Page 2 of As It Was (Strawberry Springs #1)

MOLLIE

I was riding off into the sunset with a hot cowboy when my alarm went off and broke my perfect little dreamland.

“Fuck you,” I said to the blaringly loud noise, and laid back down.

My emergency alarm went off five minutes later, just as I was seeing a buff form against an orange and pink sky.

I let out a groan so loud the bed rumbled, and finally forced myself upright.

I rubbed my eyes and grabbed the beige comforter, laying it across the bed neatly.

Personally, I didn’t care if my bed was made or not.

But my fiancé, Trevor, did. And if he wanted something, it meant I needed to get it done.

He said he was terrible at cleaning, which I certainly noticed every morning when I tripped on his clothes that he’d left on the floor. Trevor wanted our apartment a certain way, yet he left a trail of things to clean wherever he went.

If I confronted him about it, he’d always tell me that he was too busy thinking about work. Or, if he was in a good mood, our future together. He excused it by saying it was easy for me to grab them off the ground when I saw them.

He said the logic was sound .

I wanted to believe him, but I couldn’t help but feel frustrated every time I had to pick up something of his.

After that, I threw on one of my pairs of beige slacks, the one pair Trevor complimented me in, and a white dress shirt for work. I brewed a K-cup, mixed it with the chalky protein shakes he insisted were good for me, and ran out the door to head to work.

Some people found peace in their routine. I only found boredom that grew every single day.

No one paid me any mind as I walked through the lobby of our apartment and out to the streets of Nashville.

Everyone was too busy either on their phones or rushing about their day.

There was a jogger I encountered every single morning in a pink or purple outfit.

She would always run right past me, or over me, never giving me a second glance.

Everyone was like that here. Sure, some were friendly. But they were so busy .

Nashville was good at being busy.

The streets always were, even when it wasn’t rush hour. I lived downtown, and the road noise was ever present, even in my apartment. Cars honked, tires squealed, and loud trucks idled any time of the day.

It was worse whenever I walked to my car.

The only break in my usual routine was a biker nearly hitting me as I crossed the street. I jumped back, momentarily jostled by it, but he only waved an apology and kept going.

No words were exchanged.

I got in my car only to sit in traffic, listening to a podcast drone on about the morning news while I tried not to fall asleep at the wheel.

I wasn’t a morning person, but life seemed to only reward morning people. I tried to get to the office at eight, but it took me thirty minutes every morning to go five miles from the apartment to work, meaning I had to be up by seven every weekday.

Trevor was already there. Unlike me, he thrived in the mornings and liked to come in as early as possible to get work done. We used to ride together until I couldn’t get up early enough for him. Now, it was only me coming in at eight.

At first, I’d been hurt that he’d left me behind. But then I saw it as a blessing in disguise. At least when I was alone, I could groan and curse about my life as much as I wanted to.

I shouldn’t have been in a bad mood, though. Trevor and I had plans today. Sure, they weren’t romantic. Or even anything fun. But he was clocking out early for me—something he’d told me to be grateful for.

The feeling of nothingness only got worse when I arrived at work.

There was something about an office that was soul-sucking. It didn’t matter what little perks they tried to offer; even if there was a white-marble lobby that was far too expensive, being within four gray walls illuminated by fluorescent lights made me feel like I was in a prison.

I had no reason to feel this way. I had a good job in real estate. I made good money. I worked with my family and fiancé. I did my job well—marketing to people and getting return clients—but lately, it had all begun to feel like a ... slog.

A few years ago, when I’d graduated college, I was better at going all the time. I liked working. I liked proving myself. But I was now tired in a way I didn’t know how to fix.

We were trying to get more clients due to the recession, and I couldn’t care less.

I tried to tell both Dad and Trevor that the homes in Nashville were simply too expensive for what people could afford, but they didn’t believe me.

We still had more than enough money, but Dad was sure there was something we could do to fix this, so we were in planning mode.

The first thing on my list was a meeting, which sent me to the break room for more coffee. As I sat and tried to listen, I found it impossible.

I could see outside from our meeting room, and it was the only thing keeping me awake.

In the late summer air, lilies bloomed from their tall sprouts in the ground. The city had curated spots planted around signs and premade gardens.

I had dimly noticed them, but I hadn’t had time to stop and truly appreciate one of my favorite seasons.

I missed how these warm months had felt when I was a kid. How, even though the air was oppressive, nature experienced a crescendo every single year. Crops grew. Animals reproduced. Flowers bloomed until the air smelled sweet.

The city always had a certain scent to it. It was either cars or some other pollutant. Whenever I thought of happiness, it wasn’t here. It was the farm I’d used to visit when I was younger.

Papa Bennie’s berry farm had always been beautiful.

Mom and Dad only let me stay with him when they had no other childcare, but when Mom quit her job to stay at home, I no longer needed to go there.

I saw him on holidays and spent the whole time catching up with him, but my days of visiting were over.

When he passed ten years ago, I was too lost in my grief to ask about his farmland. I knew Mom wouldn’t keep it. Someone must have bought it, but I didn’t know if they’d kept the strawberry farm open.

I missed it, though.

He was Mom’s dad, but she didn’t talk about him.

Dad was cordial with him, but they had never been close.

Over the years, he’d faded into a warm memory, one that I wished I could go back to.

And now that everything had blended together, I wanted it even more.

There was a rose-tinted filter over everything, and I wished things could go back to how they used to be.

People always talked about nostalgia, but they forgot to mention one thing.

Nostalgia hurt .

“Mollie?” A voice broke me out of my dark thoughts. “What do you think?”

“About what?” I asked, pulling my gaze away from the window and back into the meeting room. Trevor had been speaking, and at my response, he sighed and ran a hand through his pale blonde hair.

“The marketing campaign,” another man, Todd, added. “We wanna buy out more emails so we can broaden our reach.”

“Yeah, sure.” I said it without thinking.

“What?” Trevor asked, shaking his head. “Mollie, I thought you were against buying email lists.”

Ah, shit. I shouldn’t have said yes. That was going to make work harder for myself.

But I just wanted to be in nature, not in this meeting room.

“She said yes,” Todd said. “So I’m doing it.”

“Mollie,” Trevor urged. “Do you want to clarify?”

I tried to find the same urgency he had. But these were emails . Sure, I was morally against this choice, but God, I didn’t care anymore. Todd had been pushing this for weeks.

Maybe it was time he learned.

“Test it out. Let me know the results.”

Trevor’s brow rose, but Todd jumped at the chance and announced his plans. I might regret giving him that concession later, but I was too out of my own head to think about it. Future Mollie could deal with it.

Thankfully, I was pulled out of the line of attention when Dad brought up something else, and I released a sigh of relief. I could feel Trevor looking at me, though, as if he were trying to figure out exactly why I was so distracted at work.

He wouldn’t be caught dead not thinking about work. He was perfect in the office and always focused. When I’d met him, I’d wanted to be like him. Now, I wasn’t so sure.

When the meeting was over, I made a beeline for my cubicle to get my head on straight.

But a hand on my arm stopped me.

“Mollie,” Trevor started. “What was that? You’ve never agreed to let Todd do anything of that nature before.”

“I’m sorry, I just ... Something else is on my mind.”

“What could possibly be on your mind?”

I screwed my eyes shut. He wasn’t going to understand what I was about to say.

But he was my fiancé, and I knew he wanted me to say something.

“It’s late summer, and I feel like I haven’t been outside at all.”

His eyebrows creased. “We have a balcony.”

“It faces another apartment. I wanna see nature .”

“Why?”

“It’s pretty? It’s nice? I’m feeling so burnt out lately that I think it might help.”

“Okay, then. Find a park.”

“I want real nature. Like Papa Bennie’s farm. I wanna go there.”

Trevor scoffed. “Why would you want to go there?”

“I miss it.”

“You miss him . And he’s dead.”

“Thank you for reminding me,” I said flatly, “but it’s not that I wanna see him. I wanna see what he left behind. The farm is still around. Or it should be. Someone bought it.”

“Or it ended up like a lot of farmland. Abandoned. ”

“You do realize that farmland is responsible for all of the things you put in your smoothies every morning, right?”

“Of course. And I have nothing but respect for the profession. But it’s ... not for people like you and me.”

My shoulders sagged. “You don’t get it. I just need to visit. Nothing else. I don’t know what happened to the farm, but someone has to.”

“I don’t understand why you’re even thinking about this.”

“I just want a reset.”