Ugh, that’s not helpful.
“Avonlea?” he asks, an eyebrow raised.
Oh right, I’m supposed to respond when asked a question. “What? Sorry.”
“Do you need anything from town?” His eyes glitter behind his glasses and I’m reminded again of the boy I knew, before he started wearing contacts more often than not. I’ve noticed that he wears his glasses most of the time now, and I wonder why that is. I wondera lotof things about thisman.
“I think we’re pretty well covered here.” I look anywhere but at him. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” he says, moving to leave.
I blush and duck my head. “Thank you for Sunday too.” I’d been wanting to bring it up for days, but this is the first time we’ve been alone.
“You’re welcome, Avi,” he says quietly, and my nickname on his lips knocks a shiver down my spine.
I snap my head up.
His hand is pressed to the door and I note how his shirt hugs every muscle of his back, and god, his ass in those jeans… He really grew up well, and that is not something I should be noticing.
Without a look back, he pushes through the door, and all the air in my lungs follows him out in a rush.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Jamie – Now
As I expected, Brent’s response was less than enthusiastic. The barrage of communication over the last five days has been overwhelming to say the least. He by no means believes I should be taking a sabbatical right now. His words exactly?You’ll be throwing away everything you’ve worked for by turning your back on another deal with Fog City Book Group.
But I’m exhausted from the grind of the past six years, and I just want a break. I need to find my love of storytelling again, need for it to feel like it used to—less like a job and more like a passion.
I dig around in my side table, looking for the notebook I threw in on a whim while panic packing for this trip. It’s the notebook my mum gave me, the leather worn and cracking, and it’s filled with tales of my youth—of Avi’s youth. The stories of our summers together.
Folded into the back is a printed copy of the short story I wrote last winter. One centered around the adventures I’d planned for me and Avi in our final summer together, the ones I’d wanted to go on with her but that never happened—because she wasn’t here.
It was cathartic to write them as if they had, but it also hurt like hell to realize they’d never be real. That story would always be fiction—something I made up to fill the void of missed opportunities.
I scootch back against my pillows and flip through the notebook, watching my handwriting become more and more precise. Taking in the way my writing grew and changed. Seeing how I played around with different styles throughout the years.
I wonder what the teenage version of me would say if I told him what his future looked like—that he’d be a bestselling adventure-fiction writer at twenty-eight with three published books to his name.
It’s hard to regret the past when I know each choice and decision led to that success. Moving to the States with my parents. Deciding to stay there for college, where I met my mentor—a man who sculpted me and helped hone my writing so I’d have a book to query my agent with. But at the end of the day, no matter how much I love my life and my career, I can acknowledge that it came at a great cost.
And I’m not willing to continue to sacrifice everything else for that goal. No matter how mad that makes Brent.
I’m here to reconnect with my roots, my family… That is the new goal.
Now I have to decide how Avi being here fits into that…
We can’t go back to the way things were between us—I know that—but I’m done existing in this standoff with her.
If I gleaned anything from her conversation with her mum the other day, it was her concern about bringing Lennox up here with the way things are. I don’t want her to keep him away because I’m being an ass.
It’s been ten years, it’s probably time I let go of all the hurt associated with that time. I owe it to myself to try.
With that as my motivation, I head downstairs only to glimpse Avi walking down the garden path in the direction of the street. Acting on a whim, I go after her and let my long legs consume the space between us until I’m close enough to call out.
“Avi!” I shout, letting her nickname slip from between my lips for the second time. Withholding it was my way of keeping my walls up, but it was only hurting me, and maybe her too.
She spins on her heel, blonde hair flying around her face. The wariness behind her eyes tells me she’s preparing for the inevitable fight. But I’m not interested in fighting with her. Not today. Not anymore.
