Practice Makes Perfect (When in Rome, #2)

by Sarah Adams

I learned it from an early age: flirtatious people are widely loved, and I’ve been in the business of getting love from anyone and everyone I can since the day I went to school and told Teressa Howard she looked pretty in her Lisa Frank shirt, and she hugged me. It had been weeks since I’d had a hug, and I still remember it feeling so damn good.

“So if you want to marry Annie, you better put your best foot forward and show us you’re worth it.” I groan. “I don’t want to marry Annie! This is one big misunderstanding.” A ridiculous one that’s quickly getting out of hand. He looks back down at his eggs with a smile. “Sure you don’t.”

I can’t decide who makes me feel more upset right now. My sisters for once again telling me who I am and what I want—or me for smiling and nodding while they do. I love my sisters so much—which is why it hurts to not feel seen by them at all. I just want to be their friend and not their baby sister all the time. I want to be valued and taken seriously. But how do I do that without opening an entire can of slimy, messy worms? Or potentially hurting them when I tell them they’ve been inadvertently hurting me for years? I don’t want to seem whiny or fragile. And please explain to me why I can’t for the life of me picture myself standing next to the man they just described, but I can perfectly picture a man with a pair of mischievous blue-gray eyes, a tilted smile, and tattoos hovering over me in my bed as he kisses my mouth again and again for the rest of my life. Crap.

Annie: Sorry. I think you have the wrong number. Will: Seriously? Annie: No. I was just messing with you. Will: Ha ha, funny girl. Annie: Everything is holding up. But the scenery is oddly a lot less hot. Will: Annie Walker. Are you…flirting with me? Annie: Maybe. Or maybe this is a forty-year-old man’s number and I’m catfishing you. Will: If you are a dude, are you at least sexy? Annie: How do you feel about loafers with little tassels on the front? Will: *Bites fist*

Will: Or… Annie: Or??? Will: We could not say anything. And just let them believe what they want to believe. You said you wanted everyone to stop seeing you as Sweet Angel Annie…this might be just the thing to do it. Annie: You’d do that for me? Will: I’m quickly learning I’d do anything for you.

Will: While I’ve got you… Will: *Picture of palm tree and blue sky overhead* Will: At the risk of sounding a little too poetic and sappy, the color of California’s sky is the same blue as your eyes. Annie: Oof. That was sappy. Will: Dammit. I thought so. Annie: I’ll let it slide this one time. Will: Changing subject now. Have you ever been to L.A.? Annie: Nope. I haven’t traveled much. Will: That’s a damn shame. You need to come to California, Annie. So many cool flower shops. You’d love it here. Annie: I want to, but I’m scared of flying. And going to new places. And meeting new people. Will: My offer stands to hold your hand. Annie: I do like your hands. Annie: Oh wow. Pretend I didn’t say that. I’m super embarrassed now. GAH! Why is there no unsend button. Will: I like your hands, too, Anna-banana.

Last night he texted me before bed, just: Good night. That was it. It’s so confusing. He says he isn’t relationship material, and then he goes and texts me “Good night.”

Amelia points over my shoulder at Will. “Okay! Rules first. You can hang out with us, but you have to interact like a friend and not a bodyguard. No subtly protecting me!” And then Will’s butterfly knuckles enter my vision, and my skin curls up with tension. I keep my eyes on the table—hand wrapped around my drink. “Deal. If a fight breaks out, I’ll use you as my shield.”

“A stern brunch daddy is a term romance readers use to describe a character type. It’s when a dude who looks scary is actually all soft and sweet to the person he loves.”

You only know that because I showed you the article ten minutes ago at the bar.” James shrugs. “But I get points for actually listening.” He pauses and looks up at my scowling brother. “Actually…now that I think of it, Noah, you’re kind of a stern brunch—” “If you say the word daddy one more time, you’re going to be scraping your teeth off the floor.” James pretends to shiver with delight. “I love it when you go all alpha.”

But the thing about quiet people is, we’re only quiet because our brains are so busy overthinking everything.

Suddenly I realize my family is all staring at me like I have a horn sprouting from between my eyes. “What?” I ask, alarm running through my voice. “He just said a cuss word. Why doesn’t he get a tally in the sacred notebook?” Emily asks. “Oh. Well, because…” I turn my eyes to Will and contemplate it. The answer springs to my mind immediately, but I know I can’t say it out loud. Because I like it when he does. So instead, I smile. Not even meaning to, really. And Will smiles, too, like he can read my thoughts. Like he’s remembering our secret stolen moments together in the flower shop, in my truck, in my room—and that just maybe he knows me in different ways than my siblings do. “He gets one freebie.”

“I’m glad you’re here,” I say with a quiet grin. “And my family knows we’re not really together now. They guessed it the other day, so there’s no pressure to act like it at the table.” “Hmm,” he says making a deep noise in his throat. “That’s too bad.” And something happens to me that I’ve never experienced before. The world around me falls away, and for once, I’m not worried what anyone is thinking of me. All I know is Will’s eyes are fixed on mine, and his mouth is curving softly and his hand is dropping to my leg where it splays out like it’s been in that same spot a hundred times before. And before I know it, I’m tipping forward. He meets me in the middle and our lips brush.

I’m in full work mode when we’re out in public, keeping an eye around us at all times for any potential threat. Zero percent of my brain is focused on Annie or what she’s doing or what her days have been full of or why she hasn’t even texted me at all. And that’s when my foot hits a divot in the sidewalk and I trip, nearly busting my ass on the pavement before I catch myself.

Will’s hand brushes affectionately over my hairline, pushing my sweaty hair away from my face. “Why didn’t you call me to come take care of you? Or Noah?” I grimace. “And risk getting any of you sick? No way. I’ll be fine. I have a doctor’s appointment in an hour.” “Good. But how do you plan on getting there?” “I’ll hitch a ride on the back of a turtle.” “Very practical,” he says with the backs of his fingers lingering against my neck. “Let’s get you off the floor, sunshine.” Sunshine. Am I hallucinating or did Will just call me by the sweetest name my ears have ever heard?

Will smirks, gently taking the spices from my hands. “I have a very strong immune system. Amelia gave me the day off. And you’ll look very cute with antennae.” “Willington…” “Annie.” His happy-go-lucky demeanor melts into something serious. Unguarded. He puts his hands on the sides of my arms and then slides them down to my fingers. “Please. Just let me be here. I don’t know why, but I can’t be anywhere else. I tried but my feet keep bringing me back here to your door.” He pauses, looks to the soup and then to me. “This…isn’t something I would normally do, but I just need to take care of you. Please let me.”

“I wouldn’t say I’m not affectionate. I’ve just never really had anyone to be affectionate with. I think I must accidentally put out an invisible force field that tells people I don’t want to be touched. And it feels too awkward to all of a sudden start after all this time.”

“You can be affectionate with me. I won’t read into it,” he says casually, like he didn’t just hand me keys to a golden palace. Because the truth is, I love physical touch. Crave it more than I want to admit. But my shyness and social anxiety often keep me from reaching out for it first. I wait for other people to initiate, and sometimes that leaves me waiting forever.

“Like Fred and Audrey before the ending.”

But now I feel almost outside of myself, as I watch a younger Annie try to pick up the pieces for her siblings. Cutting her hands in the process and never telling anyone she’s bleeding.

“Have you ever regretted not going to MIT and choosing a different career path?” There’s a loaded pause that I don’t miss. “I don’t think I like the word regret. Every choice I’ve made has been valuable in some way or other. And the fact is, if I had gone to MIT back then, I probably would have kept striving for academic perfection and returning home when I shouldn’t. But the military forced me to get that space I needed—if that makes sense. It was somewhere my parents and their drama couldn’t easily reach me.”

“Annie, the truth is, I really want to close myself off from you. But I also find myself wanting to tell you everything. What spell have you cast over me?” She laughs and slides those beautiful blue eyes to me, peeking at me from the corners. “Do you have feelings for me, Will?” I bark a laugh. “Annie. You can’t just ask a person that. That’s against the rules.” “Why?” “Because…we’re supposed to keep everything hidden and angsty. Keep each other guessing and miserable. That’s just the way it works.” Her lips curve, and she slides her hand over the covers to gently link our fingers together. “Do you like me, Will?” I hold her gaze and squeeze her fingers as her words tug the truth from me like they always do. “Yeah, I do, Annie. Do you like me?” “Yeah. Against my better judgment.” I laugh fully at this and then scrape my free hand over my face. “It’s why you need to run far away from me. Kick me out. Board up your windows. Lock your doors. I’ve got so much baggage, Annie…I’m not sure I’d be any good for you. Or that I’ll ever be the marriage type.”

I take in her long blonde hair, her soft blue eyes, and the curve of her mouth, and I throw all of my plans out the window and consider doing the one thing that scares the hell out of me: staying. Forget the open road of freedom. I think I have everything I could ever need in my arms.

I walk up the bleachers and stop just in front of Will. “Excuse me, sir, is this seat taken?” — Both guilty persons turn their eyes up to me and then to the man over my shoulder. “Of course! Have a seat there, young lady!” says Amelia in the worst impression of a male country accent I’ve ever heard. Will—the devil—bites his lips together to keep from laughing.

This is the best thing I've ever read lol

“Hi, I’m Brandon. And I guess you’ve already met Annie?” I watch the moment Amelia slips back into character. It’s painful. She smiles so big her mustache unpeels in the right corner. “Hi there! M’name’s Joe! And this here is my brother, Sam.”

Brandon sits back and then leans into my side. “That’s definitely a woman with a fake mustache, right?”

A conversation Amelia is having with the woman in front of her suddenly grabs my attention. “I’ve never seen you at these games before. Who did you say you were here to see play?” says the woman decked out in Little Grizzlies gear. “Never seen us, huh? Strange. We’re here every weekend to cheer on little Tommy.” “Timmy,” Will corrects. “Right. Little Timmy. Poor thing never was very good at baseball, but I tell him to keep on trying, just like his aunt!” “Uncle,” Will says. “Uncle, right. Oh look, there he is getting up to bat!” Amelia stands up, her jeans (that is, Noah’s jeans) swallowing her whole, and yells, “Go, Timmy!” “That’s my son…Matthew,” says the woman. Amelia pretends to squint heavily. “Well shit. That’s what I get for leaving my glasses in the car. Brother, can you see Timmy?” “No, brother, I cannot,” Will says deadpan, and I want to push them both off the back of these stands.

I am dying lol

Will leans forward suddenly and addresses Brandon directly and with zero shame for eavesdropping. “But, uh, your girlfriend just said she wants to travel. Surely if she wants to, you’d go with her?”

Brandon looks just as startled as I do by this question. He laughs lightly to cover his unease. “Oh, well, she’s not my girlfriend, actually. This is our first date. But, um, I guess if she really wanted to travel we could…figure it out.” The way he says figure it out tells me he’s just being polite. He has zero desire to travel. That’s fine, though, right? I’m fine staying put. “Great,” Will says in a bland tone.

“Oh, uh, Joe, I’m going to get us something too. Keep your eyes peeled for Timmy.” “Well, hurry back now.” “This is not as charming as you think it is,” I tell Amelia quietly as I pass. She pinches my butt cheek, and now I really hope Brandon isn’t watching.

Why is Amelia so hilarious hahaha

“You’re ruining my date.” He scoffs. “That guy was doing it already.” “No! Don’t do that.” I wiggle my fingers in front of his face. “You don’t get to say things like that and make me second-guess anything. Brandon is a perfectly nice guy. He’s kind, he wants a family, he wants to put down roots. He wants everything I want. This date was going perfectly, and he’s exactly what I’ve been looking for!” Will’s blue-gray eyes skewer me, and then he puts his thumb against my chin and tugs it back down. Neither of us say anything for a minute. No need to acknowledge that I didn’t truly mean any of that—we both know it wasn’t true.

What you haven’t done yet is see the world. Experience new things. Live by your own desires. And if you settle for someone who’s going to keep you from doing that, I’m going to be very upset.”

“And you know what else?! You’re one of the most passionate people I’ve ever met. What are you even doing here, Annie? You don’t want to go to a Little League baseball game for your first date, where the only thing he’s proving is he’s going to put his family before you from the start.”

“I’m sorry. You’re totally right. I really didn’t mean to mess this up for you today, I swear. I just wanted to…I don’t know, make sure you were safe. Taken care of. And then I heard that guy already slicing away at the things you’ve been telling me you wanted to do—and when I thought of you having to sacrifice all of that…I couldn’t handle it. I know your goal is to get married, but…” He lets go of my hands to cup my face. “Please just promise me you’ll marry someone who sees you and loves you and who makes you excited and happy—not just someone who looks right on paper.”

“So…did your friends finally leave?” he says as I sit down beside him. I snap my eyes to him. “You knew the whole time?” He laughs. “Absolutely. And that dude is in love with you, right?” I breathe in and decide to stop playing games with myself and be nothing but honest. “Yeah, I think he might be.” “What’s the deal there, then?” I stare down into my popcorn. “We’re both scared of different things.” “Been there,” he says, in a thoughtful tone of voice that clearly has a story behind it. A story I’ll never know because Brandon is not the man for me. “Um, so Brandon, I don’t think…” I pause to find the right words. Unfortunately, no inspiration hits. He laughs and saves me. “It’s okay, Annie. I’m not quite feeling a connection either if that’s what you were going to say.” My shoulders slump with relief. “Oh good. I was worried I was going to hurt your feelings. Friends?” “I think it’s for the best. You want me to drive you home now?” I look down at the water and popcorn and then at the baseball game. “Actually, if you’re not eager to get rid of me, I think it would be fun to stay and hang out.” He smiles. “Absolutely.” And that—John—is how you tactfully end a bad date.

“Okay then…” I say, thinking of how to rephrase my question. “How did you know your feelings were worth giving in to?” “Hmm.” He’s quiet for a minute. “I guess when I realized it felt scarier to live life without her than with her.”

“Did you meet someone, Will?” “Sort of.” “And you’re scared?” “A little. I’ve generally tried to not need anyone since I was a kid and realized that needing people usually ends in something painful.” There’s a taut silence. “Hey, Will?” “Hmm?” “I don’t think I’ve ever really said thank you before. For everything you were to me and did for me growing up.” I sit silent, unable to form any words. Ethan continues, “I’m not sure I ever realized the differences in our childhood quite as much as just now when you said that. Because I don’t have the same reaction toward needing people as you do—largely because when I needed you, you were always there for me.”

Ethan chuckles lightly, understanding how deeply uncomfortable I am with, well, feeling my feelings. He has mercy on me. “All right. Now tell me about her,” he says, and I hear the smile in his voice. I imagine it’s smug and over-the-top. I wish I could withhold information about Annie just to piss him off, but unfortunately, I’ve been dying to talk to someone about her for weeks now.

It’s not something you just get over or choose to un-feel. And I think the day I came to terms with that was when I started truly healing. I’ll never be able to shove it down with some elbow grease.

“Now, here’s the flip side from a divorce lawyer: I’m still not convinced marriage is for everyone. So if you’re one of those people it’s not for, Will, that’s okay. It doesn’t make you a bad person or less worthy of happiness, or even love, than anyone else out there. It means you had a messier start in life than most people. However”—he says with emphasis—“if you are one of those people who always said he would hate it and then changed his mind—that’s okay too. Just be honest with yourself about what you need, or else you’re going to be miserable in or out of love.”

“How long have you been standing there, nosy woman?” I ask her with a teasing smirk. “Long enough to know that you love my Annie and you’re scared and I would really like to pay your mama and daddy a visit,” she says in her blunt fashion, and it makes me laugh. She smiles and doesn’t say anything else, just opens her arms. I stand and walk over to her before stepping right into her arms and letting her fold me in the most comforting hug of my life. Mabel doesn’t say anything, she just squeezes me tight. I squeeze her back and bury my head in her neck, feeling a lot like the little boy who used to climb that magnolia tree just wishing for a hug like this.

Crying again

I’m scared. But I can’t tell my siblings any of this because, well, because that’s just not what I do. I’ve never saddled them with my emotional burdens. They have enough as it is without piling mine on top. And Will is leaving, so it’s useless to tell him. So I cry silently in this blue room, soaking the tops of my jeans with tears until I feel a hand on my shoulder. I suck in a breath and look up into the eyes of Mabel. She frowns as she sees my face, and then uses the pad of her thumb to wipe tears off my cheeks. She silently urges me up from the couch and then whispers, “Come on, darlin’, let’s get out of here.”

“I’m not sure who I am anymore, Mabel—and I’d really like my mom to help me sort it out, but she can’t because she’s dead.

Mabel sighs. “Well shit, darlin’. You’re running a whole race in that brain of yours.” She squeezes my hand, urging me to look up into her kind eyes. “What do you need from me, sweetie? Advice? Or for me to listen?”

Grief—that mean son of a bitch—doesn’t have a timeline or rules. It hits when it wants. Even with me—sometimes I feel all healed up, and then randomly I’ll catch a scent that smells like my husband’s cologne, and I’ll lose it in an aisle at the market. It doesn’t make sense, grief.

Suddenly, like a strike of lightning, I realize that I’ve been chasing the wrong things. I haven’t needed a husband. Or even to find myself. I think this emptiness has been a result of constantly isolating myself from my feelings. I know who I am and what I want out of life—I’ve just been ignoring those needs. “Don’t your siblings talk about your parents much?” Again, I shake my head. “No. And asking questions about Mom and Dad has always made everyone shut down. It seemed too painful for them to talk to me about their memories. So I quit trying—I didn’t want to add more grief to their pain. I just stopped acknowledging my own sadness and focused on everyone else’s instead. It’s worked. It made them feel better and in return, it made me feel good.”

And now I’ve lived so much of my life without sharing who I am with them, that I don’t know how to start. I don’t know how to tell them that this version of me they’ve seen for so long is not necessarily true to me anymore.” “You say that. Exactly that.” “They’ll be hurt, Mabel. My family loves me so much that to find out I’ve been lying to them all these years—” “Exactly, honey. They love you so much. Honesty is a gift, Annie. And if you really love them, too, you’ll be honest with them about who you are.

“While I’m not your mama or your grandma, but someone who’s lived a long time and loved deeper than I could ever describe to you, I’d say that I regret the things I never said way more than the things I have said.

I’m immediately angry. It’s not a gentle movement on the meter from green to yellow to red. It’s calm to livid in one second flat. At first, I try to swallow my feelings so I don’t upset anyone, but then I hear Mabel’s voice in my head: Tell your sisters the truth.

I sigh and then, yep, the tears finally catch up to my anger. “It’s coming from years and years of swallowed feelings that I was too afraid to voice. And that’s my fault. I haven’t been truthful with you guys at all—and now I feel like you don’t even know me.”