Right

by Jana Aston

  Now, like then, he tells me we’re just parking the car.

  Oh, well. A girl can hope.

  He takes my hand and we head towards 15th Street, walking through Dilworth Park towards John F Kennedy Boulevard. Love Park is ahead of us, walled off in construction fencing, the year-long park renovation well under way. So I’m surprised when we stop, a security guard opening a gate for us to pass through with a nod from Sawyer.

  “What are we doing, Sawyer? The park is closed.”

  “Just cutting through,” he says.

  But he leads us further into the park, stopping at a small candlelit table, champagne chilling in an ice bucket beside it.

  “I lied,” he says.

  I like where this is going.

  He pulls out a chair and seats me at the table, then sits across from me, face serious.

  “Everly, I have something important to talk to you about.”

  Yes. Yes, you do. Can I squeeze another yes in here? All the yeses.

  “What’s that?” I ask calmly. I’ve been wearing Show Me the Ring on my nails for a month.

  “Do you think you could delete the Sawyer Camden is a dick board from your Pinterest?”

  My eyes widen. I so forgot all about that. I make a mental note to never again forget what a little stalker he is.

  “Consider it done.” I smile. It’s loud downtown. Why have I never noticed that before? I hope I don’t miss anything important. I focus on Sawyer but he’s not saying anything. Just staring at me expectantly.

  “Um, now? Did you want me to delete it right this second?”

  He raises his eyebrows and nods.

  I fumble for the clutch in my lap, my hands a little shaky. I get it out and open up the Pinterest app, pulling up my boards. But it’s gone. Replaced by a board named Marry Me, Everly. There are hundreds of pictures of the words ‘Marry Me.’ On coffee cups and neon signs. Spelled out in the sand and written on chalkboards. I’ll look at them all later, but right now, Sawyer is on one knee in front of me, a ring in his hand.

  “Everly Jensen, will you marry me?”

  I must say yes because a moment later the ring is on my finger. It’s perfect. A cushion-cut stone surrounded by a perimeter of smaller diamonds that continue around the band.

  Of all the rings I’ve looked at on Pinterest it’s the one I loved the most.

  Sawyer is filling my glass with champagne when I notice a bottle of nail polish on the table. I recall that it was in his hand, the ring resting around the cap.

  “You bought me nail polish?” I question, picking it up. It’s orange, my favorite color. I immediately flip it over to see what it’s called.

  Everly Ever After is printed on the label.

  I’ve never even told him about the nail polishes.

  I’ve said it before—life really has a way of working out for me. My advice? A positive attitude and the ability to be flexible is essential. And a dash of delusion never hurts.

  Epilogue

  I fell in love with her the moment she walked into the room at my parents’ house that Sunday afternoon in November. Love at first sight was a ridiculous notion until Everly.

  That first sixty seconds was a punch to the gut. I thought I’d found her and lost her all in the blink of an eye.

  As she trailed into the room behind Eric, my brain couldn’t process fast enough. Captivated. Before she even said a word. But who was she? Eric had gotten married recently. Was that his new wife? I’d sent a silent fuck you to the universe.

  But wait.

  Eric wasn’t even looking at her. No way that woman was your wife and you weren’t looking at her every time she was in the room. And there was something similar about them—the shape of their eyes, the color of their hair. Please God, let that be his sister.

  I glanced at Finn, gauging his reaction to our guests, and caught the tiniest flicker of exasperation cross his face. It was brief. So brief I’d think I’d imagined it if not for knowing Finn his entire life. Another piece to this sixty-second puzzle.

  Eric called out a greeting and I rose, clapping him on the back and congratulating him on his wedding, but he didn’t turn to the woman trailing him at the mention of his marriage. Definitely not his wife. And neither Eric or Finn had bothered to introduce us, likely assuming we’d met somewhere along the way. And that’s when it all fell into place for me. I knew exactly who the little bombshell was.

  “You’re Eric’s little sister,” I said, and I grinned from ear to ear as she begrudgingly stepped forward to shake my hand and introduce herself.

  “Yes, I’m Everly,” she said. And I was done.

  She was like no woman I’d ever met. High-spirited, to say the least. The most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes on, certainly. But more than that, she was real. Maybe it was her belief that she was meant to be with my brother that allowed her to drop all pretences with me. Shooting me dirty looks in my parents’ living room, rejecting me all the way back to Philadelphia. I’ve never been so enraptured. I knew she was attracted to me, yet fighting it tooth and nail, under some insane belief that my brother would be the perfect match for her.

  Wooing her became my sole focus. Then keeping her my only concern.

  Until Jake came along, knocking my feet right out from underneath me. I had a son. A four-year-old son. And the love of my life was a vivacious twenty-two-year-old who had made it clear that she wasn’t interested in having children anytime soon. And worse, I knew her feelings on exes and custody arrangements. Half-siblings and holidays spent divided. I’d never have stood a chance with her if Jake had been in the picture when we’d met.

  So what was I supposed to do?

  I knew she’d stay if I told her about him. But was that best for her? For Jake? Would I be forcing a child, an instant family, on her that she’d resent later?

  So I sent her away.

  It fucking killed me. But I sent her away. I assumed she’d find out about Jake eventually, realize that was the reason why. But I thought it’d be months down the line. She’d move on. Find someone new. Someone uncomplicated. And she’d realize it was the right thing, my ending it with her. She could have the life she envisioned for herself without feeling guilty for walking away from me.

  But then she showed up that afternoon in Dilworth Park, and I watched a hundred emotions cross her face when she saw Jake, heard him call me Daddy. I couldn’t let her disappear into the subway thinking everything between us had been a lie. And then she surprised me, asking for a chance to meet Jake, to prove that not only could we make it work for us, she wanted to make it work for my son too.

  I watched her fall in love with Jake over the next several weeks and it was the most absolute love I’ve ever witnessed.

  Then she wrote him his own book, Forever Home. Jake’s obsessed with it. And so is the agent I sent it to. He’s got an offer for it, an offer and a request from the publisher for an additional two books. I received the email late this afternoon. Now I just need to tell Everly about it. She doesn’t think it’s good enough for the world to see, but she’s been wrong before.

  “What are you doing?” I approach her from behind, bending in to nip at her neck and take a peek at what she’s up to. I’ve found it’s best to stay up to date with Everly at all times. She’s not a girl you want a step ahead of you.

  She’s curled up in a corner of my couch, all of that remarkable hair piled onto the top of her head in a messy knot. She’s wearing something she refers to as yoga pants and an oversized cotton top that’s slipping off one shoulder as she taps a key on the laptop. She’s beautiful like this. Stunning, really. I can’t believe I get to spend the rest of my life with her.

  “Research,” she tells me, and I think I see a castle on the screen. Not a romantic European castle I can rent in order to fuck her in every room, but a Disney castle.

  “For?” I prod.

  “The honeymoon.”

  “Aren’t I supposed to plan the honeymoon?” I ask, walking around the couch
to sit next to her. I’m not entirely sure how all this wedding planning works, but I seem to recall that traditionally the honeymoon is the groom’s job. Then again, Everly isn’t exactly traditional.

  “Do you want to help?” she asks, brightening. “I was thinking Disneyland Paris,” she says. “It’s just outside of the city, and I’d love to see Paris with you.” She says it hopefully, giving a little tug on her bottom lip with her teeth. “We’d need three suites at the Disneyland Hotel though and it’s a bit expensive.” She taps her orange-painted nails on the laptop. “But you did say you have almost a billion dollars. So it’s probably okay?”

  She looks up from the screen to wait for my response and there’s not an ounce of mischief there. She’s completely serious.

  “Sure, it’s fine. Whatever you want,” I agree. “But why do we need three suites?”

  “For our parents and Jake.”

  Wait, what?

  “You want to bring Jake on our honeymoon?” I ask, understanding now why we’re headed to Disneyland.

  “Well, of course. It’s not just about us. Our marriage will be a celebration of us becoming a family. It’s a familymoon.”

  God. My heart explodes when she says that.

  “So I was thinking we should bring all of our parents along. Because they have a lot of catching up to do with Jake too. This would give them all a chance to bond.”

  I was looking forward to a different sort of bonding. But Everly’s being beyond gracious to include Jake in our honeymoon. Familymoon. I should focus on that.

  “Then if Jake is comfortable with it, he can alternate nights in his grandparents’ suites.”

  I like where this is going.

  “And then I thought maybe we could take off for a few nights on our own into the city,” she says, clicking on a tab that opens a page to the Paris Four Seasons.

  I’m downright delighted that Jake just went down for the night.

  And that he still sleeps like the dead.

  And that Everly is snapping the laptop closed and taking off her shirt.

  I’m a lucky, lucky man.

  Acknowledgements

  Thank you, from the bottom of my heart for taking the time to read my book. I know your time is precious and I appreciate that you spent some of it with Sawyer & Everly.

  Beverly & Kristi, thank you for talking me off the ledge on a regular basis. Your encouragement and feedback at each step in this process are priceless, I’m so lucky to have you as friends and I hope I tell you that enough.

  JA Huss, thank you for making my cover & helping with graphics. Just wait till I learn photoshop, you’ll be so sad!

  RJ Locksley, please never stop editing. I can’t imagine doing this without you. Please never make me!

  Michelle New, thank you for crying when you read the breakup scene. Not gonna lie, it makes me a little proud.

  CCL’s,

  #becausecats

  Other Work by Jana Aston

  WRONG

  I have a history of picking the wrong guy. Gay? Player? Momma’s boy? Check, check and check.

  Now I can’t stop fantasizing about one of the customers at the coffee shop I work at between classes. It’s just a harmless crush, right? It’s not like I ever see this guy outside of the coffee shop. It’s not like I’m going to see him while attempting to get birth control at the student clinic. While wearing a paper gown. While sitting on an exam table. Because he’s the doctor. Shoot. Me.

  But what if, for once, the man I’ve had the dirtiest, most scandalous fantasies about turned out to be everything but wrong?

  Notes

  These notes are filled with spoilers about the book, so if for some reason you’ve skipped here to read them, don’t!

  Everly. Holy shit she was so much fun to write. Do you want a little backstory? Originally, I thought Everly ended up with Finn. Actually, let’s go even farther back. I think Everly’s original name was Jessa. I wanted a J name to go with Jensen, Jessa Jensen. But, as I wrote I was afraid that Jessa was a little too close to Jana, and that was weird. So it had to go.

  When I wrote WRONG, I worked in a ton of names of people I knew. Probably 30 names. And one of the people I wanted to include was my great friend Beverly Tubb. Bev was originally a nurse in the exam room during Sophie’s appointment at the student clinic. And as some of you caught, when I changed it, I made a huge ass typo. So the nurse in that room is called both Bev and Marie. Oops.

  Anyway, I had this epiphany at some point while writing WRONG that I’d drop the B from Beverly & I’d name this girl Everly. And I knew even then that Everly’s full name was Beverly Cleary Jensen, because her parents named her after Beverly Cleary. And she’d have a brother named Eric Carle Jensen, named after Eric Carle. So that random bit of information I knew about Everly a long long time ago. Those names were very purposeful, because I adored reading Beverly Cleary and Eric Carle as a child.

  So that’s how Everly came about. Initially, I was only focused on Sophie & Luke. I wasn’t setting WRONG up to have a best friend that I could write about later. But Everly was just so much fun. So I started to think, well maybe. Maybe IF I wrote another book, someday, it could be about Everly. But by then I was pretty far into WRONG. And Everly had already made it clear she believed Professor Finn Camden was the one for her.

  So Everly was chasing Finn in the background as I wrote Sophie & Luke’s story and I began to worry. How was I going to write Everly’s story? I don’t read books where the girl chases the guy. I don’t like it. I like alpha males that walk in & look at the girl & say MINE. That’s what I like to read. So did I want to write a book about Everly chasing Finn? Not really. And then, poof, I knew Finn had a brother. And I knew the brother was THE ONE. The brother would take one look at Everly & think, she’s mine. I realized that Everly would end up with Sawyer at that moment in WRONG when Sophie & Everly are in the coffee shop after Thanksgiving. Sophie asks Everly about her weekend and if she made any headway with Professor Camden and for the first time, Everly falters, unsure what is going on. Because I knew that’s where the books would cross & in RIGHT she’s just met Sawyer & he’s driven her home from Connecticut. And she is very very confused. But truthfully, prior to that moment in WRONG I did think Everly ended up with Finn.

  Finn & Sawyer’s names were coincidence. I do not have any specific love of Mark Twain. Finn was always Finn. And when I decided he had a brother I ended up at Sawyer for several reasons. I thought their parents also had a thing for naming their kids after literary figures and it would be something that Everly & Sawyer could laugh about. But I also recalled somewhere in my memory that Mark Twain was a pseudonym. And as I ran to Wikipedia to check on that I thought, I’ll name Sawyer’s company after Mark Twain’s real name so Everly can connect the dots once she visits his office. Because that scene where Everly shows up in his office all, “I need to see Sawyer Camden,” without realizing he owned the place, was firmly in my mind very early on, way back in the middle of writing WRONG. And that scene stemmed from me listening to The Vamps, Somebody to You on repeat for months & months. Okay a year. Fine it’s still on my favorites playlist. I could clearly envision Sawyer standing in his office as Everly looked around & asked if he was somebody important & Sawyer responding that all he wanted to be was somebody to her.

  Mr. Pants. I don’t have any tie to the series or author. I read Mr. Pants Slacks, Camera Action! months AFTER knowing Mr. Pants would be significant to Jake. The story behind this is, I have a friend that is a librarian at a public school in Hawaii. She runs the occasional fundraiser for books or supplies and I donated to one of them. Shortly after I got the most amazing stack of thank you notes. The best kind, made from construction paper. One of them stood out. I copied it almost word for word into RIGHT. The thank you I received said, “Thanks Auntie Jana for thos books!!! next can I have mr. pans pleas!!! Inside the card was, “no!? yes!!!!!”

  Attached to the card was a post it from my friend saying, “Mr. Pants – a ser
ies about cats. This kid kills me.”

  So I did what any normal person would do. I messaged Debby immediately and asked where the fundraiser for the Mr. Pants books was. Because this kid needed Mr. Pants! What did I need to do to get Mr. Pants to this kid? Why was she not giving Mr. Pants to him? Well, it turns out that there were no more Mr. Pants. The library already had all the Mr. Pants books and the next one wouldn’t be out for months. Librarian Debby has explained this to the Kindergarteners many times, but still, this little guy walks in and asks for more Mr. Pants on a regular basis. That had to go in the book, clearly.

  The nail polishes, they’re all real, by the way. I know I could have made up any nail polish name I wanted, but it was weirdly important to me that they actually existed. I’ll list them here, if you’re so inclined to look for them.

  Chapter 11 - Mod About You - OPI

  Chapter 12 - Sole Mate purple - Essie

  Chapter 21 - A Good Man-darin is Hard to Find - OPI

  Chapter 25 - Size Matters - Essie

  Chapter 35 - Romantically Involved - OPI

  Chapter 39 - Porn-A-Thon - Smith & Cult

  Chapter 47 - Fake It Till You Make It - Deborah Lippman

  Chapter 52 - Show Me the Ring - Essie

  Chapter 52 - Everly Ever After – This one I did make up. ;)

  Well, now I’ve written two books. I just made a face at myself typing that. So weird. I wrote two books! Anyway, I hope I didn’t let you down with RIGHT. I still can’t believe anyone read WRONG. The last six months are a blur. I thought I’d publish WRONG and a few people would read it. And then, a couple weeks after hitting publish WRONG made the New York Times bestseller list. Hitting that list wasn’t even a fantasy in my delusional head. I’m still in shock. And now, as I write this a couple of weeks before RIGHT publishes I am freaking out. Will you like it as much? How will I feel if you don’t? Is there a therapist in my area that specializes in book releases? (There’s not, I’ve Googled.)