Sparkling Hope (The Eastburgh Devils Series Book 1)

Six months later.

I lived a pretty average and organized life.

I attended college and parties, studied for exams, met with friends, and worked at my college’s coffee shop.

My daily routine was planned out from morning to night every single day of the week.

To keep track of everything, I carried my notebook with me everywhere.

A dark blue book with my initials engraved in gold. Anything college-related, like essays, exams, or significant events, was marked in neon pink.

Appointments with the doctor were green, and the birthdays of my family or friends were underlined with a wavy line.

I was most interested in the light blue color on Mondays and Wednesdays because it marked when the college hockey team had swimming.

While everyone can sit on the concrete steps that serve as benches and watch the hockey players swim.

I’m not interested in how they glide through the water and try to climb out of the pool in Baywatch style.

Aria, my best friend, has taken me to watch the Eastburgh Devils practice a time or two, and I absolutely won’t deny that it’s not worth a look to watch them.

Still, I found the short time gap between the end of practice and when the cleaners arrived much more exciting.

That was usually fifty minutes, to be exact, and sometimes a full hour if they were late.

But I wanted to take my time and always disappeared after precisely forty-five minutes.

On Mondays, the cleaning lady always showed up with her bicycle after fifty minutes, ten minutes before the start of her shift, while on Wednesdays, she rolled punctually into the parking lot in front of the swimming hall in her dark blue Volvo.

My whole week was planned out from morning to night, every second, and sometimes I wished my day had more than twenty-four hours.

But when can a spontaneous move from the motel to the estate of the family whose construction company was renovating our house be scheduled?

Mom saved money now that we’re staying there transitionally rather than at the motel, but when I heard who else was living there, I’d rather be homeless for that time.

So, I wouldn’t describe my life now as Oh, I have nothing and no one, so what’s the point of going on crappy, but rather the, I would love to jump down everyone’s throat and sink into the ground and stay there forever and just never come back up crappy.

The second described my life situation right now among the best, and I have already made a list in my head consisting of two people    I would love to jump down the throats of.

First, my older brother Ethan decided to move into a campus apartment community and not let me live with him while the house was renovated.

Nothing could convince him of that. Not even concert tickets for his favorite band, The Harpers.

Second and last, I would jump down my mother’s throat.

I don’t have any more family unless I count the squirrel, who was always waiting on the canopy in the motel until I placed new nuts.

My mother told me without warning that she had canceled the motel on the outskirts of town because a good friend had invited her and me to stay there temporarily.

In principle, it would be an excellent offer if my Mom’s good friend wasn’t the wife of the boss of the construction company and the stepmother of big-shot hockey player Weston Sinclair.

This person screamed trouble, and I was sure his massive selfishness was oozing out of his pores.

I stood on a massive estate in the woods by a lake.

Far and away, not a soul, let alone another house, unless you count the small cabin on the other side of the lake.

The house’s cladding was rustic, the windows down to the ground, the wall of the house was dark wood, the long driveway was filled with pebbles, and the roof had red tiles.

I pulled my suitcase over the pebbles to the stairs and entered the Sinclairs’ house.

The house was just as rustic in decor as it appeared outside.

High ceilings, warm wall colors, a red brick fireplace, and the seating was adorned with shiny brown leather.

What intrigued me most were the hunting trophies that decorated the high, bare-paneled wooden wall above the brick fireplace decorated.

‘Would you like to see the guest room?’ asked a slender-built, young blonde-haired woman who introduced herself to me earlier by the name Camilla.

Mom had been going out to dinner with her frequently while the renovation was being planned, which led to a friendship between them.

No trace of wrinkles or signs of age. The longer I looked at her, the more I wondered how old she was.

In her early thirties?

‘Yes, please.’ Before I followed Camilla up the stairs, my eyes lingered on the boar’s head one last time.

Why would someone hang something like that in the living room?

I averted my eyes before I started imagining that the boar would blink at me or even jump out of the wall at me.

Once upstairs on the first floor, I looked into a long hallway. On the left and right sides were white doors with silver doorknobs.

The second door on the left was the guest room I’ll be occupying while her husband’s construction company renovates our house.

‘This is your room.’ With these words, Camilla opened the second room door on the left side of the hallway.

With my suitcase in my hand, I entered a large bright room.

Utterly different in decor from the rustic interior decor and paneling downstairs in the living area.

The walls were covered with wooden beams painted white, and under my socks, I felt a soft carpet.

I couldn’t help but be amazed.’Do you like it? I moved the furniture after your mother agreed to my offer and redecorated everything a bit,’ she asked.

‘It’s so beautiful.’

No words can describe just how much I liked this room.

No wonder Camilla was in charge of interior design in the construction company.

‘Thank you, Camilla,’ I smiled and, full of enthusiasm, continued looking around the room.

This room resembles one of the prefabricated rooms in a furniture store, where you would prefer not to leave because you like it so much.

The only difference was that no price tags were hanging from the white furniture here.

‘We just recently renovated. It can all still smell a little new and like paint but feel yourself at home, Luna.’ This explained the strong smell of fresh paint and the new furniture.

‘Here is the bathroom,’ she pointed to the door next to a tall white wooden dresser.

I adored this woman’s decorating style already.

No wonder Mr. Sinclair and she ran Sinclair Constructions together. He built and renovated, and her interior design gave life  and spark to the rooms.

Mom also let her pick out the wall colors in the living room in our house, but for the interior decorating, Mom wanted to come up with something.

Dad used to furnish everything and said, Mom didn’t have an eye for good furniture.

I put my bag on the bed and walked over to the enormous window fronting the wall to the balcony giving a perfect view of the lake and the forest.

The cold October air tingled on my skin as I stepped onto the  terrace.

I returned to my suitcase and took out my make up bag to put my things in the bathroom cabinet.

Behind the door was the bathroom, covered halfway up the walls with shiny, dark green tiles.

To my surprise, there were already some male drugstore products like aftershave, some deodorant that was supposed to smell like wood and peppermint, a toothbrush, and in the bottom drawer, a pack of condoms.

I quickly counted one and one together and was relatively sure what would be behind the other door next to the oversized shower, where half a swimming team would fit in.

I knew that my mother’s guest room was on the first floor and that the Sinclairs’ bedroom was in the attic.

I prayed that I wouldn’t have to share a bathroom with Weston Sinclair, who lives up to his name as fuck buddy on campus.