Page 13 of Sawyer
“Checking up on me?” He closed his art pad and put his pastel back in his handcrafted wooden art box.
“Me and our roommates have officially decided it’s time for Operation Sawyer after thatLe Mondearticle. A visit from one of us while you’re working is part of our plan to encourage you in all this new awesomeness that’s happening.”
“Maybe I need a recipe card like the ones you made for yours.” He gestured to Jean Luc. “You got everything you wanted. The new bakery. The new you. The guy.”
“But what I needed most was inside.” She touched her heart as the wind ruffled her chestnut-colored hair. “Confidence. That’s what you need too.”
“Don’t I know it.”
Her slender brow knit. “We don’t want you having panic attacks again.”
He didn’t either. The rapid heart rate, dizziness, tingling, sweating, and trembling from the panic attacks of his youth had been bad enough to mess him up for days. He wouldn’t wish them on his worst enemy if he had one.
“I’ve had those on and off since I was a kid, Thea, so I’m being careful.”
“I don’t imagine that makes them any easier to bear,” Jean Luc finally said, his gaze a little too piercing. “The kind of attention you are receiving can only add to the pressure.”
Fine. They were already worried about him. “Part of the creative process for me. Hey, I appreciate you guys doing the whole friends thing. I’m going to need it.”
“Speaking of.” Thea laughed and dug into the cloth bag she was carrying with her bakery’s new logo on it. The name,Les Meillieurs des Amis,really was perfect. She and their other roommates were his best friends, and since he’d never really had that many people around him who liked him unconditionally, they were his sun, moon, and stars, if he were being poetic.
“With the article yesterday, you might have people stopping you on the street,” he joked.
She ducked her chin, blushing. “We did, and it was incredible! People wanted to take selfies with me. A few even asked if I had any bread for sale.”
“Dean is talking about adding an online store to Thea’s website today for what he’s calling bread tickets.” Jean Luc made a very French sound—pfft.“Buy bread now. Pick it up when the bakery opens in February.”
“Nice! Tech bro is a wiz. I would never have thought of something like that.”
Thea lifted her face to the sun as if inhaling its glory. “Me either. It would also give me money now, which is wonderful.I have so many things I want to invest it in. The bakery, of course, and our wedding. Jean Luc, don’t give me that look.”
“I will not,chérie,but only because you and I have exhausted this topic. But you might give Sawyer the bread.”
“Right! I got distracted.”
Sawyer shot her a smile when she handed him one of her braided mini baguettes. “Now, that’s what I call friendship.”
Smiling back at him, Thea pulled out another baguette for herself and broke off a piece for Jean Luc. “Bread is love.”
“One of the greatest loves,” Jean Luc added, feeding her a bite, which had her giggling.
God, they were so in love, and he was happy for them. Thea definitely deserved that kind of goodness in her life. She’d quit her job at the bakery she’d been working at in the States because her boss had refused to give her time off to come and help Nanine—and it was the best decision she’d ever made. She’d found herself, her purpose, and a love.
Operation Thea had been a raving success.
He wasn’t so sure about Operation Sawyer.
To use Thea’s words, he’d say he was missing an ingredient: faith in himself. It ran deeper than a crisis of confidence. No matter how much he accomplished, he couldn’t feel a deep sense of satisfaction in himself and his talents. Okay, he had a few minutes here and there. But what were minutes in a lifetime? Drops of water in the ocean.
He needed to be the ocean now, and he knew it.
“Can I see what you were working on?” Thea asked, edging closer.
Anxiety kicked in, like he’d suddenly fallen into white water rapids. “Not today, little sister. My composition is off, and don’t even get me started on my tonals.”
She added more sunshine to her smile. “That’s all right, Sawyer. You keep remembering what Axel said. Youwilltake the art world by storm. We all know it.”
He suddenly thought how funny it was that he wasaffected so differently when his friends called him a genius versus when his parents said it. They didn’t have any agenda. Perhaps that was why it elevated his spirit as opposed to cellophaned it.
