Page 75 of We Can Do
Lawrence says nothing. Only the rush of an occasional car on the street outside breaks up the silence.
Finally… “Why does the review matter?”
I lift my head. What the hell? Isn’t it obvious?
“Why does the book matter?” He adds.
Is he being serious? “Because—because they’re my career. My reputation. My life.”
“Your career is your life?” His disdain is only thinly veiled. “They matter more than being happy?”
“Lawrence. They make me happy.”
“Really?” He chuckles and goes back to eating his calzone. “Because you don’t seem happy.”
“Yeah, because things haven’t been going well the last few years. Once Rye Again takes off?—”
“Then you’ll be happy for a little bit, until something else happens. Because this is life, and shit is always happening.”
My hands clench on my lap. “Dude. You know how important this place is. The book, too. I broke up with Alexis because it got too complicated, just like you said it would, and now you’re telling me it was the wrong thing to do?”
“I’m not saying it was the wrong thing to do. Only you know whether it was or not.” He puts his fork and knife down. “Look, I’m just calling it how I see it, and what I see is a man who puts a great deal of his happiness into something that’s ultimately out of his control.”
“It’s not out of my control,” I argue. “Rye Again is off to a great start. I just need to make sure?—”
“You can tick off all the boxes, Noah, but the truth is that Rye Again might still close. Something you never see coming could happen. The whole block could burn down. Your dad could get sick and you need to move to take care of him. You could wake up one day and realize that you want to try something new. All of these things happen. Businesses closing at some point is inevitable, and it doesn’t mean that they were failures. Once Rye Again closes, whether that’s in forty years or six months, it just means that you opened a bakery that people loved for a while and then you closed it. What I’m getting at is that I hate seeing your happiness depend on something that is, ultimately, temporary.”
“I…” I move my jaw around, lost for words.
“Also, if you want to get your book out there, you don’t need a publisher or agent to do it. With your online following, you’d have to do hardly any promotion if you self-published it.” He picks up his fork and knife and resumes eating. “Just something to consider,” he says matter-of-fact around a bite.
“I know. I know I could do that.”
“So why publish it traditionally? What are you trying to prove?”
My face turns hot, but I don’t have a rebuttal. I already know the answer: I want the world to see that I’m the real deal, that I know what I’m talking about.
Even more, I want my dad to see that.
Shit.
Is this why I’ve been working basically twenty-hour days for months? To show my dad that my dreams are worth investing in? That they’re valuable? That what happened in NYC doesn’t define me?
I already know the answer, and it’s a punch to the gut.
My whole life, I’ve wanted to make my dad proud. That’s why I’ve hated him even suggesting that I slow down. That gives the impression that he thinks I’ll never be successful so I shouldn’t even try.
But maybe he has a point. And maybe so does Lawrence. Maybe I’ve been doing too much, and even if I reach success—whatever the hell that means—it won’t even be worth it. There will always be people who criticize me, always someone who believes I’m a fraud.
“I want my dad to be proud,” I admit.
Lawrence grunts in sympathy. “You’re trying to get him to come out here to see Rye Again?”
I rub my brow. “I told him not to come. I want him to wait.”
“For what?”
“Until the place feels successful enough.” I laugh out loud, it suddenly seems that ridiculous.
