Naughty Neighbor: Falling for a Libra (Falling for the Stars)

by Lauren Runow

  I swallow and then take a heaving breath before grabbing my water. I need hydration. “Not buying it.” I try to sound unaffected.

  He leans back as he wraps his fist around his glass. “Fine. If you can’t wax philosophical, then I’ll hit you with the facts. Men can get prostate cancer if they don’t have a release often.”

  I rub my lips together, nodding my head and trying not to laugh. “Okay, fine. If science says so, then it has to be correct.”

  He winks again as he brings the glass to his lips and drinks.

  Leaning back in my seat, I bite my lip as I stare at this beguiling man who has an answer for everything and has bested me at my own game of questions. Not only is he handsome, but he’s also witty as all hell.

  “Can I be honest for a moment?” I don’t wait for him to respond as I add, “You’re really cool to hang out with.”

  A dimple appears on his cheek as he grins at my comment. “I knew you’d figure it out sooner or later.”

  I smile as I finish my cocktail.

  The bartender comes back, and we order five appetizers to share—mostly because Jake can’t decide on one, so we get all five. We talk for the next two hours. He’s funny when he tells me about some of the wild orders he’s made at the flower shop, like a John Deere tractor and Elvis Presley for a funeral. He even had a client order a thousand roses for a proposal, only to forget which one he hid the engagement ring in. The man called, furious that the flowers had eaten the ring. Turned out, it was found days later in a shoe.

  I tell him about my book signing and the random things fans have asked me to sign. I’ll put my pen to anything, but I draw the line at a dildo. That’s just not cool.

  Our conversation carries us back home as we take the scenic route along the canals, feeling the breeze whipping through the buildings.

  When we get to our front doors, I chance a glance at Jake, who is staring at me with a smile.

  “Don’t look at me like that,” he says with a grin.

  “And how am I looking at you?”

  “Like I drank too much and talked your ear off.”

  I laugh out loud. “Not you, me! I feel like I didn’t shut up all night.”

  He leans against his door and looks back at me, totally serious. “I could listen to your stories all day.”

  With a lick of my lips, I look away and roll my eyes. “Night, Jake.”

  I turn my lock, and before I close it, he calls out to me, “Lace?”

  “Yes?” I pop my head out my doorway.

  “Break a wrist.” He grins as he steps into his apartment.

  I laugh at the sentiment. “Thanks.”

  After I close my door, I stare at my computer, my fingers itching to touch the keyboard. When I do, this time, the words flow in the best possible way.

  Chapter Six

  “Help me carry the wood into the house,” my mother says as I exit my car. She’s standing in front of a log splitter, wearing jeans and a T-shirt with her hair pulled back in a low ponytail.

  I head over to her pile on the ground, not bothering for our usual hug hello yet since she’s in the midst of cutting logs.

  “Look at you, all rugged,” I muse.

  She smiles. “I prefer austere. It has a nice ring to it.”

  With a giggle, I load the log holder that’s sitting on the ground and bring the bag down to the cellar, where she keeps her wood stacked against the wall. There’s a decent stockpile down here already, and this new wood will have to dry before she can use it.

  When I get back outside, she’s grabbing a bunch of logs, loading them into her arms. “I bet I can carry more in my arms than you can in that bag.”

  I squint my eyes in determination. “You’re on.”

  I put the rest of them in the bag, and together, we bring the remainder to the basement.

  Some of my fondest memories from my childhood are doing chores like this. She would somehow always make even the hardest of tasks into a game, so I wouldn’t realize just how hard life really was for this single mother and daughter duo.

  “If you’d waited, I would have helped you split the wood,” I tell her.

  “A good woman knows how to take care of herself. Besides, this keeps me active and sets my mind at ease.” She wipes her hands on her pants and looks up at the sky.

  I love seeing my mom with her hands dirty. She has the feminine quality of a dancer with the hardened tone of an independent woman. Her long, thin arms bend as she leans back and stretches, which is graceful in its own way.

  “September is late in the year for prepping wood. Where did this come from?” I ask.

  “The neighbor had a tree cut down due to rot. He brought this over.”

  I smile. “That’s an awfully heavy piece of tree to be schlepping over here for the nice neighbor lady. Looks to me like Mr. Myers needed a reason to come over.”

  She narrows her eyes at me. “You know that’s not the case.” With a point to my outfit, she says, “You look nice. What’s the occasion?”

  I pull my brown hair to the side as I glance down at my long-sleeved sundress and ballet flats with a shrug. “Just felt like doing my hair and makeup today. I’ve been living in sweats.”

  She nods, knowing that’s my ensemble of choice when I’m writing. “Come on up. We’ll make lunch, and you can tell me about what you’re working on.”

  We go up into the kitchen, which is exactly the same as when I was a child. Floral wallpaper with yellow daffodils and oak cabinets on the wall. It was old and out of date then. It’s ancient now.

  I take a seat at the eat-in table while Mom gets bread, cold cuts, and mustard from the refrigerator.

  That’s when I notice the box sitting on the table. It’s slightly bent on the top, and it has my name written across the side.

  “What’s this?”

  She smiles big. “Open it. I found it up in the attic. I can’t believe I forgot about it.”

  I open the top, and when I do, memories come rushing back. Every summer, we would go on scavenger hunts, looking for the craziest things we could find and trying to beat the prior year’s items.

  When I see the Indian arrowhead we found on a hike or the set of oddly shaped magnets we scored at a flea market, my heart fills with joy. We didn’t have much, but my mom made sure I had the best upbringing possible.

  After I rummage through the box of childhood memories, I push it to the side. “I have an offer from a publishing house.”

  Her brows rise. “Really? For the romance books?” She sounds more surprised than excited.

  “Yes. They’re keeping an eye on my next novel. If it does well, then they’ll sign me to a three-book deal.”

  She raises her chin but doesn’t smile. “That’s very good.”

  As she takes a seat, I watch her mannerisms, namely the way she keeps her eyes fixed to the bread she’s taking out of the bag and the meat she’s putting on. Her muscles are stiff, and her mouth is steady.

  “You don’t approve,” I state.

  She drops her hands to the table as she looks up. A very small sigh escapes her lips. “Of course I approve. You’re a brilliant author. Even when you were six, I could see you had a gift for writing. That’s why I’ve always supported your career choice. I just wish you’d write something with meaning, not this sex fluff. You’re better than this.”

  “It isn’t sex fluff. Think of it as women’s literature, except when I get to the romance scenes, they’re a tad … explicit.”

  She raises a brow with a smile. “They’re a lot explicit. Makes me wonder what you’re doing over there, living alone in the big city.”

  “I’m not dating, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  My mom gives me a sorrowful expression. “I know the feeling. Men are destined to stomp our hearts. Take your father for example. That sorry excuse for a man ran off. Good-for-nothing—”

  “I got it, Mom. It’s not every day you’re reminded that your father abandoned you.”

&
nbsp; Actually, that’s a lie. Nearly every time I see my mother, she reminds me that my dad took off. It’s been twenty-three years, and she still can’t get over it.

  It’s a shame really. My mother is beautiful with long brown hair and bright blue eyes. Thanks to the manual labor she does around the house, she still has a phenomenal body. But her skin is worn—from sun and a broken heart. The years of being a single mother are written in the wrinkles on her skin. The scar my father left on her heart practically shows through the T-shirt she’s wearing.

  She’s smart too. My mother is a grant writer, the kind who gets schools and philanthropies the funds they need to succeed. I know for a fact that men have been interested in her through the years, but she has carried my father’s scarlet letter on her sleeve all this time. She’ll never change.

  “That reminds me. You have a letter.” She walks to the counter and lifts a blue envelope.

  I take it from her, looking at the familiar handwriting. “It’s not my birthday. Why is Dad sending me a card?”

  “Probably because one of your cousins mentioned you’d released a book over the summer. He’s an advantageous son of a bitch, that one.”

  With a grimace, I pop it open and take a look. It’s a congratulations card—the kind he should have sent when I graduated high school or college or pretty much every other milestone he missed. The fact that he sent it to my mother’s house and not my apartment shows how little he knows about me.

  I toss it in the trash and watch my mother.

  Her jaw is tight as she looks off to the other side of the room. I hate how Dad makes her feel this way after all these years. Every move she makes is a direct result of him walking out on her.

  Charisse’s words run through my head. “Don’t turn into your mother.”

  I close my eyes and shake off the idea. “Tell me about work. Any new grants come in?”

  Her face lights up. “Actually, yes. I spent hours researching and drafting a large one for that children’s museum downtown, and we got it. Thirty-five thousand dollars. Man, seeing the board president’s eyes light up when I told her the news was priceless.” She smiles proudly, nodding her head. “That’s why I keep at it. It’s a lot of work for little money and a lot of rejections, but when you get one that’s approved, it makes it all worth it.”

  I sigh wistfully. I know exactly what she means. I get the same satisfaction from writing my books. I just wish she would recognize that. What I do might not fund children’s museums, but my books still help people escape from their world for just a bit of happiness.

  She hands me my sandwich and we speak about work. As I eat the lunch she prepared for me, I listen to her and realize it’s not only the decor or wallpaper that hasn’t changed. My mom hasn’t either.

  As children, we put our parents on a pedestal. We make them out to be these superheroes in our minds. Don’t get me wrong; my mom has definitely had her superhero moments, having raised me on her own, but I was about seven years old when I started to see the cracks in her facade.

  She would lie and say she was happy my dad had left and that she was stronger because of it, but there were nights I heard her crying. The next day, she’d be here, at this table, talking about work and tasking me to do better with my grades. I realized, the harder she worked, the more she was hurting about something on the inside.

  I didn’t fully understand it until I was older and had my first heartbreak. His name was Rick. He took my virginity and broke up with me the next day. I sobbed, the sounds coming out of me very similar to the ones I’d heard coming from her door. Just as she held her head high in public, I did too. Poured my heart into taking the SAT and got a near-perfect score.

  With the way my mom talks about a new grant she’s working on, the kind that is almost unattainable, I know my father’s card, now sitting in her trash can, has been bothering her all week. And here she is, cutting wood, making lunch, and changing the world.

  I never realized she’d be wearing her mask twenty plus years later. To see her still holding up that facade, being strong and saying she’s fine when I can feel it in my bones that she’s not, hurts my heart for her.

  Yes, I know the issue here.

  Hello, kettle. Meet pot.

  I’m not turning into my mother. I am already her.

  As I leave my mom’s house, I feel … off. I don’t want to say I’m dejected, but as our afternoon together carried on, I found myself noticing way too many similarities about the two of us, like the way she pulls her hair at the nape of her neck when she’s concentrating or how she hums when she’s cooking. Those little habits are sweet, and I’m proud to be a reflection of her in that way, but the disdain we have toward men and the way we prefer to stay home instead of living life to the fullest have me wondering if I’m going to grow up and be just like my mother—single and alone.

  No matter how much I try to deny it, I had fun with Jake last night. It was nice to talk to someone from the opposite sex, to feel that zing you get when someone excites you. It’s been years, and I somehow forgot what a night out like that could do for your mental health, if nothing else. I wrote a ton when I got home, and my mind felt freer this morning than it had in years.

  Could Charisse really be on to something?

  I’m so lost in the thought that I miss my exit and have to take the scenic route home. As I’m driving through the streets of Chicago, I notice Moreau Flowers. The antique lights over the sign are still lit, so before I even realize what I’m doing, I pull over and exit the car. I cross the street and look up at the wooden sign hanging above the storefront. The letters are in script and show the shop has been in business since 1923.

  When I open the large wooden door with a glass floral inlay, I see Jake in his slacks and a button-down with a black apron mostly covering his designer clothes. He puts down the long-stemmed roses he brought from the back and talks to a couple at the counter. I stand behind a display as I watch him.

  His lips are pursed as he listens to the woman who has her arm wrapped around the man’s as she stares up at him with a frown.

  “I really had my heart set on all white for our wedding.”

  The gentleman looks down at her. “Yes, honey, but three hundred dollars for roses that will die is way out of our budget.”

  Jake raises a finger as he walks around the counter. “I have an idea. If you want a big centerpiece and you want all white, what do you think of these?” He grabs a handful of hydrangeas from a cooler and walks them back to the centerpiece he’s been creating.

  Replacing most of the roses with the hydrangeas, he transforms it into a full and lush floral arrangement that is almost prettier than when it was just roses.

  “These still give you that pure feeling you want while also staying within your budget. It also has a classic, old-school style, which is what you originally said you wanted,” Jake says to the woman and then turns to the guy. “And I can do it for two hundred a piece.”

  The man’s expression softens while the woman bounces on her toes.

  “I love it!” She beams.

  That debonair smile of Jake’s is on full display as he takes down their final order, joking with them and laughing as they shake hands.

  As the couple leaves, I step away from the display and give a wave.

  He looks up at me with a grin. “You don’t have to come in here and hide.”

  “You knew I was here?”

  “I’m a store owner in an inner city. I always know when someone walks in. Plus, you’re not that stealthy.”

  I stick my tongue out at him as I walk up to the wooden counter. Everything in here seems to be original, like it’s a piece of Chicago’s history.

  “To what do I owe this surprise?” he asks.

  “Luck, I guess. I made a wrong turn and just happened to see your storefront.”

  “Lady Luck, huh?” His brows rise as he smiles and walks across the room to a bucket that holds a beautiful pink flower, plucking it from the water and
handing it to me. “A peony. They’re symbolic of both good luck and good fortune.”

  I want to roll my eyes at him, but the act is so sweet that I actually grin.

  “Jake, can you come help me?” I hear a woman call from the back.

  “Coming,” he says as he walks through a door behind the counter.

  A few moments later, Jake and a woman enter through the same door, both carrying large flower bouquets that are full of vibrant colors of magenta, purples, blues, and yellows.

  “These are amazing,” I gush at the floral art.

  “Thank you.” She smiles as she places hers on the counter. “Jake designed them.”

  I look up at him and his proud stature. “Impressive.”

  “I hope the client likes them too. They were a big project,” he says.

  The woman agrees with a nod. “The driver will be here soon to deliver them to the museum. There’s a charity ball tonight. I have twenty more in the back.”

  “Wow. Can I lend a hand?” I ask, which makes her turn to me in surprise at my offer.

  “Mother,” Jake says, “I’d like for you to meet my neighbor, Lacey.”

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you. I love meeting Jake’s friends.” She walks around with open arms. “I’m Bobbi.”

  Even though it startles me, I welcome the embrace from a woman who smells like lavender.

  One of her arms is still around me as she turns to Jake. “Is this the girl who lives next door? The romance author?”

  He nods his head as I tilt mine to him.

  Bobbi looks at me, excited. “I could use your help. We can’t get this one to settle down for anything. He has girls come through here all the time, batting their lashes, and not one has piqued his interest.”

  “I’m holding out for the right woman,” he states, and his mother pats his cheek.

  “You’re thirty years old. Being the coolest guy in the room only holds its luster for so long. It’s nice to have a family to come home to, but I’m afraid you’ll always be my indecisive Libra.” She motions to me as she walks toward the back. “Come, Lacey. You can help us carry these flowers to the front while I tell you about the kind of woman Jake needs.”