Two New Pepper Pace Books: The Throwaway Year

Several years ago, while I was transitioning from writing stories to writing good stories, I lost a nearly completed novella. You can't imagine the anguish of having your words disappear. But it wasn't just any words...it was the first time that I'd written something that I knew; absolutely believed was good.

Every word just gone in one day. I went into a horrible funk in which I stopped writing any of the ideas that flowed in and out of my head. It was two years before I began writing again; and that was after posting a story called Juicy on Literotica. 

I wanted to re-write it but it never felt like the right time to not only re-write it but to TOP the story that I'd lost. Over the years I put down the parts that I remembered, improving the story as I've grown as a writer. The Throwaway Year is different than the first version, but I no longer feel that that's a bad thing. This story excites me all over again and I'm proud to offer it as my first novella of 2013.

COMING SEPTEMBER 2013

The Throwaway Year

Hayden Michaels had given six years of her life to MyKell before he informed her that things hadn’t been right for a while. He had met someone else. And that’s when she opened her eyes and saw the mess that she was; financially, emotionally and physically. Never able to maintain the discipline to carry through with any weight loss goal, Hayden makes a bold decision. She will throwaway an entire year of her life; moving towards her goals with no thought of pleasure or pain.

As she recreates herself Hayden meets situations and people that help her to realize her worth, namely a man who has been written off by society. But the question becomes whether Hayden can accept the faults of someone else without allowing herself to go backwards? 

EXCERPT:

April 2011 

It was Sunday morning and Hayden had no desire to get up and dressed to start her day.  The TV was turned on to The Food Network and Paula Deen was cooking something deep-fried, fattening, and more than likely deadly. Her stomach grumbled--right now she would eat ten of whatever Paula Deen was cooking!

MyKell was laying quietly, eyes staring at the TV screen.  He’d been quiet all weekend.  “Hey, you want to go to The Cracker Barrel for lunch?”  They had lazed through breakfast and now it was early afternoon.  MyKell’s eyes seemed to flinch.   “I’m paying.”  She interjected before he could object.  MyKell put the cheap in cheapskate.  He was 42 and had just gotten his first decent paying job since they’d been together.  All of his other jobs had been in sales where he barely raked in enough commission to cover his own personal expenses let alone enough to help her out financially.  They had been together for nearly six years and Hayden knew the routine.  If she wanted to go out to eat then it would be her treat.

MyKell turned to her slowly.  “Hade, I need to talk to you.”

Oh shit.  He’d lost another job.  The hell with this! He’d only been working at the place for six weeks-

“I met someone else.”

Hayden blinked.  “What?”  Her heart had momentarily frozen in her chest and was now fluttering rapidly against her ribcage.  MyKell pulled himself out of the bed, looking like someone had socked him in his stomach instead of the other way around…

“I’m sorry, Hade.  But things haven’t been right for a while.  I’m moving out.”  He walked to the closet while she stared after him with her mouth hanging opened…Things hadn’t been right for a while… How could he be saying this when they’d just made love last night?  She had picked him up from work Friday and for once they’d had a good evening.  He had allowed her to ramble on and on about work and her best friend Dani’s problems with her man of the hour.  He had actually listened to her intently without rolling his eyes and stating that he was tired of hearing about her whiny-ass friends.

Was that why?  Was he only being nice to her because he knew that he was going to do this?

Her breath froze in her throat as she watched him pull on a jogging suit; a 42 year old man that dressed like a 22 year old in his Sean Jean urban gear and Timberland boots.  And then like a boomerang her mind sprang back. This entire weekend had been fake, just a bone he’d thrown her to ease her pain.  She watched his back thinking; he has met someone else.  He has fallen in love with someone else.  He is not in love with me anymore…

Every new thought brought another crashing pain.  She was thirty-five and had given this man six years and now that he had finally gotten a decent job he was leaving.  It was her house that he had moved into because why should two struggling people have two households?  And it was her paycheck that had kept them fed when he quit a job because it was yet another low paying job not worth his time.  Hayden felt the tears burn the back of her eyes and she thought that she would rather die than to let him see her cry.

She already felt foolish enough.  Things hadn’t been right for a while…but she hadn’t known that.

MyKell placed a suitcase on the bed and began loading things into it.  He was talking about making arrangements to pick up the rest of his things.  She wanted to get up but she couldn’t.  Beneath the bed covers she was still naked and…well, he already had someone else.  How could she let him see her naked when he had another woman?  She quickly averted her eyes. She wouldn’t look at him because then she would see that tall caramel colored man that she remembered from six years ago; with his toned body and thick curls due to his mixed black and Hispanic heritage.

Back then she was pushing thirty and convinced that she would never find a man that would want her for more than just a booty call or a stepping stone to something better. So even though now he was a lot less muscular and a whole lot greyer, she didn’t see that because he would always be that fine man that had chosen her.

Hayden realized that the real reason she couldn’t look him in the eye was because she was afraid that she would see in them just what she really was to him; a fat, short, yellow skinned, freckled face black woman with kinked out sandy red hair.

“Hayden?”  He was talking to her.

“Just take your things now.”  Her voice was a whisper though she was trying to speak normally.  She gripped the bed covers and slid to the end of the bed while he watched her with his dark, hurt eyes.  There was a pile of clothes on the floor; hers, his.  She picked up the panties that she’d shed the night before and pulled them over her big thighs, knowing that he could see the crack of her ass when she bent over.  She quickly put on yesterdays jeans and a t-shirt, both were dirty, but it at least didn’t require her to walk across the room to the dresser for something fresh.

She dressed quickly wondering when he had met her; this other woman.  Was it someone he worked with?  Someone she knew?  She wasn’t going to watch him walk out the door because-yes he was the one leaving her, but she wouldn’t watch him do it!  The tears were running down her face suddenly, but she kept her head down so that he wouldn’t see.  She would die if he saw her crying.  He’d used her, faked it with her, but she would leave with her dignity.

“I’m going to leave.  When I come back…if you could just not be here.”  Then she hurried out of the room and down the hall as the first sob forced its way from her mouth and the hot tears blurred her vision, dripping down her face and from her chin.  She grabbed her purse and slipped on flip-flops and then she was hurrying out of the house and to her car.  MyKell didn’t have a car but…well he had someone else and SHE probably had one.  Yeah, chances are, she would have one.

She started the car and pulled out of her driveway without looking.  Thank God she lived on a residential street that saw very little traffic, or she might have been hit.  Hayden gripped the steering wheel as the tears and sobs wrecked her body.  Her chest ached when she thought about the six years and how easily he’d been able to say that he’d found someone else…after all that she had done for him…

Knowing that it wasn’t safe for her to continue driving, Hayden pulled into the nearest place where she could safely lose it. It was the parking lot of a KROGERS’ grocery store.  After she was safely stopped she stared at herself in the mirror, not recognizing the ugly woman that looked back at her.  Hatred bubbled up inside of her, but it was all directed at herself. She hated her too light skin with its freckles scattered across her nose. Redbone. High yella--but not pretty, she didn’t have the long flowing hair or the limber body that most people associated with light skinned females. When she looked at herself she simply saw an out of shape woman with a Don King mess of hair covering her head.  When she reached up to wipe her blotchy face of its tears and snot she smelled her unwashed body.  She averted her eyes in disgust. 

I hope you enjoyed this excerpt. All feedback is welcomed!