Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 88212 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 441(@200wpm)___ 353(@250wpm)___ 294(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 88212 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 441(@200wpm)___ 353(@250wpm)___ 294(@300wpm)
“You don’t think yours does the same to people? Don’t you see the way they flock to you? The way you draw attention just by entering a room?” He shakes his head, looks at me, then away. “Tell me something else.”
“She was my best friend—well, her and my brother, but it was different with Cedric because he and my dad are so close. Making our father proud is the most important thing to Cedric, and molding Cedric to follow in his footsteps is the most important thing to my father. With my mom, though…she used to call me her sunshine.”
“So it is yellow,” he says.
I have no idea what that means, but I decide not to interrupt whatever is happening and simply continue. “Every night she would ask me what my favorite thing about my day had been. She made the best orange-cranberry muffins you’ll ever eat—but those had nothing on her cookies. It doesn’t even matter what kind. She could make anything, and I loved being in the kitchen with her. Loved baking with her while she would dance around and sing into the spatula.”
“Do you bake her muffins or cookies now?”
“I’ve tried. They’re never as good as hers.”
“I bet they are, but you just don’t see it because you miss her so much. You want it to be her desserts you’re eating.”
That makes a lot of sense and is actually really fucking deep. Who is this Miles, so different from what I originally thought about him? “It feels obvious now that you say that.”
“What else did you like to do with her?” he asks, dipping the brush into the paint, then swiping across the canvas.
I can’t see what he’s painting because the angle isn’t right, and I’m so damn curious, want to see what he’s creating, what he’s so completely lost in, as I come to terms with the fact that each word I tell him creates a picture of me that makes it easier for Miles to paint me.
“What kind of nurse did she want to be?”
“Pediatrics. She loved kids. She would have been great with them. But like I said, Dad was weird about her working. To him, she was there to cook, clean, raise the kids, and make him look good.” It’s wild to me that people feel that way, that they can have those kinds of expectations of women.
“But she liked it? Staying home?”
“She did. At least, I think she did. She loved being a mom. It’s one of those things you could tell just by talking to her for five seconds. It was impossible not to feel loved by her.”
My father…now that was a different story. At least when it comes to me.
“She had the best singing voice. I loved it when she sang to me, which she always did when I got hurt. She never killed bugs. Not even spiders. She always took them outside and set them free.” It’s like now that he’s opened the floor to talk about my mom, I don’t know how to stop. The words keep coming, spilling out of me in a rush of longing and a need to show Miles what’s inside me. “I don’t understand how she stayed with my father. They were so different.”
“Probably because of you and your brother. She must’ve thought it was best.”
Yeah, probably, but… “He made her feel lonely. I didn’t get it when I was a kid, but now I look back and see it. She was so lonely, but she never showed it. She focused all her attention on me and Cedric, but honestly, it ended up being me a lot because of his relationship with our father.”
He doesn’t ask anything else, seeming lost in what he’s doing, and for a moment I get lost in him—the way his brows pinch together in concentration, the way he bleeds emotion when he paints, and I want to understand each and every thing he feels. He’s so fucking sexy—his face, his body, all his movements—but this moment isn’t about how hot he is; it’s about Miles. The real Miles. I’m showing him myself and, even if unaware, he’s reciprocating.
“Were you close…with your mom?” I ask.
“Yes,” he answers simply.
“Will you tell me about her sometime?”
“Not right now. I can’t.”
“That’s okay. I’ll keep telling you about mine.”
I share every story I can think of—fun things she did, silly stuff that happened, how she made me feel, and all the adventures we went on together. I even talk about hearing her fight with my father, trying to get him to share some of his attention with me.
“Why didn’t he?”
“I don’t know. He always seemed so angry with her about me, like something about me was always wrong to him. I’ve never been good enough for him. I don’t want to make it sound like he’s horrible to me or even that he’s a horrible person. He’s not. My father has never been abusive or anything like that. He just…never connected with me the way he does with Cedric. He loves my brother in a way he can’t love me.” That’s hard to admit, hard to acknowledge, but after all these years, I’m used to it. “He’s maybe why I like attention so much. Daddy issues and all.”