Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 121764 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 609(@200wpm)___ 487(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121764 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 609(@200wpm)___ 487(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
“Meaning?”
“Meaning… I don’t really care about a career. I’ll do whatever job I can do in the place I’m at. Maybe I’ll bartend. Maybe I’ll be a waitress. Maybe I’ll farm seaweed or be a kayak tour guide or serve lunch at a kid’s camp.” I shrugged. “Every new job will be a part of the adventure.”
Jaxson smiled. “That’s pretty cool.”
His response startled me a bit. I was used to people hearing that little speech and promptly telling me I was irresponsible or lost, that I was a dreamer who would have to wake up one day.
“Is it?” I laughed. “I’m not sure my parents would agree, or most of America, for that matter. I’m living off the fund my parents promised me upon graduation. Past that? I have zero idea how I’ll feed myself. All I know for sure is that I can’t spend my life in an office.” I shook my head. “I’d rather barely have two quarters to rub together than be loaded and stuck in a cubicle all day.”
“Well, if you were that loaded, you’d probably have a corner office with a view.”
“I don’t want to look out at the world, though,” I said, hopping off the line to stand right in front of him. “I want to swallow it whole, to take every experience it has to offer, learn every lesson it has to teach.”
His eyes searched mine, the edges of them crinkling a bit as he did. “Anyone ever tell you you’re not like other twenty-two-year-olds?”
“Well, I turn twenty-three next month, so maybe that’s why. Your turn,” I said, pointing to the line.
“My turn?”
“Come on, you big baby. Get up there.” I smacked his ass with that, and he gawked at me before barreling out a laugh and planting his foot on the line. He stepped up easily, which made me slightly hate him.
“I really do think it’s cool, you know,” he said, his body shaking with the effort it took to keep his beastly frame balanced. He took a step, arms swinging out wide. “I admire that you’re not just doing what the rest of your peers are.”
“Well, don’t admire it too much. It’s more a sign of the fact that I’m not particularly great at anything, nor do I have a passion past seeing the world. It might be different, otherwise.” I nodded toward him. “Unlike you and Vince, not many people in the world know exactly what they want to do at the ripe old age of five.”
“Not many people have parents who don’t give them a choice, either.”
“You say that like you don’t love it,” I said, watching as he carefully turned around and didn’t fall.
Bastard.
“Which I know is a lie, because I’ve seen you play.”
He bobbed his head a bit, telling me without words that I wasn’t wrong.
I could sense that he didn’t want to dive in more on the subject, so I tried to edge the conversation away from his parents. Naturally, it led me to think of my own.
“I’m pretty sure my parents forget I exist until I show up at their house to do laundry.”
Ugh.
I hated the words even as I said them. I wanted them to come out as a joke, to sound playful and funny. Instead, I sounded jealous and bitter and resentful — three emotions I didn’t make space for in my life.
“Ew, sorry,” I said on a laugh. “That sounded petty as hell. I know my parents love me and care about me. The fact that I’m living off their dime proves that. And I know they’re interested in my life just as much as Vince’s.”
I didn’t believe those words even as I said them, trying to convince Jaxson and myself that they were true.
“I just don’t have as much going on at the moment. So, it’s all good.”
Jaxson paused, studying me before he hopped down from the line and walked over to where I stood.
“I fucking hate when you do that.”
“Do what?”
“Act like you’re not allowed to feel anything but happy, like being sad or angry or disappointed makes you a bad person.”
Everything around us quieted.
The water stopped rushing, slowing to a hushed trickle. The wind ceased to blow, leaving the trees standing still.
All I heard was my heart beating overtime in my chest.
All I felt was a man seeing right through me.
His eyes held mine, not apologizing, not backing down.
My next breath stuttered out of me, and I was all too aware of how my chest rose and fell like I was running a marathon as opposed to standing still. There was a hot, enigmatic energy flowing off him — his eyes holding mine, his chest heaving just the same.
Then, those eyes fell to my lips.
Do it, the voice inside me urged.
It was a whisper at first, and then an incessant chant. He was looking at my mouth like he wanted to cover it with his own, and I silently begged him to without moving a fucking centimeter.