Page 1 of The Fear of Falling
Chapter 1
Avery
“It’sforthebest,”I whisper to myself and type out a cutesy caption that perfectly opposes my mood. “You both knew it was a bad idea.”
A bad idea to disrupt the status quo of our six-year courtship and try to turn it into something more permanent. A bad idea to mix business with pleasure. A bad idea to think I could experience my own love story instead of only reading about it.
I let out a heavy sigh.
It’s hard to think about anything to do with love when yesterday should have been my wedding day. Instead of leaving for my honeymoon, I’m looking up synonyms for romance.Courtship,affair,liaison,passion. None of them fit right, but I think the root cause of my poor mood is the fact that Eric, my fiancé—myex-fiancé—went into a panic this morning about the social media account for our shared publishing company not being trendy enough. He’s not wrong, especially as we start gearing up to announce my sister’s second book.
But that doesn’t mean I want to be fixing it right now.
I’m still planning on going on the trip we booked for our honeymoon, but my flight time is creeping closer by the minute, and I’m still at the office because Eric doesn’t think we need to hire a social media manager. While I work, my mind won’t stop thinking about how we wouldn’t have had this disagreement if we hadn’t broken up. He always listened to me when we were a couple.
Not so much lately.
My phone dings for the eighth time in the last ten minutes, and I don’t need to look at the screen to know it’s Dani. My little sister is…persistent when she wants to be. It’s a trait we share, though I’m not usually on the receiving end, but I guess this is what I get for hiding from her yesterday.
If she’d known where I was, Dani would have kidnapped me and done her best to distract me from the fact that I am still very much unmarried. She means well, but I doubt any of her plans would have been beneficial to anyone. So I worked at the library instead of here at the office or at home, leaving my phone on silent so I could focus on work and get everything done before today. Dani had the right idea when she ran away to Oregon last month to get her book finished.
While I thought I’d set myself up for success, Eric apparently thought otherwise. So here I am. Making cutesy posts about our lineup of romance books while trying not to think about how my own love story failed.
“I’m fine,” I say out loud and rearrange the text on the graphic. “I’m fine today, and I was fine yesterday, and I’m totally fine.”
“Fine people don’t talk to themselves,” a cheery voice says in the doorway.
I groan without looking up from my computer. Maybe Ishouldhave looked at my phone. It probably would have warned methat Dani was coming into the office. She might be my best-selling author, but I regret giving her a key.
Even if I hadn’t, Lynda, our office manager and receptionist—and, of course, Eric’s mom—would have let her in anyway.
“Avery,” Dani says, her tone full of warning. “Your flight leaves in like two hours.”
I glance at the clock, wincing when I realize I’ve spent more time on these graphics than I thought. But I need to get the whole week done so it’s not all on Eric. “Two and a half,” I hedge. “I have time.”
“Security has gotten faster,” a male voice says, “but not that fast.”
I look up, my stomach twisting at the sight of Dani’s brand-new boyfriend, Mason, embracing her from behind. They look so…happy. I shouldn’t hate that they look happy, given I helped get them together, but I do.
“I still have time,” I whisper right as a message pops up on my computer.
It’s from Eric, which is funny because his office is right across the hall from mine. Literally within speaking distance. But over the last couple of months, since the breakup, we’ve both done a pretty good job of avoiding face-to-face interaction whenever we can.
It’s really fun working with your ex…
Eric:
Do you have those quotes from Feinman Printing? I can’t find the email.
I open my email and find the message he needs, forwarding it to Eric though I can feel my sister glaring at me. If we want to switch to this other printer, we need to do it sooner than later sowe can get on their schedule, so getting the info to my partner quickly is crucial.
“Avery,” Dani says again.
Another message pops up.
Eric:
I’m going to send you the projections spreadsheet so we can get that nailed down before Sonny gets here next week. Let me know if you see any issues.
