Falling To Pieces – Annette Lyon

That was their MO, and it had been for years. Right ? Sunday afternoon, he managed to make the call without disconnecting. He paced the living room the entire time he left a brief message. “So, hey,” he said, painfully aware that his voice sounded strained. “Been meaning to tell you about a date I had Friday. Haven’t talked to you or seen in you in a while. Um. So, yeah. Call me back when you can.” He pressed end call and collapsed on the couch. Bizarre that they hadn’t called or texted or seen each other in days.

It had to mean that Toni and the short guy were hitting it off. A male best friend likely threatened that. He couldn’t imagine a boyfriend being okay with his girlfriend hanging out and confiding in another guy. Her past boyfriends either didn’t know about Carter, or they didn’t care. The fact that Toni had been silent over Clint told Carter that their relationship was likely different from her past ones.

The thought made him want to throw something. Several hours later, when the sun was dipping into the west and splashing a wash of orange and pinks across the sky, his doorbell rang. Carter was sketching Toni again, this time in an arabesque, wearing the white costume with tutu and tiara that she’d worn in a ballet a couple of years ago.

He set his tablet on the couch and headed for the door. He answered it, only to find Toni on the other side. “Hey. Long time, no see,” she said with the same old smile that turned his insides into butter. He’d missed it. But then Carter’s eyes darted to the tablet. Toni had never seen his pictures of her. Not the paintings, not the sketches. Which amounted to a lot of his portfolio, including some work that had landed him several freelance jobs.

arter reached for one of the paint brushes held between his teeth. He dabbed a little burnt umber on the bristles then used the color to add highlights to the hair of the dancer on the canvas. She sat on a wooden floor, one knee up, the other tucked under her. Her head tilted to one side as she untied the ribbon of a battered pointe shoe. Her chestnut hair was pulled into a bun, but wisps had escaped it during her practice time.

He bit the end of the brush again — he had three in his mouth now — and sat back to study the painting. Not bad, but not quite right, either. The lines of the figure were good, and he liked how the play of light and shadow had turned out, but he could never quite get that face to look how he pictured it.

His back had grown stiff from two straight hours of working at the easel. He stretched as he removed the earphones he always wore while working. Sometimes he listened to white noise, but today he’d put on an instrumental playlist. With the headphones off, he heard his phone ringing on his desk on the other side of the room — a clip from “The Dance of the Sugarplum Fairy.”

Toni’s ringtone. No sooner had he taken two steps toward his desk than the phone went still. Aw, well. She’d probably leave a message. Might as well tidy up and then call her back. He grabbed the brushes and headed over to the paint thinner on the counter.

Maybe Toni wanted to hang out tonight. Get a video and eat popcorn. As he cleaned the paint from the tip of a brush, he pictured having Toni in his arms, smelling her faint perfume, resting his head on hers. Too bad that even if he put his arm around her — as he often did — and even if she snuggled close — which she also often did — it wouldn’t mean anything beyond “friend” to her.

As he scrubbed the paint off the brush, the handle snapped between his fingers.

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.

Book Information

• Unique ID: 7b0b9fd26114c173
• File Extension: .pdf
• File Size: 3,423,060 bytes (3.264 MB)
• Title: –
• Author: Unknown
• Pages: 273
• Language: English (en)

Reading & Word Statistics

• Estimated Reading Time: 501.67 minutes
• Total Words: 100,333
• Total Characters: 538,675
• Average Words per Page: 367.52
• Average Characters per Page: 1973.17

Most Frequent Words

toni (975), carter (762), said (462), back (378), like (334), one (332), didn’t (327), she’d (311), he’d (307), clint (276), time (263), know (246), brooke (239), get (225), don’t (213), eyes (213), right (208), i’m (208), around (193), something (191), now (177), see (177), even (175), hand (175), went (170), looked (170), couldn’t (167), away (165), mother (162), thought (159), never (155), much (155), it’s (153), head (151), took (151), look (150), still (148), come (145), say (144), way (143), door (139), turned (137), wasn’t (136), face (135), anything (134), good (133), got (131), hadn’t (128), toni’s (126), think (125), put (124), i’ll (124), herself (124), two (123), maybe (123), felt (123), let (120), want (120), you’re (115), always (113), wouldn’t (111), first (111), voice (109), room (106), knew (105), sure (104), wanted (103), better (103), well (102), made (102), life (101), tell (100), phone (99), dance (99), chapter (96), make (96), dad (96), going (96), asked (96), really (95), night (93), tried (93), long (92), came (92), years (90), take (90), that’s (90), pulled (87), mind (87), love (86), call (85), ever (85), last (85), talk (85), without (84), hands (84), himself (84), car (84), another (83), enough (81).

PDF Download