Maybe Later(19)

“Don’t worry, it’s in my organizer and my journal. Go out and make this day your bitch.”

“We love you,” Laura says.

“I love you back.”





*



From: AlistairlovesLaura

To: Bossypants

Friday, April 15th, 4:23 p.m.

Just be you, sweetheart. Maybe not the old you, since you’ve been suffocating that girl for years, but try to become a grown-up version of her. The one who disappears every Sunday, drinks straight from the bottle, feeds the homeless, puts her right sock on first, and never uses the word can’t. Normal isn’t part of your vocabulary.

You are you.

Be proud of your fuck ups, your mistakes, and your best intentions. Accept every little bit of yourself and don’t ever apologize—for any of it.

Remember your innerweirdo.

I get your mantra, let grief nourish your courage. But you’ve been nourishing it for too long, and losing your essence; that which makes you one of the most incredible people I know.

Stop beating yourself up and move on from the past.

Live your own life.

You hate straight roads. Be proud of those curves that make you who you are. Don’t look for perfection in yourself or in a man. I want you happy again,

Al



P. S. Simone would like to meet her auntie, please come to visit soon. Lau misses you more than she wants to admit.



I smile and clear my tears, hating how well he knew the old me and how much I miss her too.





Chapter Nine





Friday, April 15th, 7:43 p.m.



Adulting is hard. Life doesn’t come with an instruction manual. Parents complain about not getting a handbook so they can easily know how to handle their newborn. How can they be asking for help on how to raise a child? Did they forget they’re still trying to figure out how to live their own lives?

Leaving your childhood home, becoming an adult, being directionless, and still getting over your past. Those are the things that need a real manual.

Once upon a time, I swore I knew who I was and where I was going. I used to feed on the deliciousness of the unpredictability served up by life. It’s not that I no longer believe in the beauty of surprise, of life-changing moments. They exist, and when I witness them, I rejoice in their beauty from far away. I just don’t think I’ll ever experience them personally. I haven’t lost hope entirely, but I stopped expecting them to happen to me.

So, I live alone, go wherever I want, and have dinner for one without giving a fuck about those who stare at me for being on my own.

Tonight, after dining at the new ramen place on First and Niagara, I walk to the bookstore down by Third and Fillmore. The owner always has a table ready for me where I can work or pretend to work while I browse the new collections.

“I thought you had to work,” Kara, the new assistant manager, says when I slide the ladder from the biography section over to fiction.

“Yeah, but according to your Instagram account,” I say, pulling out my phone and showing her the picture with boxes of used books she received today. “You got in a lot of pretties.”

“Indeed, I’m trying to refrain from buying any of the new romances we got in.”

“What’s stopping you?” I ask. Nothing can stop me from adding to my collection.

“Money,” she says,

I’m tempted to offer her a job, but I resist.

“Ah, doesn’t that stop us all.” I look around. “Are they already on the shelves?”

She nods giving me an excited smile. She reminds me of my grandma and the time we visited her during Easter. She hid eggs all around her garden and enjoyed watching us searching for them.

“The store is your playground.”

“Sure, leave me alone with these beauties and my credit card,” I say, climbing up the ladder so I can start from the top. “I’ll blame you for the bill when it arrives next month.”

My heart skips a beat as I see a book by one of my favorite authors. I adjust my glasses and grab it.

“Hello, beautiful,” I greet it, clutching it to my chest.

It’s a copy of Tender Is the Night by Fitzgerald. It’s a well-preserved first edition, which should be in a glass case—at my house and not here. As I climb down the ladder, I bump into a hard, tall object. More like—a man.

“Careful,” he yells with a deep voice.

I stumble, nearly falling down, but fortunately, I grab onto his shoulders at the same time he wraps his arms around me. Our faces are pretty close together, our mouths only inches apart. I get a whiff of woodsy notes, amber, mixed with a hint of laundry detergent.

I take a good look at him. He’s handsome.

Not just handsome. Five alarm, GQ model hot. He’s about a foot taller than my five foot three—and three quarters. Once I find my equilibrium, I take a better look at him. He’s the total definition of tall, dark, and dangerous. And he wears a pair of sexy jeans with a jacket, casual, yet elegant. He’s classy.

The man fills the entire bookstore with his presence.

“Are you okay?” his deep, sexy voice asks as he helps me find my footing.

Of course I am. I almost tripped on one of the most good-looking men on the planet.

Keep your cool!