Living Out Loud (Austen, #3)(7)

That usually worked to temper me.

My second open-heart surgery was at six months old, this time for a permanent shunt. At two, the shunt was no longer enough to keep my blood pressure and flow regulated. And so my third open-heart surgery was scheduled for the final phase in rigging my heart up in an effort to get me to my teenage years when the muscle would be fully grown, and then I could have surgery to fix it once and for all.

All of that, my mother had endured. She endured the fear and anxiety of having a child so sick. She endured my strict diet and inability to walk or run or play like a normal child. And all of that endurance had made her overprotective. As frustrating as it was and as angry as it sometimes made me, I couldn’t blame her.

It had been traumatic for her, and I forced myself to remember that. It was easy to forget. I didn’t know any different. She knew too much.

Nevertheless, it seemed we had worn her down by showing her the merits of my liberation—under the solemn promise that I’d be careful and mindful and safe.

So when I woke, it was with a smile on my face and arms stretched over my head. The winter morning sunshine filtered in through the curtains, and I greeted the day with hope and optimism and giddy, good cheer.

A job!

I found myself grinning as I reached for my little notebook on the nightstand. It was a hardback the color of a marigold with fine golden strands woven into the canvas and a shimmering satin ribbon resting between the pages where my list began.

My angled, looping handwriting smiled back at me.

LIVING OUT LOUD—or Things Annie Daschle Has Never Done and Is Ready to Do Already

1) Get a job. A real job with a paycheck and coworkers and maybe even benefits.

2) See falling snow.

3) Make a snowman.

4) Have a picnic in Central Park.

5) Get a tattoo.

6) Meet a boy,

7) Who will take me on a real date,

8) And kiss me.

9) *And maybe be my boyfriend.



I stopped scanning there. There were pages and pages of things listed—everything from, Get drunk, to, Play piano onstage. Some of them were specific to New York, and some of them were just specific—like, Use very own money to purchase something completely unnecessary simply because it makes me happy.

But that item on the top, that very first one—that one, I might cross off in a matter of hours.

It was enough to make me giggle there in the silence of the room, snapping the notebook closed and pressing it to my chest just over where my heart tha-dumped in a syncopated rhythm that felt like a cha-cha bongo.

Because for a moment, my pain was behind me in the coolness of my shadow and the whole world was spread out in front of me like a feast of possibility.

And I would take a taste of everything I could.



Greg

I never saw Annie Daschle coming.

I meant that in the most literal sense. Her small body slammed into my much larger one with enough force to send her reeling backward. The crates in my hand clattered to the ground, abandoned in favor of reaching for her.

I caught her by the wrist and pulled, righting her a little too suddenly. She tottered back into me—though softer this time. She landed in the circle of my arms, looking up at me with eyes the color of a green glass bottle, lit up from the inside with sunshine.

It was maybe only a heartbeat, a breath, but it felt like that second stretched out in a long thread between us.

She laughed, her cheeks high as she leaned away. The chilly air cut between us the second she stepped back, leaving me colder than the moment before.

“God, I’m sorry,” she said in a lilting Southern accent. “Are you all right?”

I smiled. “I could ask you the same thing.”

She brushed her wild blonde hair back from her face with a mittened hand the color of pink lemonade. Not a glove. Mittens, like a kid would wear. On anyone else, I would have considered it ridiculous. On her, it was adorable.

“I’m just fine, thanks to you. If you hadn’t caught me, I’d have gone tail over teacups.” She laughed again; the sound set a smile on my face. “Do you work here?”

We had collided just inside the doors to Wasted Words, the bookstore-slash-bar where I’d worked for the last year and a half.

“Almost every day. Anything I can help you with?”

Her smile widened. “Why, yes, there is. I’ve come to see if you’re hiring.”

The answer: no.

So like any good, honest employee, I said, “As a matter of fact, we are.”

She lit up like the Fourth of July and began pulling off her mittens, which complemented her bright yellow peacoat and made her look a little bit like an adorable popsicle. “Oh, that’s great. What are you looking for?”

“What kind of work are you interested in?” I asked, gesturing to a booth next to the bar.

Her face fell just a touch as she slid into the bench seat. “Well, I used to volunteer at the library back home, so I have plenty of experience with cataloging books and that sort of thing. And I’m pretty sure I could get the hang of a cash register, if you need a checkout girl. Really, I could learn just about anything,” she added hopefully.

I’d unknowingly boxed her in, my hand resting on the back of the booth and my body blocking any exit she might have, as if I could pen her in and make her stay. At the realization, I stepped back.