Junk Miles:
A Brenna Blixen Novel
Book 2
by
Liz Reinhardt
Junk Miles: many miles run at a slow pace, attributed to a training strategy by runners who confuse high mileage counts with improvement
Kissing someone other than your boyfriend is cheating.
But what about thinking about kissing someone other than your boyfriend?
What about thinking about it a lot?
Brenna Blixen has the perfect boyfriend. He's sweet, sexy, loyal, and sure that Brenna is the best thing that's ever happened to him. But being the perfect girlfriend isn't as easy as Brenna thought it would be, and the pressure that comes with trying to be Jake's everything is beginning to weigh on her. When her mother surprises her with a trip to Paris over winter break, she's torn. She anticipated spending her vacation snuggling with Jake Kelly, ice-skating, drinking cocoa, and relaxing...but what girl in her right mind would turn down a trip to Paris?
Things only get more confusing when she winds up unexpectedly and unavoidably thrown into Saxon Maclean's arms in the City of Lights. Far away from the comfort and stability she finds at Jake's side, Brenna faces down the feelings that have been swirling through her since the day she laid eyes on Saxon. Is it fair for her to call herself Jake's girlfriend when she has so many unresolved feelings about someone else?
Brenna is determined to figure it all out, even if it means making some of the hardest decisions of her entire life. She also learns that every single thing she does has rippling repercussions, some that fill her with total regret. By the time she figures out what her heart truly wants, she realizes that she may not be able to have it after all.
Chapter One
My mother is one of the most thoughtful, loving, caring women in the world. That doesn’t mean that she’s dumb, and it doesn’t mean that she’s nice.
I should add that I have no respect for nice mothers, at least not if you use the common teenage definition of “nice.” My mom doesn’t look the other way when I do something she doesn’t like. She doesn’t try to fit in with friends she doesn’t approve of, or with any of my friends at all, for that matter. My mom has high expectations for me, and she drives 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 on 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 cunning.
I hope I can one day be that good.
I made my eyes wide, opened my mouth, and shook my head. “Paris? Paris!” I grasped 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 had plotted this out with all 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 him 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, sweetie, 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 often was around her. “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.”