Fix You (35 page)

Authors: Beck Anderson

Yes, we’ve decided to go public. It’s awards season. Andrew threatened to leave the agency if Jeremy didn’t drop the dating clause in the contract. A client with a nomination can throw his weight around a little, I guess. So we’re putting the Franca-and-Andy-are-they-or-aren’t-they debate to rest. It’s not going to be a big deal, anyway. Except maybe to Franca, but she’s about to star in a new movie with the latest incarnation of the Justice League, so she’ll be plenty occupied with a bevy of leading men. The press really prefers famous people to date other famous people. It sells twice as many magazines. But we decided as a family, and then we did a few things to get ready. We changed the phone number. We told the school.

What will be weird is when we get home. Two weeks ago we drove around with Andrew in our part of town and picked out a new house. So when we get home, we’ll drive past a gate to get in the neighborhood. We’ll pull into a new driveway and see Ditto going crazy in a new backyard. We’ll walk into a house that has been decorated by no one, but waits for both of us to put our mark on it. And the boys too, of course. They’re very comfortable laying claim to bedrooms and hanging posters with tape that will ruin the walls.

But new is good. Different is good. Taking a risk is good. Andrew held my hand very tightly when we signed the papers. We’re pretty strong when you put the two of us together.

That’s what I think again when I step out of the black Suburban with Andrew holding my hand to steady me. Wearing heels is still not a skill I’ve mastered. Tucker gives me a big smile. He doesn’t have much of a job tonight—awards shows have their own security detail—but he walks in front us anyway.

It’s good, too, because I need a minute to figure out how to see. The flashbulbs are just like the ones I remember from when I was little and they took school pictures with big lights in the gym. I have little gray-blue spots all over my field of vision. And it’s loud, really loud. People are screaming, bellowing, “Andy! Andy!” From the public bleachers across the street, I can hear kind of a generalized, high-pitched squealing.

“How do you even see to walk?” I ask Andrew. I have to yell. I’m clinging to him, I’m pretty sure.

“You’ll be mostly blind for the first minute or so. Just look out at some point in the distance, or pretend to. Or just look at the back of Tucker’s head. Or me, you can always look at me.” He looks right at me and flashes his million-dollar smile. The flash bulbs go crazy again.

“Everybody else is. You’re going to get spoiled.”

He squeezes my hand. “Are you ready for this?”

“No.”

“Too bad. Here we go!”

And we plunge down the next chute of our lives. Together.

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to the following people:

First, to my husband, Marcus. You are the one who taught me about true love.

To my kids, for enduring the time Mama spends parked in front of the computer.

To the Chix. You complete me and help me complete my sentences. We rule.

To my awesome editor, Jessica, for equal parts common sense and cheerleading.

To all of my extended family and everyone in my “other life” at school, for your enthusiasm for this new journey of mine.

And, to the team at Omnific, for giving me my first break.

About the Author

Beck Anderson believes in the power of perfectly imperfect women and in the healing power of love. Her new novel,
Fix You
, grew out of those beliefs and the time to write afforded by the worst Thanksgiving blizzard she’s ever witnessed in West Yellowstone. Author of the blog
good enough is good
, she routinely encourages fellow women, girls, wives, and mothers to be true to themselves and cut themselves some slack.

For Beck, the path to published novelist has taken lots of twists and turns, including a degree in anthropology, a stint as a ticket seller at a ski resort, a much-loved career as a high school English teacher, and a long tenure as a member of the best writing group ever, hands down.

Beck balances (clumsily at best) writing novels and screenplays, working full-time as an educator, mothering two pre-teen males, loving one post-forty husband, and making time to walk the foothills of Boise, Idaho, with Stefano DiMera Delfino Anderson, the suavest Chihuahua north of the border.

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