Since they’d settled in Brooklyn, I got a kick out of the team name. It was so Brooklyn to name a baseball team simply the Bats. No beating around the bush as to what they were doing here with a fancy, flowery name. To me, the name said that they weren’t here to compete with any New York baseball dynasties. They just wanted to play. You had to admire ballsy gusto like that.
“When half the office is hybrid, you should give us more notice than twelve hours to find a way to Coney Island,” Auden huffed as she shifted in her seat.
I blew out the same frustrated breath and nodded. I worked as a copywriter for a PR agency and would write articles if the client’s campaign called for it. Occasionally, a client meeting or interview would disrupt my usual hybrid schedule of two days inthe office and three days at home, but I’d always had plenty of notice.
I’d handed in my manuscript to my editor last week, or else this unexpected work meeting or outing or whatever this was supposed to be would have sent me into a breakdown spiral if I’d had to sort out my sister and a deadline.
Something had to give soon, but I couldn’t handle trying to decide what.
“Aggravating or not, this is nice,” Auden said to me in a loud whisper as we settled into our seats. We’d been best friends since college, and she’d brought me into the agency after she’d been a designer here for a few years.
While my book royalties would ebb and flow, they didn’t cover the bills on a consistent basis. Plus, if I had only them to depend on, the creative side of my brain would close like a frightened clam. Writing was more for my mental health than my wallet and a treat for me. It was a way to forget my troubles in a fictional world I could create.
I tried not to think about the othertreatI’d had last month and ponder silly questions like what he was doing now and where he was working. That treat was something I could only afford to indulge in once, even if the craving was still potent when I’d let my mind drift to all that happened that afternoon and later in his hotel room.
I massaged the tension knot in my neck as I gazed up at the gray sky, drawing on some ice-cold reality to push out the hot fantasies in my brain.
Taylor was doing too much, and I had to sit her down and make her choose rather than let her do whatever activity she had a whim for. But taking that privilege away made me feel like the parenting failure I was exhausting myself not to be.
Although, the one good thing our mother had done was set the bar low. I didn’t have to try that hard to be better than shehad been, but it was an uphill battle to make up for all she hadn’t been to us.
I loved my sister to pieces, but being her official guardian was more pressure than I’d ever expected it to be, even if I’d always been the one to take care of her.
My phone buzzed as I searched for my bosses in the crowd.
Emily:Girl, this is your best book yet.
My eyes grew wide as a happy rush ran through me, pure joy kicking up my heartbeat. I was confident in this book, but that nauseated wave of anxiety when I’d hand in a manuscript never wavered. My editor calling it my best book was the distracting high I’d needed today.
Me:Really? All my tenses were good this time?
I wrote for a living, yet when I told a story, past and present tense would trip me up and piss me off.
Emily:Well, no. But don’t worry about that. Your readers are going to go nuts. The longing drips off the page. It’s been a fight to remember I’m supposed to be editing not reading.
Me:I’m thrilled you’re having that problem.
Emily:Me too. I loved your other books too, but whatever you did while you were writing this one, keep doing it.
I exhaled a slow breath, a nasty twinge of regret killing my high and settling in my stomach like a brick, as I realized exactly what I’d done differently with this book and how I couldn’t do it—or him—again.
I’d channeled all that inspiration and—as Emily had noticed—longing into the story that had led me right to Silas that day. I’d finished the entire book in record time, and as I’d read it over, I’d woven all that extra emotion and those “if only” feelings I hadn’t known what to do with into the pages.
I’d known that Silas would be an endless inspiration well, but I didn’t know how long I could draw from it without feeling dejected and depressed.
“What’s up?” Auden asked, her brows pinched at me when I lifted my head. “You looked super excited, and now you just look sad.”
“Emily is almost finished with my new book, and she says it’s my best yet.”
Emily was Auden’s cousin from Long Island, and I’d run into her at a family party years ago, right before I was about to publish my first book. I’d been researching independent publishing for a long time but had been clueless as all hell about where to begin. She was an experienced editor and patient and kind enough to always give it to me straight.
“That’s great! Please tell me you aren’t already in the ‘I know I won’t do better than this’ phase.” Auden let out a soft groan as her head fell back. “Usually, it’s a couple of months after you publish before we have to deal with that.”
“No, it’s not that. Yet,” I said, lifting the corner of my mouth. “She said the longing drips off the page and whatever I did while I was writing this book, make sure to keep doing it.”
Her brows jumped, realization dawning across her features.
“Ah, I think I see. This book was so good because you had an amazing night full of life-altering sex with a man you resolved to never see again.” She lifted a shoulder. “At least, I’m guessing.”
