Haley took a slow breath and set the glass down on the counter.
"Okay," she said carefully. "This might sound stupid and irresponsible, but the honest answer is that I really have no idea."
Sarah didn't respond right away. She simply leaned against the counter and waited.
Haley's fingers tapped lightly against the side of the glass as she continued. "I mean, thanks to Jack helping me study this year, I'm pretty sure I'll actually pass all my classes. That alone feels like a miracle. I could probably get into a college somewhere, and everyone in my family would celebrate because nobody expected me to even get that far."
She gave a small laugh at the truth of it.
"Before Jack showed up, my academic reputation was basically built on low expectations and last-minute miracles. Now my teachers talk about me like I'm suddenly responsible."
Sarah smiled faintly but remained quiet.
Haley looked down at the bright red slushy and stirred it again. "So logically, the next step should be college. That's what everyone expects. My mom especially has been really hopeful about that idea."
She paused, thinking about Claire.
"My dad would support anything I decide to try," Haley added. "He'd probably say something about following my dreams while doing a card trick and accidentally lighting a napkin on fire."
Sarah laughed quietly at the image.
Haley smiled too, but her expression softened a moment later. "But my mom will definitely feel a little disappointed if I say I want to try something else first. She worked really hard raising us, and she likes the idea that all of us go to college and build stable lives."
Her fingers slowed against the glass.
"And I get that. I really do."
She glanced toward the living room where Jack was still asleep on the couch.
"But part of me wants to explore something before I lock myself into a path I'm not even sure about."
Sarah watched her carefully.
"I'm not saying I never want college," Haley continued slowly. "I might go later when I actually figure out what I want to study. Right now, I feel like I'd just pick something random because that's what everyone expects me to do."
She let out a quiet breath.
"And that feels wrong somehow."
Sarah remained silent, giving her space.
Haley shifted slightly in her seat. "I know it probably sounds messy. Everyone else my age seems to have some kind of plan already. Alex has her entire academic universe mapped out like a space mission."
Sarah smiled knowingly.
"And Jack," Haley went on, glancing toward the living room again, "has different careers running at the same time. Acting, writing, football… and whatever else he decides to try next."
She wrapped both hands around the glass.
"Watching him work that hard kind of made me realize something."
Sarah tilted her head slightly.
"I don't want to drift through life doing whatever feels easiest," Haley said. "I want to find something that actually excites me the way his work excites him."
She looked back at Sarah with a slightly nervous smile.
"The problem is I haven't figured out what that thing is yet."
A quiet pause settled between them.
Haley sighed softly. "So now I feel stuck between everyone's expectations and my own confusion about what I actually want."
She shrugged a little. "And that's the honest answer."
Sarah studied her for a moment, thoughtful rather than judgmental.
"And I think I talked too much just now," Haley added sheepishly.
Sarah let out a soft breath and set her own glass down on the counter. "You know something?" she said gently. "When I was your age, I sounded a lot like you."
Haley blinked. "You did?"
"Oh yes." Sarah nodded slowly. "Everyone around me had very clear expectations about what my future was supposed to look like. My parents believed I would go straight to college, get a practical degree, and settle into a stable career."
She leaned one elbow on the counter as she remembered.
"My teachers talked about scholarships and internships like the path was already written. My friends were applying to universities and discussing majors like they had their entire lives figured out."
Haley listened quietly.
"And I went along with it for a while," Sarah continued. "It felt like the responsible thing to do. Everyone kept telling me college was the safe option, and that taking time to explore was risky."
She gave a small, thoughtful smile.
"So I chose the safe option."
Haley tilted her head slightly.
"But something inside me kept whispering that I wanted to try things first before committing to four years of studying something I might not even care about."
Sarah reached for the pitcher and poured a little more slushy into her glass.
"So after high school, I did something that made a lot of people unhappy," she said. "I decided to take some time and experiment with different ideas."
Haley raised an eyebrow. "What kind of ideas?"
Sarah laughed softly. "Quite a few."
She rested her forearms on the counter. "The first one was a small clothing startup."
"Really?" Haley leaned forward with interest.
Sarah nodded. "I'd always loved clothes and design, even back then. So I saved some money, rented a tiny workspace, and started trying to design simple pieces that I thought people would like."
Her smile turned nostalgic.
"It was a disaster."
Haley pressed her lips together, trying not to laugh.
"I had no idea how to run a business at that point," Sarah continued. "My pricing was wrong, my supply orders were chaotic, and I spent too much money on fabric nobody wanted to buy."
She took a small sip of the slushy.
"Within a few months, the whole thing collapsed."
"That must have been rough," Haley said.
"It was," Sarah admitted calmly. "But I learned more during that failure than I ever did in a classroom."
She tapped the side of her glass.
"After that, I decided to try something completely different."
Haley waited.
"I attempted to become a professional swimmer."
Haley nearly spit out her drink. "You're serious?"
Sarah laughed. "Very serious. I'd always been a strong swimmer growing up, and I thought maybe I could train seriously and compete."
She shook her head.
"The plan lasted about four months."
Haley frowned. "What happened?"
"It turns out," Sarah said lightly, lifting a hand, "that I'm allergic to chlorine."
Haley burst out laughing. "Oh no."
"Oh yes," Sarah said with amusement. "My skin started reacting to the pool chemicals during training. The doctor told me spending hours in chlorinated water every day would keep causing problems."
Haley wiped a tear from the corner of her eye. "So professional swimming didn't work out."
"Not even a little," Sarah agreed.
She leaned back against the counter. "Then came the bakery."
"You opened a bakery?" Haley blinked.
Sarah nodded. "I loved baking, and I thought maybe a small neighborhood shop would work. I spent months planning recipes, decorating the space, and building the menu."
"That actually sounds really nice," Haley said.
"It was nice," Sarah replied. "For about eight months."
Haley lowered her glass slowly. "What happened?"
Sarah shrugged lightly. "There was an electrical accident one night. A faulty wire in the back kitchen sparked while nobody was there. The fire spread faster than anyone expected."
Haley's eyes widened.
"The bakery burned down."
For a moment, Haley simply stared at her. "Wow."
Sarah nodded. "Insurance covered some of the damage, but not everything. By that point, I'd used almost all my savings trying different things."
She tapped the counter lightly.
"So I finally did what everyone had originally suggested."
"So then you went to college?" Haley asked.
"Yes," Sarah said. "I decided to try the safe option everyone recommended."
"Did you like it?"
"For a while. I stayed for about a year."
Haley raised an eyebrow. "Only a year?"
"During that year, I realized something important," Sarah said. "Every time I tried something before, even when it failed, I felt excited while working on it. Sitting in lectures didn't give me that same feeling."
Haley nodded thoughtfully.
"So I dropped out after one year."
"Really?"
Sarah smiled slightly. "Yes. And that decision scared my parents quite a bit."
"What did you do next?" Haley asked.
Sarah's eyes brightened. "I returned to fashion design."
"The clothing idea again?"
Sarah nodded. "I took business classes on the side, and I had learned from my earlier mistakes."
"And it worked?"
"It did."
She continued, "My designs started appearing in small boutiques. Then local magazines wrote about them. Stylists began using my clothes on television sets."
Haley listened with fascination.
"As the brand grew, I began investing some of the profits into small television projects," Sarah explained. "Those investments eventually led to bigger productions and more opportunities in Hollywood."
Haley smiled. "And now you are here."
Sarah nodded calmly. "Now I am here."
For a moment, the kitchen fell quiet. Haley slowly stirred the melting ice in her glass, watching the red slushy swirl.
"So your path was kind of chaotic," she said.
Sarah laughed softly. "That's a polite way to describe it."
Haley smiled. "I guess I always assumed successful people had a clear plan from the beginning."
Sarah shook her head gently. "Life rarely works that way."
She rested both hands on the counter. "Sometimes you try something and it works immediately. Sometimes it fails and teaches you something useful for the next attempt."
Haley nodded slowly, thinking it over.
"The important part," Sarah continued in her calm voice, "is not avoiding mistakes. The important part is learning from them and moving forward with more knowledge than before."
Haley looked thoughtful.
Sarah offered her a warm smile. "So if you want to explore different options before choosing a long-term path, that doesn't make you irresponsible."
Haley blinked. "It doesn't?"
"No," Sarah said gently. "It makes you curious about your own life."
Haley relaxed a little in her chair.
Sarah lifted her glass again. "Just remember one thing."
Haley looked up.
"Trying new things is valuable," Sarah said, "but you should always think carefully before making big decisions. Take risks you can recover from if they fail."
Haley nodded slowly.
Sarah smiled again. "Life is unpredictable. Overthinking every possible outcome rarely helps."
Haley glanced down at the slushy before looking back up.
"If something interests you," Sarah finished calmly, "try it. Work hard at it and see where it leads. If it doesn't work out, learn from it and try the next idea."
Haley's shoulders relaxed a little more.
Sarah reached for the pitcher and refilled Haley's glass. "You have time to figure things out."
Haley smiled softly. "That actually makes me feel a lot better."
Sarah chuckled. "I'm glad."
In the living room, Jack pushed himself upright on the couch with a quiet groan. Every muscle protested the movement. For a few seconds, he just sat there, blinking slowly while his brain caught up with the fact that he was awake.
Voices drifted from the kitchen.
He swung his legs off the couch and stood carefully. The soreness from the week of training still lingered in every joint. When he started walking, it looked less like walking and more like someone negotiating a peace treaty with gravity.
Step by step, he dragged his feet toward the kitchen.
Haley noticed him first.
She turned slightly in her chair, and her eyes immediately lit up. "Look who finally woke up."
Jack reached the kitchen doorway and leaned against the frame for a moment, like he needed moral support from the wall. His hair was a mess and his expression carried the dull exhaustion of someone who had discovered muscles he did not know existed.
Sarah glanced over her shoulder and smiled. "Good afternoon, sleeping beauty."
Jack grunted something that might have been a greeting and shuffled toward the table.
He pulled out the chair beside Haley and collapsed into it with the slow, defeated grace of a man who had run ten miles and lost.
Haley watched him with an amused smile. "You look like you got hit by a truck."
Jack rested his forearms on the table and dropped his forehead into one palm. "Truck would have been faster."
Sarah laughed.
Jack lifted his head again and looked from Haley to his mom, then back to Haley.
"Did she just tell you her streaks of bad luck before success?"
Haley blinked in surprise. "How do you know?"
Jack rubbed the back of his neck and leaned back in the chair. "Because she tells that story every time someone starts worrying about their life direction, and considering I was sleeping, she must have asked you about college, and you being all nervous, babbled out everything."
Haley wanted to argue, but he was right.
Sarah raised an eyebrow. "That is not true."
"It absolutely is," Jack said, pointing lazily at her. "Clothing startup disaster, chlorine allergy, bakery fire and college dropout. Then fashion comeback."
Haley stared at him. "You memorized the whole thing."
Jack shrugged tiredly. "It's a good story."
Sarah crossed her arms, pretending to be offended. "It is not a performance routine."
Jack smirked. "You skipped the part where Grandpa called you reckless for dropping out and nearly kicked you out of the house."
Sarah sighed softly. "That part is less inspirational."
Haley laughed and turned slightly in her chair to face him. "Okay, now I'm curious. How many times have you heard this speech?"
Jack thought about it for a second. "Enough times that I can predict the order of the failures."
Sarah shook her head with a small smile. "I am beginning to regret sharing life lessons with my own son."
Jack reached for Haley's slushy and stole a sip without asking.
She gasped. "Hey!"
He pushed the glass back toward her with a tired grin. "Relax. I needed sugar to survive."
Haley studied him for a moment. "You really are destroyed."
Jack stretched his arms slowly and winced. "Marcus invented three new forms of torture this week. I'm pretty sure sled pushes are illegal in at least five countries. Next, I have to take basketball lessons for a month or two."
Sarah set another glass of slushy in front of him. "Drink."
Jack accepted it gratefully and took a long sip.
The cold sweetness hit his system like medicine.
He exhaled slowly. "Okay. That helps."
Sarah's phone rang. She walked over to the living room and talked for a moment before walking back to the kitchen. "Well, an important meeting just popped up and I have to go out for a few hours. You two lovebirds enjoy your time."
She went straight to her room, changed and then left for the meeting.
"So, wanna hit the pool?" Jack asked her with a little smirk.
"I don't have my bikini with me," Haley replied with a knowing smile.
"Who said anything about a bikini?"
"Skinny dip?"
"Only if you are ready," Jack said with a smirk.
---(Words: 2.6k) Lacking Powerstones guys.
Sorry for the cliffhanger 😬😬
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