by Hayleigh Sol
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Love a Good Freebie?
About the Author
Other Books by Hayleigh Sol
Copyright © 2021 Hayleigh Sol, All rights reserved
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
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ISBN–13:
ISBN–10:
Book Cover Design by: Kari March Designs
Dedicated to Bass Lake, California
and all the wonderful memories you’ve given this nature lover.
Also, to the boy who provided the inspiration for Lukasz.
And to anyone who’s ever felt the weight of self–doubt:
You Got This.
Prologue
“Alright girls, time for Truth or Dare.”
Bailey’s prone sprawl on my bed belied the eager gleam of mischief in her ever–changing hazel eyes.
“And I think Maya should go first. It is her room, after all.” Yep, totally mischievous.
Emma and Simone groaned in tandem, Simone voicing her objection first. “Do we really have to engage in something so prosaic?”
Directing raised eyebrows toward her older sister, I mouthed, ‘prosaic?’
Lisette rolled her eyes in response. “She’s working her way through the Brontës now. Apparently, Austen didn’t ‘speak’ to her.”
Simone huffed from her spot on the floor by the door, gesturing with the open book in her hands. “It’s actually Dickens now; can’t get enough of his dry wit.”
Holly, sharing a vivid turquoise beanbag chair with Emma, nudged her seatmate and nearly pushed her off the precarious perch. “What’s wrong with Truth or Dare?”
Emma’s eyes cut to Lisette before meeting mine, widening slightly as she attempted telepathic communication. “That game always just seems to turn…kinda mean. Right, Maya?”
Ah, got it.
“Em’s right. The dares always get crazier and crazier until someone gets totally embarrassed.” Using the frame of my closet door for balance, I stood in relevé in my new pointe shoes.
“Wait, I thought you loved the dares. You almost never pick truth.” Holly leaned around Emma, frowning up at me like I’d betrayed her. Until I tilted my head ever so slightly toward Lisette and the frown became an enlightened nod.
Lisette must’ve seen it—my bedroom was small, especially with six of us crammed into it—or she was too smart for our not–exactly stealth exchange. She huffed out a breath, uncannily like her sister’s. “You guys, it’s fine. We can play Truth or Dare. Taylor King is an obnoxious attention–seeker and we all know it. But she’s not here. Thank God. You’re my best friends; I trust you not to humiliate me.”
Two weeks prior, most of us had been present at the coed birthday party of Lisette’s nemesis. Everything was fine until the birthday girl insisted on a game of Truth or Dare. One in which Lisette was dared—by said nemesis and birthday girl—to lick Joey Jackett’s jacket. Joey, unfortunately, wore his famed piece of apparel everywhere, a feat that took an impressive amount of dedication in Southern California, and the rumor that he never washed it was known to all.
Lisette followed through on the dare, of course, immediately washing her mouth out with soap afterward. She’d even gargled. Which created a hilarious mound of soap bubbles we all tried, and failed, not to laugh at or pop. Since then, Lisette had been plotting the ultimate untraceable prank to play on Princess Prissypants, our longtime moniker for Taylor.
“What should we do instead of Truth or Dare?” I lowered into fifth position, checking my turnout.
Holly, leaning around and nearly displacing Emma again, swatted my ass. “You mean if Maya’s done being prima ballerina?”
On the bed, Bailey rolled over and looked at me from her upside–down position. “Yeah, are we ever gonna see you without those things strapped to your feet?”
“I’m bonding with them. Like Emma does with her tennis rackets. You all know I’m auditioning for the role of Sugar Plum Fairy. I have to be in total harmony with my pointe shoes.”
Removing her nose from her book, Simone peered up at me. “Isn’t The Nutcracker in December?” I nodded. “Don’t you think it’s a little early to be worrying about the audition now?”
I explained that I wanted to be prepared, to wow the director of the ballet school and my own instructor so they’d have no choice but to cast me when auditions were held at the end of next month. “Mom keeps telling me not to get my hopes up, that I should audition for a different role—which really means a smaller one—but I’m going for it.”
“And you’ll totally get it.” I smiled my thanks at Bailey, who was back on her stomach once more. “Why would your mom tell you not to go for it?”
I sighed as I wandered over to sit next to her on the bed and began untying the pale pink ribbons I’d sewn in myself last week. Hadn’t done a bad job, either, especially considering it was only my second pair of pointe shoes and Mom had done most of the sewing on my first.
“She’s never fully embraced the idea of me as a dancer, says I’m too much of a tomboy for ballet.” Mom hadn’t ever said it in those exact terms but she was usually pretty transparent in her opinions.
“Why can’t you be both? Who says you have to choose between tearing up the grass playing soccer and spinning around in a tutu?” Lisette had been staunchly against following typical gender roles since before we’d learned what they were.
“It’s not just that. You know what a worrywart my mom is. She thinks I’ll be too disappointed—‘devastated’ was the word she used—if I don’t get the role.”
“But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try!” Our junior tennis player, Emma, was big on putting it all out there. She was also incredibly enthusiastic. About nearly everything.
I assured them all I intended to not only try but to dance my ass off once I won the coveted role. Just like I’d dribble my heart out when spring soccer tryouts came around. My dad always said you miss one hundred percent of the shots you don’t take. Wisdom I earnestly shared with the room.
Simone looked up from her book, brow furrowed. “Who said that, Winston Churchill?”
“Close. Wayne Gretzky,” I told her with a chuckle. “Now, what are we gonna do instead of
Truth or Dare? Simone’s right, it is prosaic. We can do better.”
Ideas were batted around, debated, and endorsed or rejected for nearly an hour. My five best friends and I were tighter than any group could be—had been since we’d unofficially become a ride–or–die crew back in elementary school—but agreeing on how to spend the hours of our frequent sleepovers was often a challenge.
Emma was the most easygoing of us, amenable to nearly any suggestion—so long as it wouldn’t get her in trouble with her uber strict parents. In later years, when the expression became mainstream, she would joke that her parents were the stereotypical Chinese–American “Tiger Parents”. Those of us who’d known her since childhood were aware there was more truth in the label than her sunny smile let on. She’d skipped second grade, putting her in class with Holly, Bailey, Lisette, and me. It was Emma’s inclusive personality that had brought us all together in the beginning.
In contrast to bubbly Emma, Bailey was known, affectionately, as our resident “grumpy old lady”. I always suspected she secretly loved it. Her strong personality tended to prolong the debates over which movie we watched or, in this case, which group activity we should partake in. It also made her the bravest among us and she was always sporting a different color stripe in her hair or shaving half of it off. In many ways, she inspired and nurtured my own bold tendencies.
Holly and I bonded over a fascination with people and places that differed from the world we’d grown up in. Freshman year of high school, she had a major crush on a Junior foreign exchange student from Denmark, whose accent was every bit as spellbinding to me as it had been to her. True to Sister Law—our version of Bro Code—Holly had called dibs first, so I’d put Aksel firmly in the friend box. She kept up an email pen–pal thing with him for a couple of years before moving on to the next novelty.
Lisette had been laser–focused on her goal of med school for as long as we’d known her and never had time for crushes. Strangely—or perhaps it made perfect sense—she had more guy friends than any of us. She didn’t giggle or flirt or get tongue–tied around them—the latter had always been my default setting—and she was the mastermind of truly awesome pranks she never seemed to get in trouble for. I’d asked her once, when we were in college, if she thought she might be into chicks. She’d thought about it for a minute, then told me she preferred dudes. Problem was, too many of them weren’t cool with her having bigger balls than they did.
Two years her sister’s junior, Simone had been adopted into our group after the popular girls in her own class had ostracized her and we’d found her sitting alone—well, alone with a book—at lunch. She’d always been several reading levels beyond her peers, probably because her parents were both university professors and her older sister was such a genius. Unfortunately, as was so often the case at that age, Simone had been teased relentlessly for being a nerd, a weirdo, and whatever other insults the airheads came up with for a girl who wasn’t ashamed of her brain.
Through middle and now high school, the six of us had stuck together. We had other friends, too, but none of them really made it beyond the periphery and into the inner circle. I’d heard that some of our classmates thought we were stuck up, that we felt we were better than everyone else. But the truth was that we’d become tight—closer than actual sisters, in a lot of ways—and I don’t think any of us ever found a good enough reason to go outside the group and forge temporary friendships with people we’d never trust as much as each other.
The grass wasn’t always greener on the other side.
Knowing these five girls would keep my secrets, have my back when I needed it, and cheer louder than anyone else over my victories was everything to me.
“I got it,” I said with a smile. “How about Two Truths and a Lie?”
And so began our tradition, the game we played every time we had sleepovers or whenever one of us was stressed about a big test, an audition, a tournament, anything that required a good distraction. We’d laugh over the lies, several of them morphing into inside jokes over the years, and bond over the truths, which were sometimes profound, sometimes utter nonsense.
I’d never felt more understood and accepted than I did with them. And it was their unwavering support that gave me the self–confidence and courage I sometimes struggled to find.
Chapter 1
Stress. Like global warming, it affected every single one of us. Even people who tried to deny it.
I was a champion denier. Of stress, not climate change. Only mental midgets—or politicians pushing an agenda—ignored decades of scientific research to insist global warming was a hoax. The question was, how soon would it kill us?
Over the years, I’d developed the habit of brushing off the fact that I had stress and was all too often overwhelmed by it. I dealt with it by telling myself, giving in to stress won’t help the situation or I’m too busy to be stressed. Which wasn’t dealing with it at all.
It had become one of those words that you hear and say and think so often that it loses its meaning. It had become an innocuous label that encompassed so many varied symptoms. Insomnia, headaches, muscle soreness, irregular menses, and that most darling problem of all, gastrointestinal distress.
For the past few months, I’d been dealing with bouts of constipation, followed by…well, its opposite. I’d ignored these episodes the first few times they’d happened but was now convinced I’d picked up some kind of super–bacteria or mutating virus. When the naturopath I finally dragged myself to suggested IBS might be the diagnosis, I went into major denial mode.
“But Dr. Lac, I’ve never had this problem before. I exercise almost every day, don’t eat dairy or processed foods, I even tried a gluten–elimination diet for two weeks and the symptoms didn’t improve. You probably hear this all the time, but I really do have a healthy diet. The food log I brought you was a true representation of what I eat.”
The petite woman gave me a penetrating look over the top of her very chic glasses. She’d already run blood tests that had ruled out my microbe theory, as well as food allergies. Crohn’s and celiac diseases and ulcerative colitis were all ruled out as well. Normally, I prided myself on being a unique individual. Not so much when I’d stumped my physician.
“Maya, let’s talk about your stress level. You mentioned at our first meeting that you own your company. Tell me about a typical day.”
Was it bad that my intestines twisted themselves into a knot and gurgled when she asked about my baby?
I ignored them and pasted on my proud–business–owner smile. “Green for Green offers consulting services and solutions for homeowners and businesses to decrease their carbon footprints, helping our clients become more environmentally responsible while saving money in the long term. We—”
“That’s a very nice elevator pitch, but what about your typical day? As the owner, I’d imagine you’re quite busy.”
She didn’t know the half of it. “Well, yes, but I love what I do.” That used to be more true. “Working evenings and weekends is just part of being self–employed, especially in the first few years.”
“And how many years have you been in business?”
I still remembered my first client, the first who wasn’t a family member or friend hiring me out of pity or expecting a freebie. “It’ll be ten years in September.”
“Mm–hmm, and what would you rate your average stress level on a scale of zero to ten?”
Eleven. Old joke but, if I was being honest? Nine. That probably wasn’t good.
“It’s higher than I’d like it to be sometimes, but I don’t feel like I have anxiety or depression or anything.” Mostly true.
“I’ve never had a panic attack.” That was true…except for the occasional tightness in the chest. The doctor watched me with shrewd eyes.
“I guess, if I had t
o put a number on it, six or seven?” Lie.
Why was I lying to the person I was paying to help me? Didn’t matter, her slight frown told me she saw right through me.
“Gastrointestinal issues—in particular, Irritable Bowel Syndrome—are commonly aggravated by, if not caused by, high stress. You’ve told me you’d prefer to avoid pharmaceutical intervention and I agree with that approach. In my opinion, Western medicine is too quick to dispense chemicals that treat a patient’s symptoms without addressing the root cause of disease or dysfunction.”
That was why I liked this lady. “So, what should I do? Are there foods I should avoid, others I should try adding to my diet?”
“I’d like to start by having you reduce your stress level.”
Oh, is that all? Why had I come to this hack again?
“I see that seems like a foreign concept to you. Do you practice any form of meditation, yoga, breathing exercises?”
Who had time for all that? When I exercised, I liked to sweat. To push myself so hard, my brain had no choice but to focus solely on the workout. Yoga was way too slow, allowed far too much thinking time for me.
“How about a vacation? When was the last time you had one of those? Preferably somewhere out in nature, away from your cell phone and email?”
Jeez, lady, what’s with all the questions? Is this an interrogation?
“This Saturday is my grandmother’s seventy–fifth birthday; I’m taking Friday off to make it a long weekend with her and the rest of the family.”
The doctor put her hands in the pockets of her white coat. “That’s lovely, Maya, but not quite what I had in mind for a vacation.”
Yeah, taking my laptop to Gram’s probably wasn’t the best way to forget about work.
“Speaking of family, though, what’s your support system like? Do you have a significant other? Close friends? Is your family a source of relaxation or do they add to your stress?”
“Close friends, yes, but they’re all pretty busy with their own lives these days. Significant other? Ha, it’s complicated.” She nodded in understanding. “Same with family.”
