Prologue 2 Clara
The first time I saw his work—the Lumberjack Artist—it stopped my scrolling thumb like it had a mind of its own.
That doesn’t happen to me. Not anymore.
In New York City, you learn to keep moving—eyes forward, heels faster, brain always three steps ahead.
You learn how to take in beauty in bite-sized doses.
Like it’s another thing on your calendar between a blowout and a meeting and pretending you’re fine.
But this wasn’t just something pretty. Not just glitter and a TikTok filter.
This was something else. Something felt.
I saw the close-up video on my feed—grainy at first, then sharp, intimate.
A craftsman’s hands holding a strip of leather while a blade kissed the surface, slow and sure.
The lines he carved weren’t simply decorative. They were intentional.
Like he wasn’t etching a design so much as releasing it from the material.
A willow tree. Branches bending, graceful and stubborn at once.
Beneath it, a horizon line that turned into a sunset—burnished gold, ember red—pressed into the leather like a memory.
The caption was vague and irritating, the way viral trends always are.
WHO IS HE???
MYSTERY LUMBERJACK ARTIST ALERT
FOUND IN MAINE??
#MOUNTAINMAN #THELUMBERJACKARTIST #ARTTOK
I watched it twice.
Then three times.
Then I clicked the profile—one of those accounts dedicated to collecting the work.
Fan pages.
Reposts.
Slow-motion shots of ironwork with silhouettes of willow trees, pines, and mountain landscapes cut so clean they looked like shadows.
Wooden boxes with sunsets burned into the grain.
A belt buckle with a tree line etched into steel, the metal darkened like dusk.
Boots. Belts. Coats. Purses. Bookcases. End tables. Doors.
All of them obviously crafted by the same master. No rhyme or reason to the medium.
Like the artist simply worked the materials as they beckoned him.
Almost every piece bears the same signature motif.
Nature at its quietest.
Maybe at its wildest.
Like he’s the sole witness to some quiet ache I couldn’t name.
And the more I watched, the more I realized something that made my throat tighten.
It felt like home.
Which was ridiculous because I’m not the kind of woman who romanticizes trees and mountains and sunsets.
I’m the kind of woman who knows which rooftop has the best martinis and which subway entrance to avoid after dark.
I’m the kind of woman who owns more designer shoes than winter boots.
I’m the kind of woman who gets engaged to a man who thinks rustic means exposed brick in a penthouse.
And maybe that’s why this man’s mountain and his willow trees hit me so hard.
Because while my life looks perfect from the outside, it isn’t.
Not really.
It hasn’t been. Not for a long time. If ever.
It’s funny what finally breaks you.
Not the big, cinematic stuff.
Not a car crash, or a hospital call, or a dramatic betrayal in front of a crowd.
For me, it was walking in on my fiancé fucking his secretary on the kitchen island he chose for our apartment.
It’s the expensive kind folks like to use to frame reels of themselves cooking for dinner parties. Cold, obnoxious, made from gold-veined marble that cost more than my first apartment.
I walked in unexpectedly—because who has to announce when they’re coming home in the middle of the day.
And I see them.
But I can’t believe it at first.
Geoffrey loves that kitchen island. I mean he obsesses about it. Gets nuts if I don’t use a coaster.
And his secretary’s bare ass is just on it.
I’m standing there in my silk blouse, the one I bought because he liked it—because he liked the way it looked on me over the carefully chosen bra and tummy smoothing cami—and I’m holding my phone like it’s evidence.
Because it is.
And then he sees me.
“Clara! What are you doing home?” he accuses—like I’m in the wrong.
“I-I live here,” I mutter like a moron.
Stephanie—his secretary, squeaks and slides off the island, smoothing out her dress while he tucks his half hard dick back in his pants—he’s wearing a condom. Thank God.
Then he’s smiling the way he always smiles when he thinks he’s going to talk his way out of consequences.
“Now, Clara, don’t get emotional,” he tells me, voice syrupy with practiced patience. “Things have been very hectic for me. So, let’s not do this right now.”
I stare at him.
At the apartment that’s more showroom than home.
At the life I’ve been performing for.
At the version of myself I keep editing, cropping, filtering.
And something inside me—something quiet and tired and done—finally sits up.
“This was a one-time thing, Clara. Stephanie was just helping me through some tension,” he explains. “We don’t need to get into it right now.”
The look on Stephanie’s face says otherwise.
“Actually, Geoffrey, I think we do,” I say.
My voice comes out steady. It surprises both of us.
“As a matter of fact, we’re absolutely doing this right now.”
He rolls his eyes.
He actually rolls his eyes like I’m a child throwing a tantrum.
That’s the moment.
Not the proof. Not the lies.
Not the months of him making me feel like I’m too much and not enough at the same time.
Not the fact that he was screwing his secretary in the middle of our kitchen just a moment ago.
It’s the eye roll.
The casual dismissal.
Like my heart is an inconvenience.
Like my life is an accessory he can toss into a drawer when he’s bored.
I end it right there.
“Clara, don’t be rash—”
“Rash? That’s really not a word I’d toss around carefully when you’ve apparently been fucking other people, Geoff. But at least I can get rid of that ugly fucking island now.”
“What? You love that island!”
“No, I don’t. And you know what else?” I ask, and I’m so shocked I am almost laughing. “I don’t think I love you, either. I’m not even that mad. Stephanie, good luck to you. Oh, and just so you know, he farts in his sleep,” I tell her, noting the way her nose scrunches up.
I feel lighter.
Emotional, sure.
But also, I feel like I dodged a bullet.
“I’ll have my people pack your things and ship them to Stephanie’s place by the end of the day. Goodbye, Geoffrey.”
“Wait! My ring!” he yells.
Now, I actually laugh. I turn to look at him, this man who is so far beneath me morally that I wonder how I ever let myself get tricked into agreeing to marry him, and I shake my head.
“It’s my mother’s ring, you asshole. Security will be here in ten minutes. I suggest you be gone before then,” I tell him, simultaneously sending a text to the doorman.
See, the thing is—Geoffrey has a good job and a lot of ambition, but the money? The real money?
It’s mine.
Or, well, it’s my parents' money.
But I have quite the healthy trust fund, and since I’m thirty-five, I have total access to it.
That’s probably why Geoffrey proposed to me on my birthday.
The thing is, he doesn’t even look shaken until I start walking toward the door.
Then his voice changes. He gets sharp. Mean in that controlled way that I loathe.
You know, the way some men do when they realize they can’t charm their way into control anymore.
“You’ll regret this,” he says, following me.
I stop at the doorway and turn back.
I expect to feel something—fear, grief, panic.
Instead, I just feel light.
Like I’ve been holding my breath for months and just now remembered how to inhale.
“My only regret is wasting the time I did on you,” I say, and I walk out.
I take my mother’s ring off in the elevator.
By the time I hit the lobby, my fingers are shaking.
“Miss Belle? Are you okay?” Arnold, the doorman, asks.
He’s older, sweet. I’ve known him since I was a child.
“I will be, Arnold. Will you give this to my mother? And have Geoffrey and his friend escorted out of the building if he doesn’t leave in the next five minutes. I already told Stanley,” I say, naming the security guard on duty.
“Yes, Miss Belle.”
I nod and thank him—impressed with my own ability to remain calm.
But by the time I get into my car, the tears fall.
When I pull out of the lot, I’m crying so hard I can’t see.
Not because I miss him.
Because I’m furious with myself.
Because I let it happen.
Because I let him shrink me.
Because I don’t know what comes next and I hate not knowing.
I drive out of the city—far, far out of it—and I stop at an all-night coffee shop outside a building my parents own in Hoboken, New Jersey.
We keep a condo there, and it’s empty right now. My parents are in Sydney on vacation.
So, I’m contemplating staying the night.
My phone buzzes as I reach for my latte.
It’s a text. From him. Geoffrey.
He’s ranting. So, I block his number.
I scroll through my social media.
Which is how I find the mountains and the willow trees again.
And that’s when a thought, unhinged and wild and totally unlike me, slides into place.
What if I just… left?
What if I pack-a-bag, get-in-the-car, drive-until-the-air-smells-like-pine way.
What if I found the artist?
Not because I’m a stalker.
Not because I think I’m the heroine in some indie film.
But because something about his work feels honest in a world that keeps feeding me polished lies.
Because I need to hear something real from someone who isn’t trying to sell me a life.
Because, God help me, I need someone to look me in the eye and tell me I’m not crazy for wanting more than marble countertops and empty promises.
I drink the last of my coffee, head to the washroom, then I get in my car, and I leave all the bad stuff behind me.