Page 48 of Opposites (Never) Attract
I reached for the glass of wine and took a long slug.
“You can’t take on everything, Sunny. It’s not fair.”
“You did,” I said. “You married Ethan to save the festival. No one is asking me to do anything but what I’m really good at.”
I slid off the stool with my glass of wine in hand and walked over to a window with an amazing view of the land. The barn and paddocks were far off to the right. The horses I’d never consider riding were grazing out in the pasture. It was gorgeous. A post card. They should film a movie here. How much money could we make renting out the land to movie people? But, then, I dismissed the idea, we couldn’t make it work in time. And Tag wouldhateit.
“Fake marrying your nemesis is just what you did this year. Let’s be honest, you took on all of this when I left forNew York,” I said, as everything I’d left behind, everything I’d left on my little sister’s shoulders, sunk in. “Mom’s grief after losing Dad, all the businesses, Amity and Mac’s break up, Bliss getting into all that trouble after high school. Boone enlisting. I mean, I’m sure our momhatedthat. I was the oldest, but I left you with all that responsibility.”
Harmony shrugged, like none of it bothered her. She was so much like her name, it was a cliché. “Yes, but I love it here. Everything I do, it’s from a place of love. Like you love the city.”
Did I love the city? I knew people who did. So many folks at the firm were die hard New Yorkers who wouldn’t consider living anywhere else. The theater, the food, the cultures.
For me, it had been an escape. A place to blend in and hide. No one looked at me like some freak, because no one looked at anyone in New York.
There were too many of us.
But, these days, it felt like I was on this never-ending escalator, and it didn’t matter how fast I ran or how hard I climbed, I was never any closer to the top.
Worse, I didn’t know what was at the top if I eventually reached it.
“I don’t know if I love it anymore. The city, I mean,” I confessed, and took another sip of wine. “Sometimes, I feel…trapped.”
The words fell hard between us. I hadn’t said that aloud. I wasn’t sure I’d even really thought them until this moment in a quiet kitchen with my sister. Things were never still in the city. It was loud and fast and non-stop.
“Uh, that’s news.”
“I’ve been up for a partnership for the last two years and it doesn’t feel like it’s going anywhere. Jared, the assholepartner I told you about, keeps telling me to be patient, wait for my time, but…”
“But?”
“It feels like they’re stalling,” I admitted. “I was such a hot shot in the beginning, but now at thirty, I’m just like every other broker out there. Making so much money, I’d be an idiot to leave, but at the same time, is making money enough? Will it be enough for the next thirty years?”
“Thirty years?” Harmony snorted. “I can’t look ahead to the next thirty days. Heck, thirty hours.”
“My therapist says I don’t know how to be in the present,” I told her, over my shoulder.
“Wow. You really are a city girl. With a therapist and everything.”
“Oh, please. Mom kept a secret for over thirty years, you don’t think she needs therapy?” I told her.
Harmony came up behind me and dropped her chin on my shoulder. We must have made a picture. Me, in designer wear. Her, in her denim overalls and long braids down her back
“This,” she said, pointing out the window to the setting sun. “This is my therapy. It reminds me how small I am every day. Just a spec on the earth for a limited time, so I need to enjoy it while I can.”
“Bleck.” I pretended to gag. “That’s the love talking.”
“Maybe it is,” she said, and then tickled the spot along my ribs where she knew I was sensitive. “You should get some for yourself.”
“Pass,” I drawled, dodging her fingers. Though an image of Tag smiling at me in his truck did flash across my mind.
That was the sex talking.
And, also, maybe because I still wasn’t wearing underwear.
TEN
KAITLYN/SUNSHINE
