldn’t have done it if you hadn’t forced the issue.”

“Well, like I said, I know what it’s like to feel that everyone else is more important.”

Voices in the background break the spell this conversation has woven over me.

“My meeting’s starting,” she says. “I gotta go.”

“Yeah, me, too. I have to drive Simone to this dance camp thing.”

“Okay.” She pauses for a second before whispering, “I love you.”

“You have no idea,” I reply immediately. “But I’m going to show you real soon.”

“I like the sound of that.”

“So do I. Love you, Button.”

I’m on the proverbial cloud, feeling like some lovesick fool, but not really giving a damn.

My high crashes when my dashboard displays an incoming call from Bridget. We’ve been civil the few times we’ve spoken. With her in New York, there have been thankfully few visits to coordinate, and those happened while I was on the road. Dr. Packer believes the harmony between Bridget and me is just as much a stabilizing force as me waiting to be with Lotus or my mom moving in with us.

I answer the phone and brace myself for any drama she may have in store. “Bridge, hey,” I say, keeping my eyes on the road. “What’s up?”

“Hey, Kenan,” she says, her voice filling the car interior. “How are you?”

Oh, manners. I remember these. “I’m good. What’s up?” I repeat.

“The cast has an appearance in LA today,” she says, her tone slightly hesitant. “I, um, thought I might swing by to see Simone.”

“You know she has that dance camp in Laguna Beach,” I remind her. “I’m on my way home to take her now.”

“Oh, yeah. I forgot. Um . . . maybe next time.”

“Well LA is even closer to Laguna Beach. Pop in and see her before you go back. I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

“You think so?” she asks, brightening.

“Yeah. I start a stretch of road games tomorrow and will be gone for the week, so seeing one of us will probably be good for her.”

“Okay. I’ll text her to make arrangements.” She goes quiet for a second. “She’s better, right?”

The same cold-sweat fear I have—that I’ll find Simone barely breathing on my bed again—resides in Bridget’s voice. I find myself in my daughter’s room when she’s asleep and watching her breathe, like I did when she was a baby. It reassures me. Right now, Bridget doesn’t even have that.

“Yeah, Bridge. She’s better.”

“I think we all are,” she says, a smile in her voice.

“Yeah.”

“She told me you’re not seeing Lotus anymore,” Bridget says, the tiniest flicker of hope in the words. “I’m sorry things didn’t work out.”