City girl Eve Whitting has given up on love. Years spent living the roller coaster life has left her feeling lost and fed up with men. But escaping the city for her small hometown wasn’t supposed to bring her face-to-face with sexy neighbor Joel Powell-a man quite possibly sent from the gods-or her mother wielding a book on Relationships and How to Have One. If Eve thought she had challenges before, she hasn’t seen anything yet... Charming cowboy Joel Powell has given up on peace and quiet. His life is already filled to the brim with complications from his divorce and the alluring, feisty Eve Whitting has plunked herself right in the middle of it. With one failed marriage under his belt, Joel’s warning bells are clanging, but there’s something about Eve he just can’t resist. While fighting for custody of his three-year-old son, Joel tries to temper his feelings for this woman who is fast becoming lodged in his heart. Faced with a burgeoning relationship that neither bargained for nor wanted, Eve and Joel must navigate through a minefield of broken dreams and broken hearts to find what true love-and true commitment-really mean.

Chasing Normal

A NovelBy Tara Fuselli

iUniverse, Inc.

Copyright © 2009 Tara Fuselli
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4401-7743-9

Chapter One

Eve

I will never look at the color yellow with the same eyes. I think it was the taffeta bridesmaid dress part of it that changed me and unfortunately for Yellow, my mind is predisposed hereafter to want to scream at the sight of it.

My mother picked out the dress which explains a lot-it's neither my color nor style. Honestly, who can make an enormous bell-shaped gown look flattering aside from Scarlet O'Hara?

I wonder, too, if the dressmaker plays practical jokes in her spare time, adding bits of straw to the hem of her dresses; it's been itching my thighs all afternoon. Though I am mere steps away from parading down the aisle in front of the congregation and risk someone seeing my underpants, I can't resist the urge to lift the layers of frills and scratch.

Things could be worse, couldn't they? I mean, it could be polka dots. No, on second thought, I think taffeta truly is the worst of the worst and considering recent events in my life, yellow taffeta is just the icing on the enormous cake of my existence. Minus the plastic groom on top.

I eye the aisle from around the corner. The pews of the small church are filled with townspeople, watching from either side as the organist begins the music.

My cue.

My sister, Maggie, nudges me to step forward. I groan again at the taffeta and take a step, nearly tripping over the fringed hem.

Yep. I am, once again, not the bride but the bridesmaid at someone else's wedding. This time it's my sister's day of wedded bliss. I can see my mother watching me with an eye roll that says, "Get that unmarried behind of yours moving, Eve. You're holding up the ceremony."

Let the music begin ...

Okay. So I've fallen in love more times than I'd like to count-with a playboy, a gay guy and a juvenile man attached to a beer keg. At least life can be adventurous that way. My name is Eve Whitting. Yes, like of the Adam and Eve, and yes, my mother tells me that I live up to the name quite well, though I'm never quite sure how to take that. I know it has something to do with the sinning part. And probably the temptation.

While my mother's ideals differ from mine at the best of times, my family has never hesitated sharing their opinions. Whether a help or hindrance, they make it their life's work to meddle and fix and advise-experts that they are.

... "Do you take this woman to be your lawfully wedded wife?"

Maggie smiles wide and Brock answers, a tear clinging to his eye as he swallows it back with an, "I do."

The guests in the audience let out a collective, "Awe."

I just groan and return to my inner dialogue ...

From my perspective, my life has been more or less simple of late. It's had its ups and downs and roller coaster turns, I'll admit; even this recent plunge into monotony is like one of those long, deep falls before the next rise. But I've found myself at a crossroad. Stuck. In need of something or someone to say, Wake up, Eve! This is where you belong! before the next turn of adventure hits.

... "I now pronounce you, husband and wife. Brock, you may kiss your bride."

More collective noises of applause, sighs and blowing into tissues.

I'm sweating and wonder to myself, how noticeable are sweat stains on yellow taffeta? ...

I am feeling stuck and I don't want to be forever staring at a NEXT STOP: MONOTONY! road sign with my flashers on, but it seems that temporarily trading in my roller coaster life in the city for my average and normal hometown is the best option just now. Just for a pause. The funny thing is I've spent years running from Normal. And where did that get me? A long stint on those hectic fairgrounds for one.

I recently returned to this land of Normal; a town where young girls marry their high school sweethearts and families still gather for annual pig roasts. Where women flock to weekly gossip groups, the men to trade secrets about ranching and farming and everything agriculture.

I returned and now stand in the churchyard. The ceremony was long, the church was hot and I've scratched a raw patch on my thigh. If not for my sister's wedding, I wouldn't have come back to this old town. I took Maggie's hand in mine with a squeeze, our last few moments alone before the guests descend on the new bride.

"So. Jackson didn't come with you to my wedding," she said. The simple statement came with a deep prodding yet subliminal question of "what's really going on here, Eve?"

"No. He didn't come to the wedding."

Maggie linked her arm through mine and we walked, her wedding dress swaying at her feet, swishing around my ankles. In the moment, this seemed the closest I would ever get to marriage so I enjoyed the swishing like a little girl watching her first bride walk down the aisle, her impish face full of awe and jealousy and utter happiness all rolled into one. Even for a tomboy like me.

"I ended things with Jackson," I finally said. "Two months ago."

"You broke up with Jackson and never told me?"

"You were planning your wedding. Of course I didn't tell you."

"What happened?" she asked, in that careful, concerned tone.

I kept our slow pace, arm in arm, down the long, gravel driveway and shrugged. "My heart didn't exactly skip a beat around Jackson anymore. I didn't lay awake thinking about him every minute of every day. I liked him. He made me smile. But honestly, Maggie, we didn't love each other. I think we did at first. But while you are here doing it for real, I only played house with Jackson, pretending we were happy."

"So what next?"

I shrugged my shoulders. "I thought I'd just live your life for a while in the Land of Normal." I sighed with the thought. I would be moving into Maggie's house for four months and while it might be the answer to finding my place in life, it also meant moving back home, a place I ran from the first chance I had out of high school.

Her eyes glimmered for a moment.

"You are my sister, Mags, and my best friend. I love you to death. But before you get any ideas, remember you don't get the privilege of picking apart my love life."

"You're right. The picking apart is Mom's job." She had to bite her lip to avoid any "advice" flowing out of it.

"Speaking of Mom, you didn't tell her I was staying at your place, did you?"

"It might have slipped out in conversation." She winced an apology.

"Ugh."

"She also might be coming by with a green bean casserole Tuesday evening around four thirty."

Huge sigh.

"I've gotta run," she said and knocked her forehead on mine. "Brock is waiting for his bride. Are you sure you don't mind staying this long to watch my place? It might be the whole four months, you know."

"Which should have been no problem except now Mom knows where to find me."

"She'd have found you sooner or later. And don't be so hard on yourself. Mom'll be there soon enough to do that for you."

"You are a joy, Maggie, you really are. Have a great trip." I squeezed her tightly in my arms, the vulnerable part of me still wanting to cry on her shoulder over Jackson, and watched her glide toward the vintage Chevy.

I watched the wedding car pull away from the church. The strident sound of the tin cans clanging against the dirt road made me certain I wasn't ready for marriage just yet. The same went for the confetti littering the lawn at my feet and sticking to the hairspray in my fancy up-do, which I never do on a regular day. In a sudden urge to grasp at my youth, I threw an outstretched arm into the air and waved at the car, jumping up and down like we used to do when we were kids. Maggie blew a kiss back with a dazzling laugh through the window.

This would be the last of those sister-to-sister moments and I suppose I resented Brock just a little for taking Maggie away. Only because my own love life hovered in the midst of a landslide and no one stood next to me just now to drag me up off the dirt. Even in that moment, I recognized this as self-pity, but other people's weddings sort of did that to a girl. One of those always a bridesmaid things.

So there I stood, alone in the churchyard. And though Mrs. Pollard's angelic wedding march still droned from the organ inside and the reverend shook hands with guests, his black robe kicking up dirt at his feet, the light breeze carrying whisperings of a lovely day for a wedding, I didn't feel the serenity, didn't breathe the hallowed air around me with pious glee.

I simply felt numb.

I lingered alongside the wedding guests, people from my distant past, fake-smiling the best I could until we finally left for the farmhouse. The moment I stepped down from Dad's old pickup truck onto home ground for the reception, I sighed. A bittersweet sight lay before me. The yellow house had a fresh coat of paint, the white detail of trim and trellises shone bright and every windowpane glimmered with the rays of welcoming sunshine. Trailing vines clung to the porch posts at even intervals, rosebushes flanking the stairs in a haven of scent and color, bright crimson a contrast to the yellow walls as its backdrop, blue sky its canvass. In the distance stood tall silos of grain, a small matching yellow barn and the far off call of the Holsteins, the lulling baa of a herd of sheep. This canvass of beauty and the symphony of sound that was the farm were sweet.

The surrounding and still arriving clusters of people sent the bitterness up my throat. And my mother. Who, I reminded myself again, did love me in her own way. With that thought, I let out an audible groan.

"Eve," called my mother. "You've lost your smile again."

I put on an over exaggerated one.

She shuffled next to me in her floral print dress and wide-brimmed hat. Both fluttered in the breeze, her hand moving quickly to the top of her head to keep the hat from flying away, the flowers that crowned it now squished and wilting.

"Eve, put on a happy face for your sister for Pete's sake." She tugged at the puffed sleeve of my yellow taffeta dress and ran her thumb over my bottom lip to dull the bright lipstick I'd added for color. For bold, yet natural color as opposed to the bright blue eye shadow and clumping mascara applied to my face by Miss Brooks in the local salon that morning.

I eyed the poor disheveled excuse for my mother's hat then focused back on the slowly crowding yard. "I'm trying to smile. But come on, Mom. Even you have to admit it's been a long day. Flower arranging and rearranging, primping over these dresses that, really, what are the chances they're going to improve? Maggie sucked back antacids, you, your "nervous pills" and Dad's still waiting for the moment everyone will leave his house so he can put his feet up in the old recliner."

"On my way there already," said Dad as if on cue, darting toward the house in what looked like a blur from the corner of my eye. Thinking on that heavenly recliner was like building castles in the air, this being only the first few minutes of a long evening reception that lay between my dad's ass and that comfortable chair.

There was room for another sigh, but I held it back for the sake of my mother.

"Oh no. You're not going anywhere Mr. Whitting," she said, following Dad into the house.

Saved by my father and his aging Lazy Boy.

The primping and preparing for the ceremony-not to mention my mother's worldly advice-had come to an end, but the crowd was sprouting roots around where I stood. Not all was lost, I thought, eyeing the perimeter of the Whitting land. There were many secluded places on the farm, little cubbies in the trees, small crevasses and coves along the fence line where the neighbor's farm and ours met, a cluster of birches weaving it one side to the other.

I found one of those sacred spots in the birches, hiked my dress to my knees and swung a leg over the waist-high wooden fence. I propped myself on the rail, feet dangling and kicking in the cool, shaded air, my high heels kicked off and hidden somewhere below in the tall grass. Memories of a small pond hinted from the recesses of my mind, somewhere not far from where I sat. I could hear it croaking with frogs, just out of sight. Here, listening to the quail skitter near the water, the sparrows in the tall treetops, trilling their song, I found my peace and solitude of home. But it wouldn't last long before I had to reappear for dinner, smile for Maggie and pretend to heed my mother's advice.

By the time I wandered slowly back through the yard, the reception was well on its way inside the house. I breathed deep, took in the scents of home. Some of them had me yearning for a comfort that remained stranded somewhere in my youth: the earthy soil, fresh, clean air, even the manure toiled into nearby wheat fields and the smoky oil from the tractors that toiled it. But the sounds of the people, the echoes of the local Ladies Social knee deep in gossip, had my stomach churning. And I just didn't feel I'd ever fit in here again.

I lasted three hours. Aside from the giant buffet style home cooked meal-everything from pot roast, ham and rosemary grilled chicken to vegetables, casseroles, salads and cakes-I managed to avoid mingling more than necessary and nod my way through one-sided conversations, slowly slipping unnoticed to the next. Eventually, I inched my way to the front drive and ducked out before the first few guests made their departure, sometime around eight thirty in the evening. The sound of my Jeep engine turning over was a welcome one.

It was less than an hour drive south into town from the farm. Hopefully the sun drummed a warmer beat there. Drops of rain hit the windshield in heavy plunks and being early spring, the warm days became fast chilled as night fell. I cranked the heater to high and blasted the music on the radio.

I felt a twinge of guilt at having left the reception early. But only a twinge. Nothing brought out the high spirits of the town and most of its folks that still lived there like a blissful country wedding. The perfect time to leave. Besides, if my mother really did plan on visiting this Tuesday, I would have all the time I needed to fill up on advice about relationships.

As I glanced around town now, the dim streetlights pulling me toward my destination, the crackle of gravel on the quiet roads lulling my tired eyes closed, I thought about home. This really would be my home, though a temporary one.

Despite the changes that had occurred, time appeared to have stood still in Tayton. My first impression, as I finally pulled down Vine Street, swarmed over like a cool breeze; the sky looked clear, stars shone through the blackness and it felt peaceful. Second, it had been a draining day and I felt as tired as a workhorse. Instead of unloading my crap from the car, I threw an overnight bag over my shoulder and trudged up the dark, lonely walk to the house. The house looked peaceful tonight, too, as it usually did. A quiet neighborhood in the suburbs of town.

I had to laugh at Tayton's "suburbs" after living ten years in the city. Here, birds chirped in the day, crickets hummed at night, stars shone brightly, not dimmed by city lights like the ones I had grown so used to. The smell of flowers from newly planted and sprouting gardens hung in the air. Suddenly, the clanging neighbors, barking dogs and honking horns of the big city reminded me of my many bad decisions. This would be nice. Four months of peace and quiet. Four months to shut out the mistakes.

It didn't feel so bad to be back.

I slammed the door behind me, kicked my shoes into a corner, peeled out of the country-frilled bridesmaid dress and hit the pillow.

Joel

I dragged myself out of bed early, only because some idiot slammed a fist on my front door at what felt like three in the morning. The clamor of voices outside and the heavy footsteps on the front porch confirmed my suspicions. It was an idiot. More than one idiot. And I felt like shit.

My name is Joel Powell. I work as a heavy-duty mechanic, fixing equipment around town and the surrounding area. When someone needs it fixed, I'm the guy to do it. Growing up, I tinkered with everything and I guess I never tired of moving parts, metal on metal-the sound of my first rebuilt engine turning over for the first time was like an orgasm. More so in recent years since my time to spend with women in that department had shriveled to a stand still. How sad was that? Welcome to the life of Joel Powell. At least I wasn't sucking dirt in the family plot.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Chasing Normalby Tara Fuselli Copyright © 2009 by Tara Fuselli. Excerpted by permission.
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