I’m a little late on the newsletter again this month. You’d think that being off of work for three weeks would make it easier to get a newsletter out on time, but it turns out that your body healing itself is kind of exhausting.

So…. remember when I got a hysterectomy last year and joked that it was “10/10, would do again”? Well, be careful the things you say, ovaries will listen. And grow squatters inside your body. So you need to do it all over again. I had that surgery at the end of September and it went really well and recovery is going pretty smoothly. I’m now fully reproductive organ free and I definitely have thoughts on that to write out soon. In the meantime, you can reread the cursed piece about my first surgery below.

Since it’s Spooky Season, I HIGHLY recommend reading both A Witch’s Guide to Magical Innkeeping as well as Sangu Mandanna’s previous book The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches. Both are full of charm and cozy magical romance, but also deeply touching (especially if you have a soft spot for Found Family).

Other Autumnal/Spooky Recs:

I am deep in the R&R revisions on THE RACING LINE, so that means ✂ ✂ ✂ . Which means more for you to read!

Enjoy this currently cut scene where our Driver, Jill, tells her best friend and Race Engineer, Nicole, that she had a moment of weakness and kissed her ex girlfriend. This is an exclusive for subscribers only!

Jill

“I kissed Maeve,” I blurt out to Nicole when I find her at her desk back at HQ on Tuesday. I need to talk this out with someone and it can’t be Daniel for obvious reasons. She swivels her chair to face me. 

“Firstly, yay! Second, about damn time. Thirdly, when?” She’s practically bouncing in her seat. 

I shake my head, kind of dazed by her reaction. “Um, after the race…” I start answering her questions but then my brain processing catches up and I pivot back to what really warrants discussion. “No, it’s not a ‘yay,’ Nicole. It’s complicated.” 

“Because Daniel hates her?” She guesses. 

“He doesn’t hate her—”

She cuts me off with another guess. “Because you don’t know if she’s seeing someone at the moment?”

“No,” I start but then realize that, shit, I don’t know if she’s seeing anyone. Did I just stick my tongue down the throat of someone with a girlfriend? “Oh my god, I don’t…” 

“She’s not,” Nicole informs me definitively. I shoot her a look. “I asked her at the beach cause I knew you wouldn’t. You’re welcome.” 

“Thank you?” I’m not used to my friends being this invested in one of my… is relationship the right word? Should I even be trying to assign a word to this right now?

“Is it because she’s a journalist and you’re a driver and there’s a huge conflict of interest for her?” 

“Well, now that’s one of the reasons.” My head falls into my hands. “It’s the history and the distraction and sponsors and all of it. And I was furious because of Alec and it was an emotional moment, and she hasn’t texted me since,” I finish quietly. 

“I mean, aren’t all first kisses during emotional moments?” She leans back in her chair and raises an eyebrow at me. 

“It wasn’t our first kiss,” I point out. Just the first in eight years or so. First as the new people we’ve both grown into. But part of what was beautiful about the kiss was that it didn’t feel like a first kiss. It felt new in some ways, but also felt so familiar. It felt like coming home. 

“Blanc bonnet ou bonnet blanc,” she uses the French phrase flippantly and I gather it means something like “potayto potahto.” “What do you want her to text you?” I raise an eyebrow at her, unsure what she’s asking. “What do you want?” she clarifies. “Do you want it to just be nice kiss, that’s it? Do you want it to be something more? Do you want to avoid her as much as possible and never think of it again? Because I like hanging out with her, but if you want that, she’s dead to me.” 

I frown. It’s a good question. One I haven’t actually thought much about yet. “I don’t know. I want… I think I want to know what she wants.” 

Nicole furrows her brow, making the expression she does when trying to figure out what’s wrong on a car. “Who kissed who, again?” 

“I kissed her.” 

She nods. “But she kissed back?” I nod. Nicole’s mouth purses in thought. 

An uneasy feeling sets into my chest and I speak quietly. “I don’t think I’m ready to… I can’t put my heart out there first with her.” That’s the crux of it. I’d given her my whole heart when I was sixteen and she’d crushed it. I understand why now, but that doesn’t erase the memory of how it had felt. Doesn’t erase how I’d held parts of myself back from relationships since then. Doesn’t erase how scared I am at the idea that it could happen all over again. 

After a long moment of pensive silence, Nicole speaks. “She hurt you. It’s fair to be hesitant. But you’re twenty five now, not fifteen. I think it’s about time you learn how to have adult conversation. With her.”

“I hate it when you’re right.”

She turns back to her computer. “No, if you did, you’d hate me all the time.” 

See you again in a couple of weeks for November’s newsletter! I’ve got some amazing character art to share!