AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Hannah
My mom and dad have been harassing me over the phone all day, asking when I’m going to settle down and find myself a nice man to marry. They drove in for the wedding and are already back on the road to their next travel destination. Seeing Jameson, who’s like a second son to them, get married yesterday lit a fire in them. Now, all of a sudden, they want a son-in-law and a horde of grandchildren to cuddle and spoil. They better be bugging Colby, too. He’s eight years older and getting all set in his grumpy, perfectionist ways.
“Now, Hannah,” my mom starts. “You know I’m not trying to tell you to settle, but, honey, your standards are so impossibly high. You’re not going to find a perfect man. You’ve met your father…he’s full of flaws, and I still love him to pieces. I mean, sometimes he makes me so angry that I could smack him into next week, and I have considered changing the locks and not giving him a new key—”
“Mom!”
“It’s just a joke, Hannah. Lighten up.”
“Well, you’re still not making me want to try harder,” I say, wondering if my dad is sitting nearby, feeling terribly offended. After thirty-five years of marriage, they probably joke like this all the time, though.
“I’m just saying, you’ve been on dates with some nice guys. You should give one of them another shot,” she says. I don’t know how to respond. I’m at the coffee shop. I can’t exactly tell her that as long as I’m in this town, with Seth Freaking Miller popping up all over the place, I’ll never be able to move on. There are listening ears everywhere, and I’d rather that little tidbit not circulate around town.
I’m standing in line at the coffee shop, waiting to place my order for my iced vanilla latte, and see two teenage girls sitting at my favorite table in the corner. They’re already on my bad side just for that. To make matters worse, it looks like they’re talking about me. I don’t always assume that everything is about me, but when they’re pointing directly at me and giggling, it kind of gives them away. I drape my hair partially over my face to try to block them from my view. I graduated from high school five years ago. I don’t need this drama in my life anymore.
“Mom, I have to go,” I mumble into the phone and hang up before she can get another word in.
Tess rushes in behind me and looks at me like I’ve lost my mind. “Why’s your hair all over your face? Are you about to audition to play Cousin It in the high school play?”
“No, no,” I answer as I push my hair from my face. “I wasn’t sure if you were coming. You didn’t reply to my text earlier.”
“Girl, I practically threw Riley at Dan, and I ran out of that house as soon as I got your text. There was no time to reply. He might’ve foiled my escape. I’ve been buried under babies all day,” she says. Now that she mentions it, she does smell a little sour, like baby spit-up.
I long for the day that I can have a loving husband like Tess’s husband, Dan, and a pile of cute babies to cuddle with on the weekend. Tess is living my dream life, and I know she loves it. Hopefully, someday I’ll get to run to her when motherhood is overwhelming me. And hopefully, someday isn’t too far in the distant future. As much as my mom’s nagging for me to find someone drives me crazy, I actually do want that. I want someone who can finish my sentences, someone who knows to buy me mountains of sugary snacks when I’m sad or stressed, someone who finds my dancing around the house more endearing than annoying.
It’s my turn to order, and as I step up to the counter, I notice the barista’s eyes widen with recognition. Her mouth opens as if she wants to say something to me, but she snaps it shut, thinking better of it. I don’t really know this girl. I’ve only ever seen her in this coffee shop, and seeing as every spare penny I have typically goes straight into savings for my future bookstore or is spent on buying used books (also for my bookstore), I hardly have extra pennies to spend on expensive coffee. I hardly ever come here, so I’m curious about what she wants to say to me.
Tess and I order our coffees and a gigantic cinnamon roll to share and sit at a table to wait for them. After a few minutes, the girl brings our stuff to the table and takes a deep breath before saying, “So, is it true? You’ve taken Seth Miller off the market?”
I’m so shocked by what I’m hearing that I begin to choke on the tiny bite of cinnamon roll that I stuck in my mouth the moment she placed it on the table. Tess grabs a water bottle from her gigantic purse and shoves it in front of me. I take a long drink before asking the girl to repeat her question, because surely I heard her wrong.
“Are you and Seth Miller really dating?” she asks again. This is the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard. Why would she think that I, Hannah Stuart, am dating the most gorgeous man in this entire town? A man so far out of my league I might as well be an alien from a different planet. Have I always dreamed of the day that someone asks me this very question and I get to say, “Why, yes. You did hear right. As a matter of fact, we’re madly in love,”? Obviously. But hearing that question right now, I am left confused, befuddled, perplexed.
“Umm, no. We’re not,” I say when I finally get control of myself. The girl looks relieved as she swipes a hand across her forehead. Tess raises her eyebrow at me. Good, I’m not the only one who has no idea what’s going on.
“Oh, good. I’m not going to lie; I would’ve been devastated,” she says. I glance at the girl’s loosely braided pigtails, jean-short overalls, and Converse sneakers. She’s a pretty girl but in an adorable, fresh-off-the-farm sort of way.
“Aren’t you in high school?” Tess asks her with a barely contained laugh.
“Yeah! I’m a senior!” she says, bouncing on her toes and clasping her hands in front of her.
“You do know that Seth Miller is thirty-one years old, right?”
“Oh my gosh, is he really? Dang… Grandpa looks good for his age,” she says with a shrug and turns to walk back to the counter.
I bite my lips between my teeth to contain my laughter, but as soon as I hear her ask the other barista if she knew Seth Miller was old, I lose it. Tess has her hands over her face, trying to not cause a scene in the middle of the peaceful coffee shop. It’s too late. My uncontrollable laughter has the entire place looking at us.
“I am so telling him about this later,” I say in between laughs.
“Oh, definitely. His ego needs to be brought down a peg—or ten,” Tess agrees.
Once we both calm down, I tell Tess about the other phone call I had bright and early this morning. My landlords called. Turns out that the fire started in the kitchen, thanks to bad wiring. Not surprising at all.
“They’re going to clear the lot and then sell it, so I have a week to get the salvageable stuff out of my bedroom. It’s the only room in the house that wasn’t burnt to a crisp.”
“It probably still smells,” Tess says.
“It definitely smells, but that’s the least of my worries. Obviously, I knew I wasn’t going to be moving back in there, but it’s really hitting me now. I’m homeless.”
