Maybe You

  MAYBE YOU

  by Marie Landry

  Copyright 2019 Marie Landry

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Also by Marie Landry

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Epilogue

  Thank you!

  Acknowledgments

  First Chapter of Only You

  About the Author

  ALSO BY MARIE LANDRY

  Blue Sky Days

  The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

  Waiting for the Storm (Angel Island #1)

  After the Storm (Angel Island #2)

  Take Them by Storm (Angel Island #3)

  Mistletoe Kiss

  Only You

  DEDICATION

  This book, just like every other book I’ve written, is for you, Mum. Thank you for being my best friend and biggest supporter. Your smile can brighten the darkest of days.

  CHAPTER ONE

  A door slams somewhere, startling me awake. My eyes pop open to find Bono giving me a moody stare from a vintage black-and-white Joshua Tree poster. The album of the same name is playing on repeat, and “With or Without You” is starting for at least the third time tonight.

  My gaze slides to the person I’m currently tangled in bed with. Her dark brown hair has fallen over her eyes, and her pink lipstick is somehow smudged. Her face is soft, relaxed, making her look even younger than she does when she’s awake.

  “Kitty?” I whisper. “Kitty, we fell asleep again.”

  Wide brown eyes fly open to meet mine. Kitty’s startled expression eases into a rueful smile as she flops onto her back. “Sorry, Meredith.” She pushes herself into a seated position and gathers her hair to one side, braiding it so quickly her fingers are a blur. “I just feel so comfortable when you’re around.”

  “Well, that’s what I’m here for.” I sit up beside her and give her shoulder a squeeze. “You good? I should probably head home, but if you need me I’ll gladly stay awhile longer.”

  “I’m good. But before you go…” She hops up from the bed and takes the few steps separating it from her desk. Despite the cell-like size of the room, she has more stuff crammed in here than I have in half of my house. “My mom sent another care package and I put an assortment of cookies and stuff in a container for you. I threw in extras of those ginger snaps you like.” She points to the plastic dish on her desk as she fishes her purse out from where it’s stashed in a drawer. I eye the container longingly, envisioning the Food Network-worthy baked goods I know are inside.

  Returning my attention to Kitty, I accept the money she’s holding out with a nod of thanks, and tuck it into my pocket. “Now,” I say, stepping forward to wrap my arms around the petite brunette, “what are you going to remember as you head into next week?”

  Her breath ruffles my hair, either from a sigh or a laugh. Maybe a combination of both. “I’m going to remember I’m strong and smart and capable. And that one bad grade isn’t going to affect my entire future. And neither will the fact I made a complete ass of myself in front of Petra.”

  “Exactly. And you’re going to tell Petra you changed your mind and want to study with her after all, right? And when she asks you out like I expect she will, I promise not to be too smug.”

  She gives my arm a playful smack as she releases me. Despite her quick turn toward the desk, I don’t miss her pleased smile or the rosy tinge in her cheeks. “Come on, I’ll walk you out.”

  “It’s okay, Miles is on duty and he’s good about walking me to my car and waiting ’til I drive away. You stay here and work on what you’re going to say to Petra.”

  She huffs out a laugh, waiting for me to don my jacket before handing me the container of cookies. “Fine. I’ll see you soon?”

  “Definitely. I’m only ever a few clicks away.” We never make specific plans to see each other again; it’s against the rules. I give her a quick one-armed hug before stepping out of her dorm room into the hall. By some miracle, Kitty’s room is mostly soundproof, but the second the door opens you’re greeted by sounds from people wandering the corridor or congregating in the lounge down the hall. You’re also greeted by a variety of scents, many of which are not exactly pleasant.

  Still, whenever I come to visit Kitty, the noise and the questionable smells make me miss my own college days. Those days—the parties, the friends I made, the ability to get only a few hours of sleep and still function properly—were some of my best ones. I miss the lifestyle more than the classes themselves, although nerd that I am, I mostly enjoyed those too. If only I could pick and choose my classes without being forced to takes ones I didn’t like in order to get a degree, I might have considered becoming one of those people who remains a perpetual student well into their twenties or beyond.

  On my way past the lounge, I run into the same guy I always see when I visit Kitty. He never speaks, not even a hello, just sweeps his gaze over me and smiles knowingly. He’s seen me coming out of Kitty’s room countless times, so I assume he thinks we’re lovers. The current bed-head state of my blond curls probably doesn’t help.

  I flash him what my friends call my best megawatt smile, paired with a cheeky little finger wave. If you can’t change a perv’s mind, let him think what he wants.

  Miles, one of the youngest campus security guards, is coming up the sidewalk when I step outside. “Good timing, Meredith.” His dark eyes brighten when they settle on the container in my hands. “I see you’ve been visiting Kitty again. She gave me some of her mama’s double chocolate chunk cookies and I asked her if she could have them sent by the truckload next time.”

  “The woman has some serious skills.” I fall into step beside him as we head toward the parking lot. Having Miles here is the perfect excuse to pop open the lid and see what’s inside. I spy the chocolate cookies he mentioned, so I hold the container in his direction. When he starts to protest, I raise the dish higher, letting him get a whiff of all that chocolaty goodness. He grins as he plucks out a cookie and immediately bites into it.

  We reach my car, where Miles does a quick visual sweep, checking underneath and shining his flashlight in the back seats. My eyes follow him, as they always do when he walks me to my car. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think he was cute, with his tightly curled black hair, dark skin, warm brown eyes, and beautiful smile. He’s a gentleman too, and it goes beyond ‘just doing his job’, which is the line he’s given me several times after I’ve thanked him.

  Miles gives the all clear, so I unlock the car and he opens the driver’s-side door for me. I slide inside, tossing my purse onto the passenger seat and setting the container of cookies carefully beside it. I’ve just fastened my seatbelt when I realize Miles is watching me intently.

  “I was thinking we should try to see each other off campus sometime,” he says. “You know, on purpose.”

  “Like a date?” I’ve been waiting for this. I’m actually surprised it took him t
his long to ask.

  “Something like that, yeah. I’d wear normal clothes instead of my uniform. We’d eat something other than cookies. Talk about stuff other than the weather or our jobs.”

  I chuckle, bowing my head. I may have been expecting this, but part of me hoped I was misreading him and he wouldn’t ask me out. I like our casual, friendly repartee, and I don’t want to say something that sounds like a line or a straight-out refusal. I have too much going on right now to commit to anything else, and yet I do believe in the concept of ‘never say never’. If things were different, I’d go out with Miles in a heartbeat. Finally, I raise my head again to meet his eyes. “Yeah. We should.”

  He’s silent for a beat, his brows inching up like he’s waiting for more.

  “Catch me next time you see me and we’ll talk,” I tell him, cringing inwardly.

  He releases the car door to clutch at his chest. “Oh, it’s like that, is it? You won’t even give me your number?”

  I swallow a sigh. “I’m not saying no. I’m just saying…not right now. I’m sorry.”

  His dark eyes turn solemn. Maybe he sees something in my face that tells him I’m being sincere. Or maybe he can see how truly exhausted I am underneath my bright smile and chipper personality. Whatever the reason, his lips curve slightly and he nods. “Gotcha. Maybe someday.” He reaches for the door again, hesitating before closing it. “Will you keep sharing Kitty’s mama’s cookies with me, though?”

  Relieved, my own lips twitch in response. “Always.”

  On the drive home, I try to ignore the weird pit in my stomach. I hated turning Miles down, but my life is too complicated to even think about dating. I have to keep my priorities straight if I want any hope of maintaining my sanity.

  The lights in the downstairs front rooms of my house are on when I pull into the driveway. My roommate Celia is a student at the same college Kitty goes to, and she usually beats me home in the evenings.

  “Honey, I’m home,” I singsong as I step inside. After kicking off my shoes and shucking my jacket, I peer around the corner into the tiny dining room. My gaze scans the pile of textbooks, notebooks, and assorted pens and highlighters before settling on a young woman with thick braids coiled around her head. “You’re not Celia,” I say stupidly.

  She laughs. “Very astute. Celia and I have a project for class and she said it’d be easier to work here rather than at the library or student center. I hope you don’t mind.”

  “No, of course not.” Despite living here for almost six months, Celia still has trouble thinking of this as ‘her’ place, even though I’ve told her a million times it’s as much her home as it is mine. We first met a year and a half ago when she and her former roommate, Ivy—who is now my best friend and boss—were hired as seasonal extras at Bellevue Village, where I work a regular nine-to-five as a manager. When Ivy moved in with her fiancé, Hugh—owner of Bellevue Village, and a longtime friend of mine—I suggested Celia come live with me. I’m ever hopeful someday she’ll stop referring to it as ‘Meredith’s place’ and start seeing it as ours.

  A string of rapid-fire Mandarin precedes Celia’s entrance into the dining room. She smiles when she sees me, followed by an eye roll as she points at the phone in her hand. “Yes, Mama. Okay, Mama. I have to go, Mama.” She says something else in Mandarin and disconnects the call, flopping into the chair across from her classmate.

  In true Celia fashion, she skips the pleasantries and says, “You’re late tonight.”

  “We fell asleep again.” Since Kitty is a client, I have to keep her identity anonymous, but I always tell Celia where I’m going, plus occasionally share details that don’t break the confidentiality agreement.

  “Did she have Joshua Tree on repeat again?” she asks with a smirk.

  Details like that. “I now officially have the whole album memorized.”

  Celia tilts her head in the direction of the other girl at the table. “This is Aneesha, she’s in my program at school. I was telling her about your companion work.”

  Aneesha gives a little wave, making the chunky rings on each of her fingers glint in the overhead light. “I kept seeing the adverts around campus and thinking it sounded so wei—” Her eyes go wide and she claps a hand over her mouth.

  “Don’t worry, I thought it was weird at first too.” I pry the lid off the container of baked goods and set it on top of one of Celia’s open textbooks before sitting down. I refrain from telling Aneesha that when I first heard of Human Touch Companions, I thought it was some kind of escort service. Even when I learned what they do, I still thought it sounded like being a call girl minus anything sexual. I quickly learned it’s so much more than that, and now I feel like I’m doing something worthwhile and helping people.

  Aneesha drops her hand, revealing a rueful smile. “Weird, but in an interesting way, right? Like it makes you curious. I thought it was a joke at first, but Celia tells me it’s legit.”

  “It’s the real deal,” I assure her.

  “How did you get into it?” Aneesha asks, pulling a double chocolate chunk cookie from the container. I order myself not to think of Miles and his love of those particular cookies.

  “Uh, well…” My eyes flit to Celia. I don’t know how much Aneesha knows about my roommate, and whether they’re simply classmates or friends.

  “It’s okay,” Celia says to me. Then to Aneesha, “I’ve been in therapy for the last year or so. I had some…let’s say ‘anger issues’. After awhile, my therapist told me about Human Touch Companions. You have to have a referral either from a doctor or someone in the program, so I checked out the site and knew immediately it wasn’t for me. I don’t even like to be hugged, but this little ray of sunshine—” She points to me with the cookie in her hand. “She’s a touchy-feely people person.”

  I laugh at her description. “It’s true. When Celia told me about the program, it seemed tailor-made for me. I went in for interviews and training, and they said I was exactly the type of person they were looking for.”

  Aneesha opens her mouth to speak, but Celia cuts her off. “Okay, less chatting, more studying,” she says, tapping her pen on her notebook. After knowing her for a year and a half and living with her for the last several months, I’m used to Celia’s bluntness and her patented snarkasm. Deep down, I suspect she could benefit from the kind of work I do for HTC, but she’d never admit it.

  Since the girls already have their own snacks, I take the cookies upstairs with me, where I change my clothes and get settled at my computer. My hand hovers over the mouse as the screensaver moves through the slideshow gallery of my favorite photos. About half the pictures include Ivy and Hugh, as well as our mutual friends Bridget and Piper. Celia is usually the one taking pictures since she hates being in them, but she’s in a couple of shots and she’s even smiling. Sort of. The other half, and my absolute favorite pictures, are the ones of my mom and me.

  The most recent one of us pops up on the screen and I lean in, wanting to be closer to my mom even though it’s just a photo. It was taken a little less than a year ago, right before she checked into Birch Hill, a facility in Kingston, the city where I grew up. She was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s about a year and a half ago at the age of sixty-eight, and the disease progressed with heartbreaking rapidity. I wanted to move home to take care of her, but she insisted a place like Birch Hill, where they specialize in the care of people with Alzheimer’s, was the right decision for her. She was worried I’d drop my whole life here in Bellevue to be with her, so she took the decision out of my hands and secured a spot at Birch Hill before I could quit my job or put my house up for sale. Now photographs and almost thirty years of amazing memories are all I have left of her.

  The bittersweet melancholy I always feel when I think of my mother rises in my chest, threatening to suffocate me. Determined not to let it win—because Mom would hate that—I jiggle the mouse, scattering the slideshow. I pull up the website for Human Touch Companions and log into my accou
nt. Kitty has already left a glowing five-star review of our time together.

  When I first signed up to be a companion, I instated a three-encounter maximum rule. My profile explains what I’m available for and my preferences on location and age. With Bellevue being a college town, the majority of my clients are college students, varying in age from fresh-out-of-high-school to students in their mid-twenties like Celia, plus a few more mature people who have returned to school or are learning a trade. I’m also popular with single women around my age and a bit older. After a session, I write a review that’s only visible to other companions, and from there I decide whether to leave my profile open or hide it from specific people so they can’t select me as a companion in the future.

  I broke my rule with Kitty, though. I try hard not to think of her as a friend, but I’d miss our time together if I stopped seeing her. I’ve created a loophole in her case; she was given up for adoption at the age of three and then bounced around between foster homes and group homes until she found her ‘forever home’ a year before she started college. She’s had so little continuity in her life, I like to think I’m helping her by remaining her companion. She could request someone else on the site, but she still chooses me, so that says something.

  I sift through my messages, reading updates from the admins, and making a note to check out the links for the new studies being done on the benefits of human touch. After confirming a few meetings with clients for next week, I open an email from a potential new client.

  Hello Meredith, my name is Kieran O’Malley. I’ve been a student at Loyola since September, and I was referred by my roommate’s girlfriend, who lived in the dorms last semester and met with you a few times.

  I’m here on a student visa from Ireland. My parents are the sort who have never approved of anything I’ve done, and coming to Canada for school is another black mark against me in a long line of perceived screw-ups. For some reason, they’re coming for a visit—likely hoping to drag me home with them so I can ‘finally take my rightful place in my dad’s company’. To most, a family gathering wouldn’t seem like something that requires backup, but you haven’t met my parents. I’ve made a few friends at school, but I don’t want them knowing my family troubles. Part of the reason I came here was for a fresh start, and airing the O’Malley family dirty laundry isn’t exactly in line with that goal.