Part Two
Mia
I can feel the warm breeze running over my skin as Ian asks me a second time to tell him what I see.
“I see,” I start, “me. I’m rolling down the ramp and out clean.”
“Good,” he says. “Now, open your eyes.”
I’m not quite ready, so I leave my eyes shut a few more seconds as I try to mentally work through this.
Ian’s taken me to the park as often as possible ever since he found out that I’ve been hiding my own skating progress, but the biggest thing I’ve dropped into was a halfpipe and Ian was right: that’s a whole other thing.
“Mia?” he asks, kissing my forehead.
“Yeah?” I answer, finally opening my eyes.
“You don’t have to do this if you’re not ready,” he says. “I don’t want to pressure you into doing this.”
“Well,” I tell him, “if I’m going to be your arm candy when you’re traveling across the globe, the least I can do is know how to bring it on four wheels.”
He grins his white-toothed grin, saying, “After we do this, we’re going to head back home and work on your trash talk. You, my dear, have a very long way to go.”
“Whatever,” I tell him. “Any final pointers before I break my neck?”
“I think between here, home, and the last year or so, we’ve pretty much covered all the finer points,” he says. “What I will tell you is that it’ll go so much easier if you’re relaxed and loose when you drop in. Otherwise, well…”
“Yeah,” I mutter and take another look down at the concrete, seemingly so far below.
Ours isn’t a perfect situation, but we’re making it work.
“Will you hurry up? I’ve got things to do!” Abby shouts from the concrete below.
Going after Ian the way she did almost ruined our friendship. It would have ruined our friendship if she’d persisted, but even that quick kiss did its fair share of damage.
Now that I’m living with Ian, though, being vindictive toward someone who was once so close to me just didn’t seem like the thing to do. Of course, I didn’t let her off completely free of punishment.
“You’re on the clock!” I shout down to her.
“Well,” she calls back up, “I think the kid’s diaper’s wet, so I’m going to go get him changed in the car.”
Every new parent should have a free babysitter.
Yep, that’s right. That day in the janitor’s closet when I forgot to grab my purse, and with it, my condoms, was the day that I became pregnant.
That was an uncomfortable conversation with dad.
He’s really started to come around ever since I moved in with Ian, though, my dad. Telling him that that guy he was so worried about knocked me up didn’t go over so well.
Now, though, when Abby has to work or, more commonly, when I just get sick of having her around, I send her home and call my dad. It’s been a long road, but I think we’re starting to make progress.
“You ready?” Ian asks.
“I don’t know,” I tell him. “Just go over it for me one more time, start to finish.”
Ian runs through it all with me, answering the few questions I have left: He really has been working with me a lot since I “came out of the garage,” as he likes to call it.
“Okay,” I tell him finally, and I roll my board to the lip until only the tail between my foot and the edge is keeping the board in place. “I’m ready.”
We’re not rich, but we’re comfortable. What’s more, we’re happy.
That day of the Midwest Championships, I realized quite possibly the most important thing about my relationship, not only with Ian, but with others as well: Ian was right. It was fear.
I didn’t believe him until I figured out what he was trying to say to me.
“The point is that I love you.”
“You’ve got this,” Ian tells me, echoing my own words from a year ago.
There’s no telling what’s going to happen in the future, but Ian, Emma, and I have got a firm foundation with each other, a beautiful life.
Right now, there’s only one thing left to do.
I put my front foot on the board, and I lean in.
JACKED
By Claire Adams
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2017 Claire Adams
Chapter One
Luke
Shrill laughter echoing from inside my place meant Ryan was trying to get laid... again. He had a habit of doing that at my house recently even though he only lived three feet from me in the other half of the house—a half with its own living room that was perfect for such activity.
“Dude, seriously?” I mumbled as I walked up the steps and pushed open the front door to my place. I shook my head when I found him on my couch covered with two girls—one brunette and one redhead. Ryan always did have a thing for redheads.
He grinned mischievously back at me. “What? Can you not see all this beauty?” he stroked the girls’ heads as they kissed on his face and neck.
“Yeah,” I shook my head again and headed for the stairs. “I can see it alright.”
“You not gonna join us?” the brunette asked. I knew I should know her name, but for the life of me, I couldn’t remember it.
“No, but thanks for the offer. I have an early morning,” I responded before turning my attention to the man in the middle of the bimbo sandwich. “Ryan, try to keep it down, would ya?” I joked as I made my way to my room upstairs.
***
The next morning, I sat on the back porch drinking my coffee and mentally planning my day as I did most mornings. Today, my mind was racing more than usual, due mostly to the nine a.m. meeting I had with one of the region's most affluent high-end furniture stores. I loved my work, and I was damned good at it, or so my customers told me. Clearly, they weren’t the only ones who thought so since this meeting was happening. However, signing a deal to sell my custom furniture would put a measure of pressure on me that I wasn’t sure I wanted. If I signed a contract to sell the furniture I made in a high-end furniture store, would it then become work? Would it take away the passion I had for what I did? It weighed on me to the point that part of me considered canceling the meeting and continuing selling it the way I always had—by word of mouth—but I needed the guaranteed income it would bring to do what I wanted to do.
I was lost in thought when Ryan meandered out onto the porch and mumbled something about the workout and practice session we scheduled the afternoon after my meeting. Competition season was almost on us, and we had a Lumberjack Championship title to win back. Ryan and I had been competing since we were seventeen years old.
I acknowledged him and stood, watching the deer move over the hill, then he disappeared back into the house just as lazily as he’d come out.
I finished my coffee then walked inside, dropping my mug into the sink as I made my way to the bathroom to get ready. I turned the shower on to let the water warm up, then placed my hands on the sink counter and stared into the mirror, studying my reflection. My beard was getting a little long, but I didn’t have the time, nor did I want to shape it up. Besides, I didn’t see how the state of my grooming had anything to do with the quality of my furniture. They shouldn’t either.
I hopped in the shower and let the hot water stream over my shoulders and back, still thinking about what it would mean to get a contract to sell some of my furniture. If this worked out, it would give me the income to buy out Ryan’s half of the house. When we decided to buy the old farmhouse and turn it into a duplex, there was an understanding that the other person could buy out the loan and turn it into a single home. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the money to do it at the moment, so I had agreed when Ryan wanted to lease out his half for a year so he could move closer to the city and his job.
It didn’t take Ryan long to find someone to rent him out. The new tenant, Emerson, was expected to be arriving in a few days. It struck me to ask Ryan if he’d warned the poor guy about the noise I sometimes make when I’m working in my shop. Of course, any noise I might make would be nothing compared to the parties Ryan often held. And even though he was moving closer to the city, I knew he’d still be back here more weekends than not.
I finished my shower and got ready in record time after I realized I’d enjoyed the hot water a little longer than I had intended. Fifteen minutes later, I was headed to the small town down the road to meet with Mr. Sharp for coffee, stoked that I wouldn't be helping Ryan move the last of his stuff this morning.
The meeting went well, and he asked to see more of my work, so I took him to the shop and showed him the pieces I had already completed, plus the plans for several projects that I wanted to finish before competition season began.
Mr. Sharp moved around the shop, but kept coming back to the piece situated in the middle of the room. “This table is amazing,” he said as he ran his hand over the glass top. The legs were made from small tree trunks that had been sanded down and then polished.
“Thanks. It took me a couple of weeks to complete that table. You have to find just the right combination for the base. It’s my favorite, and it’s very similar to the one I made for myself.” I walked around to the coffee table and a chair that matched it. I smiled and followed his eyes as he looked over each piece.
“Well, you do outstanding work. I will certainly take all of this information back to the partners and see what kind of deal we can work out for you. If we can provide the wood, then maybe that would decrease the cost?”
“Actually, I only use reclaimed wood. Please keep that in mind.”
“Very well.” He reached his hand out, and I took it. We shook before I showed him back to his car, passing Ryan in the field behind the house as he worked to put a piece of wood in its cradle, preparing for our practice session.
After I said goodbye to Mr. Sharp, I walked back around the house to where Ryan was setting up and helped him put another log in place.
“We have to shave just over a second from our time to be in the same ballpark as Smith and Brown.”
“I know,” I said watching him as he moved over and picked up the saw. We practiced for an hour before switching to our individual disciplines. Springboard was my best event, but I was only ranked third in the nation, and I wanted that world record. My best time was a half a second from the record; I just had to get over the hump.
Ryan got everything ready for my practice run, and I went to work.
“GO!” Ryan shouted, and I started to swing the ax. I chopped the hole and placed the springboard working my way up to the next level. The ax sliced through the air, and I moved quickly, trying to beat my best time. I finished just under my best and dropped the ax to the ground.
“Dude, I know you can do better than that.” Ryan shook his head as he looked down at the timer on his phone.
“I know. Maybe if people hadn’t kept me up all night, I would be better rested,” I smirked back at him.
“Totally worth it.” He laughed then moved over and picked up the ax handing it back to me after I jumped down from the top board.
I stood by the log we placed in one of the cradles and started swinging downward, practicing my technique. The smell of freshly chopped timber reminded me of all the training I had done with my father. After a set of driving chops, I began my chips and smiled when the piece fell away. I started again and did this until I was almost to midpoint of the log. My drives penetrated to the center, and I turned and started the process over. If I didn’t drive right, my log wouldn’t separate, and that’s when I get frustrated. It happened twice. Ryan noticed my irritation.
“Take a break, and we’ll set it up again later,” Ryan said as he moved around me kicking at the pieces of wood that lay around.
“I don’t understand why this shit keeps happening,” I complained as I looked at my driving blows. They weren’t where they were supposed to be, and I didn’t know why.
After a fifteen-minute break, we worked for another couple of hours until my shoulders were screaming at me.
“Let’s just get this run over with and then grab some food,” Ryan said as he walked toward the house. He was practically living with me Thursday through Monday at this point since most of his stuff had been moved already. We had a couple of months until the next competition, and he wasn’t nearly as stressed as I was. We competed together in the one team event, but he didn’t compete individually. After almost taking off half his foot a couple years ago in the underhand chop, he decided that he would just stick to the team events.
“When is Emerson moving in?” I asked as we started down the driveway for our six-mile run.
“Should be any day now,” he replied. “I got the check for the first month and the security deposit almost a month ago. So, who knows. I started moving my stuff because I thought it was supposed to be earlier in the month. But hey, the whole is paid for so... whatever.”
He asked about my meeting and we talked about that and the competition a little during the remainder of the run. A little less than an hour later, we were walking back up the driveway, cooling down. Ryan reached the porch first and pulled the screen door open but let go and let it slam into me when he released it.
“Asshat,” I said as I pushed it back and moved into the kitchen for a bottle of water.
“That was payback for locking me out last week.” He yelled from the stairs as he ran to grab a shower.
As I sat at the table and looked over the competition series dates, I tried to figure out how many days per week I would actually have to build furniture once the season was in full swing. I guess I should have made it clear to Mr. Sharp that things would be a little slower once that started. Of course, they had to decide to pick up my products first.