Growing up awkward and introverted, Allen spent increased time in his studies, and soon his intellect brought him academic success. Regardless, it didn’t take long for traditional education to leave him bored, so he decided fame and fortune were the next best things. After dropping out during his sophomore year of college, he picked up and moved to the only place he knew of where everyone had a shot at the limelight: Hollywood, California.
He immediately began networking, though time proved it was easier said than done. Dabbling here and there in the movie industry, he jubilated over his promotion from “assistant coffee boy” to “head coffee man.” Though it wasn’t an ideal position, it was the foot in the door that he needed.
His career sprouted after being sidetracked by the “right” woman—one of Hollywood’s spotlight figureheads. He wooed her, she fell for him, they used each other to climb the industry ladder of success, and the rest was history. Their marriage eventually dissolved into the typical Hollywood relationship, but what more could one expect when the foundation of marriage was built on deception and image? Thus, Allen blotted out the successive years of arguments or silence, followed by a bitter separation, until a red-eye brought him some relief in Westfield.
Though it was a humble little town, his gut told him it would open a door to the chance of a lifetime.
Chapter 11
The next few days ticked down to another Friday, just like weekdays always did. As he peered out from the covers, he could see dark clouds scudding across the sky through his window. He groaned. Another gray day. He moved his leg and gently nudged at the sleeping form next to him. During the night she’d stolen his covers. Again. He could chase her from his bed, but he hadn’t the heart. How could he resist those big, brown puppy-dog eyes? Not Marc Vincetti.
Marc rolled out of bed and stared at his chow-chow shepherd mix. Her curled tail began to wiggle. It wasn’t quite long enough to wag.
“Time to get up,” he said, patting her rear. The dog lazily jumped down and followed him as he led her through a maze of yesterday’s clothes and shoes scattered over the braided area rug. Neatness wasn’t his strong suit. But that was the luxury of being a bachelor. He got to do what he wanted, when he wanted, and no one could tell him otherwise. That’s how he liked to keep his life now: under his control.
Marc’s stomach grumbled as he made his way through the loft bedroom, down the open stairwell that overlooked his first-story layout, and past his sparsely furnished living room. He halted his trek to the kitchen to flip through the junk mail piled on the dining room table. His mailman had a tendency to hide important bills within the multi-paged ads—losing him any chance at a Christmas thankyou from Marc—and on more than one occasion Marc unknowingly threw the pile—bills and flyers—into the garbage.
His ex had been the more organized of the two and took care of his accounting for him since they dated in college. But since their break-up, when he’d make a late payment or bounce a check, he couldn’t help but blame her for incapacitating him. During all those years of her coddling him, he had never expected to have to do it on his own. Considering she left him for a big-time CPA, he could bitterly joke now that they were a perfect fit.
Marc, not unlike his ex, found an accountant of his own. The only difference was that Marc kept it professional. Since starting his own IT business, it was necessary to hire someone who could at least balance a checkbook—the checkbook that hadn’t been updated for a couple of weeks, he realized as he flipped through its empty pages. He stared at the balance that he had scribbled in; he was glad that at least he wasn’t hurting for money anymore. Once the billable hours piled up and the business took off, he actually had extra to put into savings.
Pressing his fingers against his temple, a headache persisted, triggered by the past week’s craziness. Work consumed more than seventy hours a week, which he assumed was common for the first year of startup. Every year he told himself it’d get easier; that was three years ago and the long hours were still killing him.
It was more or less the nights and weekends that killed him. However, his business had finally made it in the black, so for now he willingly suffered through the extended hours. I have nothing better to do with my time, he figured, until he glanced outside and saw the overgrown yard waiting for his attention. But at least his home was habitable. It was a miracle he even finished building the house when he did, only six months later than estimated.
When he laid out the building plans for the contemporary loft house, he decided on simplicity. Minimal décor and all natural. His creation represented who he was—unpretentious and manly. The complete opposite of what his ex tried to mold him into.
Marc fondly remembered picking out the wood for his floors with his father, a contractor by hobby, not by trade. Glancing down at the deep, rich, and textured wood floors beneath his bare feet, he remembered that excruciating summer of sanding, staining, and applying polyurethane until they glowed lustrous in the sunlight. Though, as he proudly absorbed the interior of his home, he knew the sweat was worth it all.
The high ceilings showcased matching knotted beams with recessed lighting that was hardly ever used, for the picture windows on every wall permitted more than enough light. His favorite touch to the house was the open fireplace purposefully positioned between the living room and kitchen, with multicolored stone facing on both sides, adding simultaneous warmth and atmosphere to both rooms. He even mounted a fixture to the kitchen’s side of the hearth in case he lost power and needed to cook using the fire. Heck, sometimes he’d cook over a flame just to experience good old-fashioned rustic living. Nothing beat the taste of smoked meat.
He dropped the stack of mail on the mantel and turned the corner to the kitchen. Stepping onto cold ceramic tile, his body trembled and a chill ran up his spine. His toned biceps flexed slightly as he opened the fridge. His brown eyes didn’t need to scan more than a second to see it was empty.
“Looks like someone has to go grocery shopping…” his voice trailed off as he looked down at his furry sidekick. His fingers rubbed the stubble on his chin, an abrasive reminder that he’d have to shave before going out in public. “What have you been doing all week, huh, girl? All you do is sit around getting waited on hand and foot.” Sheba looked up at him with a curious stare.
He rubbed her perked ears, chuckling as if she understood his every word. Before Sheba, he wasn’t much of a dog lover. Yet it all changed the day that this stray showed up on his doorstep out of the blue, and he instantly adopted her. It took him two weeks to pick apart the labyrinth of knots and tangles in her long coat. It was then that he found out the hard way how much she disliked baths. He never realized how slippery a wet dog could be.
As he moved to close the fridge, Sheba moved with him. It certainly didn’t take long for her to get comfortable with him; she rarely left his side. If he was in the kitchen, she was there. In bed, she was there. In the shower, well, the bath thing wasn’t a hit the first time around, so she waited at the base of the tub.
Most days he felt guilty when he headed off to work and caught a glimpse of her intently watching his departure from the window as he pulled away. Ten to twelve hours later, when his Ford F-150 rumbled up the driveway, she’d be planted exactly where he left her, wiggling her twisted, fluffy tail. He could barely get a moment’s peace, but he liked it. She was his and he was hers. Such loyalty was hard to find nowadays.
Marc checked the pantry, with Sheba a nose-length behind whining tirelessly. He ignored her, rummaging through boxed dinners until he retrieved a dusty canister of oatmeal.
The whining continued.
“You gotta pee, girl?”
She barked.
Food would have to wait—not that oatmeal was really food.
He shrugged on a coat over his bare chest, stepped into his boots, and headed outside to the back porch. Sheba took off for the woods.
Now he had to go. “When nature calls…” This was what he loved about being a guy—the
conveniences.
Every time he stepped foot on his porch he was dolefully reminded of his acquisition of the property. Being the last of kin, Marc had inherited seventeen acres from the untimely death of his great-uncle when Marc was still a disinterested teenager. The land sat vacant for a number of years while he pursued a college degree and ran off to the big city of Buffalo, New York, to hunt down a career in computer science and chase love with the woman of his dreams. Well, not exactly the woman of his dreams, but close enough. She was gorgeous and ambitious, the perfect trophy wife for most guys, but now he knew she wasn’t his “true love.”
Though it was far in the past, the memory of that loss still ached. Back then Marc had blindly thought he was in love with the woman he now referred to as “the ex,” but he knew the reality. True love wasn’t skin deep. It was knowing the other person’s heart and connecting with more than a kiss. Anyone could kiss another person and get high off the rush of excitement. But love—love didn’t need physical touch. Not that he didn’t like that aspect as well. But love was deeper, purer, and all things good. Love was knowing the person, and still adoring them, despite their flaws. True love was his high school sweetheart. Though it had been years, her name rolled off his tongue easily: “Julie Carter.”
He relished the good ol’ days. He had met Julie in the beginning of their sophomore year of high school. But when he mustered the courage to actually talk to her, it was a month into the school year. They had been sitting next to each other in their math class since the end of August, but oddly they didn’t exchange a single word. Julie was always the studious type, he chuckled to himself. And I was the slacker. She always got As and he got solid Cs. Julie was smart, pretty, popular—everything Marc wasn’t at the time. In short, she was out of his league. So he ignored her. Until she made it nearly impossible to do so. When their teacher passed out their graded quizzes and Julie glanced over at Marc’s big fat red D, she offered to tutor him—after she made several jokes at his expense. For once his bad grades got him something more than a parental scolding and weeklong grounding.
He remembered when they first hit it off as friends, but soon Marc found himself walking Julie to classes, eating lunch with her at school, and sitting with her at church. On April first—at a fancy dinner out, compliments of his dad’s credit card—Marc asked Julie to be his girlfriend. He shook his head as he remembered her response: “Is this an April Fool’s joke?”
She made him want to be a better person. And then he changed.
As he stood inhaling the lakefront air, he forced himself to dredge back the ancient history. Even as young as he was he would have married her in a heartbeat had she stuck around. But the summer after their junior year of high school, Julie was shipped off to Florida to live with her father following her parents’ messy divorce. His strong emotions never left, even after she did. The day of her departure was what Marc considered the absolute worst day of his life. Allowing himself to venture further into that awful day—something he rarely permitted himself to do—he could still hear the loudspeaker announce her section to board the plane that would take her away. A four-hour flight away, or a thirty-plus-hour drive for a broke teenage boy.
While Julie walked the ramp toward another life, Marc remembered standing all alone with a dozen red roses that she couldn’t take with her since they didn’t fit in her purse or carryon. They kept in touch for several months by phone and letters, but when homecoming and prom came and went without Julie there to accompany him, Marc eventually felt it was best to move on.
He assumed he moved on when he met his ex-fiancé, though he kept those dried red roses and his favorite picture of Julie in his dresser drawer for years.
Marc wondered if he was truly in love with Julie or merely caught in teenage infatuation. True love wouldn’t fade, would it? But just like those paled, crisp roses, he decided to file her away in the back of his mind; he’d save those memories for a rainy day. Or a sunny day like this morning.
Regret visited him this morning as he scraped the remaining oatmeal from around the edges and licked his spoon clean. He should have never let himself fall for another woman so quickly, on the rebound as he was. Julie was history—in his mind, though not his heart—a year after her move, and his interests transformed. And they did so before his heart was prepared. Much like he felt now. His heart hesitated to fall in love again, rejecting the vulnerability it would require. Hadn’t he learned anything from his past mistakes?
Yes, his ex was one big ugly mistake.
A disaster that still bared its teeth at him.
It had been a crisp autumn afternoon, after the leaves had fallen to the ground, when a tall, sexy blonde approached him in Humanities 101 during his freshman year at college, and it was lust at first sight. Four years later, they were still an item, and the next step was expected: engagement. Together the inseparable duo planted roots in Buffalo, but Marc’s roots never quite took to the urban soil. Fast-paced life rushed him into a high-salaried position that sucked every free moment. His heart was set on spending time with his fiancé rather than wading knee deep in software development and traveling to meet potential clients. But his ex pushed him to advance, and so he did. Eventually meetings, deadlines, and projects became an obsession if he wanted to provide a decent life for his future family. Whatever “decent” meant. Until one day he woke up from his never-ending work nightmare. Thank God for that wake-up call.
Homesickness beckoned him back to Westfield. Though he had adapted to his new on-the-run lifestyle, his heart wasn’t at peace. Something was missing. The big bucks couldn’t compare to the friendly faces, relaxed atmosphere, and simple pleasures of home. So he left the big city. And she stayed behind with Marc’s promise that he’d return for her soon. His plan was flawless. She’d continue working while he set up shop in Westfield and found a home for after their wedding. It never occurred to him that she was all too eager about his departure.
With only six months to go before wedded bliss, he brought her out of her urban comfort zone into rural America to house shop. When she came up with excuse after excuse about what each house lacked, Marc read between the lines. Time apart confirmed his suspicions that she wanted a different lifestyle than what Westfield could offer, and the wedding was postponed, per her request. But Marc kept planning their future together, unaware that what had started as physical distance was growing into emotional separation.
His jaw clenched at the recollection.
While they had maintained a semblance of a relationship, the ex decided it was time to see other people… without Marc’s knowledge. His surprise visit to Buffalo caught her out to dinner with another man: their accountant. Never would he forget what he saw. Back then Marc’s heart was torn to shreds as he watched her from outside the frosted window laughing and holding Mr. Bald-chubby-and-wealthy’s hand. Marc’s pride was emasculated as he remembered seeing his own warm breath on the cold pane until it eventually clouded his view, and he turned away, never to look back. It was all he needed to solidify his decision. He never called her from that moment on, and she apparently didn’t miss a beat, for his phone never rang with an apology or a good-bye.
Marc settled with the realization that both of them had changed. Or maybe neither of us had ever changed. He wasn’t the ambitious city type he pretended to be, and she would never be the down-to-earth sweetheart he wanted. It was all a farce, and only time and a single night of betrayal revealed the relationship for what it was. But it didn’t matter now. He was moving on.
He had refused divine direction when he first pursued Ms. Wrong, and eventually something had to give: trusting his heart’s intuition or blind love. Luckily my heart won out, though by force, Marc realized. Sure, it hurt to let her go, but somehow he made it through day by day, and now he was standing in this very moment enjoying winter’s frosty beauty from his back porch allowing Lady Love back into his life. She had a funny way of sneaking up on him. He just hoped he was ready for her.
&nbs
p; Wind nipped at his cheeks, and he felt his fingers start to tingle. He would happily endure any cold just to be with her right now. He imagined her standing next to him, taking in the view of the majestic blue beauty in his backyard. Though it was technically a lake, the average human eye couldn’t see the other side—only with the help of binoculars. Marc captured the most grandiose sunsets from his back porch; deep reds and oranges splattered off the water to create an expanse of never-ending color.
He’d never gotten used to the breathtaking sight. Its splendor seemed to change daily. Yesterday the water reflected a gray-blue, but today it appeared a little brighter. His father always told him that the lake was as inconsistent as the wind. No two days on the lake were alike. His father was right. In the deepest, coldest part of winter, when lapping waves froze over, even then it would transform overnight, as if completely recreated.
Sun sliced through tree branches, resting on Marc’s flushed face. He closed his eyes and embraced the concentrated heat that contrasted against the bitter air. And then he pictured her with the sun silhouetting her face. Their chance meeting hung over him the past few days, and he recalled her laugh to the forefront of his thoughts. He had no idea when he’d see her again, but something told him it would be soon.
“I hope this works out,” he whispered in a raspy morning voice. Even today, a chilly Friday morning in the depths of winter, he took in every second of his wonder and held it close, as if it would flutter away in an instant, as precious moments often did.
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