The True Love Quilting Club Read Online Free

if you give up this stupid dream and leave town.”
    “Yeah, okay, fine,” she said. Three hundred bucks wasn’t even a third of the way to her goal, but it was better than nothing. Still, that meant she had only five days left to come up with seven hundred dollars. In her situation it might as well be seven thousand. Don’t give up; you can’t give up.
    “Say it.”
    “I’ll give up this stupid dream and leave town,” Emma parroted, not meaning a word of it.
    The woman slid the money through the slot. “Leave town.”
    “Yeah, yeah.” Stuffing the three hundred dollars into the pocket of her faded jeans (that had of late grown baggy), Emma left the pawnshop, left her star brooch in the gnarled paw of the failed actress reduced to working behind a cage and trying to chase people out of Manhattan.
    She hustled down the street, carried along on the energy of the herd surrounding her, passing a collection of small, grimy storefront windows that today somehow felt ominous. The summer heat was heavy, oppressive, burning the smell of car exhaust into her nostrils. The air hummed with sounds; the sharp honking of taxi horns, the steady marching of feet, the mad mumbling of cell phone conversations. Dark clouds hung above the skyscrapers, sautéing the city in humidity. People bumped into her, glowered, growled. Her stomach grumbled, reminding her she hadn’t eaten anything besides an apple and two Wasa crackers since the evening before.
    Emma picked up her pace, almost running, pushing to escape fate.
    Don’t let the old crone rattle you. She’s bitter. She’s washed up. She’s not like you. She’s not special. She’s not a star.
    But the reassurance rang false. She could feel the lie of it deep inside her. She was the one who was bitter. She was washed up. She wasn’t special. She wasn’t a star. She’d been deceiving herself all along. Chasing a pipe dream. Trying to be something she had no hope of becoming. Her heart sank as all the old doubts collapsed, falling in on her like perfectly lined up dominoes.
    Faster and faster she walked, breathless now, sweaty.
    She passed a souvenir shop, heard Sinatra’s rendition of “New York, New York” playing from a Wurlitzer, assuring her that if she could make it here, she could make it anywhere.
    “But what if you can’t make it here?” she muttered under her breath. “What happens then, Old Blue Eyes?” Sinatra had not sung a song about that eventuality. Great, now she was talking to herself. She was a shopping cart away from being homeless.
    At her hip, her cell phone vibrated. Grateful to have a distraction, she whipped it off her waistband, flipped it open, saw the name on the caller ID. Hope muscled out despair. It was her agent, Myron Schmansky. Myron was seventy-five if he was a day, frequently forgot her name, and smelled of boiled cabbage and cheap cigars. But by God, he was an agent.
    Then a terrifying thought occurred. What if he was dumping her?
    Her spirits—which were already stuck to the bottomof her sneakers—withered, turned brittle. Great, this was all she needed. Myron was going to add insult to injury. She didn’t want to answer, but ignoring reality wasn’t going to make it go away.
    She caught her breath and pressed the phone to her ear. “Hello?”
    “Anna,” Myron said in his raspy, on-the-verge-of-throat-cancer voice.
    “Emma,” she corrected. “It’s Emma.”
    “Emma, Anna, whatever your name is,” Myron grunted. “This is it, babe.”
    “What’s it?” Emma asked, a sudden fear stomping on the hope. Had he called to dump her?
    “Your big break.” Myron wheezed.
    Her pulse slowed instantly, and she felt as if she was floating outside her body. The street shrank and Emma grew taller in some surreal Alice in Wonderland moment.
    “You got an audition with Scott Miller at three P.M . this afternoon.” He gave her the address. “He’s casting for a supporting role in a new play, and he specifically asked for you. Said