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“Okay, so what is going on exactly?” his aunt, who was more like a mother to him than the woman who had given birth to him ever was, demanded to know.
Elaine Savage was a saint in Keaton’s eyes. She wasn’t his blood. She’d been married to his father’s brother, but sadly both had passed away before their time. His father from a brain aneurysm and his brother, her husband, from a car accident. His Aunt Laney was left raising his cousins Ford, Knox, and Sebastian as a single mom. They were ten, six, and four at the time. But two years after losing her husband, she’d opened her home to Keaton.
Before moving in with his aunt and cousins, his life had been a Lemony Snicket novel level, series of unfortunate events. Once his dad died, his mom never recovered. Keaton liked to believe she did her best, but her best was nowhere near good enough. She went through boyfriends like most people go through toilet paper. Each one seemed to be worse than the last. Some were just verbally abusive, but others took it further.
One day, when he was eight, Keaton came home from school to find a note that said she’d gone to Vegas to marry her boyfriend, a man he’d only met twice, and that she didn’t know when she was going to be back.
He’d called the only number he’d known. His cousins’. His Aunt Laney answered the phone and she was there to pick him up by dinner time. He still wasn’t sure how she’d managed that because she lived four hours away from him at the time, but she’d made it in two. She told him to pack his things and brought him home.
He lived there until he graduated high school and she’d raised him as her own son, her own flesh and blood.
“Uncle Keaton was drunk last night and agreed to be on Fairytale Love,” Ivy who had always been the more pragmatic, responsible twin explained.
“You did?!” Aunt Laney squealed and clapped. She jumped out of her chair and threw her arms around his neck. “That’s amazing! I’m so excited for you.”
Keaton’s family meant everything to him. They were all he had. If him doing this show made them that happy, then he didn’t really have a choice.
“Are youactuallygoing to go on the show?” Ford asked, for clarification.
“I guess so,” Keaton sighed.
Iris jumped up from her seat and joined her grandma in hugging him.
Ford smirked as he took out his phone, no doubt to text Seb and Knox the news. Thankfully, Knox had just gotten married the day before and Seb had seemed preoccupied the past few weeks. Maybe this whole thing would blow over without any more fanfare.
Ford’s phone buzzed and his cousin smiled as he turned his phone around. “Seb just sent the link to the TMZ article, they’re using your underwear ad as the photo.”
Or…maybe not.
3
Spendingthree days alone in a car, driving from California to Illinois, had not been the zen, relaxing experience Avery had envisioned.
Her plan had been to listen to podcasts, audiobooks, and music. Which technically, she had. Unfortunately, she hadn’t enjoyed any of them because she’d been too distracted having panic attacks and a mental breakdown.
The thing about running three hotels and having a young son was there hadn’t been a lot of time to think. Avery spent her life going from one task to the next. She always felt like she was several beats behind.
At work, she was constantly putting out fires. Sometimes literally in the case of the kitchen fire last New Year’s Eve. At home, she always felt like she was playing catch up. She tried to spend every free second with Jacob, but there was cooking, cleaning, laundry, bills, and random projects she’d start and never finish.
Her mom, who had moved in after Jacob was born, helped out. But Blanche Bardot wasn’t the maid, as she liked to point out on more than one occasion. And the past year or so, Avery enrolled Jacob in several sports for socialization and it had worked. He’d made friends. But the success meant she’d added practices, games, and playdates to her already insane schedule.
Avery felt like her life was a treadmill that she couldn’t get off. As each day, week, and month passed the speed and incline both kept increasing. It had happened in such small increments; she hadn’t noticed it. Before she realized what was happening, it had gotten to the point where the only thing she’d been able to do was to keep putting one foot in front of the other, until she was running at a fifteen percent incline. She couldn’t stop, or slow down, or take her hands off the bar otherwise life would have flung her against the wall.
Which is sort of what had happened. She finally let go and boy did she hit that wall. The past three days in the car, alone with only her thoughts had been eye-opening and horrifying. The same questions kept coming up.
How had she let things get so out of control?
Why had she allowed her life to run her and not the other way around?
When had she stopped prioritizing her happiness completely?
She knew the answer to that one. It was when she found out she was going to be a mom. Even though she’d been trying to do the right thing, hindsight was twenty-twenty, and it was clear now that she’d failed miserably.
Agreeing to marry Jude was, in the immortal words of Julia Roberts, a big mistake. Big. Huge. The two of them barely spoke. They barely spent any time together. They didn’t have the same morals, the same goals, the same outlook on life or family.
Jude treated his family like an ATM. He only saw them on the holidays, and even then, he used any excuse to get out of it. When they did go and visit his family in London, Jude barely spoke to them. His parents were nice enough, but all they talked about was business, their vacations, and art, which they both collected. The time she spent with them was pleasant enough, but it was cold and impersonal.
Avery had always pictured her family, her house being filled with laughter, love, and fun. She wanted her child’s family home to be a safe haven from the world, which could be harsh and cruel.
