Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 94106 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 471(@200wpm)___ 376(@250wpm)___ 314(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94106 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 471(@200wpm)___ 376(@250wpm)___ 314(@300wpm)
I started to get pissed at all the reminders of how good my mother was to my father. How the hell could he step out on her with how thoughtful she was? My jaw set tight as I continued to open them.
Because you forgave me when I didn’t deserve forgiveness.
I froze. Did she know? I’d just assumed since they stayed together that she had no idea. I knew couples got past cheating sometimes, but it had to be a struggle, and I’d never seen any signs of hard times. From the outside, my parents had a picture-perfect marriage. I picked up another slip…there were still a dozen or so left.
Because you watch The Bachelor just because I love it, even though you hate it.
My brows drew together. My father hated that show, yet he sat with my mother while she watched it every week. I went back and re-read all of the slips of paper I’d opened already. I’d assumed these were my father’s notes, but the closer I looked at the handwriting, the more I realized I’d been reading from my mother’s jar all along.
But what the hell did he have to forgive her for?
I kept going, feeling more wary than ever. The rest shed no more light on what had gone on between the two of them, until I came to the very last one.
Because while fate decided we came into each other’s lives, sometimes we have to fight to stay. And every day, you remind me we’re worth the fight.
***
I couldn’t sleep. The blood in my veins seemed to be pumping so fast that it made it impossible to even lie down. I paced back and forth in the living room. Everything was just so fucked up. My father cheated on my mother, maybe my mother cheated on my father, or maybe she’d done something else to hurt him. Maybe she knew about his affair and chose to stay anyway. Maybe she’d even had her own. I’d never know, and at this point, I didn’t want to know.
The most fucked-up part of it all was that I was looking at them to figure out how to live my own life. Before I’d gone to Chicago, I’d been so sure of things between Valentina and me. She’d been the one who wasn’t sure. And when I’d come back, she’d obviously decided we should give pursuing things after the summer a try—exactly what I’d wanted. And I was the idiot who pushed her away. Pushed her back into dating. I shook my head thinking of the photo of her and that guy on Instagram.
Great fucking job, Ford.
Nice work!
If you love something, set it free, and if it doesn’t come back, it was never yours.
That was a crock of shit.
If you love something and set it free—it serves you fucking right. You should’ve held on to that shit.
If she’s here next year—that will be a sign.
Yeah. I got a sign out here, alright.
For. Fucking. Sale.
I raked my hands through my hair and tugged at the roots.
What the hell was I thinking?
When you love someone, you don’t walk away. Ever.
Fuck.
Fuck.
Fuuuck.
I needed to see her.
Before it was too late.
If it wasn’t already.
Chapter 31
* * *
Valentina
You can’t force feelings to exist any more than you can force them to go away.
My study group get-together tonight was fun, and I was glad I’d decided to stop sulking long enough to go after all.
Allison hadn’t been able to find a full-time, tenure-track position, so she took a job as a district-wide permanent sub. Basically, she played sit-down-and-shut-up for six, forty-two-minute periods a day. She wasn’t thrilled, but supposedly an Italian teacher in her district was retiring at the end of the year, and she’d have a foot in the door for that. Desiree had taken a three-month maternity leave replacement. It seemed Mark and I had been lucky to get full-time spots with benefits for the year.
I’d taken the train to the restaurant so I could have a glass of wine or two, and after dinner, Mark offered to give me a lift home. My house was pretty much on his way, so it felt weird to say no.
When we pulled up in front of my house, he put the car into park and turned to face me. “Tonight was fun. I’m glad you decided to come.”
I smiled. “Me, too.”
He caught my gaze. “So…things with you and young blood ended?
I swallowed. “Yeah.”
Mark’s nodded. “You seemed happy with him.”
“I was.”
He nodded and looked away for a minute. “If things don’t work out with him, I’d love to take you out…as friends…or more.”
It seemed like an odd way to phrase it…if things don’t work out with him…after I’d just acknowledged we broke up. Mark saw the confusion on my face.
He lifted his chin toward my house. “Not sure he got the memo you broke up.”