Page 16 of Chasing You

“I can’t understandwhat we are doing going to a line dancing night at the bar. We are in Italy, not Texas.”

“Becauseeeeeee,” I drawled as I skipped towards the bar. “It’s fun. And a good excuse for me to wear these boots.” I kicked out my toes from the hem of my long black skirt.

Miles grabbed my hand, pulling me flush to him. I was so close that my nose brushed his with the slightest movement of my head. “You do look damn good in your little honky-tonk outfit.”

My mouth fell open and I squirmed to get my hand in front of me. “It is not honky-tonk. It’s cowgirl chic.” I jabbed my finger into his chest with every word, trying to be serious, but he just smiled wider with every second.

“Only you could convince me to do this,” he said, his eyes looking at me with what I think is wonder.

I bit the inside of my cheek, forcing my smile to stay hidden, but it snuck out anyway. “If you keep blabbering on, we’ll miss all the fun.”

His hands dropped from where they rested on my waist, slipping under the waistband of my skirt. “There’s fun to be had out here too.”

This time, my teeth bit straight into my bottom lip. “In the parking lot? I thought you were a little classier than that, hotshot.”

He just beamed his gorgeous smile at me, and my stomach dropped at the sight of it. It did that every time. I’d never seen anyone with a smile like Miles’s. It was contagious, I didn’t know how anyone could keep a straight face when he smiled. It was like a secret weapon.

“Oh my god, are you a part of the mile high club?” I asked.

“No,” he said. “But I could be,” his smile turned suggestive, “if I ever get my princess on board a flight, I could be persuaded.”

“Do you know how to fly those little planes? Like in Top Gun?” I was getting way distracted here, but I was running with it. “Can you go upside down like Tom Cruise?”

He just laughed. “Yeah, baby, I can go upside down.”

I tipped my head. “Don’t you get disoriented?”

“I thought you wanted to go line dancing?” he said, his hands drifting back up to my waist as country music blasted from inside the bar.

“Oh my god! I love this song! Come on,” I said, dragging him across the parking lot with me.

He just laughed again, and this time, I decided I thought it was my favorite sound I’d ever heard. “Is this a bad time to say that I hate country music?”

I gaspas I open my eyes. When I find myself looking at the pillow next to me I screw them closed again, rolling onto my back and throwing a hand over my chest where my heart is beating like it wants to jump out of there like a fish out of water.

I haven’t dreamt about Miles in years. I used to, a lot. In those first few months after he left, I used to dream of him coming home. Not home, at least not to him. I dreamt of him coming back to me. And every time I woke up, another little piece of my heart crumbled away.

But this wasn’t just a dream, a figment of my imagination. Thiswas a memory. A memory of the night I realized I was in love with him.

Seeing him struggling to fall into place when we were line dancing was the cutest thing I’d ever seen. And in that moment, all I could think of was that I was in love with him. There was no other way to describe that feeling deep in my core every time I just glanced at him. It was love. And it was crazy, it was so fast, but nothing had ever felt moreright.

But here I am. Four years later, alone. That feeling in my core long gone, those butterflies in my tummy limp.

I throw my covers off my legs and haul my body upright, looking over the mess that litters my bedroom floor.

I’ve never been tidy, as much as I wished I was. As much as my ma wished I was. She’d force me to clean my bedroom when I was a teenager, watching me while I did it. I hated it.

“You’ll understand when you have your own home,principessa,”she used to say. And yeah, I understand it, but nothing has changed. I still end up with clothes thrown around my room at the end of the week.

I sigh as I set my feet down on the hardwood, the boards creaking as I stand. I just stand there for a second, taking in the way that the sun is streaming into the room through the gap in the curtains, bathing one sliver of the room in full sun. I walk over to the window, yanking the curtains open and letting the sun fall on my face. I take a deep breath, letting it warm my newly awoken body as I close my eyes. Another breath.

Meditating always seemed silly to me, like something someone takes up when they’re having a midlife crisis. That was until I went on a wellness retreat with my best friend, Rosalie, in Sorrento. She won some two-person gift voucher online and forced me to go with her. It was around a month after Miles left, and at the time, I would do almost anything to try to quiet my mind. That’s when I realized just how powerful mindfulness can be, how you can dictate your mind, calm it, quiet it. I don’t practice much anymore, but today feels like a day that I need to startoff on the right foot. I take deep breaths, counting steadily as I slow my breathing, trying to focus on the way my lungs fill with air, followed by the way they empty. But I can’t focus, my counting jumping from three to five. I can’t quiet my mind, not today.

Because today is the wedding.

chapter seven

MILES

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