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“Are you?”
“Nah,” he answered, and I had no choice but to smile at the ceiling. “Hey, Rosie?”
Turning onto my side, I stared in the direction of the couch. I could barely make him in the dark, but I still looked. “Yes, Lucas?”
“How many pages away from your dream are you?”
I thought about all the words I hadn’t written today. About howI’ll need to recalculate my daily goal again. Just like I had to do every day.
“Writers count in words and not pages.”
I heard a deephmmm, before he countered, “So how many words away from your dream, then?”
Many. “Still a few.”
Only meeting a word count wasn’t the problem, wasn’t it? It was about so much more than just that. It was about writing. Inspiration. Or the lack of both things.
Neither of us said anything for a long time and then, when I was no longer sure whether he was asleep or not, I heard him say, “Buenas noches, Rosie.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Lucas
New York. The Big Apple. The City That Never Sleeps.
Anywhere I looked, there were either people rushing through the day, vehicles dashing through the streets, or buildings bustling with activity and…
Noise. So much noise.
It was different from every other American city I’d visited during the first half of my trip and a far cry from home.
Home. Spain.
But that had been the whole point, hadn’t it? A change of scenery.
I had willingly exchanged waking up to the waves crashing against the shore for skyscrapers and hot dog vendors. I had willingly left behind the freedom of taking the coastal road and driving whenever and wherever I pleased and committed to an itinerary of sorts. I had traded Taco and my people for crowds of faceless strangers.
And the only reason I had done any of that was because that peace, that freedom, that scenery I knew like the back of my hand, and the people who loved me—or the version of Lucas I had been—were no longer comforting. They loved someone who now felt like a stranger.
New York City was my last chance to escape. To postpone the inevitable. Of everyone finding out the real reason why I’d taken this trip. Of them wanting to fix it. To fixme. Because that was how the Martín family operated.
Just like Abuela said:“Ay, Lucas, no vas a arreglar nada tumbado ahí como un monigote.”
You won’t fix a single thing lying there like a stick man.
But there was nothing to fix. I sure as hell didn’t need fixing, either. That would mean that the possibility to restore what I’d lost existed. And it didn’t. I couldn’t get on a board anymore. I couldn’t do the one thing I knew how to do. Surf. The one thing I loved and was lucky enough to make a living doing. The one thing I hadthriveddoing. The water, the waves, feeling the roughness of the wax under my feet, the sand sticking to my skin. It had been my life. The adrenaline, the constant traveling. I had just reached peak performance, and even in my early thirties, I’d had a few more good years in me. Releasing a rough breath as I stood on the Manhattan side of the Brooklyn Bridge, I noticed I’d been staring into the swirling water of the East River for what had to be an unacceptably long time.
I checked the time on my phone. It was early enough to cross one more city sight off my list: either walking around City Hall Park or checking out the Charging Bull on Wall Street. Both attractions were free, which was a requirement since I was still waiting for my replacement card. Rosie had lent me more money—money she’d slipped in my jacket when I hadn’t been looking and which I planned to return with interest—but that was reserved for public transportation.
“Como un monigote,”I muttered to myself, repeating Abuela’s words.
She might be right. I was one. Purposeless. Just like a plastic container in the river. Floating around with no course. Just being dragged around and… existing.
I was tired. Exhausted, really. And now the simple thought ofgoing sightseeing, drifting in the current of strangers didn’t seem like something I could do.
Rosie’s face popped up in my head. Unexpected. I’d promised her that I’d be out of her hair during the day so she could work, and I’d had every intention of keeping that promise. Today was an exception. Today, I was feeling extra sore. So much so that I’d be shocked if I didn’t end the day with that goddamn limp that had taken me weeks to lose.
Today, I felt extra lonely, too.
