Total pages in book: 142
Estimated words: 135522 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135522 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
“But you know, Cole, Ms. Ducasse had a point. I just hate what you went through this past Christmas, bein’ pushed at a boy who already had his heart set on another. And it has been an age and a half since you’ve had anyone knockin’ on your door.”
“Nan, you don’t have to worry about me one bit.”
“You could be walkin’ arm-in-arm with some sweet handsome fellow instead of an old bag like me.”
I give her a harsh look. “Please don’t call yourself that.”
“Fine. An old Louis Vuitton handbag. My point’s the same no matter what kind of bag I am. You know, if I had a dying wish, it’d be for you to find your Mr. Perfection and go to this festival with him instead.”
I can only imagine the impossibly long list of prerequisites my grandma has for what signifies a suitable enough partner for me. “Maybe someday,” I decide to answer vaguely.
“Goodness, that’s Dorothy Shannon!” sings my Nan. “I haven’t seen her since she came back from visiting family in Louisiana over the winter. Her husband, too. Tell you what, I’ll catch up with you later, Cole, just go along and do your own thing. I’ll be a while, our conversation will be mighty boring. Hey, Dorothy!” she calls out, bee-lining through the crowd to the other side of the street.
I watch her hurry off, a smile on my face. I love to see her out and about, in her element, her happiness bubbling over. I wish we could have a festival every day, if just to make all her days as light and happy as this one. The weather is simply perfect, too, which is only possible this time of year before the unforgiving summer season takes hold. I thrust my hands into my pockets and smile up at the bright sky, feeling indescribably good.
When I bring my eyes back down from the heavens, they land on a couple standing by a table full of wood carvings—all of them miniature horses, from the looks of it. It’s a couple I know from my high school days, Jeff and Kim. The two are picking out a wood carving together, smiles on their faces. Kim chuckles and whispers something to Jeff, which makes him put a big kiss on her cheek, surprising her. He draws a leaf out of her hair, she smiles, and the two gaze adoringly into each other’s eyes, tiny horses forgotten.
I watch them a bit too long.
What my Nan mentioned earlier isn’t difficult to imagine. Me with a sweet guy by my side, looking over little wooden figurines, bickering playfully over where we can put it in our house or why we need one at all. “Because it’s cute,” my boyfriend would say with a little laugh. “You’ll put it on a shelf or use it as a bookend and won’t even remember where you got it,” I’ll tease him back, because I know him so well. We finish each other’s sentences. And sandwiches. I’ll get him the horse anyway, and he’ll cherish it with all his heart, hugging it to his chest as we continue strolling down the street, our hearts as light as butterflies, our eyes happy.
I don’t even know what he looks like. I don’t know his name. I just know we’re joyfully sharing the world with each other, and there will never be an unhappy day for either of us ever again.
It’s easier to imagine than it is to believe.
“Take the shot!” shouts someone right next to me.
I turn to find another bright soul I went to school with, a girl who I remember could always be found around the auditorium or the costume department by the theater storage room. She backs up to the curb, appearing to be communicating to someone across the street with mounting urgency, her hands cupped around her mouth as she repeats: “Take the shot!”
I glance over my shoulder, curious who she’s talking to.
The crowd seems to part before my eyes, creating a path to the other curb, where I see a young guy with a camera in front of his face. He seems preoccupied somehow, camera slowly lowering, appearing to be in some kind of a daze. Sunlight shines over the lenses of his glasses. His lips hang slightly, parted.
A trio of kids dart behind him, chasing each other—the same ones who nearly knocked my grandma over.
But it isn’t my poor grandma they bump into this time.
It’s something behind the camera guy: a tall and mighty stack of oversized picture frames—wooden ones, metal ones, clunky and decorative ones, all of them stacked higher than they ought to be, towering over him like a giant.
And that giant is now tipping over.
The guy doesn’t even notice. He just stands there in a strange, silent stupor, camera hovering somewhere in front of his face, his lips slack, unaware of the doom about to descend upon him.