Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 76821 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 384(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 256(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76821 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 384(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 256(@300wpm)
Triss would sometimes declare that my problem was that I needed more “inspiration.” By that, she didn’t mean taking a trip to see new sights, hear new sounds, or anything like that. She meant I needed to get laid.
Objectively, she was probably right. But I just wasn’t interested.
I kind of liked my life just the way it was.
Safe.
Quiet.
Except, of course, for Triss.
“We should go out,” she decided.
“It’s almost midnight on a Tuesday,” I reminded her.
“Yeah, but you don’t have to get up at any particular hour. You’ll be up writing until almost morning anyway. And I’m practically nocturnal.”
That was true.
We were both lucky enough not to have to keep any particular hours.
Triss was a social media manager. Which was a fancy way of saying she worked for herself, doing all of four hours of work a day for her dozens of clients, and raked in almost eighty grand to do it.
My job was a bit more of a mish-mash of little writing gigs that I could piece together from listings I found online.
With a bit of hustle, I could bring in forty thousand a year. But I admittedly didn’t hustle as much as I could.
I wasn’t lazy, per se.
I was just unsure of myself, and struggled with reaching out to potential clients sometimes.
That said, I didn’t need to make the kind of money Triss did.
We were living in our lovely Gram’s house rent-free. I wasn’t drawn to designer things or going out much. So, even with my salary, after bills, and whatever books I couldn’t stop from splurging on, I usually had money left over to sock away for a rainy day.
I took after our Gramps. He’d been a practical and quiet man, the kind of person who had elbow patches not for aesthetic purposes, but because garments had to be falling apart to replace it with something new.
Triss took after our Gram. She’d been romantic and eccentric, decorating her house in bold, maximalist vibes, and being certain that cake or a stiff drink could cure all life’s ails, both physical and emotional. Gram was a woman who had a collection of no fewer than fifteen-hundred sets of large, statement earrings, and about twelve tubes of her favorite red lipstick rolling around all her drawers.
Our Gramp had passed many years ago, and in his absence, Gram had become even more outlandish with each passing year since.
Hence Triss and I living in her home while she decided to live on a cruise ship.
Yes.
Lived on it.
I hadn’t even known such a thing was possible. But it was. And she was absolutely loving it.
She usually came home for a week or two on the holidays before she got itchy to get going again.
I missed her terribly, but I felt that I had a piece of her in Triss.
I was heartbroken at the prospect of Triss finally getting serious about a man, settling down, and leaving me, giving him and her kids all of her crazy instead, leaving me alone with my insecurities and fictional characters who might drive me insane before I ever got their stories fully on paper.
That said, I also wanted it for her so much. No one deserved love quite as much as Triss.
“I already took my bra off,” I tried instead. Because every woman knew that once the bra came off, there was no putting it back on to leave the house.
Except, of course, Triss was one of the very few women who didn’t wear a bra. Ever. It wasn’t even that she was flat and could just get away with a tank or something. Nope. She had a great rack. It just defied gravity.
When the universe was doling out all the beauty, it had given Triss the lion’s share of our family’s. Great rack, high, rounded butt, cheekbones to die for, hair that never went frizzy, no matter how much moisture was in the atmosphere.
I mean, I wasn’t exactly a troll or anything, but when my sister rolled out of bed in the morning looking like she was ready to walk a runway when I was trying to flatten my hair and de-puff my eyes, yeah, I kinda felt like one.
“Who cares?” Triss said, rolling her eyes. “I don’t know if you know this about men, but they love when the titties are doing their natural jiggle,” she said, shaking hers for emphasis. “Let’s go jiggle them on a dance floor.”
“By the time we even get to Miami, it will almost be time for closing,” I reminded her.
“But then there are restaurants to hit up or… okay, okay, I know,” she said, holding up a hand to stop any further objections. “Not your thing. But we need to do something. Cheesecake and chats? Golden Girls style?” she asked, eyes bright.
“We ate the last of it over the weekend,” I reminded her.