The Space In Between

Chapter Forty

AFTER I LEFT Wisconsin, I headed back to New York. It was time to get back together with Kyle and get my career going again. It seemed like a whole life had been lived since I’d last sat across from him at his desk. He was scrolling through his emails while checking messages on his cell phone, and for the first time in awhile, it felt like things were slowly getting back to normal.
“What do we have?” I asked him, wondering what offers were being shot my way to clean up this mess I had made for Ky.
He started sifting through the papers stacked on his desk. “The norm for magazines. Us Weekly, People, Star. Television offers started flying in after those magazines came out. They want you to host shows—Wedding Disasters, Couple’s Therapy, Dr. Drew’s Rehab.” His voice started off excited and he glanced up at me. He must have seen how uninterested I was in all of it, but I knew it had to be done.
“You know what, f*ck them.” Kyle picked up all of the papers and ripped them in half.
“What the hell are you doing?”
He loosened his tie, shut down his computer, and turned off his phone. “Screw them, Coop. They don’t deserve to hear your story. You know what you need to do?”
I looked to him, knowing I was talking to my best friend and not my manager. “What you need to do is go to South Carolina and be with your mom. F*ck all this other bullshit. You’re a freakin’ amazing photographer, not a cheap reality star. You go be with your mom, you decide exactly what it is you want, and you come back here. And I will make it work.”
“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.”