Free The Truth About Letting Go by Leigh Talbert Moore Page A

beside mine.
    “You look good.” He smiles, and I think about what Charlotte said about him being brave. I think about his quirky confidence and the glasses still trapped in my locker. That’s when I get it. He really doesn’t care what anyone thinks. He’s just doing his thing, following his heart.
    “Thanks,” I say, looking back at my locker and wondering if it’s my heart I’m following. That’s certainly where my ripped-up emotions are trapped, and they seem to be calling the shots these days.
    “And, I mean, thanks for going with me still,” he says, looking down at his books. “I know things got weird, but maybe if we spend some time together—”
    “I won’t come around, if that’s what you’re about to say.”
    “I was going to say you might understand better.” He picks at the metal spiral on his notebook. “I know what I told you is sort of…”
    “Ridiculous?”
    His eyes flicker to mine, and I know he’s being sincere. Again I want to touch him, but I don’t.
    “I was going to say unexpected ,” he says. “I don’t really understand it myself. That’s why I’m doing the thing this summer.”
    “Becoming a missionary?”
    “It’s more working with a group of missionaries, seeing what they’re doing, and being their helper. Seeing if I connect. If I’ve got what it takes.” He turns his back to the lockers and looks down. “Committing to a lifetime of service is a pretty big decision.”
    “Which you’re too young to make. Nothing’s happened to you yet.”
    He nods. “I know. And that’s why you’re one of the only people who knows about it. That I’m seriously considering this. But it’s something… I’ve got to try.”
    Our eyes meet again, and his are so earnest. My thumb touches the silver ring on my middle finger, and my memory flashes back to me sitting at the bar in my kitchen with Dad. The way he’d look those days he’d talk to me about his work.
    “Sometimes when Dad would finish an article, he’d say he felt it.”
    Jordan’s brow creases, and I’ve got his full attention. “What do you mean?”
    “I don’t know exactly. I mean, I kind of did.” My whole body is shaky and afraid. Going down this road, back to those days with Dad, even carefully, has the potential to bring it all crashing in on my head. But I know I’m safe with Jordan.
    “It was like he felt like his job was to encourage people to get healthy or something,” I say. “To find the key, whatever it took, to inspire them to make a change. He said that was one of the hardest things in the world. But sometimes, he’d write something he felt got close.”
    “It was his calling.”
    All of my books are in my hands, and my eyes are too damp. “Whatever. I gotta go.”
    I take off without looking back. I don’t want to talk about these things with him. I don’t want him trying to lure me back to some phony way of life that’s all a lie. I did what was expected for years, and all it got me was to this place of pain and loneliness and anger. I want to lose these bad feelings and find that other one, that good one I felt in his bedroom.
    And it didn’t have anything to do with Jordan. It was all just chemicals and hormones. If I’ve learned anything in the last six months, it’s that our bodies do what they want. We can’t control them or how they react. Being healthy, making the right decisions, it’s all a lie. Life is simply random.
    I’ve managed to argue myself off the emotional cliff when I round the corner and spot Colt leaning against the lockers. My heart jumps. Mandy’s pressing into his chest, and he’s listening to her with a bemused expression on his face. She’s on maximum-flirt-overdrive, and I slow my pace to get my breathing back under control. I try to focus on Mandy’s rapid blinking and not my skittering pulse.
    Random. No explanations. I get closer, and he looks straight at me. He straightens and moves away from her that grin back on his face.
    “Hot