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When I’m With You
SANDI LYNN
Chapter One
Paisley
Life was beautiful—so beautiful it seemed like a sin. At twenty-six years old and a happily married newlywed to the man of my dreams, I couldn’t think of anything more I wanted. We lived in Los Angeles in a cute little home we designed and built. A home with four bedrooms, a master bedroom, and three extra rooms for the three children we planned to have. My husband graduated from Harvard at the top of his class. He set out to work for one of the most prestigious financial companies in the world, where he was the youngest ever to land a top managerial position in the company. I graduated from UCLA with a BA in English and took on a job writing a column for the LA Times. We were so incredibly happy that it seemed unreal. We had sex seven nights a week, and every morning, we would get up at five thirty a.m. and go running. Fitness was important to both of us, and we never missed a day. I cooked dinner just about every night, with the exception of Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Those were date nights, and we always went out to dinner or out with friends. My mom had family dinner on Sundays, and wewere all expected to be there. We were perfect in everyone’s eyes, including our own.
We met when we both were twenty years old at a birthday party for a friend of a friend. It was love at first sight, or should I say love at first words, because I heard his voice from behind before I even saw his face. I had stepped outside on the porch one calm, warm night in August to have a cigarette. As I flicked the lighter, I heard someone behind me.
“Do you really like to do that?” he asked.
I slowly turned my head, and my green eyes met his, and the smile on his face captured me in the most exciting way that I had never been captured before. I never smoked that cigarette or any others after that. We spent every waking moment together. Four years later, we were engaged, and two years later, we married. My world and my universe were complete until the day of our one-year wedding anniversary when we were supposed to be road-tripping to Montana. But instead, I spent the day mourning my husband’s death. At twenty-seven years old, I was a widow.
“Paisley, are you okay?”my sister Piper asked.
“Huh?” I stared blankly at her.
“You looked like you were in la-la land, and I need your opinion on this dress.”
She emerged in a black and white polka dot dress from the fitting room. Her boyfriend, Liam, was taking her to a fancy restaurant for their one-year dating anniversary.
“I like it. It looks good on you.”
She gave me that sympathetic look that everyone gave me. The “I feel so bad for her” look. The unwelcome pity that I didn’twant. I just desired to be left alone, but my family wasn’t having any of that. Since my husband passed away, they had become overbearing.
“I think so too. I’m going to buy it!” She smiled.
I had two sisters and a brother. My sisters were Charlotte, who was thirty-one years old, and Piper, who was twenty-nine. Then there was Keaton, our brother, who just turned twenty-one. Charlotte was a nurse at Cedars Sinai Hospital, and Piper was a model who was afraid that, because she was twenty-nine years old, her career was coming to an end. She was the very reason my family packed us up from our family home in Connecticut and moved us out to Los Angeles sixteen years ago. She was scouted at the local mall and appeared in her first teen magazine when she was thirteen. Keaton was Keaton. He wasn’t interested in college but managed to land a job working for a top web design company in L.A. He didn’t need to spend much time at the office, so he spent most of his days surfing and working from home. As for me, I was known as “Dear Paisley.” I wrote about love and relationships for the L.A. Times. It was a job I stumbled onto by accident when Kenny hired me as a freelance writer, a man who took a chance on me after I criticized one of his articles. The paper had come up with the idea to do a romance column because they wanted to expand their readership to more than just men. Kenny hired Cora, and she instantly flopped by giving the worst possible advice. When the column went belly up, Kenny asked me if I could step in and answer a couple of questions. Needless to say, people liked what I had to say. He fired Cora and labeled me as “Dear Paisley.”
Piper droppedme off at home and left to get ready for her date with Liam. I slipped the key into the lock and walked into my house.
“Hi, Romeo.” I smiled as he rubbed up against my leg, welcoming me home.
My mom came over about a month after my husband died and brought me Romeo. He was a three-year-old Siamese cat whose owner had passed away. According to my mom, Romeo and I needed each other because we shared a common bond. I wasn’t a big cat lover, but he stole my heart after spending one night with him. He followed me into the kitchen and made sure to let me know his food bowl was empty. As I fed the little guy, my phone rang, and when I looked at it, I saw my mom calling.
“Hi, Mom,” I answered.
“Hello, Paisley. I wanted to know if you would like to join your dad and me for dinner tonight.”
I sighed. “I can’t tonight. I have a lot of work to do, plus I’ll see you in a couple of days for family dinner.”
“You need to get out more. I’m worried about you.”
“Mom, don’t?—”
“Paisley, it’s the truth, and you know it. Sweetheart, it’s been almost a year.”
“Oh, Mom, let me call you back later. Kenny’s calling.”
I hit the end button. I felt bad for lying to her, but my family needed to understand that when I was ready to venture out into the world and become social again, I would. I didn’t care if it took me two, three, or more years. It was when I was ready and nobody else.
Chapter Two
Ben
I was a fireman for the Los Angeles Fire Department. It was something I’d wanted to be ever since my mom bought me my first fire truck at the age of six. Now, twenty-three years later, I was doing a job I loved.