First-Time Caller (Heartstrings, #1)

by B.K. Borison

I used to love talking to people. Hearing their stories and sharing mine. It made me feel connected. But now I’m just…exhausted.

don’t want—I don’t want to settle for something just to say I have it.

But I don’t want a relationship to be something I cross off my checklist, or something I do because I feel like I have to. I don’t want to be with someone if they’re not giving me something I don’t already have. I don’t want to waste my time on things that don’t feel like everything I’ve always wanted for myself.”

Sometimes a little discomfort is a good thing. A necessary thing. A thing that leads to better things.

And a part of me, a teeny-tiny sliver of myself, is still waiting. To bump into someone on the street or pick up the wrong coffee order. For the right person at the right time in exactly the right place. To not have to try so damn hard at any of it. It’s the romantic in me that Aiden laughed at. And maybe it’s childish or naive or whatever, but it’s me. I’m allowed to want soft, special things.

“I like that. Thinking that I’m worth paying attention to. Something ordinary made extraordinary by the person you’re sharing it with.”

All I know is it feels like something different and delicate. Something tremulous. Secrets shared in the middle of the night. Dark pressing in on the windows. A whole city spinning out at our feet.

“Because you said it was your favorite,” I admit. “And I want your favorite to be my favorite.”