Page 18 of My Infatuation with Isabella

I decide to mess with him a bit because he doesn’t know the can of worms he’s trying to open up here. “I’ve been having really bad period pains and?”

“Okay, stop.” His eyes widen in horror. “Don’t want to go down that road. Why don’t you speak to me like...you’d speak to Tommy.”

“So, there’s this guy I hooked up with last weekend?”

“Nope! Don’t want to hear about that, either.”

I giggle. “That’s what happens when you try to fill shoes that aren’t yours.”

“I’m trying,” he says, sounding deflated.

And I know he is. The problem isn’t him. It’s me. I appreciate Keith and everything he’s done for me and Tommy. I love that he loves my mom so deeply and he’s made her his number one priority. He’s the rock in our lives, but despite his best efforts to bond with me, I’ve kept him at arm's length. Even though I told my mother not to be loyal to a man who left us, I think I did exactly that. Maybe part of me thought Keith might leave us too and the other part feared he might reject me. I don’t have the best track record when it comes to men. They don’t stay in my life for too long. A few months and then they grow tired, so I generally don’t get emotionally attached to men.

But Keith is different. He’s reliable and dependable, and I can’t keep punishing him for what my dad did. I need to give him a proper chance, a chance he rightly deserves.

“I feel lost, Keith,” I say softly, and it shocks him that I’m serious. “I feel so lost, like I’m just floating through life, looking for something that may or may not exist. And because I don’t know what I’m looking for, I’m scared that I might not recognize it when I find it.”

He clasps his hands, resting his elbows on his thighs. “You’re chasing a feeling, Isabella. You’ll recognize it when you find it.”

“But what if I never find it? And it’s not like I’m not happy. I’m happy within my...self, but I still feel empty. I look at Cat, and she’s doing such amazing things, and I’m not doing anything. I’m sure my mother wishes I was more like her. Cat is so successful inanothercountry, and I don’t even make enough to leave the nest. She must be so disappointed in me and how I turned out.”

The words are jagged, slicing into me as I say them, but Keith just gives me a rueful smile. “Your mother isn’t disappointed. Not even close. And she doesn’t compare you to your sister because she knows she has two different daughters with different views on life. She appreciates you for the person you are. Remember, your mother is a nurse. She doesn’t measure success by wealth or money. She’s proud of you. I’m proud of you.”

Those words are touching, but I still snort my disbelief. “And what’s there to be proud of? I’ve achieved nothing.”

“You win the employee of the month award at every single job.”

“Wow,” I say with a sarcastic laugh. “Those are great accolades.”

“You’re so hard on yourself that you don’t see what other people see. At your last four jobs you got promoted to manager or assistant manager within two months and each time, it was because you were the reason for increased sales. It doesn’t matter if you’re working at a panel beater or a nail salon or a restaurant, you have this energy that draws people to you. You create this environment where they just want to be part of the vibe. Even when you were working as the receptionist at Potterman and Hart, our clientslovedyou. The other partners still ask me to get you back, and I have to constantly tell them that it’s not the job you want. Your mother and I both know that you would be amazing if you just found something you were passionate about and that’s why we agreed to give you the time and space to find it...And you will, but don’t think that because you haven’t found it already that we’re not proud of the very talented woman you’re becoming.”

I smile because it feels like he’s taken a weight off my shoulders. “Thank you, Keith. I needed to hear that. I was feeling like a total failure and?”

“Every step forward in life is one tiny success. The key thing to understand is that we’re all running our own race, so we shouldn’t be measured by the standards of others. Your steps areyours. It doesn’t matter if those steps are small or...slow. As long as they are moving forward, it’s a step in the right direction. That’s growth.”

I nod slowly, letting everything he said sink in. “You know, Keith...I don’t need you to be my sister because I already have Cat.”

He’s slightly taken aback by that statement because I don’t think he expected me to say that. “I wasn’t trying to be?”

“And I don’t need you to be my best friend because I already have Tommy. But maybe...maybe you could be my dad. I don’t have one of those.”

“Yeah, I think I could do that.” He puts his arm around me to pull me closer, and I rest my head on his shoulder. “You think I’ll be any good?”

“Based on this talk, I think you’ll be great.”

“How about I go all out and try a dad joke?”

I shift back slightly to look up at him. “Are they as bad as your lawyer jokes?”

“They may be worse.”

“Okay, try one.”

“Knock, knock.”

“Who’s there?”

“Nobel.”

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