Page 49 of Mr. Swoony

“Are you sure? Because I feel as if you think I’m some woman who ran away from her rich fiancé and now has nothing.” She leans back in the chair and crosses her legs.

“Trust fund kid, huh?”

She shrugs. “Kind of.”

“You said you stopped working because Tristan wanted you to. What will you do now?”

Her mouth twists, and her cheeks turn a light apricot color. It’s cute. She’s embarrassed for some reason.

“I don’t know.” She holds up her hand before I can comment. “It’s not what you think though.”

“Who said I’m making assumptions?” I grab two waters out of the fridge, twist the cap off hers, and slide it over to her.

“Thanks.” She takes a sip and screws the cap back on. “It’s not that I don’t want to work, don’t want something for myself. I’m not content to just live off my trust fund, but I don’t know what I want to do. I told you about my parents never being married. You met Sam, who is my stepdad. I didn’t grow up like Tristan and his friends. My dad was still very absent most of my life. When he died, he left me what was more or less his trust fund. My dad was the guy who couldn’t fall in line with what his father wanted. He never took over the family business but traveled and acted like a playboy most of his life.”

“You don’t have to explain this all to me. I think it’s great if you don’t have to work and can live off that money. It’s a dream most people would probably want.”

“Except that it’s unfulfilling. After Tristan proposed, we discussed how I’d stay at home. His mom insisted that I would go with her to charity events and sit on boards until we had kids. My entire future was planned out for me.” She points at me. “You’re judging.”

I hold up my hands and back off, leaning my back against the counter behind me. “I just can’t imagine not playing hockey. Not doing what I love. But everyone is different. It’s your life to live.”

“I used to work in marketing for a large corporation, but on the side, I had this social media thing where I posted what I was wearing, where to get it, and stuff like that, but Tristan thought it was a dumb hobby and didn’t like how it took my attention away from him so he pressured me into giving it up.” She drops her head into her hands. “I sound pathetic.”

“You sound like someone who got caught up in a life she didn’t want and didn’t know how to escape. And that’s okay.”

I round the island and put my arm around her shoulders. She turns to me, wrapping her arms around my chest. I rest my chin on her head, holding her close and wishing I could take away all her sadness.

“I think you’re still processing everything, but maybe you need to stop dissecting everything from the past and start living for the now. I know it’s only been a couple days but focus on who you are now and who you want to be.”

She nods into my chest, and I squeeze her tighter.

The timer on her phone goes off, startling both of us. She turns it off, and we go to the oven, opening the door.

Eloise grabs the hot pads, and we both stare at the cake tin as she pulls it out because the cake hardly rose.

“Oh, boy, this is a disaster.” She takes them both out and puts them on the cooling rack, both of us glaring down at it.

“I’m not sure what we could’ve done wrong.” I scratch the back of my head.

She presses her thumb into one cake, and it bounces back as the recipe said it should, but it’s really thin. “We did something wrong.”

“We’ll try again.”

She sniffles.

I put my finger under her chin, bringing her face to mine. “Hey.”

“What if I’m just a failure now?”

I shake my head. “No. This was our first try. We’ll figure it out.”

Her face is full of doubt. I hate seeing that because at some point in her life, someone told her the world wasn’t hers for the taking. That mindset isn’t going to change just because she left Tristan. She’ll need a lot of support to change her view of herself.

“It will come,” I say. “You’re going to be okay. I promise.”

She sighs but doesn’t refute my promise. Although I still hope this roommate situation will grow into more, I have to set that agenda aside for now because Eloise needs to work on herself first. She needs to find self-confidence inside herself. Otherwise, we’d never make it anyway.

Twenty-One

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