Page 68 of One Day

"Mad? Walker, I couldn't be prouder of you. I was going to have a chat with you if you did accept my offer. I was doing it for your mom's benefit, and I fear this might also be the reason you agreed to it in the first place," he explains, and my chest loosens a bit. "You are so much more than Ashmore, Georgia, my boy. You deserve a chance to do some good in the world. Now, tell me how the interview went."

I smile and sink into my seat. "It was good. Really good," I admit. "I think I might have gotten it and as much as that excites me, I don't know how to tell my mom. She's been banking on me coming home after I finish school, and I'm not really sure why I led her on. Why I led you both on, but I don't know what I'm supposed to do now."

"Because you're a good kid and you didn't want to hurt her. For as long as I've known you, Walker, you have wanted to make people happy. Especially the ones closest to you, and I think you thought you were doing what was best for her at the time," he shares. "But you deserve to have what you want. Your mom, she's so immensely proud of you. You can see it on her face when she's at the gallery and you come up. You have nothing to worry about. Just don't keep dragging it out."

"Thank you, Mr. Richards," I say, letting out the breath I've been holding in for weeks. "For everything."

"You didn't need to thank me. You are where you are because of you and you've made me so proud. I'm glad I got to see you grow from the kid who didn't know what he wanted into the self-assured man you are now," he tells me. "Now, you've got to talk to your mom."

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

WALKER

Things with Sonya are better than ever, and because everything is so unbelievably good between us, the fear that something bad is just around the corner is weighing down my shoulders. Or it’s the cynical part of my brain not willing to let me have this. To indulge in something that feels so right, so utterly easy. She’s like breathing in fresh air, and I don’t ever want to lose that.

We have fallen into a routine—one I have grown comfortable and used to—of sex, conversation, and studying. She is my favorite part of the day, my favorite part of life. I love the way everything falls into place, the easy flow of us. I’ve grown used to Sonya filling in my spaces, the way her scent lingers in my room, on my pillows, and on my clothes.

She surrounds me.

And I don’t know how I’m supposed to go back to a lesser dose of her. I don’t think I can. I want her around me and in my corner.

All the time.

“Refill?” Flynn asks across from me, pointing to the empty mug of coffee sitting on our table in The Roast House next to my laptop as she pushes back from the table.

“Please,” I say, not looking up from the document in front of me.

We’ve been sitting here for the last three hours, working on the latest form of torture from our psychology professor, and I’m slowly beginning to lose my mind over it.

With a heavy sigh, I open my web browser and navigate to my email, deciding to give myself a break from writing to breathe. The new message at the top of my inbox makes me wish I hadn’t changed course because the last thing I want is to read the email from one of the firms I interviewed with a few weeks ago about a summer internship—here in Michigan.

I’m not ready to know if I got it or not. For the last few weeks, I’ve been able to put off talking to my mom even further despite now having Sonya in my ear about it and finally taking a step forward by talking to Mr. Richards. Having a few more silent weeks of ignorant bliss should have helped, but all it's done is twist my stomach up in further knots of guilt. Guilt for shutting down, for not being upfront and honest with her. For leading her on in believing my intention has always been to come home to Ashmore when I knew it wasn’t.

I’m happy here. It’s become my home, my place, and the idea of leaving it—even for the summer—fills me with dread. For weeks, I have been avoiding my mom and curling into something that isn’t me. I have never been one to run away from my problems, but it seems that is all I am capable of these days. Flynn has been on me about it for months, and now that Sonya knows, the added pressure has been at the back of my mind.

Since I told Sonya the truth, she’s been on top of me in more ways than one. She texts me about it, she calls me about it, and she climbs into my bed and in my lap with whispers of reminders. If I didn’t know any better, I would think she’s trying to distract me and make me suddenly have the nerve to figure out my shit.

“Oh no,” Flynn says when she returns to the table, clocking the pinched look on my face as she sets our coffees down on the table. “What’s wrong? You look upset.”

“Gilmore and Boseman emailed me.”

She pulls her mug closer to her after grabbing a sweetener from the holder on the corner of the table, ripping the two pink packages open, and emptying them into her mug. “The firm you interviewed with a few weeks ago? In Rosenthal?”

I nod my head. “Yeah.”

“And?” she asks, lifting her mug up to take a sip of coffee. I reach for my glasses to move them up my nose, causing her to sigh. “So, you haven’t opened it yet. What’s holding you back?”

“You know me too well.”

She smiles. “You’re deflecting.”

“I’m scared.”

Her smile softens into something sweet and gentle as she closes her laptop, shuffling it to the side before waving my laptop in her direction. Pushing it forward on the table, I reach for the coffee she got me as she turns it her way. “You have nothing to be scared of, Walk,” she says, her eyes dropping to the screen. “Anyone would be lucky to have you.”

“That’s not what I’m scared about.”

“I know,” she says, lifting her gaze. “Just softening the blow before I tell you they’ve offered you the spot. You don’t have a reason to avoid your mom anymore.”

---