With that thought firmly in mind, she turned and headed for the door before Mac could talk her out of leaving.
“I don’t believe this,” he muttered.
Can’t really blame him, she thought. This was the first time since she’d met Mac that she was doing something for herself.
Andi paused in the doorway and glanced back over her shoulder for one last look at him. He was everything she’d ever wanted and she’d finally accepted that she would never have him. “Goodbye, Mac.”
Outside, the June sunlight streamed down from a brassy blue sky. Summer was coming and it seemed in a hurry to get here. Andi’s footsteps crunched on the gravel of the employee parking area behind the office. With every step, she felt a little more certain that what she was doing was right. Sure, it was hard, and likely to get harder because Andi would miss seeing Mac every day. But hadn’t she spent enough time mooning over him? How would she ever find a man to spend her life with if she spent all her time around the one man she couldn’t have?
“Just keep walking, Andi. You’ll be glad of it later.” Much later, of course. Because at the moment, she felt as if she couldn’t breathe.
What she needed was affirmation and she knew just where to find it. When she got to her car, Andi opened the door and slid into the dark blue compact. Then she pulled her cell phone from her purse, hit the speed dial and waited through five rings before a familiar voice answered.
“Thank God you called,” her sister, Jolene, said. “Tom’s shift ended two hours ago and now that he’s home, he says he needs to unwind...”
Andi laughed and it felt good. “So which wall is he tearing down?”
Jolene sighed. “The one between the living room and the kitchen.”
While her sister talked, Andi could picture exactly what was happening in the old Victorian on the far side of Royal. Her brother-in-law, Tom, was a fireman who relaxed by working on his house. Last year, after a brushfire that had kept him working for more than a week, he built a new powder room on the first floor.
“It’s a good thing you bought a fixer-upper,” Andi said when her older sister had wound down.
“I know.” Laughing, Jolene added, “I swear the man’s crazy. But he’s all mine.”
Andi smiled sadly, caught her expression in the rearview mirror and silently chastised herself for feeling even the slightest twinge of envy. Jolene and Tom had been married for ten years and had three kids, with another on the way. Their family was a sort of talisman for Andi. Seeing her sister happy and settled with her family made Andi want the same for herself.
Which was just one of the reasons she’d had to quit her job. Before it was too late for her to find what her heart craved. Love. Family.
“And,” Jolene was saying, “I love that my kitchen’s about to get a lot bigger. But oh, Lord, the noise. Hang on, I’m headed out to the front porch so I can hear you.”
Andi listened to the crashing and banging in the background fade as her sister walked farther away from the demolition zone.
“Okay, backyard. That’s better,” Jolene said. “So, what’s going on, little sister?”
“I did it.” Andi blew out a breath and rolled her car windows down to let the warm Texas wind slide past her. “I quit.”
“Holy...” Jolene paused and Andi imagined her sister’s shocked expression. “Really? You quit your job?”
“I did.” Andi slapped one hand to her chest to keep her pounding heart from leaping out. “Walked right out before I could change my mind.”
“I can’t believe it.”
“You and me both,” Andi said. “Oh, God. I’m unemployed.”
Jolene laughed. “It’s not like you’re living on the streets, Andi. You’ve got a house you hardly ever see, a vacation fund that you’ve never used and a rainy-day savings account that has enough in it to keep you safe through the next biblical flood.”
“You’re right, you’re right.” Nodding, Andi took a few deep breaths and told herself to calm down. “It’s just, I haven’t been unemployed since I was sixteen.”
The reality of the situation was hitting home and it came like a fist to the solar plexus. If this kept up, she might faint and wouldn’t that be embarrassing, having Mac come out to the parking lot and find her stretched out across her car seats?
She’d quit her job.
What would she do every day? How would she live? Sure, she’d had a few ideas over the past few months about what she might want to do, but none of it was carved in stone. She hadn’t looked into the logistics of anything, she hadn’t made even the first list of what she’d need do before moving on one of her ideas, so it was all too nebulous to even think about.
She had time. Plenty of time to consider her future, to look at her ideas objectively. She would need plans. Purpose. Goals. But she wasn’t going to have those right away, so it was time to take a breath. No point in making herself totally insane. Jolene was right. Andi had a big savings account—Mac was a generous employer if nothing else—and it wasn’t as if she’d had time to spend that generous salary. Now she did.
“This is so great, Andi.”
“Easy for you to say.”
Jolene laughed again, then shouted, “Jilly, don’t push your sister into the pool.”
Anyone else hearing that would immediately think built-in, very deep pool. In reality, Andi knew the kids were jumping in and out of a two-foot-deep wading pool. Shallow enough to be safe and wet enough to give relief from the early Texas heat.
“Jacob’s game still at five today?” Andi asked abruptly.
“Sure. You’re coming?”
Of course she was going to the game. She’d quit her job so she’d be able to see her family. She smiled at her reflection as she imagined the look on Jacob’s little face when she showed up at the town baseball field. “You couldn’t keep me away.”
“Look at that—only been unemployed like a second and already you’re getting a life.”
Andi rolled her eyes. Jolene had been on her to quit for the past few years, insisting that standing still meant stagnating. As it turned out, she had a point. Andi had given Mac all she could give. If she stayed, she’d only end up resenting him and infuriated with herself. So it was no doubt past time to go. Move on.
And on her first official day of freedom, she was going to the Royal Little League field to watch her nephew’s game. “I’m just going home to change and I’ll meet you at the field in an hour or so.”
“We’ll be there. Jacob will be so excited. And after the game, you’ll come back here. Tom will grill us all some steaks to go with the bottle of champagne I’m making a point of picking up. You can drink my share.”
Andi forced a smile into her voice. “Champagne and steaks. Sounds like a plan.”
But after she hung up with her sister, Andi had to ask herself why, instead of celebrating, she felt more like going home for a good cry.