Hope Between the Pages, Pepper Basham [best ebook reader android .txt] 📗

“Reading between the lines from the stories you’ve shared, I’d say you two hit it off pretty well.”

Clara shrugged and sat back in her chair, trying to quell the sudden fluttering in her chest. Circumstances didn’t bode well for an international romance between them. He had to stay with his mom. She had to stay with hers. How on earth could a relationship work like that? And despite their daily emails and almost daily phone calls, any immediate plans waited on Mom’s prognosis and the bookshop’s future. Romancing an Englishman didn’t figure into those prospects very clearly.

Though she missed him…even after only three days apart. How ridiculous was that?

“I think he’ll make an excellent friend.”

One of Mom’s eyebrows took a turn. “Friend?”

“Practically speaking, Mom, anything more than friendship at the moment isn’t a great idea.” Though memories of his kiss never drifted far from Clara’s thoughts. A pleasant distraction in the middle of sleepless nights on an uncomfortable foldout chair and constant nurse visits.

“It’s always the right time for the right romance, my girl.” Mom’s resident twinkle reemerged in her eyes after too many days’ absence. “Finding someone who understands you like few ever could and who wants to spend days just being with you, it alters your world forever.”

Clara stared at her mom as memories like photos flipped through her mind of her parents together, their beautiful friendship and camaraderie. Clara had always valued it, but since meeting Max, the recollections resurfaced with a different hue…a wistful longing full of questions like, Could Max be the match for me? Was love like her parents’ even possible anymore?

She folded her hands together, her smile resurrecting the slightest bit. Perhaps with Max.

“Like you and Dad.”

Mom nodded, her gaze taking on that distant expression she usually got when she thought about her dear husband. “I loved him from the first time he smiled at me.”

On the local college campus. Like something from a movie. She’d bumped into him because she was absorbed in the book she was reading. They both spilled their books onto the ground, and when they’d looked up from trying to retrieve their scattered belongings, they’d both just…known. Dad said it was because Mom was reading Le Mort d ’Artur, and he knew any woman reading medieval literature, not to mention fantasy-based medieval literature, had to be worth knowing.

And a part of Mom seemed to disappear when Dad died. Not enough that just anyone would notice, but Clara had.

“He sure had a great smile,” Clara added, uncertain of how to navigate this fragile moment where time spilled over itself.

“You have his smile and his eyes. The Blackwell eyes.”

Clara raised a brow. “Actually, they’re Camden eyes. Dad had his grandfather’s eyes.”

“That’s right.” Mom nodded. “And I can’t wait to see those photos when Max sends the scanned copies. They’ll be so much clearer.”

“Well, I don’t expect he’ll have time until after Christmas.” Clara squeezed her mom’s hand again. “And I’m hoping we can celebrate at home instead of here.”

“That gives me a good five days to get my act together then, doesn’t it?” Mom released a soft chuckle and pushed herself up to a better sitting position.

She looked better. Healthier. But anything was an improvement from seeing her pale and lifeless as she had been when Clara first arrived at the hospital directly from the airport.

“And you are keeping your promise to me, young lady.” Mom pointed her finger at Clara, her voice edging with more strength.

“My promise?”

“That you will go home today and sleep in your own bed.”

Clara crossed her arms, ready to do battle, but the fire in her mother’s eyes challenged her. “You said once I ate two full meals you’d go. Remember that?”

Clara deflated into a begrudging frown.

“I ate my tasteless breakfast and my slightly better lunch, so I’m holding you to your promise.” She wagged her finger, her countenance sobering. “I’ll not have you get sick too. Traveling. Sleeping in a hospital for three nights. You need rest, Clara.”

“Fine.” She leaned forward, holding her mom’s gaze. “But I’ll be back first thing in the morning, and I may even send Robbie to check on you right before bed.”

“You can’t keep spinning like this, Clara. Always hovering around me, trying to make sure I’m taken care of.” Mom squeezed Clara’s fingers. “You’ve spent the past five years of your life taking care of your father and then me, walking around as if I was going to drop dead any minute.”

“And you very well could.” Clara waved toward the bed.

“As could you,” Mom reprimanded softly. “You can’t keep living this anxious life, this half-life, by keeping so close you don’t even try to fly. I’ve lived my life and I’ve lived it well. Have you, Clara?”

Her words spilled like ice over Clara’s skin. “I don’t understa—”

“What do you want? What dreams do you have?” Her mom’s gaze bore into Clara’s, sending her back into the chair. “I know that one of them is love, marriage, a family of your own. When do you plan to start that?”

“I…I don’t want to waste what time I have left with you.”

“Waste?” She offered a sad laugh. “My girl, have you ever considered that I’d like to witness your dreams come true? I’d like to watch them happen, if God allows? That one of my biggest dreams is to see you fulfilling yours? So…what do you want?”

Clara sat riveted to the chair, her vision bleary from a sudden rush of tears. The question echoed through her from previous moments of solitude when she’d silently wondered the same thing. She’d watched life go by. England and Gillie and Max had given her a taste of living beyond the walls she’d built around herself. Her parents had never forced those expectations on her. She’d embraced them and defined them herself.

What did she want? The smiling faces of book-loving patrons blended in with scenes from Biltmore to England to…Max. At the core of her dreams