The house creaked and settled around me. I remembered the last time I’d slept in this house, the night before I left for grad school in Atlanta. I had plans and was filled with conviction. I was going to write stories that mattered. Travel the world and bring it back in words that would inspire people. I wanted to prove leaving was the right choice.
Now here I was, back where I started, broker than before, with a twist-out that needed serious intervention and a manuscript not worth the cloud storage it occupied.
As I turned onto my side, the lumpy ass mattress dipped under me, and I wondered if Raina was right. Or maybe it was the weight of my failure. Had I been running in circles, chasing something I would never catch?
I was still awake as the first hints of morning appeared through the attic window when the house began to stir, a shower running, probably my brother-in-law, Mike. Soon Raina’s kids would be up, getting ready for school, living the kind of structured life I’d always run from.
Was I the family failure everyone thought I was? The cautionary tale parents told their kids to keep them on the straight and narrow?Stay in school, get a real job, or you’ll end up like Aunt Aven, coming home with nothing but stories nobody wants to read.
The plastic stars above me had faded, invisible in the growing morning light. Just like my plans, my confidence, and my sense of purpose all faded until I barely remembered they were ever there at all.
By sunrise, I’d had enough of staring at Junior’s ceiling and feeling sorry for myself. I slipped out of bed, threw my hair into a high bun, one bad day away from a full intervention, and grabbed the first clean clothes I found in my suitcase.
Raina’s house was quiet, except for the coffee maker gurgling downstairs. It was my signal to move fast, slipping into the bathroom before the morning interrogation began. I needed air that wasn’t recycled through an attic and a plan that didn’t involve admitting everyone had been right about me all along.
After a quick shower, I pulled myself together. I left a note on the counter.Gone job hunting. Back later. ~Aven. It was vague enough to buy me some time but specific enough to avoid a worried text every fifteen minutes. The thought of Raina’s concerned eyes and questions pushed me toward the door.
The morning air felt like a blessing. July in Goodwin Grove, Ohio, was already warming up, but anything was better than the attic. I had forty-three dollars to my name, a twisted ankle that complained with each step, and my nerves one loud noise away from shattering completely. Yet, I also had my determination, which Raina always said was just stubbornness with a better PR team.
I needed a job, any job. Something to provide a check, a schedule, and enough purpose to get me through each day until I figured out what came next. Writing might have been a bust, but I still had working hands and a brain. That had to be worth something to somebody.
Main Street looked completely different from when I’d left years ago. In Atlanta, I was another face. Here, I was Aven Compton, the girl who’d left like I was too good for this place, only to return with my tail between my legs.
I found myself at Brew & Bean, a small coffee shop that had survived the economic ups and downs of our town for as long as I could remember. The owner, Mrs. Patrice, still played Jill Scotton a loop and greeted everyone like family; she was genuinely happy to see them.
“Wow. Look what the wind blew in,” she said when I approached the counter, her smile wide and genuine.
“Just for a little while,” I commented, trying to sound like I had options.
“You know we’re always happy to have you back.”
“Thanks. How are you?” I asked.
“I woke up on the right side of the dirt. Amen. What would you like today, sweetie?” Mrs. Patrice asked.
Mrs. Patrice made me giggle at her antics. I ordered a chai tea, the cheapest thing on the menu, and took it to a small table by the window. The tea was hot and too sweet, but it gave my nervous hands something to do.
I pulled out my journal and phone to scroll through job listings, trying not to panic at how few options were relevant to my interests — retail, food service, administrative assistant at the high school where half the teachers had taught me and would remember every detention I’d ever served. I did manage to apply for a few jobs.
That’s when I saw him… Across the street, coming out of a building I didn’t recognize, was a man who made my heart forget how to beat. He was taller than I remembered, broader through the shoulders, with a neatly shaped beard and a fresh haircut. Still, I’d know that walk anywhere, purposeful without being hurried, like he knew exactly where he was going and how long it would take to get there.
Langston Black — my high school love, my almost everything, the boy who’d looked at me like I hung the moon and then forgotten I existed after graduation. He was the one whose future I’d saved with a single lie told convincingly to a police officer who’d wanted to believe me.
He wore a button-up shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows, revealing forearms corded with muscle that hadn’t been there when we were eighteen. He was handsome and seemed to carry the same quiet intensity that had drawn me to him all those years ago, now seasoned with a confidence that came from knowing who you were and what you’re about.
I sank lower in my chair, not ready for him to see me looking like this, tired, broke, and nowhere near the success I’d promised I’d become the last time we spoke. Langston didn’t glance toward the coffee shop. Instead, he stopped to talk to a man in a suit, their conversation looking serious and professional.
The sign above readBlack Security & Investigationswith a logo underneath. My eyes went back to Langston, taking in the details I’d missed, the security badge clipped to his belt, the way the older man deferred to him, and the professional handshake concluded their conversation.
Langston owned a security company. Langston Black, who’d almost lost everything his senior year because of the crowd he ran with, now ran a legitimate business in the same town that had nearly written him off.
The chai sat forgotten in my hand as Langston walked the gentleman to a black SUV parked at the curb. My mind raced, not with panic but with possibility. For the first time since I’d stepped off the plane, a plan came to mind. It was not a perfect plan, not even a good one, but something with potential, something to keep me from having to admit defeat to Raina and everyone else who’d been waiting for me to fail.
My expression shifted from despair to calculation as Langston headed back toward the building after the SUV drove away. If Langston Black could reinvent himself in this town, maybe I could too.
And I knew where to start.
Chapter
