Double Clutch (39 page)

“
Brenna!” Mom rushed to the bed. “Why are you crying sweetheart?”

“
Just a book,” I sobbed.

Mom tilted her head and looked at the cover. “
Sense and Sensibility?
Honey, it’s a romance. I don’t remember anything sad in the book.”

“
I’m not done yet.” I wiped my tears away, embarrassed now. “Mom, why doesn’t Willoughby end up with Marianne?”

“
It will ruin the book, honey.” Mom stared at me with wide eyes.

“
Please.” I grabbed her arm.

She sat on the bed and swept my hair back off of my neck, kissing me softly, and recited the information I asked for. “He makes her believe he has serious intentions for her, then gets forced to chose to be poor with her or marry a woman he doesn’t love for money. He marries the one he doesn’t love.”

“
So he was just a huge jerk?” I said, calming down.

“
Yes.” Mom tilts her head and considers her answer. “But he did honestly love Marianne, he just chose the person who was right for him realistically and let her marry the person who was right for her. He realized that being in love wasn’t all there was. There were realities in life.” Mom sighed. “I wrote a great paper my junior year about that book.” She looked dreamy.

“
I’m sorry I was so weird.” I rubbed my eyes and gave them a watery smile.

“
That’s okay, baby. When you’re ready, Thorsten is making his famous waffles.” She kissed my forehead and left. I heard her talking about “…Brenna’s emotions when she has her period…” as she walked down the hall with Fa.

I would have to finish the book later and figure it out for myself. I closed it with a snap. There was a big difference between fiction and real life. I could cry all I wanted over Austen, but thinking about the reality of my upcoming day made me smile despite all of the bullshit.

First and foremost, I want to thank my strong, smart, fierce mother. Her maniacal faith in my ability to do absolutely anything is sometimes overwhelming and always encouraging, especially when I start I get the urge to curl into fetal position and eat massive amounts of comfort pudding. I give her all the love and respect in the world.

And thanks to my baby sister, Katie, who never pulled a single punch in her young, mean life. Especially the day she ripped that “Do you want to be a writer?” leaflet from an Avon novel back when we were in high school, raised her perfect eyebrow, and stuffed the page in my hand with a single, fateful remark; “You could write a better book than this, so you should.”

I want to thank my brothers Jack and Zachary for supporting me even if they act like books will burn them if they hold them for too long. Thank you to my “baby” sisters Jessica, Jillian, and Jamie, who make me laugh and remind me of what it was like to grow up in NJ. Thanks to my dad, who constantly calls and updates me on any book/writing/publishing news he hears on NPR. I’d like to thank my grandparents for calling me and nagging me to get my work out there or just generally encouraging me so I could make some money and stop mooching off of them. But also, of course, because they love me and think I’m a decent writer. Thank you to all my family who have cheered me on and believed in me, no matter how obnoxiously lost in my own fictional world I’ve been. I want to thank those friends who inspired the friendships in this book and still warm my cockles (Ronan, Jessie, Kimmy, Liz, Jesse, Aaron, Ellen, Lou, Fran, Frank, Chloe, Elisa, Lauren, Biffy, Holly, Jen K…)

An unimaginably huge debt of thanks goes out to the long line of teachers who loved and nourished my voracious little reader-mind; Mr. Post, Mrs. Schroth, Mr. Flynn, Mrs. White, Ms. Mattil, Ms. Hassenplug, Mr. Bauer. Every single one of you swept me up in reading and inspired me to write more. Or less, if I was being too longwinded. Thank you for your red pens, your passion for words, and your patience with my sometimes irritating exuberance.

I could not have done this without my best friend and amazing editor, Alexa Offenhauer, who runs a fantastic editing business, Loose Leaf Editing. She untangled my crazy sentences, updated my 90’s era fashion nightmares, and rooted for the book with her entire, brilliant heart from day one. A huge thanks also goes out to the hugely talented YA authors Caryn Caldwell and Angie Stanton for being so sweet but firm as critiquers, Tamar Goetke for reluctantly embracing her inner teen and being my meanest beta, and Brittany Hansen for her uncontrolled squeals of girlish delight. I tucked them in my head for ear cleanings and to give me happy courage when I just wanted to sink into a bottomless pit and stop this writing madness. Thank you to my fantastic, amazing, blow-me-away cover designer, Steven Peterson. He made Brenna, Jake, and Saxon come alive right before my eyes, and I will never forget the moment he made them jump out of my head and onto the page.

Last, but never least, thank you to my girl, Amelia, who I hope grows up crazier and more amazing than any girl I could imagine in any book…but not too fast. And a big, wet, sloppy thank you to my husband, Frank, my love, my best friend, and the coolest guy I’ve ever known. His awesomeness has inspired some great fictional romance.

And a huge thank you to my readers! I hope Brenna, Jake, and Saxon meant as much to you as they do to me. Anytime you want to drop a line, send me an email at [email protected]. Love to you all!

Liz Reinhardt was born and raised in the idyllic beauty of northwest NJ. A move to the subtropics of coastal Georgia with her daughter and husband left her with a newly realized taste for the beach and a bloated sunscreen budget. Right alongside these new loves is her old, steadfast affection for bagels and the fast-talking, foul mouths of her youth. She loves Raisinettes, even if they aren’t really candy, the Oxford comma, movies that are hilarious or feature zombies, any and all books, but especially romance (the smarter and hotter, the better), the sound of her daughter’s incessantly wise and entertaining chatter, and watching her husband work on cars in the driveway. You can read her blog at www.elizabethreinhardt.blogspot.com, like her on Facebook, or email her at [email protected].

A preview of Liz Reinhardt’s new novel,

Junk Miles: A Brenna Blixen Novel

Book 2

coming Autumn 2011!

Junk Miles: many miles run at a slow pace, attributed to a training strategy by runners who confuse high mileage counts with improvement

My mother was one of the most thoughtful, loving, caring women in the world. That didn’t mean that she was dumb, and it didn’t mean that she was nice.

I should add that I’ve never had respect for nice mothers, at least not according to the common teenage definition of “nice.” My mom never looked the other way when I did something she didn’t like. She didn’t try to fit in with my friends if she didn’t approve of them, or with any of my friends at all, for that matter. My mom had high expectations for me, and she drove me with a huge mixture of love, neurotic pressure, and guilt.

A whole lot of guilt.

This complicated theory ran through my mind Christmas morning, while my head was still bent down, my eyes fixed on the open box in my lap. I had split seconds to come up with the appropriate face for my mom and Thorsten, my step-father, and I knew that my initial feelings of shock and disappointment were in no way appropriate. My mother had done exactly what she was best at.

She had rocked my world with her generosity and sneakiness.

I made my eyes wide, opened my mouth, and shook my head. “Paris? Paris!” I shook the ticket in my hand and jumped up. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.” I hugged her tight. And I was thankful and genuinely excited.

Mom smiled and kissed me hard. I could feel her triumph. Because this wasn’t exactly what it seemed.

Mom plotted this out with all of the intelligence of a military tactician, and that was why there was no chance of moping or sulking. I had always wanted to go to Paris, and there was no one in the world I wanted to go with more than Mom.

But there was more to it than just that. I told Mom and Thorsten about my super sexy, super awesome boyfriend Jake a few months back, and they had handled it really well; no yelling, no threats, no unreasonable restrictions. They had even included him in things. Jake went out with us for my birthday, they gave him a gift on his, invited him over for Thanksgiving, and he was coming over for Christmas dinner later on this evening. I didn’t take advantage of their willingness to be nice about Jake. I am, after all, my mother’s daughter, and I knew that I had to keep Jake distanced from them or they would start to find things about him that weren’t good enough for me. Well, Mom would start to find things. Because Jake isn’t exactly what she wants for me, and my mother does not even consider second best when it comes to me.

I understand where she’s coming from, but it’s still constricting. And since I wanted to stay with Jake, I limited the time I spent with him, even though my body physically ached with the need to be near him sometimes. Cheesy as it might sound, that’s the best way I can explain it. I thought I had done a pretty good job of disguising just how obsessed I was with him and how deliciously he had taken over my life.

But Mom started watching me, exactly the way I knew she would. She looked for anything that would provide evidence that Jake was breaking my heart, making me sad, keeping me up too late, stopping me from pursuing my interests, hogging me from other friends or any other trumped up charge. In her mind, she filed any shred of evidence away to digest later.

If I woke up with dark circles under my eyes because Jake and I had an amazing conversation on the phone the night before, Mom narrowed her eyes and made a mental check. If I arranged to go out with Kelsie and she cancelled, and I went out with Jake instead, Mom noted it and frowned. Tiny charges, little details grew and compounded until Mom had, in her mind, a real reason to orchestrate a campaign against Jake, or at least against me being so wrapped around him.

Mom was a huge proponent of dating lots of different people, keeping your options open, and focusing on yourself. All sound good in theory. Until you meet someone like Jake Kelly and have to think about living without hearing his sweet laugh or smelling the clean, minty smell of him or feeling his arms tight around you. Thinking about it made my heart skip and surge.

This was love.

And my mom was no fool. She wasn’t about to drive a wedge between us by harping on Jake or voicing her neurotic concerns. My mother was too brilliant for that kind of novice work.

“
It’s part of a program with the college, honey.” Mom took out a pamphlet and handed it to me eagerly. “They want to give the professors a chance to scout prospective study abroad locations before they choose them, so we’re allowed to bring any family and check out the museums, local universities…oh, it’s going to be so incredible.” She hugged me again, and I took a deep breath.

“
Mom, this sounds so great.” I swallowed hard and prepared for the worst. “So, when do we go?”

“
We leave the day after tomorrow! We’ll be gone for a full week, just past your winter break. I’ve already cleared it at your schools if you need some jet-lag recovery time on the way back, so don’t worry about that.” She put an arm around me and squeezed me close.

“
Mom?” I dug deep and willed up some courage to argue on Jake‘s behalf. She looked at me, and the look was new-knife sharp. I swallowed back my arguments like the weak coward I sometimes was. “I have to pack right now. What’s Paris like in December?”

“
Chilly.” The flinty light was gone from her eyes. She took both my hands in hers. “Go ahead and get packing, honey.”

“
Thank you, Mom. So much.” I modulated my voice carefully to keep it happy, and I hugged her again. “This will be amazing.”

And I hoped that by saying it, I would force myself to mean it. Because as I walked quickly to my recently redone room, I felt the itchy pain of tears pricking behind my eyes. I tried not to think too hard about the fact that I would miss New Year’s Eve with Jake. It would have been my first ever romantic New Year’s kiss.

In my room, with its robin-egg blue wall and poppy-covered bed, the Chagall and Cassatt on the wall, the paper lamps and the books piled everywhere, I popped my iPod onto its dock and put on some happy packing music, even though I wanted to scroll through my specially made teen angst mix and let it envelope me in something suitably dreary. I started to put piles of clothes here and there and took out my brand new pink leather traveling bag, the one I had unwrapped this morning and hugged Thorsten for. I didn’t feel any ill will towards Fa. He was a puppet in Mom’s very capable hands, no doubt about that.

I didn’t feel any ill will at all, not really. I picked up the picture of me and Mom in front of the big tree in Rockefeller Square. We’re both really pink cheeked and nosed with cute hats on, our arms around each other. I knew what my mom was feeling stemmed from a lot of really deep emotions and events that all proved the one thing I’ve known my entire life -- my mom loves me so fiercely, it’s scary.

Mom had me when she was barely out of high school. The guy, my father, left her high and dry. He was her boyfriend and as far as I can tell, she thought this guy was the love of her life. I knew that she thought what Jake and I had was very similar to what she once imagined she had with my biological father, before he stomped on all of her dreams and left her high and dry. It took her a long time to get her life back on track after him. I know it’s the ghost of that experience that makes her uber protective.