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10
Viv was feeling particularlymelancholy as she pulled into the Golden Years parking lot. She told herself, in her best Cher impression to, Snap out of it!, but it wasn’t working. Ever since Glenn had walked out of her garage four days ago, she’d felt…off.
Her phone buzzed and she grabbed it to see that she’d gotten a text.
Jimmy Blue Eyes Carwash: Can I see you l8r
Even if Viv wanted to hook up with Jimmy who, from the context clues in the name she’d saved him under in her phone had blue eyes and she’d met at the carwash, the fact that he’d decided to use the number eight instead of writing out the word later would have been a deal-breaker.
But she didn’t want to meet Jimmy Blue Eyes Carwash or anyone else for that matter. It had been two days since she’d had her heart to heart with The Gladiator in the garage and she could not get the man out of her head.
She’d thought that she’d obsessed over him before, but this was at a creepy level. Not an hour, not a minute, not a second went by without him being in her thoughts. He had camped out in her mind and she wasn’t exactly sure how in the hell to evict him.
And it wasn’t in a fun way. Like it had been when she’d googled all the pictures of him and she just kept thinking about his abs, chest, and arms. It was in a bummer way, like just the knowledge that a perfect specimen of a man like him existed made her feel shitty.
Which made no sense. None. At. All.
Sitting in the car feeling sorry for herself wasn’t going to help anything. Plus, Nonna was probably watching her from her window, so she got out and hightailed it up the walkway into the retirement home. As the sliding doors opened guilt crept up and tapped her on the shoulder but she did her best to ignore it.
It whispered, “You only have your house because poor Nonna has to live here.”
No. Viv shook the thought off. Josh, her soon to be brother-in-law had been trying to get his grandmother to move into this place for years. Her inheriting Nonna’s house was not the cause of her current living situation.
She stepped inside and saw Cindy seated behind reception.
“Hello, beautiful!” Cindy smiled widely as Viv approached the desk to sign in.
“Hey, gorgeous!” Viv replied.
“Here to see Nonna?” Cindy asked.
“Yep.” Viv nodded as she picked up the pen to sign her name.
Cindy leaned forward, placing her hands flat on the desk.
Viv had lived in Hope Falls long enough to recognize the move. Cindy was going to either ask something personal, or share a tidbit of gossip that she didn’t want to be overheard. Viv seriously hoped it was door number two. The last thing she wanted to do was answer any personal questions.
Normally, they didn’t bother her. But that was before she actually wanted more in her personal life than just random hookups and relationships with an expiration date shorter than milk. Now that she wanted something real, her dating life had become a lot less fun.
“I heard that Nonna gifted you her house.”
“Oh, yeah.” Viv nodded. She wasn’t sure why Cindy was whispering. It’s not like that was much of a secret. Unless, Nonna didn’t want people to know. Which in Hope Falls would be impossible. “She did.”
“And I heard that you have a very sexy tenant in the back.” Cindy continued whispering. “How’s that working out?”
“Not as scandalous as one would hope. Daughter, remember.”
Cindy sat back in her chair and looked a little disappointed. “Oh yeah, that’s right. I forgot.”
Cindy had tried to set Viv up on more than one occasion. Her husband Davis owned a construction company and every time an eligible man got hired Cindy either tried to set Audrey or Viv up. Now that Audrey was off the market, she guessed all the single men would be coming her way.
That thought should make her a lot happier than it did. If anything, it just sounded depressing.
“Have I told you about Davis’s foreman? He’s forty, divorced, no kids, and used to play for the NFL.”
All of those stats, on paper, sounded amazing. Age appropriate. Check. Gainfully employed. Check. Divorced, which meant he was once married, which meant he could commit. Check. No kids. Check. Used to play for the NFL, which meant he was athletic. Check.
But Viv had absolutely no desire to meet the man. Or any man. She’d deleted all her dating apps this morning. She was in, what her mom used to refer to as, a funk. But Ava would probably call it mild depression. She wasn’t sure if what she was experiencing was on a clinical level, but she definitely didn’t feel like herself.
