Love Far Away: 2 Page 9

  Despite myself, I smiled. “It’ll be great to see Henry and Olivia,” I said. I had souvenirs for both of them tucked away in my suitcase. “I’ve missed them. It’ll be a big change, going back home and trying to figure out my new life. That’s what’s holding me back, I think- moving on. Bradley and I are over and that’s been hard. Now I have to adjust to life as a single mom. We’ll probably have to sell the house- I know I couldn’t afford it on my own. Find a lawyer. Figure out custody. Maybe I’ll go back to school to train in...something.”

  “Take some more photography courses,” suggested Megan. “Photograph weddings, too.”

  “Get a teaching degree,” suggested Becca. “You already have early childhood education- you could teach kindergarten.”

  “Get your real estate license and go in to business with me,” said Ashley. “It’ll be great!”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I really love photography, but I need to find something that will support me and the kids.” I heaved a sigh. “This sucks. Anybody have a magazine? I need to distract myself.”

  Ashley tossed me an Italian gossip magazine someone had left on the seat before her, and I spent the next five minutes flipping through it. I couldn’t read any of it and I didn’t recognize any of the Italian celebrities in it, so it wasn’t much of a distraction. I ended up staring out the window as we travelled up through Italy on our way to Milan, where we would switch trains for Paris.

  Megan was watching a movie on her tablet, Becca was reading a book, and Ashley had an eye mask on and appeared to be taking a nap, so I was alone with my thoughts. Heading back to Ohio as a single mother of two kids was not nearly as exciting and romantic as it had been on the way over here, jetting off for Paris as a newly single woman. What a wonderful trip it had been, though- I’d dreamed of seeing Paris and Rome my whole life. Sadly, it had taken my husband telling me he was in love with someone else to make me wake up and decide to go and do something for a change.

  I smiled to myself as I remembered some of the things I’d seen- the view from the balcony in our hotel room in Paris, as my friends and I crowded out there to eat croissants and drink coffee. The museums that Becca had dragged us to were magnificent. I will never forget the view from the Eiffel Tower. How chic I had felt sitting in a sidewalk cafe on the Champs-Elysees eating lunch. And that beautiful leather Louis Vuitton bag that I’d bought for myself as a special treat. I drank and ate all of the glorious wine, coffee, and pastries I could handle, and then some. A crazy night of clubbing in Paris, staying out way too late, and deciding to go to an after party at a hotel. There, I’d snuck away from everyone else and ended up meeting a sexy stranger. I blushed at the memory of what we’d done- stolen some bottles of wine from the party’s bar, and ended up having sex in the shower.

  It was by far the craziest thing I had ever done. In my teen years and my early twenties, when it seemed like everyone else was meeting boys and experimenting with sex, I’d started dating Bradley and stayed with him. In college, the other girls were going to bars and dating different guys and, if they were Ashley, filling up the notches on their bedposts. After we’d graduated college I’d gotten pregnant with Henry, and that was the end of the potential for any wild and crazy times. I’d been in Mom Mode since then- minivan, yoga pants, preschool drop off, soccer carpool, the whole deal. The morning after I’d woken up after my crazy Parisian night, I’d been embarrassed and full of regret, but now a few days out I had a bit more perspective and I was glad I’d done it. If Bradley and I were no more, I was going to have to sleep with another man eventually, so it might as well be a memorable stranger I was never going to see again, right? Besides, leaving Paris- what I’d thought was the city of my dreams- had led me to the south of France.

  When I closed my eyes and pictured where I wanted to be, it was the south of France. Maybe not Monaco- as Sébastien had said, Monaco was too expensive for us mere mortals to live in- but the villages and towns and cities that dotted the coast, looking out over the azure sea. I smiled as I remembered the color of the sea as we’d cruised along in Gianluca’s yacht, surrounded by the thin, tan, beautiful people. It had been wonderful to imagine myself living that life for a few days. Sébastien had told me that several of the young women on board Gianluca’s yacht were paid models, and it tickled me to put myself in the same category as them.

  Sébastien.

  My breath caught in my throat as I remembered him. The whiteness of his teeth the first time I had seen him, on the lower deck of his yacht. The way he would smile and give a little shrug in that oh-so-French way of his, and the careful way he spoke. The way his eye sparkled when he talked about sailing or the ancient Roman mosaics drove me crazy. My heart yearned to see him just one more time, leaning over the railing of the yacht in his crisp white uniform. But it was over. I’d told him as much the last time I’d seen him. It was time for me to go home and deal with the divorce. It was crazy to get involved with someone this quickly. Besides, he spent his life travelling between Rome and the south of France, while I lived in suburban Ohio. It was never going to work. I closed my eyes and slid my sunglasses on as I turned my head towards the window of the train. I didn’t want my friends to see the tears that filled my eyes.

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  Authors Other Books

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  “Love Far Away: 2” – Free With K.U.!

  “Love Far Away: 3”- Free With K.U.!