Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 121210 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 606(@200wpm)___ 485(@250wpm)___ 404(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121210 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 606(@200wpm)___ 485(@250wpm)___ 404(@300wpm)
And then, she brushes past me.
I want to stop her, but I don’t. I stand there, watching my wife walk away from me.
She told me to file the divorce papers, but she told me that after she kissed me.
She told me it’s over, but she showed up at my bar in a Snow White costume, knowing full well what that means. What that would mean to Summer. What that would mean to me. And she spent two hours being the Josie that I remembered, running the pool tables like we used to do together back in the day.
All of that tells me one thing. It’s not over.
The gloves are off now. I’m ready to fight for my wife.
57
Josie
Thursday, November 25th
Fall has officially fallen over Vermont. The trees are beautiful shades of vibrant oranges and reds, and every time a breeze blows through, they flit off the branches, twirling and twisting in the air until they find a landing spot on the ground.
It’s chilly outside but tolerable, and I pull my wool coat tighter around my chest as I walk out of Bennett’s—and now, Norah’s—front door with the rest of the crowd. Today is Thanksgiving, and a few weeks ago, Norah found out the gender of her baby and decided it would be a grand idea to host Thanksgiving dinner combined with a gender reveal at Bennett’s and her house.
Now, on the day she found out what she was having, she called me immediately, and we cried like babies over it. We even celebrated the next morning with pancakes at the diner, and I cried all over again when she told me what she and Bennett have decided to name their baby. But I’ve sworn not to tell a single soul because she wanted to do something special for the rest of the town who have been on pins and needles waiting to find out.
And this whole Thanksgiving dinner plus gender reveal shindig has ended in my sister inviting what feels like half the town and Bennett grumbling all afternoon about there being too many fucking people in his house.
The vibe is a little too reminiscent of the last Thanksgiving I spent at Bennett’s house, when Breezy was the one who planned the whole soiree and Summer was just a precocious toddler who giggled her little butt off over the silly faces Sheriff Pete and Reverend Bob were making. The Thanksgiving Clay nearly died.
I try to push the memories down, fearful of where they’ll take me if I let myself remember everything. I try to focus on Norah and Bennett as they smile at each other in the middle of his yard as Breezy hands them each a gender reveal smoke bomb.
But when my eyes scan the people standing in front of me and catch sight of the back of Clay’s head, it all just comes rushing back to me in guttural, painful waves.
I press on my abdomen, willing the feeling of overwhelming emptiness to subside, but memories stab at me like a jagged knife until my lungs grow so tight that breathing feels impossible. I struggle to regain my composure, fight to focus on anything but the devasting things racing inside my head.
I force my gaze to my sister and take in the way she’s smiling at Bennett. I take in how beautiful she looks with a little belly beneath her soft pink sweaterdress and brown leggings and find a way to join the countdown with the rest of the crowd as we count them off to the big reveal, calming myself down.
It’s hard, but all the time that’s passed does help—even only just a little.
“Three…! Two…!” everyone shouts. “One!”
Norah and Bennett try to release their smoke bombs, but nothing happens, and everyone kicks up into a bluster of chatter.
“What the hell?” Bennett grumbles, and Norah shakes her smoke bomb around erratically, trying to get the damn thing to go.
“Hold on!” Earl calls out, striding toward them. “Let me help you.”
But the poor man only gets a few feet from Norah before her smoke bomb explodes right into his face.
Gasps move through the crowd as pink smoke puffs out all around him, covering his face and his hair and his entire body, and Norah’s eyes go wide in shock. Bennett’s smoke bomb decides to join in on the fun and provides a second explosion all over poor Earl.
“Welp. Looks like it’s a girl!” Sheriff Pete shouts at the top of his lungs before bursting into a fit of laughter. “Pink looks good on you, Earl!”
Everyone else starts to laugh after that, including my sister and Bennett. Her giggles move her little preggo belly up and down as she cackles so hard she can barely get out her apology to Earl.
I laugh, but it’s hollow. Earl is the kind of man who always seems to find himself in these types of situations and it’s always funny, but it’s especially hard to find humor in anything on a day like today. A day that holds so much history, so much pain, so much tragedy.