Prologue:

​

     What could I even say? His mind was made up. My things were already in boxes, some closed, others overflowing. Two years of my life sat in the breezeway of my former apartment, barely held together with yellowed tape.

     The unrelenting pattering of rain was only a few yards from where I stood, between it and the once inviting warmth of my living room, now blocked from view by my ex-roommate’s sickly-sweet odor as much as his belly.

     When I’d left this morning for yet another job interview, this was not how I’d pictured my homecoming. Not that living here had been a dream come true, but it’d been my space. Logically, I understood why this had happened. I’d been late on rent for too many months in a row. Six to be exact, later and later each time.

     “Where am I supposed to go?” I asked myself, not expecting an answer.

     “Not my problem,” Ian said anyway. “You’re lucky I took the time to pack your shit.”

     I rolled my eyes but knelt to grab one of the boxes. He had to get my stuff out if he wanted another renter in here. Scents of lemon and Clorox drifted with the heated air from where he no doubt was scrubbing away traces of me from the room I’d called my own for a while.

     “Elliot, you knew this was coming. I told you last month.”

     “Yeah. I thought this one job …” I trailed off, not bothering to finish. For one, he didn’t care. Second, even I was tired of the wishful thinking.

     Jobs were scarce, and so many places wanted experience I wasn’t getting since no one would hire me. That communications degree was doing jack all, but my parents had insisted. If they were going to pay for it, then they chose it. I just didn’t want to work in communications. At least, not their idea of it.

     Mom’s newspaper and printing press were doing great in our small town, but that was her dream, not mine. The trouble was, well, one of many, the town of Twisted Oak Valley wasn’t big enough for my dreams. An event coordinator needed events. And the few our town put on were so much a part of tradition, who’d need a coordinator for them?

     “Why don’t you head on back to that fancy family of yours? It’s not like you don’t have anywhere to go,” Ian said, probably to make himself feel better about this.

     We’d never been friendly, but when I first moved in, we’d had an awkward conversation or two about our backgrounds. I, trying to make friends, had overshared about where I came from. Yes, my family did all right. Yes, I’d never wanted for much, and they’d paid for my college expenses. Did either of those things mean they’d welcome me home?

     A jobless loser?

     The youngest kid who had disappointed them at every turn?

     What choice did I have? I couldn’t sleep in my car. This far into the fall season, nights were too cold for that. The great job I’d managed to snag with my fancy degree hadn’t lasted long enough to build my savings. Even if I could work twenty-four hours a day, part-time jobs couldn’t pay me enough to live in the city, much less for food or gas in my car.

     My savings hit rock bottom months ago, and now, so had I.

     “Can I wait for the rain to ease up?” I asked, hoping he didn’t have the power to toss me out of the breezeway as he had his apartment.

     “You might be waiting a while. It’s supposed to go on for days.” With that, Ian stepped back and slammed his door.

     This chapter was closed.

     “Bright side?” I stared at the rain. “I have a car.” It was all I could muster in this moment. Once I got my boxes packed away, I’d think about where to go.

     Thankfully, I didn’t have much, just clothes and a few other small things. My laptop and tablet were always with me in my messenger bag. Since moving from college dorms to a room at someone else’s place, I’d never had a need for stuff. Maybe that was a bright side too: my life would fit in the trunk of my car.

     I ran into the rain with the first box, and by the last one, I was soaked. Twisting around in my seat, I fished out dry clothes from the nearest box and changed.

     “Another bright side,” I muttered. “You’re small enough you can do this in the front seat without being uncomfortable.”

     When I was a kid, I got a lot of crap for being smaller than average. Every shooting star, every birthday candle, had me wishing to be six feet tall, latching onto that number, thinking it the perfect height because my older brother Peter was six feet. My sister Angelica and I had taken after our mom’s side of the family. I claimed five feet, six inches, but that was only with a decent heel on my shoes.

     As I got older, and the taunts and teasing stopped, I didn’t mind being smaller. Tall people had their own set of problems, and I’d already gotten used to my shorter ones.

     Now that I was warm, my things secured inside my car, the only space I could call mine, I had to figure out what to do. My choices? Well, I supposed there was only one. The choice that came with so much baggage, so many memories I’d rather forget, and one in particular I never would.

     I started my car, and once my phone had connected to the Bluetooth, I said, “Call Mom.”

     Crawling home wasn’t part of my ten-year plan. It hadn’t been a part of any plan. This phone call was me admitting defeat. This was me admitting my family had been right about me all my life, that I’d never amount to anything.

     “Hello?” Mom said, picking up on the third ring. “Elliot?”

     “Hey, Mom, I’ve got news.”

     The pause was filled with a sigh I couldn’t quite hear but was sure to be there. “What news?”

     “I’m coming home,” I said more cheerfully than I felt.

     “Home?”

     “Yeah. You know, that place where I grew up. The house you live in.”

     “Hmmph,” she huffed, not impressed with my joking. “For how long?”

     “I’m not sure. Maybe a while.”

     “Oh. You mean you’re moving home? This isn’t a visit? What happened to your place? Your job?”

     “Umm, can we talk about it when I get there? I probably won’t make it for dinner. Can you leave a light on?” With it already late in the day, I’d be hitting traffic getting out of the city, and then it was a three-hour drive into the countryside.

     “Today? No notice?” This time, the sigh was very audible. “I’ve got my hands full this week, so of course you’re here to add more to it. Fine. I’ll just … I’ll put you to work is what I’ll do.”

     “Yeah, of co—”

     “You can even help me out with the Faulkners’ interview. They always did like you for some reason.”

     “Okay, bu—”

     “There’ll be leftovers in the fridge.”

     “Uh, th-thanks, Mom,” I rushed out, but she’d hung up.

     I was really doing this. I was tucking tail and slinking back home. A failure. A new regret to add to others. But as much as this homecoming, this family reunion, would suck, one bright side snuck in.

     Maybe I’d see him again. The man I’d given up trying to forget or move on from. The man who metaphorically chased me out of town as much as my huge dreams had. The man I’d embarrassed myself in front of but couldn’t seem to regret doing so.

     Telling Garrett Faulkner, the prince as he’d been nicknamed in school, that I was in love with him, had altered my future. Though I’d run from him that night, too emotional to stand there while he found the words to let me down gently, it had ushered in the courage I’d needed to take that step, to move away and pave my own path free of the bounds my family had placed around me. Though that path hadn’t lasted. Still, I could say I tried.

Darn those bright sides.