Home Again by Christine L'Amour

Author:Christine L'Amour [L'Amour, Christine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Romance
Published: 2019-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

Steph was inside the café when Erika walked in, at the table in the corner like she usually was. She didn’t notice Erika walk in—she was frowning at her computer with an agitated expression on her face, eyes flitting across the screen. Erika better leave her be for a moment, and she had to talk to the staff anyway.

When she managed to extricate herself from the staff room and pop in back to the main area of the café it was almost two hours later, but Steph was still there. She had two more cups by her elbow and marks so deep around her eyes she looked about five years older. It was admittedly hilarious, Erika thought.

Erika managed to convince herself not to take a picture. She walked up to Steph.

“Stephanie, hi,” she said, and set a hand on her shoulder. Steph blinked up at her and some of the stressed marks around her eyes disappeared, which made pleasure rise up in Erika. “You’ve been pretty focused there. Is everything all right?”

At once Stephanie deflated. Her expression turned into something small and anxious.

“I’m just working,” she said. “And thinking. About things.”

Erika sat down right beside her, dragging her chair closer.

“The thinking’s not going well for you?”

Steph sighed, letting herself tilt sideways until she could lay her head on Erika’s shoulder.

“I work on revisions and I’m doing my job like always, but I hate this story,” Steph told her, voice low and sad. “It’s awful everywhere, in every way, and I don’t have time to work on my original novel—I tried, I was doing it, but I have to finish this soon—but I keep thinking, if this idiot managed to get this bought by our company, why couldn’t I? Am I such a piece of shit writer? I don’t—“

“You’re not,” Erika said firmly.

“You’ve never read my writing,” Steph told her. “You can’t tell. I guess I stopped writing for a reason, but the more I read this the angrier I get, and I’m probably never getting anything published—“

“Steph, you don’t know that—”

“No? I’m twenty-six! I’ve met people who were published at sixteen. I’ve yet to do anything that was accepted anywhere, and believe me I used to write a lot more—”

“You don’t have to give up,” Erika told her, a frown on her face. “Steph, I know you have some issues, but—you shouldn’t let them get in the way of doing what you want. If you—“

The look Steph sent her was unimpressed and weary.

“It’s not my multitude of issues stopping me, Erika,” she said blandly. “It’s the fact that my stories have without failure been refused so far and it’s been years. And anyway, it doesn’t matter, because writing doesn’t pay, and I’ve just been fired—“

“What?” Erika said. “Just now? Jesus, Steph, why did they fire you?”

Steph winced.

“No, it’s been…some time. I’m staying as a freelancer. So, it’s not as bad! It’s not. Except… you know, no job security at all.”

“Oh,” Erika said. “It’s been some time, but you’ve just been fired?”

Steph winced again.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.