1
Destiny
Candi:Happy birthday! I’m so excited we’re going out tonight! Come to the studio around 5:00 and you can pick out a fun outfit to wear. No backing out. I love you. Mwah!
Crap, it’s my birthday. I’m dreading that I agreed to let Candi take me out. With her crazy schedule, she hasn’t been home for my birthday the last three years. Up until that time, we celebrated our birthdays together for as long as I can remember. Our celebrations have always been very different. My introverted self loves ordering sushi, eating cupcakes, and drinking hot cocoa while we curl up under blankets and watch movies until we fall asleep. For Candi’s birthday, it’s always party, party, party. While I don’t enjoy going out to nightclubs, drinking and dancing all night, I’d do anything for her. She’s my ride-or-die.
Me:Nope. No backing out. I’ll see you tonight. I love you bunches!
Thirty. Thirty years on this earth. I’ve had a pretty good life so far. Nothing awful and nothing fabulous. My parents love me, I love what I do for a living, and I have the best friend a girl could ask for.
My fingers rest, almost paralyzed, on my keyboard as I stare out the window at the waves crashing onto the shore and spilling across the sand. I’m desperate for inspiration to crash into my head and spill onto the blank page that’s taunting me. The cursor blinks relentlessly, provoking me.
The waves that used to practically sing love stories to me are useless right now. I can remember days of walking along the beach with my notebook, furiously scribbling down scenes as they popped into my head. And now…nothing. My last book was, by far, worse than the first book I ever wrote. Each word felt forced and the love scenes lacked passion. Passion? They were pathetic fizzles.
I had a pretty successful career for a while, but right now, I’m wondering if I’m going to be able to pay the rent on my little beach cottage next month. My book sales have plummeted over the last seven months and my savings account is dwindling quickly.
Being an indie author is a lot of work. Between self-editing, self-promoting, self-publishing, being active on social media to build your audience, creating a team of people to support you, writing newsletters, and everything else the do-it-yourself romance author has to do, finding time to write can feel impossible sometimes. And when youdohave time, you pray for inspiration and the most wonderful love story to create itself in your brain.
So, here I sit, my mind blank, wallowing in self-pity.
Staring at this page won’t miraculously make a love story come out of me, so I make lunch and put onThe Holiday. Maybe it’ll jolt some romance into me. I get all swoony for the character of Graham and love the scene where he, his girls, and Amanda are all lying in the girls’ tent in their bedroom. Oh, my heart.
Though I didn’t intend to watch the entire movie, what can I say, I got totally sucked in and did. After my laughs, my cries, and my hopeful romantic heart was tugged on, I get up from the sofa, put my lunch dishes in the dishwasher, and sit back down at my computer, determined to write. Words. I’ll take any and all words that come to me right now. Something, anything.
Placing my fingers on the keyboard, I start typing away. Click, click, click. I don’t quite know what I’m typing, I’m just trying to see what comes out. Several hundred words later, I take a swig of water from my glass water bottle and scroll up to read what I’ve written.
Crap. It’s total and utter crap.
Tap, tap, tap. Tappity-tap. My taps on the faded backspace key become more like a pounding. Ugh. I grab the mouse, select everything I’ve written, and hit the delete button. Whoosh. Gone. The blinking cursor torments me. Blink, blink, blink.
Irritated by the blank page that’s now mocking me, I grab my notebook and head to the beach. If nothing else, it’ll soothe me.
My stroll on the beach is exactly what I needed on my birthday. While inspiration doesn’t strike, breathing in the salt air that tousles my hair and feeling the warm sand seep between my toes is like a cozy blanket to my soul.
Several houses down from mine, there’s a woman and a little girl building a sandcastle. My mind wanders to when I was little and Mom and I built elaborate, multi-level sand castles with moats. I smile at the memory. We’d spend hours building them, only to have the waves wash them away. One time I asked her if I could live in a castle someday. She told me I could do anything I dreamed of. She’s always been my biggest supporter and my most devoted fan.
I check my phone and it’s time to head back home to get ready for the evening. I shower and shave, do my hair, and put on a little makeup. Even though Candi has tried for years to teach me how to do my makeup better, I’m just not great at it.
Candi always has tons of different outfits at her photography studio, and sometimes, when she’s in town, we play dress-up like when we were kids. Knowing she’ll be letting me wear something from her studio wardrobe, I throw on skinny jeans, a white T-shirt, and sneakers.
As usual, I’m ready early. I schedule my Uber and settle into the weathered white rocking chair on the front porch. Closing my eyes, I rock easily back and forth, letting the warm summer breeze caress me.
The Uber driver honks me out of my momentary escape from reality and I jump to my feet. The instant I get into his car, I’m uncomfortable. The smell of heavy cologne stings my nostrils and the way he turns around and glares at me is creepy.
“Be sure to strap in, little lady.” He doesn’t wink at me, but he may as well have. Heebie-jeebies crawl up my arms, meeting between my shoulder blades, then shooting up my neck to the base of my head.
Not being a big drinker, I’m usually the designated driver when Candi and I go out drinking. Those occasions are far less frequent now that we’re older. With it being my birthday, I figured I’d have a few drinks tonight. But right now, in this car with Mr. Creepyman, I’m regretting that decision.
He pulls up to Candi’s studio and I can’t get out of his car fast enough. I scurry into the studio as quietly as possible so I don’t disrupt Candi’s photo shoot. She’s incredibly talented and the most driven person I know. Her career exploded about three years ago and she now travels the world doing photo shoots with all kinds of famous people and iconic brands. It makes me so happy to see how successful she’s become. She’s worked extremely hard to get where she is.
From our appearance to our personalities, Candi and I are polar opposites. With her waist-long cotton-candy pink hair, her screaming-sexy body, exquisite Italian-Egyptian beauty, and flamboyant style, she could be a top model if she didn’t love being behind the camera so much. She’s sassy, confident, and doesn’t take shit from anyone. People are often surprised to learn we’re best friends.
One place we’re exactly the same, however, is our fierce loyalty to each other and our friendship.
She got crazy-lucky with her studio in that her uncle owned it and sold it to her for an ungodly low price. It’s a huge old warehouse with exposed brick walls. It has tons of space and Candi has loads of various styles of furniture and decor for setting up different scenes. Massive windows at the top of the brick walls filter in plenty of natural daylight.
Today she’s doing a shoot for Fendi. Fendi! Our lifestyles have become so different, but Candi remains unchanged by her success. She’s still the goofy-ass girl with a huge heart who’s been with me through all of life’s ups and downs. Every failed history test, every bad perm, and every heartbreaking relationship demise.
