Following Bliss (The Quest series) (6 page)

Chapter 4

And inside his
wallet is where Shelby’s card stayed.

Daniel went home
that afternoon reeling. How could his mother be proud of him? He hadn’t done
anything he set out to. He wasn’t living the life she would have wanted for
him. She wanted him to get married, have a family, be responsible and work a
normal job like everyone else.

“Daniel, honey,
life is much easier than you make it out to be. And it starts with love. When
you love others, the rest unfolds as it’s meant to. You can’t force becoming a
great novelist like Steinbeck. You only need to find love and the rest will
come.”

She used to tell
him that over and over again.

Well, he was 38
now and he wasn’t doing any of that. And to make matters worse, he had let her
down by not being a better son during her illness. He didn’t want to believe
she could really be sick, so sick that she might die. And she had put up a good
face and told him it was fine to take the trip to Europe. He would never forget
that day.

She was home,
with her sisters and brothers there taking care of her. Daniel’s dad bounced in
and out of their lives, but never stayed around too long. Daniel went on weekend
visits with him up until age 11, but after that quit seeing him altogether. He
never felt comfortable with him. His dad loved to drink and point out where
others were wrong. If Daniel was around when his father was drinking, all he
heard was how he would never amount to anything.

So when Daniel’s
mom got sick with cancer at age 56, it was her family that came together and
rallied around her, supporting her through it. He wished he had been a more
integral part of that process. He let himself fade into the background as his
aunts and uncles took care of his mom.

The morning he
told her about the opportunity to take a trip to Europe with a few friends, she
was pale and a bit out of breath, but in good spirits. She was sitting on the
patio, dressed in a white bathrobe, sipping peppermint tea. It felt like only
yesterday that they had the conversation.

“What do you
want to talk to me about, Daniel?” she had said, her blue eyes still revealing
a faint light.

“Mom, I know you
haven’t been feeling well (Daniel realizes now this was pretty much the
understatement of the year, as she had been sick for six months at this point),
but I have an opportunity to go to London with some friends in a few weeks and
I wanted to see how you felt about that.”

She had smiled
at the mention of London, a place she had visited once, long ago, when she was
in her early twenties. It was a time of great adventure and love. She had
fallen in lust with a pub owner-slash-motorcycle rider that summer. Tattooed
and tan, they had spent weeks rolling around in bed together followed by going
out visiting all the sights in London. She giggled softly to herself.

“Mom??”

“Oh, sorry love.
I was reminiscing about the last time I was in London. It is such a fun place
to visit, especially when you’re young.” She had winked at him then.

Her eyes drifted
far off into the distance and Daniel could feel that she was revisiting London
yet again, no longer sitting there with him.

He touched her
hand.

“Are you okay
mom?”

“Oh yes, I’m
fine—minus the breast cancer, of course.” She smiled feebly, somewhat proud of
her ability to make light of a situation that had seemed so dark to everyone
else. She patted his hand and said, “You go and do whatever you need to and
I’ll be right here when you get back. Don’t you worry.”

Daniel leaned in
and kissed her cheek.

“Thanks mom. I
love you.”

“I love you too,
dear. Now go get your aunt Ali and tell her I am in need of some sliced fruit
and juice. All that London reminiscing has made me hungry.”

Daniel had
smiled then thinking to himself that she would be fine and one day things would
go back to normal, with her taking painting classes, traveling to Paris and
anywhere else she wanted to go.

But that didn’t
happen. Instead, the day Daniel was set to fly back from his trip, his Aunt Ali
called him with the news.

“She’s gone
Daniel,” she had said in between sobs.

Daniel stood in
the airport, stunned, unable to move. People moved all around him, but he
couldn’t even see them. All he could see was that far off look in her eyes and
that white gown. A cold breeze washed over him and he crumpled to the floor
crying.

From that moment
forward, Daniel’s heart closed. He could never allow himself to love anyone
again, especially another woman who could also leave him.

The pain of
allowing himself to feel all of the various emotions around his mother’s death
was too much for Daniel to handle. He had allowed himself that one day in the
airport. After that, he had not let himself cry over her passing. Meeting
Shelby had shifted something within him, but his conditioned way of behaving
and his ego were stronger. So, he did what he always did, and threw himself
back into his work. He began making edits to his novel and checking his email
in hopes of hearing from Kaley Hamilton with good news.

Daniel didn’t
have to wait long. Two weeks after he last saw Shelby, he received the
following email from Kaley Hamilton:

Dear Daniel,
It was such a pleasure meeting you a few weeks ago at the Willamette Writers Conference.
Your confidence and talent definitely got my attention.

I have
finished reading your manuscript and feel like we might have something very
valuable to work with. I am headed off to a writing retreat in Maui, Hawaii,
and would love to have you join me, so we can go over the manuscript, make some
adjustments and begin pitching it to publishers.

There were be
a host of publishers at this intimate and exclusive retreat, and I feel it’s
the perfect opportunity to share your writing with some big players in the
publishing game. It’s also a wonderful opportunity for us to further develop
our partnership!

The details
for the retreat location, dates, and costs are all included at the end of this
email. Please let me know at once if you can be there. I know it’s last-minute,
but careers like John Steinbeck’s have an expiration date. The sooner we move
forward the better!

Warmly,
Kaley

Daniel could
hardly believe his eyes. Maui? Kaley Hamilton? Publishers? A career like
Steinbeck’s? It was as if the Universe was delivering to him exactly what he
had always wanted, but in a way he had never imagined.

He shook his
head and read it again.

No, as it turns
out, he wasn’t dreaming. The costs were steep, but Daniel still had some money
tucked away with over $10,000 that he could use to fund the trip. It was the
opportunity of a lifetime and he could not turn it down.

# # #

“So, does your
food cart adhere to the state health code for restaurants?” Shelby asked the
owner of Sweet Thai, yet another Thai food cart located in Portland’s downtown.
She was working on a piece about the food cart phenomenon for
Hello Portland
and couldn’t help but focus in on the health concerns. Not all of the carts
seemed that up to code.

As she was
listening to the man, her digi-recorder held up to capture his response, something
out of the corner of her eye caught her attention. She could have sworn it was
Daniel. He was practically speed walking into the Portland Luggage store,
although she wasn’t 100 percent sure it was him.

“Okay, yes, that’s
great, thanks so much. I just remembered that I have to go to the Portland
Luggage store. Right now. Thanks for your time,” Shelby interrupted the food
cart owner (who in hindsight she felt badly for, with her rushing off the way
she did), quickly making her way over to where she had seen Daniel. There were
about 50 Thai food carts in Portland, she could find another cart owner to
interview at a time when Daniel wasn’t in the area—she was sure of it.

It had been two
and a half weeks and she hadn’t heard a thing from Daniel since their first,
and so far only, date. She knew giving him the message from his mother had
overwhelmed him, but she couldn’t believe he wouldn’t at least follow up with
an email or something. Their connection had been so strong that it simply
didn’t make any sense to Shelby that he would outright ignore it.

Seeing him on
the street meant something and she would be damned if she let him walk on by.
Shelby picked up the pace as she came upon the store, silently cursing the
2-inch red heels she had let Kathryn talk her into buying. Although, they were
absolutely perfect for seeing Daniel again, just not for race-walking down
sidewalks.

Shelby
stealthily slid into the Portland Luggage store, on full alert. She had no idea
what she was going to say to Daniel or how she was going to approach the fact
that he had blown her off, but she was going to do it. She didn’t have
connections like that very often with men, and she would completely regret it
if she didn’t take some type of action.

It was, however,
beyond her to know exactly what action she should take. Hiding behind a large
display of oversized suitcases, Shelby began texting Kathryn, giving her the
4-1-1 on the situation. She prayed that as a fellow writer, Kathryn would be in
her home office, in front of the computer with her cellphone nearby.
Fortunately, she was and the reply came in quickly, although it wasn’t exactly
what Shelby had hoped she would say:

Stop hiding!
Center urself in ur heart rt now, see green light all around ur heart and then
go up to him. Let ur intuition guide u. It will know what 2 say
.

Really? She
would miraculously know what to say? That honestly was not much of a plan. She
gave Kathryn the middle finger (in her mind, of course) and stepped out from
behind the suitcases. Daniel was exactly kitty-corner from her, looking at some
backpack, laptop combo bag. Shelby didn’t know what else to do, so she went
with Kathryn’s advice. She moved her focus from her mind, which was in
hyper-chatter mode, and into her heart. She visualized a green ball of light
emanating from her chest. At that exact moment, Daniel spun around as though a
laser beam had hit him from behind.

His mouth
dropped open.

Shelby smiled.
Kathryn had known what she was talking about after all.

# # #

It took Daniel a
few moments to collect himself. He had been so deep in thought about what bag
would give him the most room and would be the easiest to trek to Maui with,
that he was completely startled when he felt a rush of heat and energy surround
him from behind and move into his heart. He spun around, unsure of what he
might see, and even more stunned to see Shelby standing there smiling back at
him.

Was the heat and
rush of energy from her? He felt a bit dizzy. He began to remember that she had
this effect on him. As all of this was running through his now frazzled mind,
she walked over to him. He couldn’t help but reflect on how unbelievably
beautiful she was. Her blonde hair was piled on top of her head in a messy yet
perfectly styled manner, her bangs dropping slightly into her gorgeous blue
eyes. She was wearing a black pencil skirt with a black top, but what really
got his attention were her bright red heels. She looked gorgeous.

He opened his
mouth to say something, but nothing came out.

“Looks as though
you’re as stunned as I am,” Shelby said, looking up at him rather coyly.

“You look
beautiful,” was all he could get out.

Her face
softened.

“Thank you, that’s
so sweet.” The line in her brow creased. “Were you beginning to forget what I
looked like?”

He could sense
her displeasure in his obvious lack of communication in the past two-and-a-half
weeks.  At the moment, he couldn’t remember why he hadn’t called her back or
what was delaying him from not spending every day with her. He shook his head.

“Shelby. I’m
sorry. It’s far more complicated than that, I—“

“Well then, tell
me about it. Disappearing on me only to have the Universe find random ways to
reconnect us might become a little exhausting over time.”

She didn’t want
to sound irritated, but she was. She wanted to scream at him!
How can you
have such a wonderful, loving connection with someone—like a once in a lifetime
connection—and not call them? Not even text them?!

Instead, she
looked up at him and sighed with disdain.

Daniel smiled
sweetly at her. She didn’t want it to work, but it did, and she softened yet
again. Somewhere she could hear Kathryn in the distance yelling at her “green
light!”

“Listen, you’re
right,” Daniel said. “Avoiding each other only means the Universe has to work
harder. I totally agree. I’m surprised, but I agree. And honestly, since we
met, so much has happened, I really want to tell you all about it.”

“And I would
love to hear it. But first, why are you surprised?”

“Well, uh, I’ve
never had such obvious interference by the Universe to make sure I connected
with someone. It’s a bit eerie.”

“Or awesome,”
Shelby laughed.

“Or awesome,
you’re right.”

“So, what are
you doing at the luggage store on a random Wednesday anyway?”

Daniel still had
the molten red backpack laptop, carry-all in his hand. He held it down to her
heels.

“I was trying to
find something for you that would match those killer heels.”

They both
laughed.

“I wish you
would. I literally can only wear black with them,” Shelby responded.

“In all
seriousness, I got this incredible opportunity to go to Maui and meet with this
agent. She wants to go over my manuscript and share it with some publishers
that are going to be there for this small retreat.”

“Wow!
Congratulations! That seems like a long way to go to review your manuscript,
but it’s Maui—so who cares, right?”