Chapter 1
I wanted to be left alone.
Why was that so hard to ask for?
But my friends?
They couldn’t do that.
Sure, it was my birthday, but I still wanted to be alone.
I was forty-two, still looking for love, still hoping someone out there would want an old hag like me.
But so far, no luck.
So, for today, I wanted to be in my sad little apartment, but they couldn’t do that.
They all barged in, drinks, food, and cupcakes in hand.
Did I mention that cakes and donuts were my weakness and it showed? Because at my age, I had curves and rolls, and lots of them. And it wasn’t like I was getting rid of them anytime soon.
“Come on, Janelle. It’s your birthday, be happy.”
“I am, Chris,” I told her, hugging her. “Just kind of wanted to be alone.”
“No, you wanted to sulk, and those are two different things.” She glanced around at our friends and then took my hand, leading me outside. “I wanted to run something by you.”
“What’s that?” I asked her, worried because it was obvious she couldn’t say it in front of the others.
“Have you thought about a dating app?”
“A what? No, no thank you. I won’t do that.”
“Really, think about it? You find someone that likes you for you and you can fall in love and get away from this place. How is that bad?”
“How do you even know that guys would like this?” I asked, waving my hand over myself.
She ducked her head and gave me a sheepish look. “Christina, what did you do?”
“I signed you up, Janelle. It’s a site called Mountain Mates. And you got pinged, a lot.”
I frowned, not sure what to think about that. My privacy was certainly taken advantage of, but I couldn’t deny that someone liking me had me feeling a lot better.
And it was a mountain thing; it wasn’t like they were close. If I didn’t want to meet them, I didn’t have to, right?
So, where in all of this was the problem?
“Let me see it,” I finally told her, holding out my hand for her phone.
“Great. It’s easy to log in so you can change it. I just wanted to start it for you.”
She pulled up the app and handed me the phone.
I browsed through the guys who had commented on my phone, which I was glad to see was a real one that she had taken of me, not some filtered piece that didn’t show the real me at all.
“All these guys want to talk to me? To get to know me?”
She looked over my shoulder and then nodded. “They do. Are you going to message any of them?”
