2. Clara

CHAPTER 2

CLARA

Hey there, quarterback. Just because I hang out under the bleachers doesn’t mean I’m easy. Stay in your own habitat, try a cheerleader. I’m busy. - Clara

Was there ever a time in my life when I had known what I wanted?

Like, from the bottom of my soul knew how I wanted to spend the rest of my life? No.

Liar . . .

I pulled into my garage and cut the engine. The rest of the day loomed in front of me like a one of those nightmares you wake up from that lingers around in your subconscious all day to wreck your mood.

Had school always started in August? What utter bullshit. It was hot, way too bright outside, and far too early for my liking.

At least I had done something useful before the Nick sighting. My baby sister had sprained her ankle over the weekend, and I had been pathetically quick to volunteer to chauffer her around for the next few weeks. Why not? It wasn’t like I had anything else going on in my life.

Leaving the garage door open, I wandered out to my driveway as my sister and brother-in-law pulled up to the curb to pick up his daughter, Lizzy, on their way to work at Monroe & Sons, a local contracting company. Barrett was an architect, and Sadie was an interior designer; together, they were adorable and nauseating. Barrett lived next door before they got married, but Lizzy and her husband rented the place now.

Gracie was the youngest of my three sisters. Sadie was the oldest, I was next, Willa was third. The three of us were all born within two years of each other and Gracie came almost ten years after Willa. She was the last hurrah of my parents’ miserable marriage before my dad took off for parts unknown, never to be heard from again.

We grew up on a farm in the foothills above Green Valley called Lavender Hill. When we were kids, it was a run-down mess, but year by year my mother had grown it into something spectacular.

“How were the boys this morning? First day drop-off go okay?” The look on Sadie’s face told the tale. My twin nephews could be a lot in the mornings.

“How do you think? It went by in a blur of exhausted chaos, whining, and complaints. Let’s schedule a margarita patio night. I need to unwind.” Barrett helped her out of his truck, the dang frickin’ gentleman. I couldn’t even hate him for taking my sister away—he was just too nice of a guy.

“So much yes to that. You’re my soul mate, Sadie. Sorry, Barrett, she’s mine and I’m never letting her go.” For years it had been me and Sadie against the world; sharing her with Barrett had taken some getting used to.

We’d grown up hard. Our mother was not a warm person. In fact, she used to be downright cruel. Her disappointment in us was the one constant in our childhood we could always count on, and she had never been shy about expressing it.

He closed her door and met me on the porch with a grin. “Aw, Clara. You don’t have to let her go—I’d never dare attempt to get between the two of you. Choose a night, I’ll take the boys with me and pick up tacos for dinner while y’all relax.”

“Damn it, I adore you, you sister-stealing punk ass.”

“Right back at ya, sweetheart.” His smile shifted to the side as he spotted Lizzy walking out of her house. He flicked two fingers out in a wave. “See you later.” Hand in hand they went back to the truck and left with Lizzy.

I waved them off, then wandered through the garage into the kitchen. I had bought this dang house to help out Sadie after her dumbass ex-husband left her, and for a while it had been great. It was impossible to feel lonely with her here to talk to and my twin nephews running amok all over the place.

After years of living alone in Nashville it had felt great to be with family again. And then Sadie got married to Barrett, took the boys, and moved up to Bandit Lake, into the house they fell in love in while renovating it for Monroe & Sons.

I missed the closeness I had shared with Sadie and the boys when we were all together under my roof. Late nights and early mornings were the times you really got to know a person, when the masks you wore during the day came off and everyone became their true selves.

The house was too quiet now and the last thing I needed was to be alone with my thoughts.

The past couple years had been terrible. I’d lost out on a partnership at my law firm for not sleeping with the newest partner—who was also the founder’s son—then quit in a fit of righteous fury. The HR complaints I’d filed were still “pending” and would probably be buried somewhere beneath a pile of proverbial papers for the rest of eternity. There’s nothing that old rich white guys loved more than other old rich white guys, and my former law firm was as old money and established as you could get. I suspected someone had been bribed to squash my complaints. I knew I should push the issue, but I’d lost the will to fight.

I’d had a boyfriend, a breakup, a pregnancy scare, and a second chance with said boyfriend, only to be unceremoniously dumped about two months ago when he decided to take a job on an oil rig and leave town. According to Chris, I was a handful. It seemed I was both too much for him and not enough all at the same time.

Good riddance to bad rubbish. I was better off unemployed and alone anyway. At least that’s what I was trying to convince myself of, though I didn’t quite believe it just yet.

I needed to reevaluate my life and it had to be done on my own. Therefore, with the exception of my brothers-in-law—who had proved their worthiness of my sisters—I was on an indefinite break from all men.

Like my father, who left when life got hard and never looked back.

Like the creeper I had worked for, who felt like I owed him free access to my vagina and a BJ in exchange for a promotion to partner.

Or like my ex, Chris, who dumped me for requiring respect and basic human decency—like, why is a good morning text such a dang big deal? Was acknowledging my existence that hard?

I deserved to have a break from the stresses of life, which I found were almost always caused by an entitled, stupid man.

I deserved to have some Zen and inner peace, damn it.

I needed a fresh start.

But how many “fresh starts” can one woman have?

At what point should I pack it in and just commit to a lifetime of solitude? Maybe I should continue living off my savings and hide out in this house for the rest of my life. I mean, I could certainly afford to do so. It’s not like there were men waiting around to hit on me in my pantry, dang it. I was safe from temptation in here.

I paced a circle around the kitchen island like a lion in a cage, growing more frustrated when I finally acknowledged what had really set me off.

It wasn’t men.

I could handle men.

Hell, I’d been handling idiot men and the various messes they’d brought into my life since I was a kid.

It was one man.

The truth was my mood had shot to hell when Gracie stepped to the side and I saw Nick Easton’s head pop up in the window of that stupid truck.

Nick was different.

He had always been the exception to every rule I had ever made for myself, the main one being to stay away from men.

He’d broken my heart a long time ago and I’d never quite managed to put it back together right. It pissed me off how much it hurt to see him after all this time. So far I’d managed to avoid running into him in town, and I had wanted to keep it that way.

My heart lurched in my chest, and I flung my keys across the kitchen as I slammed my eyes shut and tried to force out the memories his presence this morning had awakened in me.

He was my first love. My first everything. He had held me together after my dad left. Nick had loved me, comforted me, and treated me like a princess. When I was with him, for the first time in my life, I had felt like I was worth something. So in return I gave him my whole entire heart, along with my body and soul. I trusted him with everything I had to give and confided in him my deepest feelings. He was one of the few people I’d allowed to know the real me. I hadn’t been the same since I lost him.

Mindlessly, I prepared a pot of coffee and continued pacing the kitchen as it brewed. Caffeination and distraction were the name of the game for me lately.

I found my favorite self-help podcast and mentally prepared to zone out. By now, I had it memorized; it always gave me a mood lift. It was either listen to this woo-woo bullshit or start plotting some murders.

“Focus your breath and quiet your minds. Let us manifest a positive outlook together . . .”

I inhaled a deep breath then let it out alongside a burst of rage as my thoughts swarmed with images of Nick and me together. How could I manifest anything when there was not a single speck of serotonin left rattling around in my brain and a dopamine hit was nothing but a distant memory?

I filled my huge travel mug with coffee, dressed it up with hazelnut creamer, and stalked outside. My favorite coping mechanism of late was to sit on my porch and watch the neighborhood as I worked on my knitting, took care of my plants, and performed a live reenactment of Rear Window—except my injuries were all mental, unlike good ol’ Jimmy Stewart in his wheelchair. I felt like the captain of my own little ship, cruising along while I watched the world go by. Safe and sound—and alone—with all the comforts I needed right inside my house.

Watching everyone else’s lives go by as I let mine fade into a lonely and boring oblivion was the only thing keeping my finger on the pulse of humanity. It was either this or embrace rock bottom and become a full-on hermit.

This is how busybodies are made.

Speaking of busybodies, I glanced down the block, waving at Mr. Neal as he got into his old Buick to drive to the high school. He was ancient and had been the librarian at Green Valley High for decades.

Yeah, I see you, you bitchy little troll.

He’d never liked me or any of my sisters, like it was our fault our circumstances were bad as kids. He used to call us trash whenever we went to check out books. He was judging me right now; I could see it in his holier-than-thou sneer as he waved back to me. Like, how dare I be able to afford a house better than his? But I didn’t really care since I judged him back just as much for being mean to three girls who just wanted something to read to help them escape their shitty home life.

I shook the thought off. I did not need that kind of negativity at the moment, thank you very much. Not when I was barely hanging on by a thread.

Rationally, I knew I had options, but I was not in the mood to see reason. Logic was for people with motivation, goals, and the will to make life changes. I was fresh out of all that stuff. Chris had stolen most of it when he left, along with the bulk of my pride. And Nick had taken the few remaining shreds of that this morning.

Okay, I admit it. Being alone sucked.

I propped my feet on the porch railing, took a huge burning hot sip of coffee, and waited for something to happen.

Bring on the freakin’ inner peace.

Even though it was empty now, I still loved my house. Two stories, four bedrooms, three bathrooms, and a huge backyard. The fact that I’d ended up in the middle of Green Valley, owning a house on Clearview Lane, was ridiculous. Especially considering the way I had blown out of town nearing on fifteen years ago, determined to never come back.

The image of Nick sitting there in his truck, all sexy and handsome with his adorable, floppy, dark hair and gorgeous square jawline—looking even better than I remembered, for Pete’s sake—flashed through my mind and I forced it right back out. Thinking of him would be the opposite of peaceful. Seeing him had knocked the air out of my lungs and launched me straight back to the morning after high school graduation and the sad, pathetic hours I’d spent at the bus station waiting for him to meet me before finally being dumped with a note.

I remembered calling his house days later, desperate to find out how he was doing, only to have his mother tell me he was fine. He was happy, all moved into his new apartment at college, getting ready to start football practice, and living next to a cute girl with possibilities. She had hinted broadly that I should leave him alone. Something about her tone had made me wonder if she had somehow found out about us.

Enough.

His family would never accept me, no matter what I’d made myself into. I’d had nothing back then and he’d had everything to look forward to.

I picked up my knitting and watched as a moving truck backed into the corner lot next door. It had been empty since last weekend when the Middletons, my elderly next-door neighbors, had moved out to cruise the country in their RV. Maybe I should buy an RV and get the hell out of here . . .

Nah, I liked this porch too much and I had finally gotten my yard exactly the way I wanted it. Old lady porch life was the way to go. I just had to figure out exactly what that entailed, beyond being a busybody, of course.

I didn’t think I was old enough yet for bird-watching; so far, I found it boring and I couldn’t tell the different species apart. I perked up. Maybe I’d get an interesting new neighbor to observe, for science and boredom and my own amusement.

Maybe a lonely hot guy would move in, and we could start up an illicit friends-with-benefits affair. Or perhaps I could just surreptitiously watch from my balcony when he would inevitably take a skinny-dip in that awesome pool in the backyard.

How convenient would that be?

So far, the alone part of my life was terrible, but I felt it would ultimately become survivable. After all, I did have family and friends to hang out with, so I wasn’t actually alone-alone, just lonely sometimes. It was the horny part that was becoming an issue.

The dry spell was real.

A man in a moving company polo shirt stepped out of the cab of the truck with a grin.

I smiled back as he slid open the garage and headed inside.

“Alexa, volume up!” I shouted through the open window behind me.

“True inner peace begins when we allow ourselves to acknowledge our pain.”

“Oh, fuck off,” I mumbled as I stabbed my knitting needles into the ball of yarn. “Alexa, stop!” My mood was too bleak for this crap today and it was all frickin’ Nick’s fault—as if I needed another reason to hate him. I’d been acknowledging my dang pain all morning. Maybe it was time for a new podcast.

God, how I wished I really did hate Nick.

I chucked my knitting across the porch with a low scream of frustration. “Damn it.”

My across-the-street neighbor, Leonard, strolled outside through his open garage, gardening gloves on and hands full of supplies, at exactly the right time to see my outburst.

He was hot, and I watched him frequently. But he was also a total weirdo—not that I had room to judge when I was currently in the middle of my reign as the Wackadoodle Queen of Clearview Lane.

I couldn’t decide if he was trying to have a better yard than mine, or if he was just very into gardening; either way, he wouldn’t win. Mine would always be better.

He lived with his mom, Janice, who used to be the band director at the high school. I remembered her from when I went there. Janice was good people. Sometimes she brought me brownies and joined me on my porch for a chat. Being a lonely object of pity sometimes came with baked goods, which was a bonus I had never expected but one I could get behind.

“Mornin’,” he called, lifting his chin in my direction as a knowing smirk slid across his face.

I narrowed my eyes and shot back a smirk of my own. “Hey.”

Was he judging me?

So what if I was out here every day?

So what if I frequently yelled at my Echo Dot? I could do what I wanted on my own damn porch.

Sure, on occasion I wondered what my neighbors thought of me with my positivity podcasts blaring through my window, crystals lining my porch railing, and my mug of coffee constantly within reach as I sat out here all day clad in my various leggings and hoodie combinations as I spite-knitted in a straight line because I didn’t know shit about knitting except what my mother had forced me and my sisters to learn as kids.

Whatever.

Leonard had no life either, aside from his obsessive gardening and bunco night with his mom and her friends—The Bunco Broads. They’d invited me to join them, but I was at least two-and-a-half decades younger, so I’d said no. It had felt like a pity invite. Anyway, Leonard could just fuck all the way off if he was judging me.

“Clara!” I was so far into my internal rant that I almost fell out of my chair at the sound of my name being called. My head whipped to the side as Sadie jumped out of Barrett’s truck and came hauling ass my way, her face filled with concern.

“Oh crap.” She carried a box of doughnuts from Daisy’s Nut House and an iced mocha. “What is it?” Whatever she was about to tell me had to be bad if she came here armed with doughnuts. I mean, doughnuts were great. But also harbingers of doom. Why did everyone bring me treats with their bad news? Was I that easy to placate?

Her eyes darted to the moving truck next door as she barreled to a stop in front of me. “I have news,” she announced. “And you’re not going to like it. Take these, you’re gonna need at least one of them first.” She shoved the doughnuts my way and sat next to me on the porch swing. “Eat one. Go on, take a bite.”

I opened the box and stuffed half a cream-filled into my mouth. “I’m ready,” I murmured, covering my mouth with a hand as I chewed. “Tell me.”

“The Middletons sold their house to Nick Easton. He’s moving in this weekend. And yes, I do mean, your Nick Easton . . . that stupid ass, leaving you waiting at that damn bus stop all alone, dumping you with a damn note like a dang coward—frickin’ Nick. I should march right over there when he moves in and⁠—”

“Sadie.” I slapped a palm on her thigh. “Focus, please.”

“Fine,” she grumbled, flinging a hand in the general direction of the place. “He bought it. We can’t do anything—it’s a done deal. It’s happening and soon.” She blurted the rest out quick. Like pulling off a Band-Aid.

She knew about me and Nick. She was the only one in the world aside from Nick himself who knew what had gone on between us, and that was because I always told Sadie everything. Well, almost everything. She still didn’t know how I’d paid my way through college; no one knew about that.

“Nooooooo,” I breathed. I took another huge bite. If I had to stuff my feelings, at least I had doughnuts.

“I’m afraid so. Becky Lee told me when we were going over plans for the day—at some point today someone from Monroe & Sons will be by to make some minor repairs on the deck. So I picked up the doughnuts and came straight here to break the news.”

Becky Lee Monroe was Sadie’s mother-in-law. She was also my sister Willa’s mother-in-law, and my best friend Molly’s. Her sons had basically infiltrated my entire life, which was fine because they were great. The only bad thing about them was they were all married and there wasn’t one left for me to snap up to protect me from Nick and all the sucky, heartbreaking memories that were about to put the smackdown on me even harder once he moved in and I’d have to see his stupid gorgeous face every day.

“What the hell, Sadie?” I said with my mouth full.

“Listen. I know. This sucks, but it’s true. She heard it from Janice at bunco night.” She gestured across the street toward Leonard and Janice’s house. “Janice heard it from Mari—what’s it called when our grandfathers are brothers? Second cousins? Third?” She wrinkled her nose in confusion as I shook my head and gestured for her to get to the dang point. “Whatever, it doesn’t matter. Mari took over for Janice years ago. She’s the band director at the high school, so she knows Nick pretty well now.” I stared at her blankly as she rambled away. “You know Nick teaches there too, right? And he coaches the football team. Anyway, they’re friends and⁠—”

“Gah! Stop.” Mari was our cousin. We used to play together at all the Hill family functions but drifted apart when my father left and my mother cut off his side of the family. We’d reconnected after I came back to town to stay.

Sadie’s mouth slammed shut. She stabbed a straw into the mocha and took a huge slurp, watching me carefully as my mind slowly unraveled. “I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I don’t know what to say and you’re kind of freaking me out right now. I’ve never seen you this quiet. Usually news like this would have you enraged, plotting—Gah! At least get up and pace. This silence is scaring me.”

“I saw him this morning at the high school when I dropped Gracie off. It was like an omen. I thought it then and I was right. This day is shit. My life is worse.” I half groaned, half whined, “I can’t move. Can I? I mean, I like it here, my yard is awesome, and what would I do without my porch, Sadie? It’s all I have, damn it.”

“Hell no, you aren’t moving. We’ll deal with this. I’m here for you, okay? I promise you’ll be fine.” She rubbed a hand across her forehead. “Maybe we could do something to make him think the place is haunted or something. Maybe important things could start ‘accidentally’ breaking, like his toilets, or his garage door opener, and he’ll get frustrated and move away.” She air-quoted the word accidentally and I laughed in spite of myself. “Oh my god! I know!” She stood up, hands in the air. “We could put a bunch of red Jell-O powder in the pool. Boom! Instant creepy murder scene. Redrum, amirite?” Her grin was infectious and I smiled back, but it didn’t last.

“No, we can’t do any of that. We’re apparently adults now.” I scoffed. “Damn, I’ve been a wreck all morning and I only saw him for less than a minute sitting in his truck.” I tossed the doughnut into the box and dropped my head into my hands. “He’s one of Gracie’s teachers, for the love of god. Does he have kids? Is he married? Holy crap, how am I going to deal with this?”

The thought of him with another woman made me want to vomit. I had deliberately never asked around about him. The thought of knowing where he’d been and what he’d done without me over all these years was simply too much to bear, so I’d kept my head in the sand when it came to him.

Eyes soft with sympathy met mine as Sadie sat back down and took my hands. “He’s divorced and he has two kids, a boy and a girl. Both go to the middle school in town. His ex-wife lives around the corner, in that big house with that yard full of daffodils you’ve been coveting, and he’s been living in one of those crappy apartments across town. Now he’s moving in next door.”

My eyebrows rose as I reached for another doughnut. “Kids?” I wanted to cry but somehow managed to avoid it.

“I asked Mari about him, okay? I knew you’d want to know. Look, what happened between the two of y’all was almost fifteen years ago. You don’t have to talk to him. You don’t have to acknowledge he even exists.” She dropped her chin and looked me in the eye, her tone much more serious when she said, “You’ve come a long way and you don’t have to do anything that makes you uncomfortable. You have the power now, right?”

I nodded. “You’re right. I have the power.” I chucked my doughnut back into the box and grabbed her by the shoulders. “I have the freaking power. Damn straight I do. Alexa, play!” I shrieked. I needed my podcast to confirm it.

“Only you have the power to make positive changes in your life.”

“See?” Sadie let out a laugh and pulled me close. “You have this. Ice him out. And if you’re into getting a little bit of petty revenge, you know who to call. Jell-O is on sale at the Piggly Wiggly. I got your back, sister.”