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I’m not purposefully looking… well, sort of. I mean, if some hot guy happens to park at the end of the parking lot closest to your house and is facing you every time he lifts his shirt, what’s the point in missing the show? Or the hot ass that bends over with his towel wrapped around his waist as he pulls his wetsuit up underneath it. I pray every day that it will accidently slip undone. I still don’t know… does he wear anything under that towel and wetsuit, or is it a commando thing?
“Shit!”
Stumbling forward, I nearly fall flat on my face as Coco decides she is going to run again. Except this time, she’s attached to me.
Bitch of a dog, I’m sure she does it on purpose. Probably because she saw me eyeing her surfer boy. I swear this dog is human, or at least wants to be.
“Coco, if you don’t slow down, you are not getting any breakfast!” My squeaky voice rings out as I try to keep up with her.
“Yeah, that’s right,” I say as she slows to a walk again. “I’m the boss, remember.” I’m trying to catch my breath again, and I let out a giggle. You would think walking every afternoon and morning—with this crazy dog that has me running half the time—would make me fit.
God, what must that guy on the board think of me? I’m probably his morning comedy relief. I’m the story he tells his work buddies when he gets to work.
‘Oh, you should have seen the crazy dog lady this morning, almost face planting in the sand when the dog took off on her.’
Hmm, what would his voice sound like?
I’m sure it would be deep and a little raspy, like the real rugged guy that he looks like. Trying to imagine him talking about me is a bad idea. My mind starts wandering to what he would sound like, except not talking to his buddies. That voice I can hear, but then it changes to his dirty talk. Fuck, I have been on my own too long.
That’s what they call desperation, when you are imagining a guy you have never met talking dirty to you while he fucks you.
“I’m a lost cause,” I mumble to myself as I walk along the beach toward home. Coco just looks back at me with those sad eyes, then turns forward again and keeps walking.
“Great, now even my dog thinks I’m a hopeless case. My life is a mess.”
The sun is starting to creep a little higher in the sky now as the day is waking up. Looking up towards the houses, you can see more activity and cars on the roads, everyone going about their morning routine. Although the sun is rising, there are clouds starting to build. They might look light and fluffy now, but that tinge of gray in them tells me they aren’t going to be as innocent as they seem.
Walking up the bank of grass on the sand dune towards my house, I take a breath. My life might be a mess, but this is my sanctuary. My little house on the beach where I can be me and then let my imagination run wild.
After coming through the gate to the yard, I lean down and take off the lead from Coco’s collar and give her a pat and hug her. She might drive me crazy, but I do love her and know she is the one who keeps me from going insane. Living on your own can be lonely. No matter how many characters are talking to me in my head, human interaction is what I crave. Or to be more accurate, I miss the feeling of being touched. Not even intimately, just the regular cuddle, holding hands, or even the stupid thump in the arm of a friend joking with you.
It’s the life I walked into back then, but some days I wonder why.
Coco’s wet nose gives me nudge on the back of my leg to remind me I promised breakfast, and instead I’m standing here on the porch daydreaming again.
“Okay, girl, let’s get you some food and I can get on with my workday.” Her wagging tail tells me she approves.
* * *
Standing in front of the bathroom mirror, pulling my wet hair up into a ponytail, my mind is already in work mode. A plot twist has just come to me in the shower, and I want to get in front of the computer and get it down. It’s the strangest thing being an author. It’s my mind, and even I don’t understand how it works. The storylines that come to me happen at the strangest times. Not always in one go, either. Sometimes it builds slowly, and I know the ideas of what the book is about, then bam, it hits. The pivotal scene or the whole story starts playing my head. Or I see one character and their storyline, and the other is hiding from me.
No wonder I’m a loner. How do I expect people to understand me when I can’t even work out my thoughts some days?
One thing I know, though, is by the time I pull a book together, there are people out there in this world who can make sense of my jumble, and luckily for me, come back for more.
Opening up my computer, I quickly jot down the scene for the plot twist, so I don’t lose it.
“Right, now where was I up to?” Yeah, talking to myself is another sign I’m certifiably insane.
“You know exactly where you are up to, you idiot. They are about to have sex. Why do you think you were dreaming about surfer boy this morning, talking dirty to you?” Rolling my eyes at myself seems a waste of energy, but hey, that’s what us creatives do.
Coco lets out a snore from at my feet. The big energetic dog that wouldn’t stop running this morning has left, and in her place is the lazy lump that spends most of the day lying next to me while I lose myself in my book.
When I moved to North Carolina a year ago, I had no idea what my future held in store. Taking the leap and releasing my first book that I had written years before was the scariest thing I’ve done in my life. And let me assure you, I’ve done some scary things before now.
Three books later and I can’t stop.
Writing is my addiction.
