Lean On Me
Chapter Four
Wednesday November 21, 2007
The right thing to do would be to call Logan and tell him that Cooper had run into Serena, rather than let Logan be blindsided by bumping into her on the street. Cooper knew that.
But talking to Logan these days only pissed him the hell off.
Cooper wrestled with his conscious over what he was going to do while he got his perp processed down at the station. He put the mugger in a holding cell in the main squad room of the PCPD and turned around to bump right into Sam McCall. He said "Oh, sorry. You all right?"
His hand touched her arm and time stopped.
For one second all that existed in the whole universe was a pair of chocolate eyes. It was unnerving. Cooper shook himself out of it quickly.
He might have the occasional fantasy about a hot chick he met but all his spine tingling moments were reserved for Maxie Jones. Or they had been before she cheated on him. Still, in his heart, he was hers. Just hers. All hers.
Even if he didn't think they could ever be together again.
He didn't like getting lost in Sam's eyes but that didn't mean he had any control of it happening.
Sam said "Don't sweat it. I'm fine. How are you, Cooper? Maxie says you've been working overtime lately, huh? Burning the midnight oil around here just like Lucky?"
Cooper had been taking double shifts to avoid Kelly's where he would have to see Maxie, with her pleas for them to talk, Logan, with his cocky attitude that hid all his pain- pain Coop didn't want to think about at present- and Georgie, who only wanted to help them all but her sad eyes and her sweet smile seemed to make them all somehow only feel worse. Guilty.
Even Cooper was guilty as sin. He was Three. Sonny's spy. Jerry's pawn.
Sam asked "Where is Lucky anyway? He told me he got called in a few hours ago. He's not back from the crime scene yet?"
"I'm not sure. I could check into it for you."
"Would you? You're so sweet. Maxie really misses you, you know." Seeing the look on his face she threw up her hands "I'll stop. I just...she's my friend...my only friend...and she really is sorry. She knows she screwed up big time. But we all do that sometimes, right?"
"Sure."
"So maybe there is still some hope?"
He found himself once again mesmerized by her eyes. It was the damndest thing. He had met this woman plenty of times before. She wasn't really his friend but he knew her. So what the hell was his problem today?
Of course all those other times he had been a man consumed by thoughts of another woman. His woman. The one he had lost for good now. The woman Logan ruined for Cooper.
Cooper ignored Sam's question about him and Maxie and said "I'll look into where Lucky is for you." He walked over to the Sergeant's desk. "Hey, is Spencer due back soon?"
"Spencer signed out ten minutes ago. Personal time."
Cooper looked across the room at Sam. She flashed him a smile. Putting two and two together Cooper had the bad feeling that if Lucky had to leave work it meant he had to go deal with another family crisis with his ex-wife Elizabeth.
And where did that leave Sam? The odd one out. Just like Cooper had been when his best friend was rolling around in bed with Coop's woman.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXX
At the food drive Milo found himself standing next to Lulu, after he came back from making his phone call to check in with Jason about work.
Lulu smiled at him and said "Its really nice of you to do this for Georgie."
"I didn't have anything else going on."
"Thanks for trying to get rid of Logan earlier. When I think that I actually picked him....I just don't know where my head was at. It kinda makes me throw up a little in my mouth now just to remember I went back to him after he sleazed around with Maxie."
"That guy is a real punk, Lulu. You're better off."
"You're right. I know that I hurt Logan...okay, I own that...but he hurt me first and together we were toxic. I don't need him in my life. I'm just glad I didn't lose all my friends when I was all about him for all those months. I became really selfish and I know that."
"Its okay. You weren't that bad."
She threw him another grin and then chuckled. "You're lying through your teeth, Milo, just to try and spare my feelings. I know I was a complete brat. You want to know what Nikolas told me after that brawl at his engagement party between Logan and Johnny? He said I was so immature that I should take lessons from my three year old nephew in how to behave. And, you have to understand that my brother has perfect manners, so for him to say that I had to be really bad. I guess I pushed him over the edge with my whining about my guy troubles right after Anthony held Emily hostage at the Ball. My timing could have used some real work."
"I'm sure you didn't mean to be insensitive to your brother's pain that night. You're not like that, Lulu."
"You're sweet for saying that but yeah, I'm like that."
Milo replied "I'll never believe that about you."
Maxie walked up and caught the end of their conversation. "Believe it, Giambetti. Its the first honest thing our Little Lulu has said in years."
"Shove it," Lulu told her.
"Spinelli is waiting for you in the storage closet. Last I saw him he was a little overheated. Think you can do something about that? Is this his week to be your man? I know you keep a rotating schedule."
"You better not have messed with him."
Maxie smirked. "Run little Lulu and find out. Because if you don't keep your man happy you know what is bound to happen again....I'll have to come in and pick up the slack."
Lulu gave her a hard glare and walked off.
Milo told Maxie "You should go easy on her. She's been through a lot lately."
Maxie started packing another bag, eager to get finished and tell Georgie she had done her good dead for the year, "Oh really? And just what tragedy has stuck her life? A bad dye job? Those clothes? She doesn't know any better. That look is on purpose."
"She's...you know...going through boyfriend troubles. Just lay off her, please."
"You're sweet, Milo."
"Thank you."
"But sweet gets played like a fiddle by her. Guard your junk. That's all I'm saying."
Milo blanched.
Georgie ended her conversation with one of the organizers and walked back over. "Everything going okay?" Georgie asked.
Maxie said "I was just schooling Milo here in the ways of Lulu. I was about to hit the chapter on her breaking up your marriage. Or would you rather do the honors?"
"Really," Milo said "I don't want to hear..."
"Let it go," Georgie told her sister. "Every time you bring it up all you do is remind me of something I don't want to think about. Just because you are miserable and missing Cooper it is not fair to make everyone else around you miserable too."
"Is that what I'm doing? Well then I guess I should just go get a vanilla latte and mani pedi like I wanted to do this morning instead of wasting my day away here trying to help you."
Maxie grabbed her purse and stormed out.
Georgie told Milo "I'm sorry. She's...made a mess out of her life and until she fixes it no one around her is going to get to be happy as long as she can't be. But you shouldn't get hit by the fall out. That's not fair."
"Its fine."
"Thank you for showing up today."
"Happy to help."
XXXXXXXXXXXXXX
"So this was your bedroom when you were in high school?" Sarah Roberts asked her fiancee.
Dillon motioned around the room. "In all its glory. Though you're missing the full effect without the Spielberg movie posters on the walls and the film equipment spread everywhere." He moved around the room. "Picture it. Jaws was right here. And over here was Saving Private Ryan. Right here there was Close Encounters of the Third Kind and over there by the window I had..."
"Really, D, enough. I'm getting the idea here." She threw him a sweet smile and he started across the room, talking her into his arms. "So you ever have any of your girlfriends in here?"
The guilty expression on his face said it all. Sarah busted up laughing.
Dillon said "I can count them all on one hand...if that helps my case anyway. And I married one of those women so that was really legalized by the state fooling around that went on."
"Just stop talking now," she said with a chuckle as her lips connected with his. The kiss was slow and sweet and perfect. Like every kiss before for them.
They had met on the second worst day of his life. When he was flying out of La Gaurdia to go take a job on a film set. But he couldn't be excited because he had just lost the woman he loved. Sarah was sitting next to Dillon on the plane. One look in those sad eyes of his and she was hooked. She wanted to make him happy. She ditched the job she had been heading out to start and went with him instead. He let her be his soft place to fall....let her put him back together again....just as his friend at first. Three weeks later they kissed and that was it.
Their kisses were too good to walk away from now.
(Its the way you love me Its that pivotal moment This kiss, this kiss
Its a feeling like this
Its centrifugal motion
Its perpetual bliss
Its, ah, impossible
Unstoppable
This kiss, this kiss) (Faith Hill)