About If Only in Cranbury Park

by Charlotte Dare
62 pages / 16000 words
ISBN: 978-1-60370-719-0, 1-60370-719-0
Ebook zipped file contains - html, lit, Adobe and Sony optimized pdf, prc, epub

Courtney and Joanna have been on the rocks for awhile, thanks to Courtney's club-going lifestyle and Joanna's need to settle down. When Joanna finally decides to move on, though, it's devastating to both of them, leaving the ladies at a loss as to how to live without each other.

While they try to go it solo, both Courtney and Joanna realize they each had their part to play in their break-up, and that they might just have to learn how to be alone so they can be together. Will their love be enough to overcome their differences, or will they have to learn to let go?

Sample

Courtney watched the cat twitch as he slept in the lamb’s wool kitty bed too small for his fifteen pound body. Downstairs the rumble of boxes and plastic storage containers Joanna carted out of their house reverberated in her ears. The acoustics of mosaic tile and refinished hardwood floors precluded a silent escape. Courtney closed her eyes, woozy from the echoes below, and wondered what kind of demented impulse compelled her to stay home this morning.

“Courtney,” Joanna shouted from the foot of the staircase. “I’m leaving the keys on the dining room table.”

Courtney sniffled and swallowed. “All right,” she shouted back after clearing the sadness from her throat. Was it so surprising it’d come to this after the last tumultuous year? She stroked Oliver’s ear and hoped Joanna wasn’t going to come back for him, too.

“Hey, Court,” Joanna called again, her voice this time stilted with hesitation. “I’m leaving. Do you want to say good-bye?”

What a question. Courtney sighed and shuffled her cross-trainers across the frieze throw rug in the hall. She leaned over the railing and looked down on the fly-aways on top of Joanna’s dark chocolate hair. “You were right. I should’ve gone for coffee or something this morning.”

Joanna’s deep green eyes were glassy and anxious. “Courtney, someday we’ll be friends again. I really hope so anyway,” she said and walked away after a solemn nod.

When Courtney heard the door close, she walked downstairs and gazed at the holes left by Joanna’s missing antique rocking chair, mystery novels, and Hummel collection. The picture frames of them during holidays and summer vacations were gone too, but Courtney had appropriated those herself last week when Joanna had come back from her sister’s house with her brother-in-law and his SUV and announced she was leaving. They’d moved her armoire, treadmill, business files, and most of her clothing. Today was the day the seasonal clothing left and Joanna did too, for good.

Courtney collapsed on the loveseat and sank into the hollow silence. After a while, she remembered to breathe. It was a long, deep breath, but she couldn’t suck in enough air to distill her despair into something she could use. She finally picked up the cordless, pressed Julian’s speed dial number and closed her eyes.

“She’s gone,” she said when he answered.