Watching Amanda Read Online Free PDF Page A

coffee table and flipped her long auburn hair behind her shoulders. “Amanda, let’s go over your situation, shall we? One: You were fired from your job yesterday. Two: Your health insurance will be terminated at the end of the month. Three: You have to pay your rent in three weeks. Four: Diapers don’t grow on trees. Need I go on?”
    Jenny was Amanda’s best friend and had been since high school, when Jenny moved to Queens from Brooklyn. The women were complete opposites and always had been, but for some reason, that worked for them. Jenny was outgoing and daring and trendy; at the moment she wore a long black mohair sweater coat, a white satin camisole, and sexy low-rise jeans, with knee-high black leather boots. In contrast, Amanda wore a long sleeve pink T-shirt with jeans and sneakers and a burp cloth tossed over her shoulder. “Mom clothes,” Jenny called them.
    Jenny sipped her tea. “I’ll sit on this sofa for as long as it takes to convince you that it’s not wrong to accept whatever your father left you in his will.”
    Amanda let out a deep breath. “But Jenny, it is wrong. How can it not be wrong to suddenly take money from a man who didn’t care that I was his daughter when he was alive? What does that say about me?”
    â€œIt says you’re not an idiot,” Jenny insisted. “It says you need the money. It says you won’t let pride stand in the way of surviving. It says that until you find a new job with benefits, not easy to do at the start of the holiday season, you’re screwed.”
    â€œEven if you’re right,” Amanda said, “I—”
    I don’t want his money. I wanted him . I wanted a father.
    â€œSweetheart,” Jenny said. “I know your dream was for your father to be a dad to you. But that never happened and now it never will. It’s time to stop. To let go of that and look to the future. And the future requires the money he may have left you.”
    Amanda crossed her arms over her chest. “I don’t want his money. It would make me feel dirty to use his money when it has no meaning behind it.”
    â€œOh, Amanda,” Jenny said. “Integrity is not going to pay your rent.”
    She was right, Amanda knew. But how could she do it? What would her mother think? Her mom hadn’t taken a dime from William Sedgwick her entire life.
    Mom? I need some guidance here. Amanda directed her thoughts toward the ceiling.
    â€œHow about if you just go to the reading,” Jenny suggested. “Just go and listen. Maybe he didn’t leave you money. Maybe he left you a beautiful letter, saying how much he regrets what a crappy father he was.”
    â€œThat’s possible,” Amanda said, brightening. “Perhaps he did write me a letter or left a memento of who he was. I’d like that. And it would be nice to be able to see Olivia and Ivy, offer my condolences to them.”
    Suddenly it occurred to Amanda that she had seen one of her sisters, by complete coincidence, on the very day their father had died. It seemed like divine intervention had placed Amanda and Olivia in each other’s paths yesterday. Even if Olivia hadn’t seen her.
    â€œYou’re right,” Amanda told her friend and took a sip of her tea. “I’ll definitely go.”
    Jenny smiled, grabbed a chocolate chip cookie off the tray on the coffee table and bit into it with a satisfied sigh. “I knew I’d say the right thing eventually. That almost feels as good as this cookie tastes.”
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    Ethan stood by the window of his cabin, alternately glancing at his watch and looking for a flash of Nick Marrow’s royal blue down jacket to appear in his driveway.
    Come on, kid.
    It was four o’clock, and with a six hour drive to New York City ahead of him and the storm coming, Ethan wanted to hit the road now.
    Finally, the bright blue turned up against the dusting of white snow