Page 121 of As They Are
“Go get some rest before dinner,” she said. “You sound exhausted.”
I nodded, grateful for the escape. I went to my room and flopped on the bed, trying to work out everything I felt.
And how my mom managed to still haunt me after all of these years.
I didn’t expect to see Henry for a while. The plan was to give him as much space as he needed and worry about the show later.
So when I saw him walking down the sidewalk as usual, my heart jumped into my throat and I abandoned the contractor who’d been asking me a question.
“What are you doing here?” I asked as I ran up to him.
“Hold on!” one of the PAs called. “He doesn’t have a mic yet!”
“This is a private conversation,” I told her. “I’ll let you know when he’s ready.”
She huffed and turned around.
“Wren,” he began. “I’m fine.”
“Are you? Yesterday was a dumpster fire.” In more ways than one. My emotions felt more tangled than my hair after a roller coaster ride.
“I took the whole day off. Rest does wonders.” His eyes went down to my ankle. “And I’m pretty sure you don’t need to be running on a freshly healed sprain.”
Something in my chest loosened. He was back.
“I was making sure my boyfriend wasn’t doing something dumb,” I said with a roll of my eyes.
“That’smyjob.”
My jaw fell open. “Are youroastingme right now? Who are you?”
“We can switch it up,” he said with a smile. “Now, go back over to what you were doing. I have something to give you, and Madison will come after us if it’s not on camera.”
I blinked, realizing he had something behind his back. “You’re killing my curiosity.”
“It’ll only take a few minutes.”
“That’s forever,” I moaned as I returned to my contractor. It was hard to talk about crack filling while I knew Henry had a gift for me, but I did my best.
It didn’t take much acting for me to be happy to see him. Or for me to run up and kiss him. In fact, I would have done that any day. Especially now that I knew how it felt when he?—
My thoughts flew out of my mind when he brought out a massive blue hydrangea. “This is for you.”
I stared at him in awe. “This is ... Wow, are yousureyou don’t have a secret florist connection?”
“No, they’re from my house. I grew it.”
And I killed any plant I touched. “Thank you,” I said, looking at the fluffy flower. His gestures had been so sweet that I decided to dry all the others he’d given me. But for a flower this massive, I’d need to figure out how to do the same thing.
“I can open the clinic a little later if we need to do that interview.”
“Oh, don’t worry about it. I figured it out.”
“Cut!” Madison yelled. “No business talk!”
“I’m not gonna apologize for communicating!” I snapped back.
“So, you’re still being difficult?”
