Page 5 of Love Notes
Who knew that readers would lap that shit up?After years of working at Staples in order to pay the rent on a pretty shitty apartment, I’d been able to quit my job.Suddenly, I had money.And not just the sort of money that got me through until the end of the month but the sort of money that was still in my bank account after I’d paid my bills.The sort of money that had enough zeroes in it that I’d had to hire a guy to tell me what to do with it because everyone said I couldn’t just let it sit there.I wasn’t out here taking a private jet to parties in the Bahamas or anything, but for the first time in my life I didn’t have to pinch pennies.It was a feeling I wasn’t quite used to yet, even though I was currently writing the fourth book in the series and the first three had all been incredibly successful.
Insert eye twitch here.
So the thing with suddenly being successful was that I had both critics and fans.And a lot of them had very strong opinions and liked to share those opinions loudly on the internet.The sort that typed in all caps.And it was fine, because none of that was any of my business.Leo, Anita’s assistant, sent me copies of the most gushing reviews, and I pretended the other kind didn’t exist.Well, I was supposed to pretend the other kind didn’t exist, but sometimes, at three in the morning after too many glasses of wine, I made bad choices.Everyone made bad choices in those circumstances, probably, but mine didn’t involve drunk dialing my exes.Mine involved checking my reviews.
You know what was really stupid?The vitriolic burn-it-with-fire reviews weren’t even the ones that got under my skin.The reviews that really stung were those that damned me with faint praise, like the one that had recently gone viral on social media.
“Adam Nelson is a good writer, but it’s obvious he’s never been to New Hampshire.He gets so much wrong about the area that it makes me cringe.”
Ouch, right?
Because Ihadbeen to New Hampshire.I’d specifically been to Harmony Lake, on several occasions, and I’d only loved it so much that I was writing an entire series of books set there!Anita had told me to ignore the review and the resulting online arguments about it, and I had.But while I didn’t respond to the review in public, despite the traction Leo said it was getting in a bunch of online fan forums, I did address it another way: I decided that I was going to spend a month and a half at Harmony Lake while I finished the draft of the fourth book, and I was going to fill the book with so much local color and specific details that nobody would ever be able to say I’d never been to New Hampshire.So I’d booked a cute cottage in Caldwell Crossing, and now, because I was an idiot who believed Rebecca and her sob story about busted pipes, I was about to get scammed.
Or murdered.
It was like fifty-fifty at this point.
But, on the plus side, imagine what getting murdered in Harmony Lake would do for my sales!
I turned off the winding road onto an even more winding one.It was so narrow that the trees on either side almost blocked out the sunlight.
“Your destination is on the right,” the GPS told me, and I slowed down on the approach to the next mailbox.I took the driveway at a crawl; it was gravel, and tiny stones pinged against the underside of my hire car.
“Holy shit,” I said, peering out the windshield as the narrow driveway suddenly opened up onto a clearing, and a gorgeous wooden cabin appeared in front of the glittering lake.It was built out of some kind of honey-colored wood and had a sharply-pitched roof and a wide porch.The only splash of color on the porch was the bright blue cushions on the porch swing.But the cabin didn’t need much, not with the trees and the lake and the brilliant blue sky.It was idyllic.
A little red hatchback was parked out the front, and I parked beside it.As I did, the front door to the cabin opened, and a woman about my age hurried down the couple of steps onto the ground to meet me.She had a bright smile on her face and wore her dark hair pulled up in a ponytail.
“Adam?”she asked as I got out of the car.“I’m Rebecca.I’m so sorry for the hassle, but I think you’re going to love the cabin.”
“The view is nice,” I admitted.
“It’s agreatview,” she agreed, sounding relieved.“And the place is entirely yours.”She pointed to a building that was just visible through the trees.“My brother lives through there, and his number is on the refrigerator underneath mine if you have any urgent problems, but otherwise he’ll keep out of your way.”
My stomach gave a small unhappy twist at that, but I couldn’t really complain too much.He was farther away than a neighbor in town would have been.I just would have preferred a fence between us, I guessed, although I supposed I could suck it up since I was now right on the lake’s edge.
“Come on in,” Rebecca said, “and I’ll give you the tour.”
I followed her to the porch, leaving my suitcase in the trunk because I still wasn’t entirely convinced I wouldn’t have to make a quick escape.
“The cabin’s been here forever,” Rebecca said as the porch steps creaked underneath our feet, “but it’s been fully renovated.”
She pushed the door open and led me inside.
Wow.
The front door opened into a living room dominated by a sage-green sectional sofa.A fireplace was on one wall and a large TV on the other.A bookshelf seemingly devoid of books housed a collection of little wooden knickknacks and shiny rocks.Sunlight bathed the interior of the cabin in warm light, making the honey-colored walls glow.
“Kitchen,” Rebecca said, gesturing to our left, where the living room flowed directly into the sunlit kitchen.“And the bathroom is off that.”She pointed to a closed door at the back wall.“Bedroom.Or…” To our right, a set of steps clung to the wall before making a sharp left turn to the open loft that overlooked the living room.“The upstairs bedroom has a view of the lake.”
She held out her hand, a set of keys dangling from her fingers, and I took them.“Thanks.”
“There’s a welcome basket on the kitchen table,” she said.“And a folder with directions to the grocery store and a bunch of other places you might need.It’s from the cottage in Caldwell Crossing though, so please ignore where it says everything is in walking distance.”
“It’s fine,” I said, drawn to the window that looked out onto the lake.“I was initially hoping for somewhere close to the lake anyway, but everything was booked out.”
Rebecca threw me a look that was both grateful and relieved, and I felt a stab of guilt for ever suspecting she’d lured me here to murder me.“Again, I’m sorry for the inconvenience.”
I curled my fingers around the keys.“It’s no problem, really.”
