Page 5 of Atlas & Miles
As my momma pulled out her famous pecan pie—which I could never resist—the conversation shifted to my upcomingjob. Momma was friends with the mother of someone I’d barely known in high school, a player on the football team. Ms. Willson apparently had her finger on the pulse of the town and had known that the local landscaping company was looking for a Marketing Director.
Surprisingly, the company was quite large for a small town like this because, though it was headquartered out of Gomillion, it had several locations nearby. From the gossip my momma shared with me, the owner, Jeb, had found love here with his high school boyfriend and stayed. She hadn’t blinked when she’d relayed this bit of news to me, which gave me hope that the town was not the bigoted, homophobic place I’d known it to be when I was growing up.
Or maybe that was just some of the asshole kids I went to school with.
Momma had been supportive of me the moment I expressed a desire to wear dresses, heels, and makeup at five, when I’d come out to her as gay at thirteen, and when I’d realized I was genderfluid at seventeen, right before I graduated high school. She’d embraced all of it—and me, by extension—by taking me to the mall in a nearby town and buying me all the pretty things multiple times during the years I lived at home.
I distinctly remember one such shopping trip where I was in a dress and in tears near the dressing room because a group of teenaged boys had walked by, spewing some nasty comments my way. Once they were gone, she’d grabbed my fourteen-year-old face between her hands, looked me straight in the eye, and said, “Atlas, you were always meant to be glitter and sunshine and rainbows. Your beauty and passion for life will make some ignorant people uncomfortable, but that’stheirproblem, not yours. Just because they can’t see how fabulous you are doesn’t mean you aren’t meant to be the amazing, incredible kid you are. Don’t letanyoneever dim your light. You were born to shine.”
I still took those words to heart nearly twenty-five years later.
“So,” Momma started as we carried our after-dinner coffee into her cozy living room and sunk into the battered oldcouchshe’d had when I was a kid. It was still supremely comfortable if my ass cheek didn’t find the one spring that had started popping through the cushion. “Anything else new in your life?”
I knew what she was getting at—she wanted to know if I was open to finding anyone special to “settle down” with now that I had moved back home. Though she’d stopped asking directly long ago, a child still knew their mother.
I nearly cringed but managed to keep my face neutral. “No, Momma, I haven’t found anyone yet. And I think I need to get settled in before I start looking, don’t you agree?”
She gasped, throwing a hand to her chest in mock horror. “Well, I never!”
I laughed until she joined me. When I’d quieted, I shook my finger at her. “I know your code by now.”
She smirked. “Can’t blame a mother for trying.”
I patted her knee before taking a sip of my half coffee, half sweetened creamer. “I know, Momma. I know it comes from a place of love. But I’m happy with my love life—or lack thereof—right now. If that changes, I’ll let you know as soon as I can.”
“I’d appreciate that, my sweet child. You are incredible, and I just want to see you find someone to share that with, someone who will accept and celebrate every part of you.”
I bit my cheek to stop myself from blurting out the “not likely” on the tip of my tongue. I just smiled demurely and took another sip as Momma launched into another bit of gossip she’d heard from Ms. Willson.
It was nearly suppertime when I left for home, so I picked up a pizza and salad from the only pizza place in town and scarfed down a few pieces and the salad while I unpacked a good portion of the bedroom and kitchen.
I needed to start cooking for myself again; takeout was going to get old fast.
My resolve only lasted overnight, because as soon as I woke up, I realized I now had clean dishes but was sorely lacking in groceries. That meant coffee and breakfast first—which I was absolutely going to purchase at the coffee shop nearby that I’d passed on my way into town—then I’d head to the local grocery store before the handyman came to get my internet working this afternoon.
And so my mundane life began.
Chapter two
Miles
My phone dinged just as I was attaching the water supply to the toilet I was installing at the local hotel. The wrench in my hand jerked, lurching off the nut, and I cursed under my breath. “Goddammit.”
After a deep breath, I readjusted the wrench, finished connecting the water supply, and turned the water back on. Once the tank was filled, I tested the installation with a flush and set my tools down, wiping my hands on a towel. Then I reached up to the counter to check my phone.
I scowled at the notification from the social media app I was only on because my sister had all but threatened me several years back before tapping it open. Skimming the page for an upcoming event I’d been invited to, I cursed again—still under my breath because I was on a job site, and I was a professional, dammit.
As the town’s only handyman worth their salt, I picked up each and every odd job I was comfortable doing—which, after twenty years of doing it, was just about anything. The only things I wouldn’t touch were tasks that required a permit and thus alicensed professional—everything else I’d either done a million times or could learn how to do quickly, so it was all fair game.
I tapped over to my email app, realizing I hadn’t checked it yet today, and given the event . . .
Shit. A few more taps into my postal service’s delivery alert email had confirmed it: My twenty-year high school reunion invitation would be delivered to my mailbox today.
I didn’t want to go. That was my initial reaction. It would’ve been my forever and always reaction, but Claudia, my aforementioned menace of a sister—who I inexplicably still loved very much—would wear me down until I went.
Double shit.
Setting my phone back down, I packed up my tools, wiped the new toilet with a clean rag, then grabbed my phone and headed to the main lobby.
