Chapter Twelve: The Good Kind of Distraction

This is Mira’s story — part fiction, part reflection, wholly honest.
(Each chapter will end with a note from her writing, signed as your trusted friend.)

Mira’s Story: The Good Kind of Distraction
Where choice begins to feel like devotion

Rowan stood in line at the coffee shop, hands in his pockets, half-listening to the hum of grinders and early-morning conversations. The chalkboard sign still read “Try the spiced cider!” in crooked handwriting, and someone had drawn a cartoon pumpkin wearing glasses underneath.

When he stepped up to the counter, the barista squinted at him. “So,” she said slowly, “who was the woman with the linen coat and don’t-mess-with-me swagger?”

Rowan tried to play it cool, but the heat crept into his cheeks.

“Ah,” she said, nodding at his blush. “Didn’t think I’d get an answer. But you looked different. Happier.”

He grinned, the kind of grin he didn’t realize he was still capable of. “She’s… something.”

“Yeah. She lit up the room. And you? You were humming.”

Rowan chuckled. He had been. Quietly. All damn weekend.

---

At the dock, he repaired a weathered stairwell, the morning sun catching the edges of the water. His hands moved automatically, measured, and familiar, but his thoughts wandered.

He found himself replaying Mira’s laugh. Not the polite kind. The throw-your-head-back, completely-unfiltered one. He’d heard it when he joked about his emotionally evolved eggs.

He wanted to hear it again.

He tightened a bolt, then paused to stretch his back. A heron cut across the surface of the water, slow and smooth, its reflection rippling beneath it. He watched it for a moment, remembering the way the morning sun had hit Mira’s face. The softness in her eyes when she told him about Pepper.

Something in his chest shifted then, a small ache. Not from pain, but from recognition.

She carried tenderness like a muscle. He didn’t know many people like that.

His phone buzzed in his pocket. A message from his oldest:

Ellie: Dad, you’re in a mood. Did you reorganize the tools again? We get it. You like someone.

He smirked. Then texted back:

Tools are sacred. Don’t come for my joy.

He hadn’t expected a morning walk to shift something inside him. But it had.

Desire, he could handle. Mira was gorgeous, full of quiet magnetism and curves that made it hard not to look twice. But this wasn’t about that. Not just that.

It was the way she moved through the world, with curiosity, with care, with strength that didn’t need to be loud to be felt. She took up space in a way that made you want to lean in.

And now that he’d seen that up close, now that her voice was in his ears and her laugh was in his bones, Rowan knew:

This wasn’t just want. This was choice.

He wanted to keep showing up. Not because she’d asked him to. But because he did.

---

That night, he made dinner for himself and his kids, pasta, salad, garlic bread. They teased him mercilessly, as they always did, but his daughter gave him a sideways look before clearing her plate.

“You seem lighter, Dad. Like… less serious.”

“Maybe I’m just tired,” he deflected.

“Or maybe there’s a giiiiiirl,” Cal said, not even looking up from his phone.

Rowan didn’t answer. But his silence was the kind that spoke volumes.

He passed the salad bowl to Ellie without asking, she always took seconds, and nudged the garlic bread toward Cal, who was pretending not to care but had already eaten three slices.

---

Later, in bed, he opened his laptop. The tab for her blog was still open. He hadn’t read anything new since their first date. He’d promised himself he wouldn’t, not until he knew her from her, not from curated truths.

Still… the temptation was there.

He hovered. Clicked. Scrolled past titles. Paused.

Then closed the browser.

Not yet, he thought. Let her tell me who she is, one day at a time.

He looked around his room. It was tidy, like most things he kept under his roof, but the drawers told a different story. Half-finished sketches tucked into manila folders. A broken reel-to-reel camera he’d been meaning of fix. Books with notes in the margins. Things that didn’t fit neatly into the life he’d built after Paige.

Paige had her own world now. A finance firm, new husband, a new baby. She’d made her choice. One that hurt. One that had shaken the kids. One that still echoed, quietly, in the spaces Rowan tried to keep steady.

And he, he’d rebuilt. Quietly. With tools and time and muscle memory. But Mira? Mira made him want to build forward.

He reached for the notepad on his nightstand and scribbled a quick list:

• coffee with her (learn her coffee order)
• bring the cactus
• meet her daughter again
• ask about the card she pulled (have her pull my card?)
• make her laugh again
• show her the inlet at low tide
• ask what she is afraid to want
• kiss her

And beneath it, just one line:
Keep showing up. That’s all she asked.

Then, almost as an afterthought…
Let her see me, too. Not because I need to prove anything…
But because I’ve decided she’s worth being real for.

Ever had someone sneak up on you, not with intensity, but with presence?
Not someone you were chasing, but someone who made you want to show up?
I’d love to hear about the good kind of distractions in your life.
(Leave it in the comments — or write it down somewhere only your heart will find it.

---

P.S. No letter from The Clever Confidante today. Rowan didn’t read on. Not this time.
He’s not following Mira’s story through the screen anymore.
He’s learning her one moment at a time.

☁️ New here? You can start Mira’s Story from the beginning with Chapter Zero.

➡️✨ Continue Mira’s Story with Chapter Thirteen: Stepping Into the Light

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