by Ali Parker
Wes smiled, but it didn’t touch his eyes. “Struggling artists anonymous should be a support group.”
I giggled into my drink and took a sip. He intrigued me. “Can I read some of what you have written in there?”
Wes glanced at his notebook. “I fear I’m not nearly drunk enough to let a stranger read my work right in front of me. That’s the kind of stress that will turn my stomach into knots.”
“Am I not your target audience? I’m good at constructive feedback. I swear.”
He licked his lips.
“You don’t have to,” I said. “I’m just curious. And I love to read. And I want to know just what kind of writer you are, Wes. You’re tricky to figure out.”
“Women like a bit of mystery, don’t they?”
Damn him for always having a sly question prepared. “Sometimes.”
He surprised me by sliding the notebook across the bar to me. He patted the cover before flipping it open. Random scribblings filled the first two pages. Most of it had been aggressively crossed out. There were small notes written in the columns. Then as the pages went on, the scratch-outs grew fewer and farther between, like he’d found his rhythm.
I looked from the book up to him. “You’re sure?”
“Go ahead.”
I leaned over the notebook. His writing was elegant and somewhat old fashioned. It reminded me of the kind of writing one might see on an old love letter a soldier sent his woman back in the first or second World War.
A blue bird with a white puffed-up chest chirped outside the window while she swept the broken pieces of china into the dustpan. Fragmented flowers made a messy puzzle in the pan and she paused, staring down at it, lips turned down in a frown.
It had been the last one left of her mother’s china set. The first broke two years ago when a family friend knocked it off the coffee table. The second fell from the cabinet when she hit the leg with the vacuum cleaner. The third broke in the sink when it was struck with a metal pot. And now the fourth had crumbled to pieces after she hurled it at the floor.
She remembered drinking tea out of the flowery cups after dinner on special occasions with her mother and grandmother. Sometimes, they would have shortbread cookies or biscotti. Sometimes, they would talk. Sometimes, they wouldn’t. Regardless, the memories were fond and the cups were whole.
Unlike now.
She rose to her feet, opened the cupboard under the kitchen sink, and poured the debris of her mother’s last china cup into the garbage can. Her throat tightened, her eyes burned, and she closed the cupboard fiercely so she didn’t have to face what she’d done.
What she’d lost.
Why did everything she touch fall to ruin? Why couldn’t she keep things together? Why had she been plagued with the inevitability of destruction from the moment she left him that night, staring after her under a blanket of stars as she drove away in the back of a taxi that smelled like breath mints and cigarettes?
Why hadn’t she stayed?
Why hadn’t he fought for her?
Katelyn slid down the length of the cupboard, drew her knees to her chest and her hands to her face, and cried out the years of frustration that had turned her heart to stone.
I looked up from the page where the words ended and frowned. “That’s all there is so far?”
“There’s more before this. Plenty more. But it’s not refined. This is…” Wes trailed off. “It needs less work than the rest of it. Let’s put it that way.”
“It’s really good.”
“You have to say that. I’m sitting right here.”
“I mean it,” I pressed. And I did. The words were beautiful and sad. The woman was as broken and hollow as the cup she’d broken and I needed to know who this man was that she’d left behind—and I needed to know why he hadn’t followed her. “What happens in the end?”
“I’m not sure yet.”
I blinked in surprise. “What do you mean, you’re not sure? It’s your book! They’re your characters.”
Wes laughed and took his notebook back. “Yeah, you’re right. I have an idea of where it’s going. A destination, so to speak. But when I write, I have a tendency to take back roads and sometimes they lead to unexpected places. For all I know, this could end entirely differently than I see it in my head.”
“Which is how?”
“You’ll just have to wait until it’s finished to find out.”
It sounded to me like I might have just made my first friend in New York City. “Deal.”
Wes slid his notebook into his bag and checked the watch on his wrist. “Damn, it’s getting pretty late. This place closes in another half hour.”
“I should get back to my motel anyway. I have a big day ahead of me tomorrow.” I slid off my stool and collected my jacket. It was still damp but not nearly as soaked through as it had been when I first arrived.
“Can I drive you? The weather is still miserable.”
I considered saying no, but the thought of walking all the way back to my motel made my legs hurt. “That would be amazing.”
He hooked his thumb over his shoulder. “I’m parked out back. Let’s get out of here.” He called goodbye to Charlie, who waved without looking up at us while he dried freshly washed glasses. Wes opened the back door for me and we stepped into a well-lit parking lot. There were only three cars there. A red sedan, a black old mustang, and a luxury car of some sort in pearl white.
I assumed my new writer friend drove the sedan.
When he strode over to the pearl-white vehicle and opened the passenger door, I had to keep my composure. I thanked him, slid into the seat, and wondered how he made enough money to buy such a nice car. The interior was all white leather with red stitching. It smelled like new car and leather, and when he got in and started the ignition, I could barely hear it. All the lights in the dash came slowly to life, and an old rock song played softly on the radio.
“So where are you staying?” Wes asked.
“The Super Eight down the block.”
He frowned. “Are you pulling my leg?”
I shook my head. “No, like I said, budget issues.” I felt like a dumbass for making the crack that he’d understand that since he was a writer and all. Clearly, he had no such troubles.
He put the car in reverse and pulled out of the space. Soon, the headlights were leading the way down the street to my motel. Minutes later, we pulled into the parking lot. Wes peered up at the motel and I could see the worry in his eyes.
“This is no place for a young woman to stay by herself,” he said.
“It’s all I can afford.”
Wes drummed his fingers on the top of his steering wheel. “I can help you find a job, you know. Sometimes, a couple connections are all it takes to get your foot in the door somewhere.”
I smiled and took my seatbelt off. “I appreciate that offer, Wes. I really do. But I believe in making my own way. I came out here to prove to myself that I’m capable. I’m going to build a life for myself, not take handouts.”
“You’re stubborn, aren’t you?”
“One of my best qualities.”
Wes nodded as I got out of the car. He leaned over the console to peer up at me. “Am I going to see you again?”
I raked my fingers through my hair. “You know where to find me, Shakespeare.”
Chapter 8
Wes
Fourteen years.
She hadn’t seen him in fourteen years.
The night she’d gotten in the back of that taxi and driven away from him had been the biggest mistake of her life. At the time, she’d thought she was doing the right thing. She was so sure he wasn’t enough for her, so sure that there were bigger and better things out there waiting for her on the horizon.
All that had been waiting for her was discontent and a man who didn’t love her like he had. And that’s who she’d married.
How could she ever forgive herself? How could she go back home after all this time and tell him what a h
orrible mistake she’d made?
She opened the cupboard and fished the largest pieces of the broken china cup out of the garbage can. She held them in her hands like a bird with broken wings and flipped the pieces over until she found one with a whole flower on it. Briar poured the rest of the broken pieces back into the garbage can but held the flower to her heart and thought of her mother and—
I stared down at the page and Briar’s name written in my handwriting. How had that happened? The woman had been on my mind relentlessly since I sat with her at the bar last night. I’d thought about her as I went to bed and again this morning when I opened my eyes. Now here I was scribbling her name into my story.
“Get it together, Wes,” I grumbled as I crossed her name out and replaced it with the character’s real name, Katelyn. She’d been named after Katie at the El Cartana. Or rather her name had been inspired by Katie. I hoped she knew that when she read this book when it was eventually finished.
I tried to continue with the scene I was writing, but all that spilled from the tip of my pen was a bunch of nonsense that I ended up scribbling out. The distraction was costing too much mental energy. I needed a way to extinguish it.
To satisfy it.
My phone rang.
It sat facedown within reach on the filing cabinet beside my desk in my home office. It vibrated while it rang and inched toward the edge of the cabinet. I considered ignoring it in the name of writing, but seeing as how that wasn’t working well for me, I turned the phone over. Harriet’s name flashed across the screen and I stifled a groan.
She was going to take a bite out of me if she was calling to ask about the book. My agent was a busy woman and the last thing she wanted was to be told I was behind schedule.
But I was no liar.
I answered the call. “Harriet,” I said as cheerfully as I could manage. “How’ve you been?”
Harriet sounded distracted. I heard horns honking and the distant rumble of a motorcycle running. She was in her Range Rover, no doubt. “Wes,” Harriet purred. “So nice to hear your voice, as always. I’m good. Busy as ever. You know how it is. Someone wants this and someone wants that and I’m stuck in the middle making sure everything gets done.”
“A miracle worker really.”
“I think so too. Hold on a second.” Harriet promptly laid on her horn. I winced and held the phone far from my ear as she bellowed at a stranger on the street about some slight they’d caused her. When she returned to the call, it was like nothing had happened. “How was the rest of your retreat? Did you enjoy the tropical weather and the beach?”
“Always.”
“And the food?”
“Of course.”
“And the writing?”
“Well, it wasn’t the best, but—”
“You’re on a deadline here, Wes. You know that, right? Your publisher is breathing down my neck, and the last thing I want to do is call him today and tell him you’re still having writer’s block. You know that’s not a real thing, right? There are studies that prove it.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose and leaned back in my chair. “So you’ve said.”
“I don’t make up the facts, sweetheart. I’m just giving them to you. The longer you sit there telling yourself you have a mental block, the longer you keep yourself from cashing in on this book. And me too, I might add. There’s a lot tied up in this publication. There are contracts to re-sign at the end of this. Haven’t you considered that your tardiness might cost you the publishing house? They have plenty of authors who want to work with them, Wes. Authors who would be over the moon to have their work seen and marketed the way yours are. You have to keep your competitive edge.”
“Pressure makes it harder to write.”
“Pressure?” Harriet chuckled into the line. “Honey, you don’t know what pressure is. I’m under pressure. I have a husband who’s never home and three kids to manage. Do you know how many extracurricular activities come along with three overachieving children, Wes?”
“Twelve,” I said. “You’ve told me.”
“I have to bust my ass so those kids can pursue their passions. I can’t sit around just hoping you’ll deliver when I know you need someone to light that fire under your ass. Where would you be without me, Wes? Don’t answer that. It’s rhetorical. You’d still be modeling for cover ads and fashion magazines. That’s what. And you’d be bored as shit and aimlessly trying to find purpose in the most materialistic, self-intrinsic, wealth-driven industry out there.”
“I don’t know if that’s accurate.”
“That’s not the point.”
I frowned. Conversing with Harriet had never been easy. She talked circles around people and made money doing it. Back when we first signed on to work together, I thought it had been the wise choice. She was my golden ticket to success. And theoretically, I’d been right. But the level of success I’d reached came with sacrifices.
Working with Harriet meant I had to cross a lot of personal boundaries, lose sleep, and be beaten over the head with a figurative stick on a near weekly basis.
“All I’m saying is you have to step back and look at the big picture, Wes. Your procrastination tendencies are going to ruin your career if you don’t get a handle on them. I’m in your corner. You know that.”
I massaged my temples. “Yeah, I know.”
Was she in my corner, or was she in the corner where the most money flowed into?
“So what are you going to do when we get off the phone?” she asked.
“Write.”
“Good answer. Now, off you go. Set that mind of yours to the task and make those sparks fly!” Harriet ended the call.
I put my phone in my pocket, stood up, grabbed my jacket, and abandoned my loft to go in search of my red-haired muse.
The book could wait a little while longer.
Chapter 9
Briar
In the short amount of time I’d been in New York City, I had come to one borderline-paralyzing realization.
I was in over my head.
That didn’t mean I wanted to go home. Not at all. I wasn’t going to turn tail and run like a coward all because this city, and quite frankly the people who lived in it, intimidated me more than my eighth-grade home economics teacher, Mrs. Richardson. She was someone not to be messed with, and if you did, there would be hell to pay. She threw a pan of fresh-baked cookies across the classroom one time after Will Peterson mouthed off in class. The melted chocolate chips had left streaks on the cupboards and it was a miracle the pan never hit anybody.
It was also a miracle she was never fired.
I didn’t leave home economics because of Mrs. Richardson. I certainly wasn’t going to leave New York all because New Yorkers were abrasive, rude, and a little scary. The pace of everything here was fifteen times faster than it was back in Waynesville. People had places to be. People to meet. Checks to sign. Here, they wore high heels and power suits. Back home, they wore jeans and flannel and cotton T-shirts with puns written on them.
I had to step up my game, and the best way to do that was to be bolder with my look. The red hair helped, but I wasn’t doing myself any favors strutting around town in jeans and a cardigan. I needed to look like I belonged here.
I needed to look like I could fight for what I wanted.
So on Wednesday morning, I took the time to get ready. I curled my hair and put enough hairspray in it to make it as big and wild as a lion’s mane. I swept thick black liner on my eyes and flicked it out on the edges into a wing. I coated my lashes in mascara until they were almost touching my eyebrows.
Then I swept a dark burgundy lip stain on. I’d stolen the color from Madison’s collection. She had a dozen shades that were nearly the exact same hue and I doubted she’d notice it was gone. Besides, I needed it more than she did. I’d never purchased beauty products before. Everything I owned came in gift sets from my old roommates. Sometimes, my mother put the odd skin-care item in my Christmas stocking but tha
t was about it.
Low maintenance was my middle name.
As I stared at my reflection in the bathroom mirror of my motel room, I acknowledged that the girl staring back at me certainly didn’t look high maintenance.
She looked like she wasn’t here to fuck around.
I stood up straight and put two big gold hoop earrings in. Feeling like I could take on the world, I left the terrible fluorescent lighting of the bathroom, grabbed my purse from the end of my bed, and slung it over my shoulder. I had an umbrella with me this time that I’d purchased last night from a man on a street corner selling them out of a covered trolley. It had only cost me fifteen dollars and I suspected it might be the best purchase I could have made here.
Right before I stepped out the door, my phone rang.
Riley’s name flashed across the screen. I grinned and answered the call, pinching the phone between my cheek and shoulder as I opened my motel room door and stepped out into the crisp late morning air. I’d meant to get an earlier start for job hunting today but the hair and makeup had taken time.
“Hey, girl,” I said as I turned back to make sure the door had closed properly. I gave the handle a sharp tug and carried on down the sidewalk when I was satisfied that all my belongings were safe. “How are you?”
Riley’s voice was thick with fatigue. She didn’t work on Wednesdays or Thursdays and always slept in whenever she had the chance. “I’m good, babe. I’m good. Just sitting in the kitchen with my morning coffee missing you. Usually, you’d be here with me while Madison slept.”
I frowned. “I wish I could be there.”
“Tell me about New York. What’s it been like so far?”
“It’s been great,” I lied. “The city is alive and vibrant and I already made a friend.”