Cooper by Nhys Glover Read Free Book Online Page B

nose in to your own door, and luckily the parking lot was pretty empty. Not a busy night for travellers then. Or maybe this place was too close to the city where a better class of hotel could be found.
    While he got his hoist operating, Amy went to unlock the door to their room and turn on the lights and heating. By the time he'd wheeled himself inside, she'd taken a seat on the lumpy-looking queen-sized bed and was studying the ancient carpet on the floor beneath her booted feet. Because the room hadn't heated up yet, she hadn't take off her coat, the collar of which hid her long, straight hair.
    "I brought munchies," Cooper offered lamely, producing a McDonald's bag. He knew she'd probably never had fries before, it being unhealthy and all that, so he'd seen it as yet another treat he could offer her. Another new discovery. Maybe junk food wasn't the best kind of discovery he could offer her, he reasoned suddenly, but it was the only one he knew about so far.
    She took the bag, opening the top curiously. When she pulled out the two large cardboard containers of fries she smiled, despite herself.
    "Are you determined to make me fat?" she asked cheekily.
    Her eyes grew large as she realised what she’d said. Did this odd girl always worry about her every word and gesture?
    Suddenly the tension between them evaporated. It was as if the intervening hours since they'd last sat across from each other had evaporated.
    "I think it would take a fair few Macca’s Meals to make you fat," he replied with a silly grin.
    She passed him his serving and took out one long, thin straw from hers, tentatively nibbling at it. At first he couldn't tell if she liked what she tasted or not. Then she popped the whole thing into her mouth and grinned at him.
    "Not as good as brownies, but a close second," she said as she munched and swallowed.
    "I can't believe you didn't sneak out to Maccas during recess or something, when you were at school."
    "First, I went to a very expensive, very elite academy. There wasn't a store within miles, and certainly no McDonalds. Second, our canteen was stocked with the very best gourmet food available. Why would anyone want to sneak out when we could get meals like that? And lastly, even if kids did, I wouldn't have been invited along. I was the kid no one would be caught dead having lunch with. Ugly and crazy might rub off, you know."
    He groaned, trying to deal with his empathetic reaction to her words by rubbing a hand through his too-long hair. He needed a haircut badly but never seemed to find the time to book an appointment. The same went for shaving. Such unimportant aspects of daily living were always left at the end of his To Do List, so they rarely got done.
    "Kids can be cruel...” Unable to think of anything wiser to say that might offset her pain, he paused before taking a slightly safer path. “You said you were in and out of mental institutions. Tell me about that… Please," he added as an afterthought.
    For too long she said nothing, and he wondered if he’d stepped over the line again, probing into areas of her life that were private. How would he feel if some stranger asked him about his stays in a mental institution? Furious, defensive? He was just about to change the subject when Amy started talking, slowly, almost as if she was measuring every word before speaking it.
    "You've heard the saying a square peg in a round hole?" She paused as if waiting for him to answer. He nodded his reply. "Well that's me. My parents have never been particularly affectionate. I was a disappointment to them right from an early age. I'm not sure why. But they put up with me, tried to mould me into a more acceptable round shape, but I was always a square, I just couldn't be anything else.
    "And I am over-sensitive, I have to admit. I took, and continue to take, every criticism to heart. But I managed to survive when I was little because I had Maria. She was my nurse from the time I was born. She was like a