Blue Moon (14 page)

someone who thought she was a bad influence on her daughter. At least this was a chance to make

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another impression on Mrs. Morgan.
And I know just which dress to wear,
Annie thought happily.

CHAPTER 14

“All these secrets. All these lies. Built around my heart. One by one they come undone and all that’s left

is truth.”

Cooper sang the words to the song that was blasting in her ears through the headphones. She was sitting

on her bed, trying to write some new material. But she was stuck, so she’d pulled out some tapes of

songs she’d written and was listening to them, hoping to get some inspiration. This was one of her

favorite songs. She’d written it during the time when she’d been trying to sort out the mystery of Elizabeth

Sanger’s death. It was a good song. Really good.

But listening to it also made her sad. She’d been playing it for T.J. the night the newspapers had printed

the story about her having the visions. When Mouse and Jed, her other bandmates, had come into the

garage carrying the paper she’d run out, afraid that they, and especially T.J., would think she was a

freak. A few days later, T.J. had given her the tape the band had recorded of the song, and she’d known

that it had been his way of saying that everything was okay.

Now, though, it looked like things weren’t okay after all. She hadn’t talked to T.J. in days.
You’re the

one who hung up on him,
she reminded herself.
Yeah,
she argued,
but he’s the one who was being a

jerk in the first place.

She’d been going over the situation with her apparently now ex-boyfriend in her mind all day. Actually,

she’d been thinking about it since the blowup with Annie the night before. Was Annie right? Was she just

jealous because Annie had a boyfriend while hers seemed to have disappeared on her? And was she

jealous because people had liked Annie’s stuff more than they’d liked hers?

Yeah,
she thought.
I am.
Mostly because the crowd at Big Mouth had liked Annie’s piece, which Cooper

still thought was kind of lame. But she was also irritated about the whole boyfriend thing. No, it wasn’t

Annie’s fault that she and T.J. had fought. And she couldn’t begrudge her friend the fact that she’d found

a great guy. Well, she
shouldn’t
begrudge her that. But she was doing it all the same.

The phone rang and Cooper picked it up.

“Hey,” Kate said. “I just got through talking to Annie.”

“What a coincidence,” Cooper said. “I was just thinking about her.”

“Everything’s cool,” said Kate. “She’s on for Saturday. I told her we were sorry we kind of ganged up

on her.”

“What did she say?” Cooper asked.

“Not much,” Kate told her. “She still says she didn’t do anything. I guess we have to believe her.”

Cooper sniffed. “We don’t have much choice,” she responded.

“You really don’t, though, do you?” asked Kate.

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“I don’t know what to think about anything right now,” admitted Cooper.

“Still no word from T.J.?” asked Kate.

“No,” Cooper said.

There was a long pause before Kate said, “At the risk of getting in trouble again for telling my other best

friend what to do, I think you should call him.”

“But he—” Cooper began.

“I know,” said Kate, cutting her off. “He pissed you off. That’s what boys do. And maybe he’s wrong.

But if you want to see him again someone has to make the first move.”

“But he—” Cooper said again.

“Do you want to see him?” Kate asked, interrupting.

Cooper hesitated. “I guess I wouldn’t mind,” she answered.

“Coming from you that’s a yes,” her friend said. “So call him already.”

“I can’t do that,” said Cooper.

Kate sighed. “Fine,” she said. “I’m through telling everyone what to do. You sit there and sulk. I have

strawberries to pick over. I’ll talk to you later.”

She hung up and Cooper put down the phone. She put the headphones on again and turned the song on.

But every time she heard it, it just reminded her of T.J., and that made her mad. She didn’t want to think

about him.

“I will
not
call him,” she said out loud. “I will not. He can just call me.”

She listened to the song for another half a minute before turning off the stereo and tossing the

headphones onto the bed.

“Oh, fine,” she said as she stood up and reached for her shoes. “Goddess, I hate being the girl

sometimes.”

She grabbed her car keys from her dresser and went downstairs before she could convince herself to

not do what she was doing. Then she jumped into her Nash Metropolitan convertible, started it up, and

took off down the street toward T.J.’s house.

It took her a while to get there, and by the time she pulled up in front of his house she had thought of a

million things to say to him. She was trying to decide which one of them to start with when a guy walked

out of the garage next to the house. He was wearing a grease-stained white T-shirt and jeans, and he

wiped his hands on a rag as he walked toward her. With his short red hair, muscular body, and freckles,

he looked like an older, hunkier version of T.J.

“Nice car,” he said, eyeing the Nash. “Is it a nineteen fifty-six?”

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“Nineteen fifty-seven,” Cooper corrected him.

The guy nodded. “I should have known from the amber taillights. Before ’fifty-six they were plain old

white.”

“I’m assuming you’re one of the infamous McAllister boys,” Cooper said. “Let me guess—Seamus?”

“Close,” the guy said. “But no cigar. Dylan.”

He held out his hand to Cooper, who shook it. “And you must be Cooper.”

“Guilty,” Cooper said.

Dylan looked at her in the same way he’d been looking at the Nash. “T.J. was right,” he said.

“About what?” Cooper asked, unable to stand not knowing what Dylan meant.

Dylan smiled. “You’re an original,” he said.

Cooper nodded. “He is right about that,” she said. “So what are you doing here? I thought you lived in

L.A.”

“I do,” Dylan replied. “I just came up for a few days. I haven’t seen the family in a while. Besides, none

of them know how to fix anything. If I heard Dad complain one more time about that lawn mower not

working right I was going to buy him a new one.”

“Tell me about it,” said Cooper, laughing. “I had to show T.J. how to pump gas.”

Dylan leaned up against the Nash, running his hand over the paint job. “T.J. talks about you a lot,” he

said.

“Really?” Cooper asked, intrigued. Like her, T.J. didn’t have a lot of close friends, so she’d never really

spoken to anyone who knew him well. She’d sometimes wondered what he told people about her. Now

that she was talking to Dylan she figured it was her chance to find out.

“Oh, yeah,” Dylan said. “I’ve never heard him talk about anyone the way he talks about you. Or, I

should say, about any
thing.
The only thing he ever got excited about was music. Until you.”

Cooper looked away from Dylan’s gaze. She was surprised at how hearing what he had to say made

her feel. T.J. talked to his brother about her? She knew how much he loved Dylan and how much he

respected his opinion. For him to talk to his big brother about her meant that he really cared.

“I guess he told you we haven’t exactly been talking much lately,” she said finally.

Dylan nodded. “He mentioned it,” he said guardedly.

Cooper sighed. “Can I ask you something?” she said.

“Shoot,” replied Dylan.

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“Why is your brother such a pain in the butt?” she said.

Dylan laughed loudly. “I’m afraid all the McAllister men are like that,” he said. “My mother has

wondered the same thing about my father since the day she met him.”

Dylan was quiet for a moment. Then he said, “T.J. said he told you about what happened to me,” he

said.

Cooper nodded. “I hope that’s okay,” she said.

“He wouldn’t have told you if it wasn’t,” Dylan responded. “So you know how upset he was about the

whole thing, then?”

Cooper nodded, not sure of what else to say.

“T.J. worries about it more than I do myself,” Dylan said. “They all do. Sometimes it drives me nuts.”

“Same here,” said Cooper. “So how do you get them to calm down?”

“You don’t,” Dylan said. “That’s what people who love you do. They worry.”

Cooper sighed. “But he just won’t listen,” she said.

Dylan smiled again. “I don’t know what the two of you are having a difference of opinion about,” he

said. “T.J. didn’t tell me. But whatever it is, it sounds to me like both of you feel strongly about it.”

“That’s an understatement,” said Cooper.

“Which means that either one of you has to budge or you have to come to some kind of compromise,”

Dylan continued.

“But how can we do that when neither one of us wants to give in?” asked Cooper.

“That’s the hard part,” Dylan answered. “I’ve been in a relationship for four years now, and I can tell

you that the hardest part is finding that common ground when you both think you’re right.”

“Well, I feel sorry for anyone who has to find that common ground with a McAllister boy,” Cooper said.

“Your boyfriend has my sympathies.”

“I’d pass that along,” Dylan said, “but I don’t want to give him any more ammo than he already has.

You made the first step, though, and that’s usually the hardest.”

“What’s that?” Cooper asked.

“You came over here,” Dylan said.

“Yeah, well, I was planning on yelling at him some more,” said Cooper.

“Well, you can decide what to say while you walk to the door,” said Dylan, nodding toward the house.

“He’s inside.”

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Cooper looked at the door, which suddenly seemed really imposing.

“Go on,” said Dylan. “What have you got to lose?”

“Oh, nothing,” answered Cooper. “Just my pride.”

Dylan snorted. “Trust me,” he said. “You can always get that back. But a McAllister boy—now, that’s

not something you want to let slip through your fingers.”

“Give me a break,” Cooper said, laughing, as she walked away.

“Can I sit in your car?” Dylan called after her.

“Sure,” Cooper called back. “Just don’t get grease on the seats. I’d have to kill you.”

She walked up to the door and rang the bell. She didn’t even have time to take a deep breath before the

door opened and T.J. was standing in front of her.

“You didn’t give him the keys, did you?” he asked.

“Excuse me?” said Cooper.

“Dylan,” T.J. said. “You didn’t give him the keys, did you? We won’t see him all day if you did.”

“No,” Cooper said, holding up the keys. “They’re safe and sound.”

“Good,” said T.J.

“Um, can I come in?” asked Cooper.

T.J. stepped aside, and Cooper walked into the house. Unlike her house, which resembled a museum

because it had to be kept clean for the tourists who came to see it for its place in Beecher Falls town

history, the McAllisters’ home was much more casual. There were magazines on the coffee table, and

their dog, a big old Irish setter named Mac, was allowed to sleep on the couch. Cooper liked going there

because it always felt like people really lived there.

“Hey, Mac,” she said, patting the dog on the head as he ran up to say hello, his tail wagging and his nose

sniffing around her feet.

“So what’s up?” T.J. asked her.

Cooper sat on the edge of the couch while Mac jumped up and sat next to her, putting his big head in

her lap. She stroked his ears, relieved to have something to do with her hands.

“I thought maybe we should talk in person,” she said. “It’s a little too easy to hang up the phone, if you

know what I mean.”

T.J. gave her a half smile. “I think I do,” he said.

“Anyway,” said Cooper, “I’ve been thinking about this.”

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“And?” asked T.J. when she didn’t say anything.

Cooper sighed. “I can’t hide who I am, T.J.,” she said. “Not for you, not for anybody. I did that and it

made me miserable. My mother didn’t talk to my grandmother for a long time because she wouldn’t hide

who she was. I swore I wouldn’t do that, and I haven’t. I can’t stop now.”

T.J. looked at her. “And I can’t not worry about you,” he said.

They sat there in silence, just looking at each other for a long time. Cooper’s fingers kneaded Mac’s

head anxiously while she waited for T.J. to say something.

“So where does that leave us?” T.J. said finally.

Cooper thought about her conversation with Dylan. In the past things had always been all or nothing with

her. She was right and the other person was wrong. She never gave in. But that was before T.J. She’d

never felt about anyone the way she felt about him.

“How about a compromise?” she said nervously.

“A compromise?” T.J. repeated.

Cooper nodded. “I can do my thing and you can worry about me,” she said.

“I thought you said a compromise,” said T.J. “It sounds to me like we’re back where we started.”

Cooper swallowed. “Look,” she said. “I’ve never met anyone as stubborn as I am until you. You’re