Chapter 29
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
T ully
Joselyn had been trying to wear me down for days now. Showing up in Blueball had been just another tool in her tool belt of bossy bullshit. I’d hoped to get rid of her before Colson got back from his long shift. I knew seeing her name on my phone brought him anxiety about us as a couple. I couldn’t imagine the racing thoughts he’d have seeing her here, in the carriage house where we’d come back together again. But then he’d surprised me again, pushing me to sit down with her rather than kicking her out.
“This is the best contract I’ve seen in years, Tully! Do you see those zeroes? The bonuses if it gets picked up for a second season? This kind of deal doesn’t just get dropped in your lap every day!” Joselyn waved the stack of papers in my face.
I pushed her hand down and shot her a patient smile. She was just doing her job, and as of a few months ago, I would have jumped all over the offer. She just didn’t understand how much my dreams had shifted being back home.
“Joselyn. Thank you.” She opened her mouth to celebrate winning me over, but I beat her to the punch. “But I’m not signing that.”
Her gorgeous face crumpled as much as it could given the limits she’d injected into it on a regular basis. “But…but your friends!”
I nodded. “I know. It’s a lot of money to turn down, but I talked to all of them yesterday and they support me on this decision.” I reached over and squeezed her hand. “You’ve done such an excellent job for me and I appreciate you so much. But I’m done with Hollywood. Focus your incredible talents on someone else. Please.”
Joselyn snapped her mouth shut and stared at me like she was trying to figure out when I’d turned into an alien. Someone she no longer understood.
“But…why?” she finally whispered.
I thought it through before I answered. I wanted to make sure my answer encompassed everything that had been circling in my brain the last few weeks as I fell back in love with Colson, Blueball, the second half of my life.
“Because when I chased my dreams in Hollywood, they made me happy for awhile, then left me empty. Someone other than me could snatch it away at any moment. When I chase my dreams of love and family and friendship here in my hometown, it makes me happy indefinitely. No one can take it away from me. I don’t expect you to understand, and that’s okay. It’s enough that I understand myself.”
Joselyn’s surprised expression bled into sadness, and then into something that looked like acceptance. “You’re right. I don’t understand, but I did get to know you over the years, Tully Starling, and you’re a firecracker. The camera makes you even shorter than you are in real life, but you’re mighty. Whatever you put your mind to, I know you’ll succeed. And if Blueball and that handsome man with the sexy mustache is what you want, then I’m happy for you.”
“Thank you.” I hugged her, and for the first time in our working relationship, it wasn’t air kisses and a quick pat. We hugged, chest to chest, two women wanting the best for the other, even if we didn’t agree on what that best looked like.
She pulled back, her eyes sparkling again. “Now, show me the way to the hotel I booked in town. I have plans to put on a flannel shirt tomorrow and see if Hallmark was right all these years.”
“What?”
Joselyn shimmied her shoulders and stood. “I’m the big-city woman, coming to a small town. Surely I’ll run into a Prince Charming lumberjack tomorrow!”
I shook my head, laughing. Joselyn was a piece of work, but I liked her. I escorted her to her car with simple directions to the bed-and-breakfast in downtown Blueball. I waved until the car was out of sight. Then I hustled over to Mama’s, thinking that’s where Colson would have gone to hide from Joselyn.
“Mama!” I hollered, walking in the front door without knocking.
“In here!” she called back.
I found her in her chair, working on a pile of sewing like usual. Hayes lifted his head from the floor where he was keeping Mama company. “Where’s Colson?”
Mama jabbed the needle into the cloth, not bothering to look at me. “He’s gone.”
I reared back, both at her tone and the words. “Gone? What do you mean?” I sank onto the couch and tried to get in her line of vision since she seemed determined to ignore me. I bobbed left, then right. She finally sighed and put her sewing in her lap to look me in the eye.
“What did you do?” she snapped.
My hand slapped my chest. “What did I do? What do you mean?”
“Colson said he was heading out of the town for a day or two. He looked…”
A sense of alarm trickled into my veins. “He looked…what?”
Mama’s eyes filled with tears, ratcheting up my fear. “He looked haunted. Sad. The same way he looked nineteen years ago.”
I flopped back, brain spinning in overdrive. So many thoughts were swirling, overlapping and competing with each other. I jumped to my feet, unable to sit still. I had to go talk to him.
“Where did he go?”
Mama lifted her sewing with a sniff. “He didn’t say.”
I shook my head, waiting for more. When more didn’t come, I grabbed my phone out of my pocket and hit his contact. It rang and rang. Then went to voicemail. I hung up without leaving a message. Sadly, we hadn’t reached that point in our relationship where we shared our locations on our devices with the other person or I could have tracked him. I shot off a quick text, hoping something would reach him.
Me: Hey. Where are you? What’s going on? Talk to me, Colson.
No bubble popped up to show me that he was texting back or that he’d even seen my text. Mama just kept right on sewing, ignoring me. She’d be no help. Once she got good and comfortable in a stubborn streak, she wouldn’t budge for anyone. And she always sided with Colson.
I dialed Em instead and left the house. She answered before I got to the carriage house. “Hey, do you know where Colson went?”
“Umm, no? What’s going on?” I could hear Georgia singing in the background.
“I’m sorry. I’m interrupting. I just…” I began pacing back and forth outside the little house, panic setting in. “I think I fucked up.”
I heard a door close. “Hey, Warrick? Can you make sure Georgia doesn’t track water all over the house?” Then she was back to talking into the phone. “Sorry, bathtime is always an adventure. How about we meet down at Gin/Tan/Laundry? You can tell me all about it over a beer?”
“Make it a gin and tonic and you’re on.”
“See you in ten.”
We hung up and I switched out my slippers for a pair of sandals. No one would have blinked an eye if I showed up in town in slippers, but a girl had to have some standards. Even if she was on the verge of hyperventilating. When I pulled up to the bar-slash-laundromat-slash-tanning salon, Em was there waiting for me, along with Pip and Savannah.
“Group hug!” Savannah crowed, pulling me into the middle of them for a sloppy girl hug that was supposed to be funny yet made my eyes brim with tears.
“Oh girl,” Em said quietly when they pulled back and she could see me teetering on the emotional edge. “It can’t be that bad. That man adores you.”
“He left,” I manage to say through a throat closing with tears.
“Alcohol first,” Pip said in a tone that brooked no argument.
“Wait for me!” Gabi called from her car. She climbed out and joined the group.
I looked at Em and she shrugged. “This is what friends do. Get over it.”
Later, when I wasn’t freaking out over what Colson leaving town meant for us, I’d tear up over the girls all coming together to support me. For now, we went inside and the young guy behind the bar got our drinks in front of us in record time. After a couple sips of my drink, I told the whole story about Joselyn trying to get ahold of me, then showing up in town, and ending with finding out Colson was gone.
Em leaned back in her chair, beer in hand, and hissed. “That’s messy.”
Gabi shoved her drink aside and leaned in close. “I grilled Joey before I came down here. That’s why I was late. He said Colson showed up at work on Monday going on and on about you two dating again and even asked the group for the name and number of a therapist. The guys gave him shit, but he defended you two, saying you’re more mature now and just want to be happy together. Joey was so proud of Colson for declaring the two of you dating publicly.”
I screwed up my face. Everyone in town knew we’d dated, got married, and then divorced. Ever since I’d been back in town we’d been out and about together. It’s not like it was that hard to figure out we were together again. “Why?”
Pip smacked her fist on the bartop and every head in the place turned in her direction. “This is male pride, little Tully. He claimed you in front of his peers.”
“Basically, his biggest fear coming to life again,” Em added. When I still hadn’t put the pieces together, Em went on. “When you divorced and left town, he was humiliated. Think of it from his perspective. You ditched him and then your star shined so bright he couldn’t even argue that you were better off being with him. He licked his wounds and limped off to another town to live his life. Now you’re both back and in a good place, he tells his peers about the two of you, and now he thinks you’re leaving him again!”
“I’m not leaving him!” My voice carried and those heads were swiveling again. I lowered my voice and explained with no less urgency. “I told Joselyn no, just like we talked about yesterday!”
“Oh!” Gabi caught our attention. She had her nose buried in her phone. “Joey is so getting lucky tonight.”
“What?” I asked, hoping it was word about Colson. I didn’t need to know about my best friend’s sexual favors.
“Joey’s been texting him and finally got a text back just now. Colson is on his way to Texas with Boon.” Gabi lifted her head and put her phone back in her pocket.
I nodded, feeling only slightly better that I knew where he was. The little brother I’d known way back when was a troublemaker, so I wasn’t sure I liked this news. “Why would he just up and leave without talking to me though? We literally just said we have to be better about talking things through when issues come up!”
“Male pride,” Pip boomed again, seeming exasperated that I didn’t get it the first time.
Savannah put her hand on my arm. “What’s your biggest fear?”
I had to shake my head to clear the alcohol and panic. I thought about the reasons I’d left Blueball in the first place, fueled by not wanting to become my mother. Her entire world collapsed to just the inside of her house. “Uhh, maybe feeling empty and worthless?”
Savannah nodded. “Oh, good one. Mine would probably be boredom. If I’m bored, I get destructive.”
“Spiders.” Emmerleigh shivered.
“Mine is weak beer,” Pip, known for her love of thick German beer, made us laugh. Well, everyone except me. My gut was still churning.
“Basically, Colson feels like his worst fear is coming true again. He’s not enough to keep you by his side.” Em signaled the bartender for another round for all of us.
“Maybe he just needs some time to think things through? Process his fears? His anger?” Gabi offered a reasonable explanation for him leaving the state.
But all I saw was the parallels. I’d left him before. Maybe to outrun the hurt, he was trying to be the first one to leave. And I didn’t fucking like it. Not one bit.
I grabbed the refreshed gin and tonic and lifted it in the air. The girls all grabbed their drinks and lifted them, waiting for my toast.
“Let’s get a few things straight, ladies. I’m not going anywhere. You all are my family. Blueball is my home. And Colson is the love of my life. I’m going to fight to show him he’s more than enough.”
The girls cheered and we sipped our drinks, getting down to the brass tacks of a plan.
A plan to win back my ex-husband once and for all.