by Karen Deen
The letters that my mother wrote for me and Paige, I couldn’t even open or read until I started with Dr Bridge. However, she made me see that to have the future I want I need to deal with the past. The letter was short and just explained what we suspected, that she gave me up out of fear. The last line gave me the closure I longed for with her words: ‘I will always love you no matter where you are.’ She longed for a better life for me and it may have taken time, but now I couldn’t be happier.
So much for Lex and his slowness. We married six months after that night at the lake house and spent our honeymoon creating a new life. If I thought his alpha protectiveness was bad before, it just hit overload. Hence the therapy, so we never get to a point where we stop communicating our fears.
Lex is already an amazing dad, but part of him is worried his upbringing will come out in him as the kids grow older. He has been having a few therapy sessions with his dad to try to work on their relationship, since his dad left his mother. His dad wants to be a grandfather to the kids, and I know deep down Lex wants that too but it’s a work in progress. What I do know without a doubt, is that there is no chance of Lex being a bad dad, his heart is too big, and Jack and Kayla already have him wrapped around their fingers. So, the twins Remi and Gabe being born will make no difference. It’s just another little boy and girl to add to the list in this house to drive him crazy but suck him in at the same time.
Anna has been to visit us a few times now and the kids have started to call her Franna. It’s their version of Nanna for the framily. She loves Lex and he adores her. I overheard him one night telling her how grateful he was for her keeping us all safe before he found me. They shed a few tears together and I quietly did too. I’m so glad she is still part of our lives.
Slowly running my hand over my pregnant stomach, I’m smiling. The bigger the family the better.
Secretly I can’t wait.
Our little family and our big framily I wouldn’t trade for the world.
Them or my life under the stars.
Fifteen years later
“Do you think he needs me? I mean, what if he panics? He’s never panicked before and he won’t know the counting. Remember the counting, Lex? I should have taught him…” Before I can finish the sentence, Lex kisses the air back into my lungs.
“Mia, stop. Otherwise I will make you count.” He hugs me tight and kisses me on the forehead. “Baby, Jack is fine. You’ve heard him. The crowd will love him.” The lights dim, and the crowd is starting to cheer.
“Hey Chicago!” My Jack’s voice booms into the concert hall. “Thank you all for coming tonight for the first concert of our national tour.” The crowd is now starting to go wild. I can feel the electricity in the air as Lex pulls me back against his chest and wraps his arms around me.
“Look at our boy, Lex,” I say as he leans down to kiss my cheek.
“Yeah, baby, we did good.”
“My name is Jack Jefferson or JJ as my dad calls me. Before we start tonight, I want to just give a shout out to my huge framily who are a here tonight to support me, my two sisters Kayla and Remi, my little brother Gabe, and my dad, Lex. But there is one special lady who I need to tell something, and if I can get through this then I can get through anything in life.”
My heart drops and I’m crying already.
“My mom lived a hard life when I was little. She did everything she could to survive and protect my sister and me. The memories are blurred, but there is one thing I will never forget, and that’s how she used to tell me to sing away the fear. So, from the age I could talk she taught me that my happy place was when I was singing, which I have never lost. Mom and Dad, tonight is for you, and I have a special surprise for you. I found this book a few years ago in a box of family memories, that you had packed away. You may recognize the words of this brand-new song, Mom. For everyone out there, these are the words my mother wrote on a piece of paper in my auntie’s bedroom over fifteen years ago, while she watched over me sleeping. I hope you love it, as much as I will always love you both.”
I can’t stop crying and my heart is so full seeing Jack truly happy on the stage where he was always meant to be. He takes a breath, and in my mind, I say the only words that make sense. ‘I’ve got you, just breathe.’
“Tonight, for you, Mom, I’m dreaming big and wishing on my star that same wish I remember from way back then. I wished for you to find someone to be your star just like you have always been mine.”
I blow him a kiss, and I feel Lex’s tears on my cheeks too as he whispers in my ear, “Home is where the heart is.”
Looking at my big extended family around me.
I know this will always be my home.
THE END
Read on for the first chapter of Gorgeous Gyno & Love’s Wall
COULD THIS BE MY TIME
Mia’s Song
The search has always been for that place for me,
Deep inside my soul, where only you can see.
But even then, no one knows the real me.
It’s so hard for me to see, who I’m meant to be.
Today was the same as yesterday and
Tomorrow I can’t see any change.
A day of me trying to be who I think they want to see,
But instead you came along and showed me a place for us to feel free.
A lifetime of trying, fighting for happiness.
How hard does it have to be?
I’m being pushed and shoved in your chosen direction,
But what you failed to see, was it was never right for me.
I had to look deep inside, to see where I wanted to be,
To see who I really had growing within me.
Then today was the day, change is upon me.
You’ve seen past the fuss.
It’s you being you, and I’m learning to be me,
Today we can be us, and tomorrow hoping for the same.
If this change can stay, then the pretending goes away.
People come and go as just part of the show,
But tonight, I know you and I are more than before.
I look back now at the grief I was made to feel,
Those silent punches into my soul they didn’t see.
I had to believe and hope that in time
The circle will keep moving to set me free.
Now that I’m finally in a place to be me
You want me to keep believing in who I can be.
My eyes are open wide and all I can see
Is my heart now beating outside and it’s not just for me.
A safe place for us is where we are now standing.
Put your strength in me and we can finally be
Who we always should have been.
To the critics stay on your road
And that life, you don’t know how to alter.
But I’m no longer on your train
To the place you said I should be.
The time has come to tell you all
That this place was never for me.
Because finally he was the first to see
What’s been buried deep inside me.
This is my time, his time,
Our time, the time to live the dream.
LEX’S LOVE LETTERS
BONUS LETTERS
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Lex wrote for Mia in his time at the Lake House.
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LIST OF TITLES
The Complete TIME FOR LOVE Series is now available:
LOVE’S WALL #1
LOVE’S DANCE #2
LOVE’S HIDING #3
LOVE’S FUN #4
LOVE’S HOT #5
Standalones:
GORGEOUS GYNO
PRIVATE PILOT
NAUGHTY NEURO
LOVABLE LAWYER
Gorgeous Gyno
Matilda
&nbs
p; Today has disaster written all over it.
Five fifty-seven am and already I have three emails that have the potential to derail tonight’s function. Why do people insist on being so disorganized? Truly, it’s not that hard.
Have a diary, use your phone, write it down, order the stock – whatever it takes. Either way, don’t fuck my order up! I shouldn’t have to use my grown-up words before six am on a weekday. Seriously!
I’m standing in the shower with hot water streaming down my body. I feel like I’m about to draw blood with how hard I’m scrubbing my scalp, while I’m thinking about solutions for my problems. It’s what I’m good at. Not the hair-pulling but the problem-solving in a crisis. A professional event planner has many sneaky tricks up her sleeve. I just happen to have them up my sleeve, in my pockets, and hiding in my shoes. As a last resort, I pull them out of my ass.
I need to get into the office to find a new supplier that can have nine hundred mint-green cloth serviettes delivered to the hotel by lunchtime today. You would think this is trivial in the world. However, if tonight’s event is not perfect, it could be the difference between my dream penthouse apartment or the shoebox I’m living in now. I’ll be damned if mint napkins are the deciding factor. Why can’t Lucia just settle for white? Oh, that’s right, because she is about as easy to please as a child waiting for food. No matter what you say, they complain until they get what they want. Lucia is a nice lady, I’m sure, when she’s not being my client from hell.
Standing in the bathroom, foot on the side of the bath, stretching my stockings on, I sneak a glance in the mirror. I hate looking at myself. Who wants to look at their fat rolls and butt dimples. Not me! I should get rid of the mirror and then I wouldn’t have to cringe every time I see it. Maybe in that penthouse I’m seeing in my future, there will be a personal trainer and chef included.
Yes! Let’s put that in the picture. Need to add that to my vision board. I already have the personal driver posted up on my board—of course, he’s sizzling hot. The trains and taxis got old about seven years ago. Well, maybe six years and eleven months. The first month I moved to Chicago I loved it. The hustle and bustle, such a change from the country town I grew up in. Trains running on raised platforms instead of the ground, the amount of taxis that seemed to be in the thousands compared to three that were run by the McKinnon family. Now all the extra time you lose in traffic every day is so frustrating, it’s hard to make up in a busy schedule.
I slip my pencil skirt up over my hips, zip up and turn side to side. Happy with my outfit, I slide my suit jacket on, and then I do the last thing, putting on lipstick. Time to take on the world for another day. As stressful as it is and how often I will complain about things going wrong, I love my life. With a passion. Working with my best friend in our own business is the best leap of faith we took together. Leaving our childhood hometown of Williamsport, we were seeking adventure. The new beginning we both needed. It didn’t quite start how I thought. Those first few months were tough. I really struggled, but I just didn’t feel like I could go home anymore because the feeling of being happy there had changed thanks to my ex-boyfriend. Lucky I had Fleur to get me through that time.
Fleur and I met in preschool. She was busy setting up her toy kitchen in the classroom when I walked in. I say hers, because one of the boys tried to tell her how to arrange it and her look stopped him in his tracks. I remember thinking, he has no idea. I would set it up just how she did. It made perfect sense. I knew we were right. Well, that was what we agreed on and bonded over our PB&J sandwich. That and our OCD behavior, of being painfully pedantic. Sometimes it meant we butted heads being so similar, but not often. We have been inseparable ever since that first day.
We used to lay in the hammock in my parents’ backyard while growing up. Dreaming of the adventures we were going to have together. We may as well have been sisters. Our moms always said we were joined at the hip. Which was fine until boys came into the picture. They didn’t understand us wanting to spend so much time together. Of course, that changed when our hormones kicked in. Boys became important in our lives, but we never lost our closeness. We have each other’s backs no matter what. Still today, she is that one person I will trust with my life is my partner in crime, my bestie.
Leaning my head on the back wall of the elevator as it descends, my mind is already running through my checklist of things I need to tackle the moment I walk into the office. That pre-event anxiety is starting to surface. It’s not bad anxiety. It’s the kick of adrenaline I use to get me moving. It focuses me and blocks out the rest of the world. The only thing that exists is the job I’m working on. From the moment we started up our business of planning high-end events, we have been working so hard, day and night. It feels like we haven’t had time to breathe yet. The point we have been aiming for is so close we can feel it. Being shortlisted for a major contract is such a huge achievement and acknowledgement of our business. Tapping my head, I say to myself, “touch wood”. So far, we’ve never had any disaster functions that we haven’t been able to turn around to a success on the day. I put it down to the way Fleur and I work together. We have this mental connection. Not even having to talk, we know what the other is thinking and do it before the other person asks. It’s just a perfect combination.
Let’s hope that connection is working today.
Walking through the foyer, phone in hand, it chimes. I was in the middle of checking how close my Uber is, but the words in front of my eyes stop me dead in my tracks.
Fleur: Tonight’s guest speaker woke up vomiting – CANCELLED!!!
“Fuck!” There is no other word needed.
I hear from behind me, “Pardon me, young lady.” Shit, it’s Mrs. Johnson. My old-fashioned conscience. I have no idea how she seems to pop up at the most random times. I don’t even need to turn around and look at her. What confuses me is why she is in the foyer at six forty-five in the morning. When I’m eighty-two years of age, there is no way I’ll be up this early.
“Sorry, Mrs. Johnson. I will drop in my dollar for the swear jar tomorrow,” I mumble as I’m madly typing back to Fleur.
“See that you do, missy. Otherwise I will chase you down, and you know I’m not joking.” I hear her laughing as she shuffles on her way towards the front doors. I’m sure everyone in this building is paying for her nursing home when they finally get her to move there. I don’t swear that often—well, I tell myself that in my head, anyway. It just seems Mrs. Johnson manages to be around, every time I curse.
“Got to run, Mrs. Johnson. I will pop in tomorrow,” I call out, heading out the front doors. Part of me feels for her. I think the swear jar is more about getting people to call in to visit her apartment. Her husband passed away six months after I moved in. He was a beautiful old man. She misses him terribly and gets quite lonely. She’s been adopted by everyone in the building as our stand-in Nana whether we like it or not. Although she is still stuck in the previous century, she has a big heart and just wants to feel like she has a reason to get up every day and live her life.
My ride into work allows me to get a few emails sorted, at the same time I’m thinking on how I’m going to solve the guest speaker problem. Fleur is on the food organization for this one, and I am on everything else. It’s the way we work it. Whoever is on food is rostered on for the actual event. If I can get through today, then tonight I get to relax. As much as you can relax when you are a control freak and you aren’t there. We need to split the work this way, otherwise we’d never get a day or night off.
The event is for the ‘End of the Cycle’ program. It’s a great organization that helps stop the cycle of poverty and poor education in families. Trying to help the parents learn to budget and get the kids in school and learning. A joint effort to give the next generation a fighting chance of living the life they dream about.
Maybe if I call the CEO, they’ll have someone who has been through the program or somehow associated with the mentoring that can give a firsthand account of
what it means to the families. Next email on my list. Another skill I have learned: Delegation makes things happen. I can’t do it all, and even with Fleur, we need to coordinate with others to make things proceed quickly.
As usual, Thursday morning traffic is slow even at this time of the day. We are crawling at a snail’s pace. I could get out and walk faster than this. I contemplate it, but with the summer heat, I know even at this time of the morning, I’d end up a sweaty mess. That is not the look I need when I’m trying to present like the woman in charge. Even if you have no idea what you’re doing, you need people to believe you do. Smoke and mirrors, the illusion is part of the performance.
My phone is pinging constantly as I approach the front of the office building. We chose the location in the beginning because it was central to all the big function spaces in the city. Being new to the city, we didn’t factor in how busy it is here. Yet the convenience of being so close far outweighs the traffic hassles.
Hustling down the hall, I push open the door of our office.
‘FLEURTILLY’.
It still gives me goosebumps seeing our dream name on the door. The one we thought of all those years ago in that hammock. Even more exciting is that it’s all ours. No answering to anyone else. We have worked hard, and this is our reward.
The noise in the office tells me Fleur already has everything turned on and is yelling down the phone at someone. Surely, we can’t have another disaster even before my first morning coffee.