Love By The Breather: Short Romantic Reads by Nadine C. Keels - Perfect for a Relaxing Hour or Two...

 

Inhaling Hope

You’re special. That’s all her first note from him had said. She’d found it taped to the knob of her apartment’s front door after she arrived back from her jog one morning. Given the difference in their schedules, he’d have time to leave the note and be gone for work before she’d be back from her pre-work cardio jaunt around the community, and he’d known it. She hadn’t recognized the handwriting, and no wonder. Who wrote anything down so much anymore in this increasingly paperless world? A note from an apartment-complex neighbor, jotted inside of a folded little sheet of repurposed tree and stuck to a doorknob, was a definite twenty-first-century anomaly. He hadn’t signed it, but she loved that. Not because he’d never been too wild about his name (he said the sound of it always made him feel like he ought to be tap dancing somewhere in a tux with tails, and he’d never tapped in his life) but because his leaving the unexpected, two-word message unsigned made it more intimate. Unrecognizable handwriting and absence of a signature aside, she knew right away that the note was from him. And he knew she’d know it. “Ah, Tracey,” she’d murmured over the paper as she delayed refolding it, the essence of a smile drifting over her lips. Her eyes embraced the message, or rather surrendered to the message’s embrace, as two of her fingers fiddled with the string from the hood of her hoodie, a garment often tasked with shielding her head from the early mist of the outdoors. The mist, among other things her various workout shields shielded her from. She didn’t usually address her favorite neighbor by the full first name with which he’d only come to resigned terms in adulthood...

I don't know about you, but I enjoy a little mystery with romance... And Nadine Keels who has become a friend plus a favorite author begins her lovely set of short stories with one that is intriguing... It starts with a short unsigned note left on the main character's door--two or three words just to let her know that somebody is thinking about her! Cool, right! As the story goes on, Clarion meets and begins talking to her new admirer, at least until she brings up a question she'd been wondering about: “Tray? Do you ever think you and I must look mismatched?” she’d come out and asked him one weekend afternoon... 

At this time when some are trying to divide America racially, I loved Nadine's approach to this sad issue being "used" in today's politics by one party... Young people don't have those biases unless they are taught by their parents or other influential people in their lives. It certainly does not come from the church as Jesus Christ proclaims that we must love our neighbor--all our neighbors... So,

As two people who were not really acquainted began to send messages to each other, they learn more and more about the other and learning to be friends. That is, until tragedy strikes the life of Clarion and she is lost to a world where she must begin to find her own way. Can her new friend help?

Show Me Silver

It was more than a dance. First of all, she wasn’t the kind of woman for just anybody to take dancing just anywhere. Yvonne’s very essence spoke of high class, and that was more than all right. Sterling wasn’t the kind of man to take just any woman out anyway, and classy entertainment was his dating specialty. Fine dining. Theater. Book readings. Art and history exhibits. Orchestral ensembles and symphonies. Ballroom dancing. Tonight, the music was live jazz, from an excellent band that knew how to create and work an atmosphere.

There wasn’t only one couple out on the dance floor. But as far as Sterling’s consciousness was concerned for this space in time, he and Yvonne could have been the only two people on the floor at this dinner concert. It wasn’t because the band’s number at the moment was a slow one with rich tones. It wasn’t because the refined yet alluring fragrance floating from Yvonne’s skin was such a complement to Sterling’s aromatic cologne. It wasn’t even because on what was now their fifth date, this was the longest the two of them had ever held each other. No, no. The other people around faded away and the dance became more than a dance once Sterling began to realize he hadn’t stopped…looking at Yvonne. Meeting her open stare, and saying nothing. By this point in his life, slow-dancing with a woman wasn’t anything new to him. Oftentimes, maintaining a stream of light banter with a dance partner could keep prolonged staring from becoming uncomfortable. Or if Sterling had sensed any possibility that this close and quiet interlude might become at all awkward, this would be the time when he’d lean in to rest his russet brown cheek against Yvonne’s darker, rounder one. Of course, in favorable scenarios, it’d be romantic of Sterling to make such a move. Conversely, it could serve as a convenient next step for a slow dance that would stagnate or become uneasy if the banter ran out, leaving him and his partner with nothing but music and eye contact. But tonight, two or three songs ago, Sterling had lost any sense of time. Neither he nor Yvonne had spoken a word for however long on this dance floor. Neither pair of their brown eyes, his behind wire-framed glasses, had strayed long or far from the other. And Yvonne’s gaze—as soft as her full, feminine form, gently swaying in Sterling’s arms to velvety jazz—had yet to make him feel in any way that it would be best for him to look elsewhere. This was different. A different level of seeing and being seen. He should’ve known. Should’ve known that dancing with Yvonne wouldn’t be only that. He should’ve known because not one thing between him and Yvonne, from the first day to now, had been “only” anything. Every exchange on the phone and in person, every outing with her had left him sated with light, pleasure, and verve. He should’ve been prepared. Yet, how did one prepare for this? For this level of seeing. Seeing that accordingly called for knowing. Not merely the kind of knowing that Sterling could boast about if he wanted. Here while he was amazingly lost but right at home in Yvonne’s gaze, any manner of boasting couldn’t be further from his mind. He wasn’t imagining himself turning back to face all the eyes that had overlooked or looked down on him in past years. He hadn’t a notion of announcing to all the owners of those eyes, as though it would prove anything, “I know Yvonne Royale now. The Yvonne Royale.” No. That wasn’t the nature of potential knowing, here. Besides, it had never been Sterling’s style to boast about anything that daunted him. The sigh he gave then wasn’t outward but inward. And bewildered. Was it strange that, in an atmosphere saturated with music so marvelous, with a woman whose presence he found both invigorating and soothing, and with her honest gaze for him to get so lost in and to feel he’d been found there, all at once—might it be strange that some part of Sterling’s psyche could even consider something about this experience…to be daunting? 

Moving Points of View between the two who are looking for love, makes this even more interesting because, at first, each would have their own opinions and background which are important to them, while at the same time, not knowing how the other might react! 

Sterling was a man who spent time and money to ensure that his dates were impressed by his interest in the arts of all kinds, choosing jazz for an evening meal or a book reading--anything that would allow him to carry on a conversation to keep his date interested in him... His early life had been unhappy, never being able to satisfy, or even know, what his father expected of him. Now he carried the words he'd said each night as he went to bed: "I'll Show Them!" And even though he was now successful and met many interesting women, he was never quite sure how to ensure a longer relationship--one that would lead to their being interest enough to go on to a deeper level of the relationship.

That is, until he met Yvonne... By the fifth date, he found that they had spent time dancing, dancing, without no concern whether they were talking about this or that. It was enough just to be in each other's arms, gazing at each other... There was talk on earlier dates, about books or music, but when Yvonne would ask personal questions about his family, he tended to evade the question by moving on to another topic quickly. And then, one evening he had brought a folder, containing part of a novel he was writing and presented it to her. But her response was not what he had expected. She thought he had wined and dined her, hoping to have her review his book and help to get it published. He stumbled into an apology that it was in response to her always asking about his personal plans and that it was his way of sharing something important to him with her...

So she did read it and talked to him via video to give him her best feedback... She had to be truthful, yet helpful, complimentary yet point out problems she saw... But, in Sterling's mind, he was already whispering, "I'll Show Her..." 

I'm sure every writer will totally get involved in this short story that goes to the heart of every writer's wishes for their future... For me? It was whether or not Sterling's writing was to be an obstacle for their own relationship... Can a newly developing relationship be destroyed by one misstep by one or the other?

Debbie Duo

Dream Debbie

It’s a bird! A majestic eagle, soaring high and gracefully through the skies. It’s a plane! A jet aircraft, piercing through the clouds so swiftly that not even sound can keep up with it as its onlookers from the earth below hold fast to their hats and scarves, standing in an afterglow of awe. No! It’s Dream Woman! Taking flight through the stratosphere yet again, undoubtedly on another momentous, noble mission that only she can achieve—since she, quite frankly, is the only one perfect enough to do that sort of thing. A stellar career woman, a domestic genius, a renowned icon with the striking form of a goddess beneath her magnificent cape… Groan. “Delete.” Debbie hits the backspace key to eliminate her unrelated ramblings of the past few minutes from her computer screen, and she frowns at the aging remnants of her lunch on the desk, a pasta recipe that needs an upgrade. Having told her editor that she would have her story to him a week ago, she knows that the book’s illustrator cannot resume his work on the project during such a standstill. But here Debbie sits, wasting time with word-doodles that don’t have anything to do with anything. Her tale about a bunch of neighborhood pals on summer vacation has the possibility of becoming Debbie’s best children’s tale yet. She’d seen it so clearly the month before, as the proverbial bulb had burst into light over her head one morning, yanking her out of sleep with its promising incandescence. She’d floated through the next few days, refining her new characters in her head, piecing together a lively plot that would teach developing minds an important lesson on friendship while simultaneously entertaining their young, eager imaginations. Debbie isn’t sure what became of that bulb, but currently, she can’t seem to get the end of the story to pan out in a choice amount of words. She’s been mulling over this issue for days, reworking the plot, and now (taking a look at her cell phone) she hasn’t left herself sufficient time to close up shop, so to speak, and to get ready for her date with Stuart. “Enough. I quit.” In exasperation, Debbie puts her computer down for a nap and shoots up from her desk, but she pauses to tell her unfinished story, in case it happens to be listening, “I mean, until tomorrow.” Once again, Saturday won’t be a day off. An involuntary smile of apology flashes toward her computer before Debbie rushes out of her home office, taking the scraps of her lunch along for disposal. Stuart will be on his way to pick her up soon, and she absolutely must be ready on time. Ahh. Stuart. The brilliant magazine columnist Debbie met some weeks ago in the coffee shop she frequents early on weekday mornings, sometimes just to get out of the house. She hadn’t known at first that Stuart is at the shop almost as much as she is. She’d failed to truly notice him until he’d approached her table by the windows one day, saying, “Pardon me, but I’ve been observing for some time that you never order coffee here.” Debbie had peeked up from her newspaper to see the tall stranger there. He probably wasn’t the handsomest man on the planet, but he did have a pair of kind, soothing eyes. Debbie’s friends might’ve judged that Stuart had natural “bedroom eyes,” but Debbie had immediately informed herself that she had no business thinking of bedrooms. She’d jumped into her favorite old pair of unsexy flannel pajamas that night to remind herself of the fact. Debbie had briefly glanced away from the stranger, down to her apple, bagel, and orange juice breakfast. She’d smiled, somewhat embarrassed. “I don’t drink coffee. But I’ve always revered the aroma of it.” The stranger had laughed. On the mornings since then, he’d been making regular visits to Debbie’s table to chat with her, even sitting down for breakfast with her on occasion, until he’d declared earlier this week, “To be honest, Debbie, I’d really like to see you outside of this shop. I’ve got tickets for a play downtown, this Friday night…” Debbie had nearly choked on her blueberry muffin. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been asked on a date by somebody she actually liked. “And I don’t want him to regret having asked me,” Debbie now says as she rifles through her closet, looking for her knee-length, emerald green dress. She takes the dress out and goes to stand before her long mirror, holding the garment against her delicate frame, knowing that she wants to look as nice as possible. Even as alluring as possible—without looking, well, as alluring as she possibly could. “If that makes sense.” Time is of the essence, but Debbie can’t resist sacrificing a moment for a jubilant, girlish spin in front of the mirror. She remembers the first time she’d ever consciously done that, when her mother had brought home a new, flouncy dress for her to wear to her fifth birthday party. Yes, even now she can see that imaginative little girl who’d wanted her parents to get her a space helmet when she turned five, since she was going to be an astronaut when she grew up. How she was going to fit that in with being a dentist, a Hollywood actress, and the Queen of America, she hadn’t known at the time, but that didn’t matter. Her becoming Dream Woman one day would take care of it, and she’d fit everything in seamlessly as the ultimate life planner. And Dream Woman could fly like a jet, of course, so soaring from one task to another in a timely fashion, or even swooping from one career to another if necessary, wouldn’t be a problem for her. Debbie slips into her green dress after a quick shower, a dashing of makeup, and a whirl with a curling iron through her dark hair. She looks herself over front and back, not without a tiny sigh. This isn’t quite the curvaceous figure she’d once been sure she had a chance of developing, but she’ll strut what she has to work with. She releases a chortle, recalling the first time she’d ever scrutinized herself so closely, having donned an outfit for a high school dance. She’d initially hoped that it would be her first date, but no guy had asked her to go. In the end, it hadn’t made too great a difference because she went with two of her closest friends, people who consistently stuck by her, much like her family; friends she is fortunate enough to still have. They were all there for her while, perhaps prematurely, Debbie’s vast and glittery ideas of the future began to settle around her like fairy dust, leaving her standing there, not on top of the world but atop a living pile of hardbacks, paperbacks, and notebooks. Thoughts about dentistry and Hollywood faded. Writing was what this bibliophile had grown to love, and she couldn’t help being good at it. As a teenager, Debbie started making crude little picture books for the neighbors’ kids next door. Her pictures were horrid, but the stories were delicious, and Debbie’s soul would lift in response to the light in the children’s faces as she read to them aloud. Memories of those faces carried her through college, and she gets that same feeling to this day, when she reads her books to her engrossed listeners during story hours at local libraries. Never an astronaut. Never the queen of her country. Dream Woman yet soars, nonetheless, disappearing far off into the horizon. She must still be out there, somewhere… “Hello. You look lovely,” Stuart says when Debbie opens her front door to greet him at the appointed time. She lets out a relieved breath and warms at the sight of her date standing there in a dark blue overcoat, handing her a bouquet of blossoms that could have been made of silk. Debbie thoroughly enjoys her evening out. Conversation over dinner is great, as is the play downtown. However, while their outing draws toward a close, Stuart appears to have a question in his kind eyes as he walks Debbie back to her front door. “Is there something you’re waiting to say to me?” Debbie ventures to ask Stuart. His eyebrows go up. “On the contrary. I could be wrong, but it’s seemed all evening that there might be something you’re waiting to say to me.” Debbie doesn’t bother to ask him how he knows it. It’s one of the things she likes so much about him. She shakes her head. “I’m rather out of practice with all this. I don’t want you to regret having asked me out.” “Regret asking you?” Stuart’s forehead wrinkles. “Why would I—?” “I’m just me, you know.” Debbie gives a slight shrug. “I’m not exactly what I dreamed I would be. And I haven’t won a medal in literature to make up for it. I think I burn my cuisine a bit more often than a grown woman should, and sometimes I’ll lose a battle with a stubborn stain in my laundry. But, despite all of it, when the dust settles, I’ve got my family, and my friends are still here. I am what I am, I do what I love, and my love helps people, especially little ones.” Is it silly that Debbie’s eyes are growing damp? She blinks, smiling. “I can’t fly, Stuart. But I’m happy. I’m happy, and I’m grateful to be one in probably too small a number of people who can genuinely say that.” Stuart hesitates, his look both warm and quizzical. “You are the woman I met in a coffee shop who doesn’t drink coffee, aren’t you?” Debbie wonders at his question, but before she can answer, Stuart leans in to brush a soft kiss over her lips. He lingers close for a moment, murmuring, “You’re amazing, Deborah.” Debbie blinks a few more times, her eyes now wide. She’s at a loss for any more words.

What draws another person to start paying attention to another? Is it looks, body type--are they taller than you or shorter, are they the right race or religion (if you meet them in church)... Or is it, that the other individual started to pay attention to you first?!? That's what happened to Deborah when Stuart approached her while they were both in a coffee shop... She realized that Stuart seemed to want to get to know her better, but when that happened, she worried whether or not she could manage to keep him interested... Then the question might be, will Stuart continue to be interested after knowing each other for a week or so?

Stuart had already begun to think about how his parents seemingly never were happy with even his breathing! And his defenses would arise, but without anybody to whom he could turn to get positive feedback, he had carried this fear into his adult life. Can this shy couple get past their own fears and begin to share openly and truthfully?

Tea and Cream Debbie

She never would have thought of herself as one of the most popular girls in senior high. She was too busy enjoying this time in her life with all of her upbeat, teenage friends to stop and worry about how popular she might be. She and several of her girlfriends would engage in lively chatter between classes at school, their cute and curly hairstyles bouncing, their modest but trendy and feminine skirts lightly swishing as they’d walk down the hallways in their saddle shoes and bobby socks. They’d hold their mathematics and English textbooks up close to their chests, but books weren’t the biggest thing about their high school careers. Of course, learning and getting good grades was important. She and her friends weren’t dense or daffy, and most of them would be going on to further education after they graduated. But books and homework assignments and such were more in the background somewhere, since high school was, above everything else, an exhilarating social experience.

Well, you'll have to wait and see how this story turns out! LOL

Celebrating Solo?

Wake Up Sheridan!

Dumped. Whose jolly idea was it to ever apply such a thwunk of a word to an experience that has such potential to be, well, delicate? “Dumping” rightly identifies the deeds of, say, county waste management crews at junkyards. And individuals who’ve determined that a nearby ravine or a sloping stretch of grass alongside the Interstate onramp would be the best place to desert the raggedy sofa or the busted TV they no longer have room or use for. Stuff like that. Oh…granted, it was all so romantic, really, when I thought about it. Picture tallish, chocolate-dipped specimen of charisma and a looker-to-end-all-lookers, David Franklin. David once had a high school sweetheart: a gregarious, gorgeous girl he lost to her moving family’s move to the opposite side of the country, on account of the prestigious job promotion the girl’s father had landed. David saw the apple of his teenaged eye off at the airport, vowing to remain true to her and her alone from across the miles. But after the passing of a few months, David’s sobbing sweetheart called to break the news to him. Her mother held firm that her daughter was too young to be going steady with a boy who wasn’t even around. There were plenty of other nice, young gentlemen in the girl’s neck of the woods for her to socialize with, and she had better get to proper socializing, lest her growing fluidity in social graces be stunted before she would come of age, her mother said. That phone call devastated David. He mourned the loss of his love until after high school, when, as a freshman in college, he met the first girl he’d thought to date since his sweetheart had been taken away. This new young woman was a bibliophilic sort, not unladylike but without the deepest concern for cosmetics or fashion. She was a fellow student David was thrown together with for a two-person presentation for their Introduction to World Literature course. After a couple of study sessions with her outside of class, followed by a resounding 105% score on their presentation, David decided that he liked the bibliophile enough to ask her out. Thus began a casual courtship that happened to endure for the rest of David’s four-year college career. However, before he could resign himself to plans of making the courtship something more than casual after graduation, up popped his high school sweetheart. She was local again, free from parental clutches, gorgeous and gregarious as ever, ready to reclaim what she knew to be destiny. David knew it too. Destiny won out, and off Mr. Franklin went to pursue the sun, the moon, and the very Milky Way with the girl he’d once lost but had never been able to forget. Ahh. The romance. [Insert long, breathy sigh, full of dreams.] The incandescence of it all could scarcely be dimmed by a leftover factor: the bibliophile who hadn’t known the college courtship had been but a casual one, despite the fact that it hadn’t included any affairs of a distinctly serious or fancy nature. The bibliophile had even taken the plunge into stylish jeans and trendy tops and appealing perfumes and elegant eye shadows and luscious lip colors after she’d become the (initially stunned) recipient of David Franklin’s attentions. How she’d paid through the nose for some of those lipsticks but hadn’t had the faintest objection whenever David would step in to disrupt their dazzling displays of color, asking for one of the cottony wipes from her purse. He’d take it upon himself to ease her lipstick from her lips as he’d declare, in that mesmeric murmur of his, “There, nice and bare. 

~~~

Hi-ho, the Derry-o

🙀 There's a number of things that I'd say to all of those involved in this threesome... But, if you don't see where this is going, you need to read it for your own oohs and LOLs!  And,  here's a "real" clue...

Joy to the World, Even!

I loved reading these stories, but it's always hard to do a review and give enough to allow potential readers to decide whether they want to read the book. So I've tried to be as fair as possible, but several were too short to not give the storyline away...So I added music instead! And, especially on the last story, bet you'd never guess how The Farmer in the Dell was brought into the storyline... You'll enjoy this one for sure! I can highly recommend this for ages beginning mid-teens... And check out other books by this author by entering her name in the search column on the right!

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