listened then.” She sighed. “I haven’t been taking his calls, so he’s been leaving long messages with all kinds of promises.”
“What kind of promises?” Kate asked. Kristen could tell from her tone and expression that she shared their mother’s opinion of Sean.
“Nothing I haven’t heard before. The latest is that he wants to take me to Manhattan for a romantic getaway weekend so we can ‘find each other’ again.”
Abby laughed. “I’m sorry, but that is so lame. He doesn’t get it at all does he?”
Kristen nodded sadly. “No, he doesn’t. He thinks that spending money on fancy dinners and hotels will win me back. None of his messages mention a thing about moving forward with his divorce.”
“Maybe you should call him back and tell him to stop calling,” Kate suggested gently.
Kristen felt a pit in her stomach at the thought of it, but she knew her sister was right.
“I’ll do it tomorrow.”
“Have you started writing your book, Kate?” Kristen asked. She was eager to change the subject.
“Sort of. I’m working on the outline and I’m almost done with it. Philippe said he’d take a look at it for me, to make sure it looks on track before I start the actual writing. But, I’ve already written most of the first two chapters, and that helped me to figure out the feel of the story. They’ll probably change depending on his feedback.”
“That’s nice of him,” their mother said. “I was chatting with Sue today, and she mentioned something about self-publishing and that it might be a good idea for you. Have you thought about that at all?”
Kate nodded. “I have actually. The traditional publishing process takes so long, getting an agent and submitting to publishers and waiting to hear back. And then if you get accepted it’s often a year or longer before your book is out there. I thought I might publish this first one myself and see if I can build a reader base. Then maybe consider traditional publishing too, down the road.”
“How does that work? Wouldn’t you be better off with a regular publisher?” Kristen asked.
“Maybe. It’s hard to say. I’m hearing from other writer friends that publisher advances are smaller than they’ve ever been before. And that you can earn more money, sometimes a lot more money by doing it yourself.”
“But you’d have to do everything, get it edited, have a cover made, market it.” It sounded horrible to Kristen. She hated the business side of making art.
But Kate laughed. “I actually like a lot of that stuff, and I’ve learned about Facebook ads a bit at the magazine. Plus, I know a talented artist…maybe she could help me make a memorable cover?”
“Oh! That could actually be really cool.” Kristen’s mind immediately began to whirl as she pictured various images she could create.
“I haven’t decided on anything for sure though. I still need to finish the book, make sure it works and see what Philippe says. I trust his judgment and am grateful he offered to help.”
“Do you think he’ll still be willing to help if you’re not dating him?” Abby sounded cynical.
“I think he will. He seemed sincere. I really like him and I think we’ll be good friends. I kind of think of him like a wayward brother.”
“Speaking of brothers, is Chase dating anyone? He hasn’t mentioned any girls lately,” Kristen asked.
“I saw him talking to Lauren Snyder for quite a while the other night at the Chicken Box,” Abby said.
Everyone turned to look at Abby in surprise.
“What were you doing at the Chicken Box?” Kate asked. It was one of the busiest bars on the island with live music and a younger crowd.
“Emily dragged me there. She wanted to go hear the band, and she thought it would do me good to get out.” Emily was Abby’s best friend and was very much single.
“And did it? Did you have fun?” Kristen asked.
Abby smiled. “I did, actually. The band was really good, and the place wasn’t too packed like it gets in the summer. Chase sat at the bar with Lauren for a long time. They looked deep in conversation so I didn’t want to interrupt. I went to the bathroom and when I came out they were both gone, so I didn’t get a chance to talk to him.”
“Hmm, that’s interesting. He hasn’t mentioned her,” Kate said.
“Didn’t he date her a million years ago? In high school?” Kristen asked.
Abby laughed. “If you can call it that. They ‘went out’ for a week or two,