 by Riley Hart.jpg)
Total pages in book: 88
Estimated words: 83586 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 418(@200wpm)___ 334(@250wpm)___ 279(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83586 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 418(@200wpm)___ 334(@250wpm)___ 279(@300wpm)
Jasper’s been my best friend my whole life. From losing my family when I was young, to living together and running our business, it’s always been me and Jasp. I feel more for him than I should, but confessing the truth would be the first step to losing him.
Our lives are so entwined, it’s hard to tell where one of us ends and the other begins. It’s killing me more each day to be this close to him and not be able to call him mine, so when it hurts too much, the only choice is to walk away.
Jasper
My life is perfect. I have my family, my business, and my best friend. But when Sutton starts pulling away, everything changes, and it’s ripping me apart, forcing me to admit hard truths—that I feel different when he touches me; that I need him always by my side.
The thing is, I’m in love with Sutton, and apparently he feels the same. Loving Sutton is as easy as breathing, yet knowing my parents won’t accept us, not with all the backward things they raised me to believe, makes each day a struggle.
But one thing I know for sure—the world doesn’t make sense if Sutton and I aren’t together. We’ve had a million little moments to prove it. And to be the man he deserves, I have to fight for him, for us, and maybe that means fighting for myself too.
A Million Little Moments is a double bi-awakening, friends-to-lovers romance filled with first times, self-discovery, and two men destined to be together.
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
PROLOGUE
Sutton
Twelve years old
My legs hurt, but I couldn’t stop running. Tears mixed with sweat, both running freely down my face as I pushed myself harder, faster, needing to get away, to escape as far as I could because maybe then I could lie to myself and pretend my reality didn’t exist.
When I finally slowed down, my legs feeling like they would collapse beneath me, I wasn’t surprised to realize I was on the Finches’ property. Jasper Finch had been my best friend since we were five. He was the coolest person I’d ever met, but the best thing about Jasper was that he didn’t know it. Sometimes he acted like he did. He tried to make himself seem big, but he told me once he didn’t feel big at all. Those were the kinds of things he shared with me and no one else.
But he was big—sometimes it felt like the whole world revolved around him, in the best way. Being with Jasper made everything better.
I didn’t want to feel better right then, though. How could I ever feel better again? How could I be normal once I watched my mama, daddy, and sister get lowered into the ground and knowing I was gonna be forever without them?
I made my way toward the back of the Finches’ property, through the woods that separated their house from the railroad tracks. Sometimes Jasp and I would sit back there and watch the trains speed by, and we’d tell each other stories about jumping into one of the cars and letting it take us all over the country, pretend we could ride it into eternity, anywhere we wanted to go, exploring life outside Ryland, North Carolina.
I wished a train would go by right now. Wished I could jump on and just…go.
I sat down against a tree, ripping off the stupid blazer I was wearing. Why did you dress up when someone died? I didn’t get it. Didn’t they deserve the real you? The one they laughed with and hugged and ate dinner with every night? This dumb suit wasn’t me, and I hated it.
“Hey,” Jasp said, and I dropped my head back against the tree. Of course he would come. Of course he would find me.
“How’d you know I was out here?”
“Your uncle Brian called Mama to say he couldn’t find you. She asked if I knew where you were. I didn’t, but then I thought…if I were Sutton, I’d wanna run away, so I figured you might be here.”
It didn’t surprise me he’d worked it out. How could he not? No one knew me better than Jasper. “I wanna disappear.”
Jasper sighed, walked over, and sat beside me. “Don’t.”
“Why not?”
“Cuz I’m selfish and I don’t know what I’d do without my best friend.”
Like I knew what I’d do without him either. “I don’t want ’em to be dead.”
“I know, but we can’t do nothin’ to change that.”
“I should have been with them.” I swiped at my face with the sleeve of my shirt, leaving dirt, tears, and sweat behind.
“Don’t say that. I get scared just thinkin’ about the fact that you coulda been.”
“You do?” I turned to look at him for the first time. At the freckles across his nose and cheeks, and his thick, blond hair that was usually messy but now looked like his mama had styled it on account of the funeral today.
“’Course I do. You’re basically my brother. The only person where all I’d have to think about is how I’d feel or what I’d do and know exactly how to find ’em. Who else would I talk to? Or laugh with?”
“So it’s all about you?” I teased.
“Are you surprised?” Jasper joked back. It was one of those moments where he tried to pretend he didn’t care as much as he did, that he was more confident than he was. Sometimes his daddy made him feel like he had to be all these certain things, told him stuff about boys not crying and things like that. Jasper always tried real hard to be just like him.
I pulled my legs closer to my chest, watched for a train that wasn’t coming. “I don’t wanna go to the funeral.”
“Then we won’t.”
“Your mama will kick your ass.”
Jasper shrugged. “Don’t care much right now. You don’t wanna go, we won’t go. We’ll sit right here and imagine all the places we could go.”
And the thing was, I knew Jasper would stay if I asked him to. I also knew his mama would be pissed, and though he would deal with her anger for me, Jasper hated disappointing her; both his parents. They were a close family, the way we had been before I stayed home with a stomachache and they got into a car accident and died.
“I’m all alone now,” I said softly, leaves rustling and settling with the wind around us.