Tess
I blink back at her, processing. It’s everything I want to hear, but my mind is miles away right now—specifically in Pleasant Hill, Colorado.
I can’t help wondering about Hunter’s interview—how he’s doing, if he’s nervous, if he remembered to smile.
It’s making this meeting a hell of a lot harder to get excited about than it should be.
“That’s…that’s great,” I manage with a smile. “I’m thrilled to hear it.”
Heidi nods, her mauve-painted lips revealing perfect teeth as she snaps her fingers at her assistant, who scrambles over with a folder.
“This is the proposal we’ve put together.
It’s mostly standard; it outlines your signing bonus and per-episode pay, as well as the locations and projects we already have lined up for you. ”
That makes me sit up. “I don’t get a say in the projects?”
“Unfortunately,” Heidi says with a slight frown, “there’s a lot of legal stuff involved in this sort of thing—insurance waivers and such.
Things we have to take care of well in advance.
It’s just easier if we pick your projects.
” She gives me another reassuring grin. “Don’t worry, we’ve all thoroughly scoured your channel, and we’re more than sure that you’ll approve. ”
I flip open the folder, skimming the contents briefly.
I know I’ll need my lawyer to look over everything, but currently I’m looking for the one thing that matters most. I release a shuddering breath when I see the signing bonus—thirty grand.
More than enough to schedule dad’s operation.
Does it even matter that I don’t get to pick my projects with that much on the line?
“This looks great,” I tell her. “I’ll need my lawyer to look over everything before I can sign a contract, of course—”
Heidi nods. “Of course.”
“—but I’m pretty confident that we’ll be agreeing to the terms.”
It’s not like I have any other choice, really.
“That’s so good to hear,” Heidi says, beaming. “We have your first project all lined up—we’ll have you starting in two weeks.”
Cold runs through my blood. “So soon?”
“Yes,” Heidi says with a nod. “Like I said, we’re fitting you into a canceled slot, so we need to move as fast as possible. Truthfully, we’re already behind on filming.” She gives me a pointed look. “So I hope that you won’t need too long to look things over.”
My mouth opens and closes as I think of the project I left behind, all the unfinished things still in Colorado, seeing it practically slip through my fingers.
Seeing the man I left there slip with it.
How could I possibly ask him to wait around for me while I undertake all this, knowing I’ll have to abandon him in his hour of need?
“You can take the packet with you,” Heidi tells me. “We’ll need Legal to put together a formal deal agreement for you to sign if you say yes, but we can expedite that—don’t worry. In fact, if you can get me an answer by Monday, I can guarantee we’ll have you signed by the end of next week.”
It’s everything I’ve wanted, everything I’ve been dying to hear since this became even a remote possibility—so why the hell am I hesitating?
I know deep down that I can’t afford to, that no matter what my heart might be saying, I will be saying yes to this before Monday’s end…
I just didn’t expect it to feel like this.
I expected to feel accomplishment, to feel some sense of gratification at having reached the ending I’ve been working so hard for, and yet… all I feel is…empty, mostly.
But still I paste on a smile, tucking the packet under my arm as I rise from my chair and hold out my hand in offering for Heidi to shake.
She takes it with a matching grin, no doubt knowing as well as I do that I won’t be saying no to this.
No matter how much it will hurt me to do it.
Which is something I never could have anticipated.
And when I leave her office, when I step out into the bright waiting room, with its sleek tiles and cream-colored walls that feel like they’re closing in…there’s only one voice I want to hear.
“…So you just left?”
I sigh as I grip the steering wheel. “What choice did I have?”
“It sounds like you’d rather have made a different one,” Ada says.
I’ve spilled my guts to Ada about everything that’s happened the last few days—about the heat, about Hunter, HGTV…all of it. She listened patiently as I recounted everything we did and everything I felt, and she was thoughtfully quiet throughout all of it.
“He didn’t really give me any other option,” I tell her. “He barely acted like he wanted me to stay.” Ada is silent as she seems to consider, and it makes me uneasy. “Well?”
“I’m thinking that I might understand where he’s coming from,” she says finally.
“What do you mean?”
“I just…I know what it’s like to push everyone away because you think they couldn’t want you.”
My chest squeezes at her admission, and I know she’s thinking of her own issues, of how she uses her humor and her jokes to hide the fact that she’s most likely lonely.
“Anyone would want you, Ada,” I tell her. “One idiot doesn’t change that.”
She sniffs. “I’m just saying, it sounds to me like Hunter was trying to protect himself from heartbreak.”
“I would never hurt him,” I argue.
“But it sounds like he might have a hard time believing that with everything he’s been through, yeah?”
“Maybe,” I admit. My breath comes a little shorter as I recall all that he’d said, and my voice is quiet when I ask, “Do you think he could be right? Do I feel this way because of hormones or biology or whatever?”
“I can’t tell you that,” she says. “There’s no way I could be sure. But I know what it’s like to be afraid of your own feelings, and I know what it’s like to find out everything you thought was real never was.”
“Ada, not every guy is going to be a bastard like Perry’s dad,” I tell her.
She blows out a breath. “Maybe you’re right. But it’s not about me right now. It’s about you. Ask yourself, Tess. Do you think you really care about Hunter? Does it feel like it’s just hormones?”
I let myself consider that, thinking about his quiet smile and his grumpy demeanor and his silly jokes at the most random of times, trying to imagine never experiencing any of it ever again. The thought fills me with immediate melancholy.
“It feels real,” I half whisper. “Is that stupid?”
“Not if you feel it,” Ada says. “You know your heart better than anyone else. And as scary as it is—and believe me, I know it is—sometimes you have to trust it. Even if it means you might get hurt. You’ll never know otherwise.”
“Maybe you’re right,” I say thickly.
“Of course I am,” she chuffs. “I’m always right.”
That gets a watery laugh out of me. “Of course you are.”
“Are you going to be okay?”
“I think so. Maybe. I don’t know.”
“Just remember that you can follow your dreams without giving up everything you love,” she tells me.
Love.
It feels strange to even think it, but it also feels odd how not strange it is. I’ve never felt longing like this, never felt this need to be with another person—to see them, to touch them, to simply be near them—and what else could that be if not love?
It’s as terrifying as it is exhilarating.
“Thank you,” I say. “I really needed this.”
“I’m always here for you, babe,” she assures me. “You know I love you.”
“I love you too,” I say with a broken sort of laugh.
“Now go rip off the Band-Aid and tell your parents everything you’ve told me.”
“Maybe I’ll leave out some parts.”
She chuckles. “Probably a good idea.”
“I’ll talk to you soon?”
“I hope so. Sounds like you might miss my birthday though, superstar.”
“I’m so sorry,” I tell her.
“Don’t be,” she urges. “I’m happy for you.”
“I’ll call you later.”
“You’d better.”
I hang up the phone, feeling only slightly better than I did before.
The drive from the airport to Newport Beach takes barely half an hour—I’m bone-tired after two flights in a twenty-four-hour period—and I’m grateful for the proximity of my childhood home now more than ever.
It’s the same as always—red door, shingled roof that’s seen better days, wide wraparound porch that holds memories of hide-and-seek and tag and hot cocoa while it rains—and I know that inside is an abundance of love and understanding that I can’t get anywhere else.
Well, at least that’s what I thought until very recently.
Mom’s car is gone from the driveway, but Dad’s old pickup is parked where it always is, and I realize after checking the time that Mom has most likely run off to her weekly book club meeting with her girlfriends.
It’s not ideal, since I wanted to tell them together, but I know if I don’t get all this off my chest now, it’s going to eat me alive.
The excitement is too great, as is the strange forlornness that I can’t seem to shake.
I knew from the minute I signed the contract that I needed to tell my dad in person, but now that I’m here…there’s a wariness in me. Almost as if I’m worried he’ll be upset that I’ve been keeping things from him.
I knock before testing the handle, then turn it and push the door open before calling, “Dad?”
“Back here,” he says.
I find him in his old recliner, already lowering the raised leg rest and looking at me with pure confusion as he pulls himself from the chair. “Tess?”
“Hey, Dad,” I say, moving to meet him for a hug. “Surprise.”
“What on earth are you doing here? You’re supposed to be in Colorado.”
“I was,” I tell him, moving to the couch, where he sinks down beside me. “But I came home because I have good news.”
His forehead wrinkles, his brown eyes that are just like mine squinting under his thick brows. “News?”
I take a deep breath as I gather my thoughts…
and then I tell him. About the first time HGTV tapped our shoulders, about the waiting game we’ve been playing while they deliberated, about the offer—all of it.
He listens with rapt attention, letting me get it everything out before he releases a heavy breath.