Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 77269 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 309(@250wpm)___ 258(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77269 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 309(@250wpm)___ 258(@300wpm)
“Yes,” Roman said before leaning back and giving me a kiss. “Fuck yes, baby. You did it.”
We were on a trip to Los Angeles, and as usual, the sun was shining and the sky was blue. I had just gotten back from my final meeting with my real estate agent, where I had finally, after a long deliberation process, sold my modern LA mansion.
“No more big glass house,” Roman said.
“Good riddance to it,” I said. “It was pretty, but I want something different, now.”
“I don’t blame you. You went through a lot in that house, Theo.”
Over the past year, Roman and I had taken various trips back to LA when I needed to for work. The LA house had been safe and secure every time we’d been there, but in my heart, I knew that I wanted something else now.
The house had far too many memories attached to it. Good ones, sure, but the bad memories kept me tied to a past that I had no connection to anymore. A few months ago, I had known it was time to sell.
I’d purchased a much smaller, old Spanish-style home in the Hollywood hills as we waited for the sale on the old house to go through. I still wanted a home base in Los Angeles for when we flew out for jobs, and the new home was a much better fit. It was beautiful, but in a cozy storybook way instead of a glass fishbowl way. It felt safe, tucked at the side of a little hill surrounded by tall trees. And when I was here with Roman, it almost felt like home.
Because my real home, to me, was now my house in Kansas. Over the past year, it had grown into a house I was deeply proud of, and with the renovations finally complete I had been able to decorate the house how I wanted it. I had gotten big, black-and-white photo prints made of my grandfather’s photos from Kansas, and framed them in the living room.
I’d even taken out the smart-home features from my bedroom, because Roman didn’t like them.
“You must really love me,” he’d said when I showed him, and it made me so damn happy.
“I’m still keeping all of my voice-activated stuff downstairs,” I said. “But I want you to be as comfortable as possible sleeping with me. Because I love you sleeping with me.”
“And I think I’m warming up to the smart-home crap, anyway,” he said. “Just a little. I used it to set a timer the other day.”
“Wow, look at you, enjoying technology.”
“You’ve expanded my life in so many ways, T.”
I licked my lip. “I’ll definitely expand something later tonight, my love.”
“Is that a joke about you stretching my ass?” Roman said, pretending to be shocked.
“You bet your tight little ass, it is,” I said.
Even just thinking about it made me miss Kansas, even though I knew we’d be back in a few days. I loved it there, though I never would have known it was possible.
Roman and I hopped in my McLaren and I sped off through the hills up to the new home. It was still in the process of being furnished.
“I didn’t tell you, but I brought something very special to make sure this house at least sort of feels like a home-away-from-home,” I said as we got out of the car and headed in.
“Oh yeah? What’s that?”
I walked over to one of the big windows in the living room that looked out over the small pool in the backyard. I reached in my pocket, felt something fuzzy, and pulled it out.
“What could make this place feel more like home than a nice, soft little ball sack?” I said, reaching over to place it on the windowsill.
“Holy shit,” Roman said, smiling wide. “You were carrying that around this whole time?”
“Had it in my pocket all day,” I said. I pulled out my phone and snapped a picture of it, texting it to Donna.
>>Theo: The cherries have found a new home.
Roman was still laughing. “You could have taken the hummingbird one.”
“Nope. It’s the ball sack. It had to be the ball sack.”
“I love you.”
I kissed him. “I love you so much, Rome.”
“You’re going to do great tomorrow.”
A thread of excited nervousness wound through my heart. Finalizing the sale of the old house wasn’t the only reason we were briefly back in LA.
I also had a meeting tomorrow with the film director I admired most, Martina Sanford, about the script I had sent to her a couple of weeks ago.
Not just any script. My script. The one about my grandfather’s life, which I’d been slowly working on writing over the past year.
I’d never written anything that long before. I was colossally nervous sending it to Martina, who was an Academy-Award-winning director of incredible independent films. I was still worried the script wasn’t good enough. It wasn’t perfect, and it never would be. But Roman, as usual, had been so supportive about it that I’d decided it was finally time to show it to people in the industry.