The Things We Leave Unfinished Yarros, Rebecca (reading like a writer .TXT) 📖

my eyes pop. Add the startup costs and I’d wipe out just about everything I had in savings. It was naive to even think about it, yet here I was, doing exactly that. After asking Dan to call me if he got an offer, we headed out for pedicures.

Hazel fired off a text at her mom to join us, and I did the same with mine, but she didn’t answer. Then again, she’d been napping a lot lately.

My toenails were Summer Coral pink as I parked in the garage, the logical side of my brain already at war with the creative, listing every reason I shouldn’t even dream of buying the shop. It had been years since I’d been in a studio. It was risky to start a business. What if I failed at that as spectacularly as I had my marriage? At least no one would put it in the tabloids.

My keys jingled as I tossed them onto the kitchen counter.

“Is that you, Gigi?” Mom called from the entry.

I rolled my eyes at the nickname and headed in her direction. “It’s me. I have the wildest idea. Oh, and I texted earlier about a pedicure—”

Mom smiled, her hair and makeup perfectly done, her suitcases at her side in the entry, lined up like little ducks in a row. Her designer purse was slung over her shoulder. “Oh, good! I was hoping I’d get to see you before I had to go.”

“Go where?” I folded my arms across my chest and rubbed the skin of my arms to ward off the chills as goose bumps rose on my skin. There wasn’t a cure for the instant hit of nausea.

“Well, Ian called, and it turns out he got himself into a little snag, so I’m just going to pop up to Seattle and help him out.” She fished her phone from her pocket.

Ian. Husband number four. The one who liked to gamble.

Pieces clicked into a puzzle that I’d willingly kept myself from seeing. “The advance came in, didn’t it?” I sounded small… I felt small, too.

“I’m glad you asked, because it did!” Mom beamed. “Now, I didn’t want you to worry about a thing, so I told Lydia to make sure the house was stocked with groceries.”

Groceries. Right.

“When will you be back?” Ridiculous question, but I had to ask.

She yanked her gaze from her phone, meeting mine in a flash of guilt.

“You’re not.” It was a statement, not a question.

Hurt flashed in Mom’s eyes. “Well, that was mean.”

“Are you?”

“Well, not right away. Ian is going to need a little looking after, and this could really be our chance to rekindle things. There’s always been that zing between us. It’s never faded.” She fumbled with her phone. “I called an Uber. They take forever around here.”

“It’s a small town.” I glanced around the entry, from the French doors that led to the living room to the framed pictures on the walls. Anything to keep from looking right at her. Bile rose in my throat, and my heart screamed as the fragile stitches I’d thoughtlessly sewn there popped one at a time.

“Don’t I know it.” She shook her head.

“What happened to Christmas?”

“Plans change, honey. But you have your feet under you now, and as soon as you feel like you’re ready to face the rest of the world, you get back to New York City, Gigi. You’ll go stagnant here. Everyone does.” She scrolled through her apps. “Oh, good. Seven minutes.”

“Don’t call me that.”

Her face snapped to mine. “What?”

“I told you, I hate that nickname. Stop using it.”

“Well, pardon me. I’m just your mother.” Her eyes widened in sarcasm.

“You know he’s just going to drain your account and dump you again, right?” That’s exactly what he’d done the first time, which was when Gran had cut her out of the will.

Mom’s eyes reduced to slits. “You don’t know that. You don’t know him.”

“But you should.” My jaw ticked, and I embraced the anger that filled my chest, wrapping it like Kevlar around my hemorrhaging heart. I’d believed her like a naive five-year-old, believed that she’d stick around for me this time, even if it was just for the next few months.

“I don’t know why you’re being so nasty.” She shook her head like I was the one delivering the blows here. “I stayed for you, took care of you, and now I deserve to be happy, just like you.”

“Just like me?” I ran my hands down my face. “I’m nothing like you.”

Her expression softened. “Oh, my little heart. You took off for college, and what did you find? A lonely, older man to take care of you. You may have graduated, but don’t lie to yourself—you weren’t there for an education; you were husband hunting, just like I was at that age.”

“I wasn’t,” I fired back. “I met Damian on campus while he was researching filming locations.”

Pity…God, that was pity in her eyes. “Oh, honey, and you don’t think the fact that your last name was Stanton had anything to do with it?”

I lifted my chin in the air. “He didn’t know. Not when we met.”

“You keep believing that.” She checked her phone again.

“It’s true!” It had to be. The last eight years of my life were a lie if it wasn’t.

Mom sucked in a deep breath and rolled her eyes heavenward, like she was praying for patience. “Dear, dear Georgia. The sooner you come to grips with the truth, the happier you’ll be.”

Color flashed through the window beside the door. Her ride was here.

“And what truth is that, Mom?” She was leaving again. How many times was this? I’d stopped keeping count when I was thirteen.

“When you have someone like your gran in the family, it’s nearly impossible to get out from under that kind of shadow.” She tilted her head. “He knew. They all know. You have to learn to use it to your advantage.” Her soft tone was at odds with her harsh words.

“I’m not you,” I repeated.

“Maybe not yet,”