Total pages in book: 142
Estimated words: 135522 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135522 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
There was such a better way I could have handled all of this.
I didn’t have to disappear on him like that, ghosting him like a cruel villain, and ending what we had without warning.
Except, worst of all, I didn’t even properly end it.
I just left Cole holding a pile of confusions and frustrations.
How was this helping anything at all?
I deleted the message I had written out, set my phone back on the nightstand, then went to the bathroom. Afterwards, I stood in the kitchen and drank a glass of milk, staring into the darkness with my thoughts. I wandered up to the door of the guestroom and peered in at my father’s train town. I came up to the edge of Windville to inspect the little people, the buildings and tiny plastic trees, and the caboose of the train with “I’m happy in this town!” painted across its back in tiny cursive letters. I stared at the town for what felt like half the night, thinking about Cole, about my dad, about this past month and all the events that have transpired since the moment Burton pushed me out of the Spruce Press building with the mission of finding a story at the festival.
Little did I realize I’d become the story.
Or at least a part of it.
Now Cole can carry it on from here, I thought to myself with the train tracks in front of my face, then returned to my room and put myself back to sleep.
There’s no telling how much sleep I actually got before I woke up in the afternoon to the sight of my mother standing over my bed with her hands on her hips.
“No,” she said. “This simply won’t do.”
I sat straight up, rubbing my eyes. “What?”
“I spoke with Dad. I spoke with your dear grandpoppy on the phone. I spoke with God. I spoke with my batch of Cute Tutes I just pulled outta the oven. I spoke with myself … and I even spoke with you while you were sleepin’ and snorin’ away.”
“I don’t snore.”
“And all of us agreed. Including your sleeping body.” She sat on the bed next to me. “Cole is the best dang thing to ever happen to us, and what in ever lovin’ heavens are you doin’ to my future son-in-law and our happy family we could have together?”
I gaped at her. “S-Son-in-law?”
“He fits in with us so well here. And he adores you, Noah. What else can you possibly need? Why did I have to send that beautiful young man away yesterday? Do y’know how much that hurt me?”
“Mom.” I sighed as I reached for my glasses on the nightstand and fumbled to put them on. “It’s more complicated than that.”
“No, it ain’t. You just need to quit overthinkin’. Who was it that said them words?” She drummed her fingers along her chin. I just then noticed she was still wearing her oven mitt. “Tommy … somethin’-‘r-other … friend of the family. He’d said: ‘Quiet people have the loudest minds’ …”
I frowned. “You think my mind is loud?”
“I think you talk yourself outta everything. I’m tellin’ you, you need to get out of your own way and accept the joy and happiness that is literally droppin’ himself on your doorstep. Sweetheart.” It was then her voice went soft. “Is somethin’ wrong with him?”
“No.” I let out a huff of frustration. “There’s … literally nothing wrong with Cole Harding.”
“Somethin’ wrong with you, then?”
I took a minute to gather myself. I grew quiet. “You … haven’t even seen the competition out there. These guys who will be going tonight to bid on a date with Cole … They are hot. They’re stunning. They’re studly and handsome and about a dozen other adjectives I could easily stuff an article full of.”
My mom made a noise right then that was halfway between a laugh and a fart. “Honey, darlin’, you have got to learn a serious and fundamental life lesson right now before I lose my dang mind. As cute as you are, and as gorgeous as I think you are despite what you say about these other boys that’ll be there, it ain’t your looks that’s got Cole hooked on you. When you go to take your showers, or when you’re not in the room … me and him talk, y’know.”
“He and I,” I groaned, “and please, spare me. You don’t—”
“Do you think it’s my gorgeous looks that made your dad fall for me? I wasn’t any more of a colorful peacock when I was seventeen than I am right now, y’know.”
“It’s male peacocks that are the colorful ones,” I mumbled.
“Your daddy fell for me because I burned a batch of cookies in home ec class.” She chuckled. “I felt like I’d made the whole school stink to high heaven. Your daddy, sweet, sweet Elmer, he was in my class, and while all the girls had a laugh about how bad a baker I was, he stood there in front of everyone, took one of my burned cookies, and would you believe it? He ate the whole dang thing!”