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  Books. Change. Lives.

  Copyright © 2022 by Roni Loren

  Cover and internal design © 2022 by Sourcebooks

  Cover illustration by Elizabeth Turner Stokes

  Sourcebooks and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks.

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

  All brand names and product names used in this book are trademarks, registered trademarks, or trade names of their respective holders. Sourcebooks is not associated with any product or vendor in this book.

  Published by Sourcebooks Casablanca, an imprint of Sourcebooks

  P.O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4410

  (630) 961-3900

  sourcebooks.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Loren, Roni, author.

  Title: For you & no one else / Roni Loren.

  Other titles: For you and no one else

  Description: Naperville, Illinois: Sourcebooks Casablanca, [2022]

  Series: Say everything; book 3

  Identifiers: LCCN 2022004923 (print) | LCCN 2022004924 (ebook)

  (trade paperback) | (epub) | (pdf)

  Subjects: LCGFT: Novels.

  Classification: LCC PS3612.O764 F67 2022 (print) | LCC PS3612.O764

  (ebook) | DDC 813/.6--dc23/eng/20220204

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022004923

  LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022004924

  Contents

  Front Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Back Cover

  To Donnie, my favorite person ever

  For You & No One Else contains frank discussions of mental health, alcohol addiction, the loss of loved ones, escaping a religious cult, and suicidal thoughts.

  One

  Merry freaking Christmas.

  Eliza stared at the ceiling, willing herself to get out of bed, telling herself that she could have gingerbread cookies for breakfast, that she could stay in pajamas for as long as she wanted, that she could binge-watch The Great British Baking Show or Gilmore Girls all day and no one would be the wiser. She could have a great, rejuvenating day. Do all those self-care activities she talked about on her YouTube wellness channel. But none of her internal pep-talking was working today. Christmas wasn’t meant to be a solo holiday, and no mental gymnastics were going to convince her subconscious otherwise. That part of her knew what was up and wanted to pull the blanket back over her head and wait for tomorrow.

  Eliza did exactly that for a solid twenty minutes, safe in her blanket tent, but then it started to get humid under there and she had to pee. She groaned at how ridiculous she was being. If her clients could see her now, literally hiding from the world like a little kid, they’d cancel their appointments in a hot second. Therapists weren’t supposed to have trouble getting out of bed in the morning. Therapists also weren’t supposed to wet the bed, so she’d better get herself up before she broke that rule, too.

  With a new sense of urgency, she flipped her blanket down and hurried to the bathroom to take care of the necessities. Once she’d brushed her teeth and washed her face, she felt a little more human, but she plopped back on her bed anyway—on top of the covers, though, so she counted that as progress.

  She checked her smartwatch, the screen informing her she’d had a restless night. You don’t say! She could almost hear its little electronic brain judging her—Maybe staying up ’til 2:00 a.m. watching sappy Christmas movies and drinking spiked eggnog alone until you’re dizzy isn’t the best life choice, Eliza. She winced, her head throbbing from last night’s activities—which had seemed like a good idea at the time—and reached for her phone. She grabbed it from the side table and unlocked the screen, making sure she hadn’t missed any calls from the answering service.

  Zero messages. The ping of disappointment that zipped through Eliza startled her, and she let out a frustrated breath. “Relief,” she said aloud, her tone firm. “That’s what you’re supposed to feel, Eliza. Your clients didn’t have any emergencies. That’s good news.”

  But the self-berating didn’t help. Knowing she wasn’t needed anywhere or by anyone today, even by her clients, made her throat want to close up. Her nose began to burn and her chest tightened. She shook her head. Nope…nope, nope, nope. Not doing that today.

  She would not have a repeat of last Christmas when she’d embodied every open-mouthed sobbing, mascara-streaked GIF on the internet. She’d allowed herself one Ugly Cry Christmas. One. Her parents wouldn’t want her to make that a tradition. Her parents would want…

  She inhaled a deep breath, trying to suck the energy out of a thought spiral that would lead nowhere good, and quickly opened her YouTube channel to distract herself with the stats on her latest video.

  Solo on Christmas?

  5 Ways to Make the Holiday Special

  232 new likes

  Okay. Not bad numbers. And she had a few new comments as well.

  BreccaBri24: Love this! My family lives far from me, and I didn’t have the funds to travel this year. I was dreading Christmas, but I tried your tip about being open with friends about my solo state and a few have invited me to their family’s celebrations. Now I’ve got more places to go than I can probably fit in!

  GiPesslGi: I love the idea about volunteering on Christmas! Last year, I helped serve meals at the local women’s shelter, and it was the most meaningful holiday I’ve ever had. This year, I’m going to be helping out at the animal shelter!

  Some of the heaviness in Eliza’s chest eased as she scanned through the comments. Even though she was failing spectacularly at taking her own advice today, it gave her some comfort to know her tips had brightened at least a few people’s holidays. Plus, good responses to her videos always cheered her. A bigger online platform meant more clients, steadier income, and possibly some online sponsors one day. Maybe something even bigger than that—like a book deal on the relationship book she’d been trying to write for the last year.

  Plus, the awkward adolescent version of herself that still lived right beneath the surface, the one who’d had to move to a new school midyear in seventh grade and couldn’t have bought popularity with a million-dollar check, still got a little thrill at being liked.

  Buoyed, she climbed off her bed, vowing to follow her video Tip 5: Remember, it can be just another day. Remove the pressure. Her head pounded with a dull thud, and her stomach was considering staging a coup as she made her way back into the bathroom, but the hot shower and putting on a little makeup worked wonders. By the time she was dressed and having her café au lait and a piece of toast on her couch, she felt somewhat human again.

  She raised her coffee mug toward her houseplants, which were basking in the meager New Orleans sunshine filtering in through her sliding glass doors. “Merry Christmas, y’all.” She’d taken to naming the plants because she’d been posting them on Instagram and felt they needed identities. She set her cup down and took a few quick photos of Hemingway, the pencil cactus with the single red Christmas ornament she’d hung on him Charlie Brown style. She posted the pic with the caption, Happy Holidays from Hemingway! Hope you all have a wonderful day!

  A comment instantly popped up from one of her followers. Merry Christmas to you and Hemingway!

  Then another. Hemingway looks lonely. You should get a pet!

  Eliza frowned at the word lonely, the plant suddenly looking sad in the picture instead of festive, and that chest pressure tried to return. She quickly deleted the photo and, for a moment, wished she had a furry companion to post instead. She’d consider
ed adopting a dog a while back, had even filled out the paperwork and gone through all the steps, but the lady who’d done her home visit had seemed very judgy about Eliza’s singlehood and busy work schedule. She’d both pissed Eliza off and undermined her pet-parent confidence. Maybe she was too busy. Maybe she was too single. She’d never gone back to the shelter.

  She sent a quick text and a GIF of a puppy popping out of a gift box to her friends Andi and Hollyn, puppies on the brain now.

  Her friends responded within seconds, each with their own well wishes and accompanying GIF. They had both invited Eliza along to Christmas celebrations with their partners and families, but despite the advice she’d given her YouTube followers, she didn’t want to feel like a guest anywhere today, an intruder on other people’s family traditions.

  Plus, her holiday grief was like a bomb with a hair trigger. She wasn’t foisting that liability onto her friends’ get-togethers. One minute she might be that fun lady who knew all the words to “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer,” and the next she might dissolve into hysterics because someone else’s mom also likes to make shrimp-and-crabmeat dressing on Christmas. No way. Spending the day alone was the right choice.

  Very, very alone.

  Eliza closed out her texting screen, and as if on autopilot, her thumb shifted to the bright-magenta square she clicked on way too often—Aligned. Male faces appeared on her screen, and something unlocked in her shoulders, like a nice glass of wine making her muscles relax. Other single people. People like her. Anonymous photos stared back at her. Swipe left. Swipe left. Swipe left. She wondered if any dude on the dating app was sitting alone like her this morning, wishing for his own Hallmark Christmas movie. Not likely.

  Most of the guys she met on Aligned were searching for a whole other kind of movie fantasy, one with a mature rating and a one-night expiration date. She’d tried that route for a while but had learned she was too goal-oriented to enjoy hookups that were leading nowhere. Plus, strolling into work the next day to give people advice on how to have a healthy romantic relationship when the guy she’d slept with the night before had called her sweet thing because he couldn’t remember her name made her feel like a hypocrite.

  She didn’t begrudge people their hookup lifestyle. She’d just learned it wasn’t for her. Her parents had ruined her with their epically romantic relationship. They’d been so devoted to each other that her mom had even given up a tenured professorship so her dad could accept his dream job, and she’d never once seemed bitter about it. His happiness was hers and vice versa.

  Watching them, Eliza had seen that real love could exist, and now she didn’t want to settle for anything else. Sometimes she felt like Veruca Salt, stomping her feet and demanding her own glass elevator, her own Golden Ticket. Maybe she was asking for too much, but setting high standards had worked for her before—straight A’s through school, scholarship to college, master’s degree by twenty-three. Her own business by twenty-eight. Great friends. So she’d figured, why not with relationships?

  The plan had been a good one. Results, though, had been dismal.

  Once she’d started telling guys that she didn’t go home with anyone on the first date as a rule, she’d quickly learned that she was a woman guys liked to sleep with, not one they wanted to invest any time in. One guy had straight up told her, “No offense, but who would want to date a shrink? I don’t want someone trying to get into my head.”

  On the flip side, she’d had a few dates where the guys wanted free therapy, not a date. Those nights were their own special kind of torture.

  She should’ve ditched the app a long time ago and stuck with imaginary book and movie boyfriends and her vibrator. She’d even tried on occasion to cut the right-swipe habit. But then a few days would pass, hope would spring up like a weed, and she’d find herself opening the app again.

  She paused on the photo of a guy with dark hair and what looked to be a confident but kind smile.

  ALIGNED Dating Profile

  Ryan L.

  Age: 32

  Location: Metairie

  Occupation: Financial planner

  Likes: Jazz music, travel, boating, and finding the best microbrews in town

  Account Status: Open for alignment

  The guy was cute, didn’t have any red flags that she could tell, and had a steady job. He also was cuddling an adorable dog in one of his photos. You couldn’t set a bar much higher than that on a dating app with such limited information. Before she could talk herself out of it, she swiped right.

  She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. Only then did it hit her that swiping right on Christmas morning would probably look ten kinds of pathetic. Who was on a dating app at this time on this day?

  Christmas orphans, that’s who. How freaking Dickensian of her. Please, sir, can you spare a date?

  She quickly closed the app, vowing not to look at it again today. She stared at the screen. Any distraction the app had provided melted away, dragging her back to reality.

  Orphan. Orphan. Orphan.

  Her phone went dark.

  The room hummed with silence.

  Her brain flooded with all the thoughts she’d been trying to avoid and pushed the panic button. The tidal wave of emotion that welled inside her was enough to make her audibly choke.

  No, no, no. Before the tears broke free, she rushed to her feet, muttering “we are not doing this” under her breath in a white-knuckled pep talk. She’d been wrong to plan a chill, stay-at-home day. She couldn’t sit here with nothing to do.

  Everything else was closed, but she didn’t need to be. WorkAround, the shared workspace where she rented an office, would be empty but open. She could get some filing done, maybe outline a new video. That would make the day go by quickly, occupy her brain. It could just be Tuesday. She liked Tuesdays. She poured herself another coffee, this time in her travel mug, and ignored the slight trembling of her hands.

  She grabbed her bag and was out the door before she could overthink the plan. The sounds of happy voices and her neighbor’s cheery reindeer songs blasted from an open window nearby. She resisted putting her hands over her ears and sped up her pace to get to her car.

  Run, run, Rudolph.

  ***

  As expected, the bottom floor of WorkAround was silent as a library when Eliza let herself in around lunchtime. The effect was a little eerie. Normally the place would be a hive of activity with people typing away on their laptops at the rented hot desks, others chatting in the strategically placed groupings of furniture, and the gurgle and whir of drinks being made at the in-house coffee bar. She loved walking in to all those sounds, all that energy.

  When she’d first started looking for office space to rent for her therapy practice, she’d been dreading getting stuck in some isolated, soulless office building where no one talked to one another. So when she’d found WorkAround, a concept built on collaboration and start-ups and a constantly rotating corral of creative people, she’d been hooked.

  The rent had been a bit of a stretch, but she needed to match the image on her YouTube channel—the successful professional therapist who could afford a nice office. Unfortunately, if her client load didn’t increase or she didn’t find an additional stream of income, she wouldn’t be able to keep renting here long-term.

  That grim thought had her even more motivated to get some work done today. She needed to catch up on client notes, outline a new video, and come up with a new thirty-day challenge for January. She did a new wellness challenge each month on her channel. Those videos garnered some of her best numbers. People—herself included—loved a life experiment. This month, the challenge had been about getting better sleep. She’d been an utter fail at it personally, but her followers had seemed to get a lot out of it.

  She headed past the closed coffee bar to the elevator and punched the button for the third floor. The hallway was quiet when she stepped out of the elevator, and her lace-up boots moved silently across the gray carpet as she made her way to her office. But when she got closer to her door, she heard the distinct chatter of an old-school clickety-clack keyboard. Her eyebrows lifted.

  So her too-cool-for-the-room neighbor was working on Christmas, too? It had to be him because she didn’t know anyone else on this floor with such a loud keyboard. She’d only heard it a few times before because Beckham Carter almost always kept his door shut tight. She slowed her step as she neared his office. The door was wide open.