Total pages in book: 106
Estimated words: 101398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 507(@200wpm)___ 406(@250wpm)___ 338(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 101398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 507(@200wpm)___ 406(@250wpm)___ 338(@300wpm)
Silence stretches between us like a newborn baby waking up from a nap. And it continues for a good five minutes as he drives us toward the center of town.
Though, for all three hundred seconds of the silence, my people-pleaser mind won’t stop racing with possible things I can say to thaw out the frigid quiet and make him not be so dang surly.
I come up with exactly zero things.
And as downtown Red Bridge starts to come into view, I notice his shoulders tensing out of the corner of my eye, but I don’t allow myself to consider the reasons why he might be feeling so aggressive.
I mean, I—
“I guess you have no sense of self-preservation, huh?”
My head jerks toward him like a whip. “Excuse me?”
“Getting in a truck with a complete stranger and letting him lock you in without even acknowledging it? That’s fucking stupid.”
“But you said—”
“I don’t care what I said or how desperate you are. You never do this again. You could’ve wound up dead or worse, you understand?”
I hate being lectured. It reminds me of my mother. Lecturing me about my life decisions is one of her favorite hobbies. Or at least, it was, until I turned into a runaway bride and left the man she wanted me to marry at the altar.
“Did you hear what I said?” the macho, lecture-loving grump spits, and his words might as well be the match to my flame.
What is this guy’s problem? If giving me a ride pissed him off this much, then he shouldn’t have done it. It’s not like someone was putting a gun to his head. He offered of his own volition.
“Now is when you confirm you understand hitchhiking a ride is a stupid fucking thing to do,” he adds through a clenched jaw while keeping his eyes on the road.
Okay, yeah. I’ve had enough of this guy’s bullshit.
Red-hot anger pulsates inside me until it finds its preferred exit out of my body—through my big, fat mouth.
“Listen here, bucko. I don’t need a lecture from some random muscle man!” I slap both of my hands down onto my thighs. “I need a ride to my sister’s house. So, either give it to me and shut up, or let me out here.”
On the one hand, I’m proud of myself for standing up to a bully for once. On the other, I wish I would’ve said just a little less.
Not even ten seconds later, the truck rocks to a hard stop.
His door swings open, and my suitcase hits the sidewalk before I can shove my foot any deeper into my mouth.
And all I can do is climb out willingly—scared of what my lack of cooperation might cause—and watch as he drives off in a cloud of speedy dust.
Way to go, Norah. You’ve officially started this new adventure in Red Bridge with a fan.
Norah
Apparently, when you combine embarrassment and anxiety and exhaustion and fear, time becomes a vortex.
It also doesn’t help when an alphahole in a truck dumps you in the middle of town, a good four miles from your actual destination, because you got sassy with his broody, lecture-giving ass.
Thankfully, cell service picked up in downtown Red Bridge, and I was able to successfully GPS myself to Josie’s. I know it took me just over an hour to walk to her house on Oak Street, but I have no idea how long I’ve been standing here since arriving. I’m drenched in sweat from the unexpected exercise, and Lil’s suitcase looks like it’s been involved in a hilltop battle with a conscientious cooperator named Desmond Doss.
Leaving a man at the altar, followed by a few days of couch time and violent movies with Lil at the Holiday Inn in Midtown—the whole reason I’m able to make a Hacksaw Ridge reference, honestly—and a journey from hell have left me feeling like I’m barely a person. But I’m here now, and that’s all that matters.
If only I could get myself to lift my hand and knock.
I take inventory of my sister’s house and yard again, for what has to be the hundredth time, but this time, it’s…different. Overwhelming nostalgia hits me square in the chest. I’m in a Lana Del Rey song, and everywhere I look are things that make me feel simultaneously happy and sad.
Everything is the same. The yellow shutters. The white brick. The pink door and porch swing. Even the little yard ornaments and knickknacks in the form of fairy statues and gnomes and frogs littering the garden beds surrounding the house.
This used to be our grandmother Rose’s cottage and our father’s childhood home.
After our grandmother passed away, Josie moved out of the small, studio apartment above her coffee shop and started living here. And from the looks of it, the only thing she’s done with the place is keep it maintained. Everything else is exactly as it was when we were kids, and that realization settles the smallest sense of relief inside my belly. I feel like I’m where I’m supposed to be.