A Chance at Love Read online

  A Chance At Love

  By:

  T.K. Chapin

  www.tkchapin.com

  Copyright © 2016 T.K. Chapin All rights reserved.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to actual events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with.

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  Version: 02.06.2016

  ISBN: 978-1523898367

  ISBN-13: 1523898364

  Available Books

  By T.K. Chapin

  (Inspirational Christian Fiction & Romance)

  Embers & Ashes Series

  Amongst the Flames (Book 1)

  Out of the Ashes (Book 2)

  Up in Smoke (Book 3)

  After the Fire (Book 4)

  Love’s Enduring Promise Series

  The Perfect Cast (Book 1) FREE

  Finding Love (Book 2)

  Claire’s Hope (Book 3)

  Dylan’s Faith (Book 4)

  Stand Alones

  Love Interrupted

  Love Again

  A Chance at Love

  The Lost Truth (2016)

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  Dedicated to my loving wife.

  For all the years she has put up with me

  And many more to come.

  Table of Contents

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  Book Previews

  Other Books

  Bonus

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Author’s Note

  PROLOGUE

  Love isn’t difficult to find in a world full of people that love themselves. What is difficult to find is true love, a love not only worth fighting for, but worth all the pain and heartache that comes along with it.

  When I met the love of my life, I knew there was something different about her. She was able to invoke something within me that I hadn’t felt before. While I was quite young at the time and much of what I was experiencing had to do with hormones, I knew deep down that she’d be special to me forever.

  With over two hundred billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy and over a hundred billion total planets, I didn’t care about anything other than being with her, no matter what.

  When I fell in love with her, I was already beginning to fall in love with the Lord.

  My name is Kyle Reynolds, and this is my story.

  CHAPTER 1

  The smell of pizza baking in the oven filled the air as I leaned against the counter at Pilo’s Pizza Parlor on the corner of Monroe and 7th. I watched as my manager, Jessica, pulled a pizza from the oven. She moved gracefully as she twirled from the oven and over to the counter. The pizza slid off the pan and onto the cutting board. As she began to slice, I contemplated my life. Was I destined to deliver pizzas? Then she picked up the cutting board and slid the slices into the box and went back over to the oven to grab another pie. While she seemed to love the work, I loathed it.

  The phone on the wall near the map of Spokane rang, breaking me from my thoughts. Reaching an arm over, I lifted it and answered.

  “Pilo’s Pizza Parlor, pizza pies piled sky high. This is Kyle.”

  Being a pizza delivery guy wasn’t exactly how I envisioned my life, but it was a job that put cash in my pocket while I searched for my purpose in the universe. My parents, Frank and Lucy, told me last summer after I graduated high school that I could take a year to figure out what I was going to do. They were a lot nicer than my buddy, Jake’s, parents, who told him to move out the day after we graduated.

  “Order up,” Jessica said, stacking the boxes on one another as she glared at me. I tried not to make eye contact with her as I closed out of the order I had just input into the computer and hung up the phone.

  Walking over to the pizzas she had boxed, I grabbed one of the delivery bags off the nearby counter and began loading them. I tried to be quick, but I wasn’t fast enough. She came over.

  “Try to be more careful with the pizza this time, Kyle. I know it’s really hard to do your job,” Jessica spewed as she walked by. She might have been an artist with pizza, but her heart wasn’t bigger than a bristle on a paintbrush.

  Closing up the delivery bag, I rested my arm on it and watched her walk by. “The dog tripped me, and I don’t think it had anything to do with my not being careful enough.”

  She ignored me and placed a ball of dough down onto a pan and began working the new order that had just come in. Setting the bag of pizzas down on the counter, I walked over to her.

  “Why do you insist on being so rude?”

  She paused and looked over at me with a surprised look on her face. “Why do you insist on not doing your job? Some of us need to work and don’t just live at home with parents who take care of everything for us.” She returned to making the pizza, grabbing the Italian sausage as she went further down the line.

  Withholding the desire to say more, I stepped away and grabbed my delivery bag. Heading over to the map on the wall, I checked the address for the order. “A church?” I said out loud as the back door opened.

  “You think Christians can’t eat pizza?” Mike said as he stomped the snow off of his boots. He was a delivery guy like me, just older—way older. Mike, in a non-threatening kind of way, terrified me. He had been slinging pepperonis and fighting back dogs on doorsteps for twenty years now. I didn’t want to become that. I had to figure something out for my life.

  “I think they can eat pizza,” I replied. “Churches just make me feel like . . . I don’t know. Confused. It’s God’s house, right?”

  He nodded.

  “So, like, it’s strange for me to think that God could be hanging out in there.” I laughed. “I don’t know.” Turning my eyes back to the map on the wall, I mentally mapped out the route I’d take and then started walking toward the back door.

  Mike’s icy hand patted my shoulder as I walked by him. Looking over, he flashed a smile, that same big, ridiculous smile he always carried with him.

  “Be careful on those roads, little man,” he said. “They’re slicking up real good now that the sun is down. Saw two wrecks on the way back from my delivery.”

  “Thanks for the heads up, Mike.” I tipped him a nod and left.

  Getting up to the church doors, I gave them a firm knock and took a step back. As I waited for someone to arrive, I took a look around the parking lot and pondered what they could be doing at church in the middle of the week.

  The doors opened.

  A man with a confused look stood in the doorway staring at me. “They weren’t locked, were they?”

  “I . . . I didn’t know,” I replied, forcing a half-smile. I held the bag in one arm as I pulled the pizzas out and handed them over.

&nbs
p; “Those roads pretty treacherous out there?” he asked as he handed me the money.

  I nodded. I began to pull bills out to give him his change.

  “Keep it,” he said, putting his hand out to stop me from breaking the hundred-dollar bill.

  I shook my head. “That’s a hundred-dollar bill, sir. I’ll get your change.”

  As my head was down, the doors of the church shut and the man was gone. Pausing for a moment, I thought to myself as I looked at the change in my hand. What on earth? Why would he give me a hundred for a twenty-five-dollar order?

  Following after him, I went inside and came into a lobby-type area and looked around for the guy. My eyes fell onto a large bay window that led into a sanctuary. Walking over, I peered in and saw that he was already down the aisle and in the front pew.

  I went through one of the doors, but I stopped for a moment when I saw a pretty girl about my age up on the stage. She looked toward me for a second and I could feel my heart’s flame of desire flicker. Maybe this was truly God’s house, because I was pretty sure she was an angel. She had curly brunette hair that shone and shimmered in the lights that were shining down onto the stage. Her lips were a soft pink color, and she had an innocence about her that made the frostbite that was nipping at my toes and fingers melt away.

  The guy saw her looking at me, and while I stood stupefied by her beauty, he hollered across the sanctuary. “Pizza boy, what are you still doing here?”

  Snapping out of it, I hurried down the rest of the aisle and came over to him. “Here’s your change, dude.”

  “I said to keep that. Why would you bring it to me?”

  “I don’t need charity. You’re crazy.”

  “It’s a tip. It ain’t crazy.”

  “I know what it is. It’s just too much of a tip. I don’t like that.”

  The girl up on stage started giggling a little and cupping her mouth as she turned her back toward us. I smiled in her direction for a moment. She thought I was funny, I thought to myself. Turning back to the crazy man, I set the money down beside the boxes of pizza on the pew since he wouldn’t take it.

  “There’s your change. I took a five for the tip.”

  Turning, I headed out of the sanctuary and to my car.

  Getting home that night, I found both of my parents still burning the night away with their friends that they had over for their annual Christmas party. My sister, Joanie, and I weren’t allowed to hang out in the living room during those occasions. Banishment to the basement to entertain the toddlers and other children that came along with their parents was standard protocol. It was usually my job, but luckily I had to work that night so the responsibility fell on Joanie.

  Walking down the stairs, I immediately laughed at the sight of Joanie. She was covered in clown make-up and her hair was up in a jumbled mess.

  “Thank goodness you’re here,” she said, standing up in the midst of the dozen or so kids.

  “But Jooooannnieeee,” one of the little girls said while she tugged at my sister’s shirt.

  The other kids were pleading for her to stay. “You’re our queen!” they chanted.

  I laughed as I came over and said with an excited tone, “Who wants to build a fort?”

  All the kids abandoned their queen at my words and rushed over to me as I stood at the base of the stairs. As I walked farther into the room, Joanie slipped away and up the stairs to make her escape.

  CHAPTER 2

  Lying in bed the next morning and not wanting to get up, I began to think. My mind went back to that angel I saw last night at the church. Was she just like all the other girls my path had crossed in the past, or was she different? Many of the girls I had dated in high school always talked about others our age while I longed for deeper conversation. Often I find myself wondering if I’ll ever meet a girl who is deeper than the puddles I find outside after a spring rain.

  Pushing her to the back of my mind, I decided to get out of bed. I played video games for an hour and then headed out to the kitchen to satisfy my growling stomach before I hit the shower and headed off to work. Having a job was something I used to long for when I was younger—even a few years ago I did—but now that I have one, I hate it. That realization worried me. It made me wonder how much more in life I was wrong about.

  As I walked into the kitchen, my eyes landed on my parents. Similar to two zombies that were raised from the dead, my parents sat at the kitchen table clutching cups of coffee as they covered their foreheads with their hands, trying to shield their regret from the night before.

  “You do know it’s literally poison you’re putting in your bodies, right?” I asked, heading for the coffee pot.

  “Shh . . .” my mother said with a soft and remorseful tone.

  I laughed and poured coffee into my mug. My father looked over at me and said, “You don’t drink coffee.”

  “Yeah I do, Dad. You’re just normally at work around this time.”

  He looked over at my mom and asked without raising his voice too much, “When did this start, Lucy?”

  “Frank, he was drinking a cup of coffee just the other day when you were home to grab your work keys,” she replied.

  “Hmm . . .” he replied, not seeming to care. He shrugged and slowly brought his cup up to his lips.

  I sat my coffee mug down at the table, and it made a small clanking noise as it hit the surface.

  “Quiet down!” my father scolded.

  I laughed and sat down at the table with my parents. A few minutes went by with silence at the table, and then my mother got up and went into the other room.

  “How was your shift last night?” my father asked.

  “Fine.”

  “Fine? The roads were bad yesterday. My buddy, Pete, from work said he slid off the road once on his way over.”

  I nodded as I finished taking a drink of my coffee. “They were slick, but it worked out. This dude at a church tried to tip me like $75.”

  “Tried?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. Tried. I refused it.”

  “That was stupid. That’s a great tip you passed up,” he retorted.

  “I don’t need handouts.”

  “That’s stupid, Son. What do you call living rent-free at my house? That’s a handout! That guy was just trying to be nice.”

  I furrowed my eyebrows. “Not taking handouts is what you taught me.”

  “Yeah. From the government! This is your job. Someone wants to tip you for a job well done, take the money!” He began laughing as he shook his head. “I’m sorry if I’m coming off mean. I’m just baffled, Son.”

  “I get it.”

  Not long after my conversation with my father, I headed to the shower and then took off to work.

  After my shift that day, I went over to my friend, Jake’s, place. He had been my buddy for over a decade, and we shared not only an interest for deep discussions about life, but a passion for gaming. He moved out of his parents’ and into an apartment with the help of his grandmother co-signing on the lease. Within a week of being on his own, he snagged a dream job with a local magazine that publishes monthly. He’s paid per article he writes and doesn’t have to punch a clock.

  When I walked into his apartment, Jake’s eyes were glued to his TV and his butt to his gaming chair. Without stopping his game, he dropped his headphones to his neck and said, “Sup, Kyle.”

  “Just got off work. What’s up with you?”

  “Just gaming. How was work?”

  “It was all right,” I replied as I watched him climb through a tunnel with his gun on the screen. “Wanna go up to The Abby?”

  The Abby was a large hill just north of Spokane, off the freeway and down a beaten path. It had the perfect view of the entire city, and it was the perfect spot to sit, chill and think about life. Jake and I often went up there with a twelve pack of soda and would just stare at the stars as we talked about girls, life and the futures we had before us.

  He shook his head. “Not really.”

/>   I sighed.

  “Why do you like that place so much? It doesn’t hold the same value to me anymore.”

  “Whatever. We’ve been up there plenty of times. It’s cool.”

  “Yeah—in high school, when I needed to get out of my parents’ house. I’m on my own now. I don’t need that.” His eyes stayed on the TV.

  “Man . . . there’s got to be more to life than this.”

  He paused his game and furrowed his eyebrows at me as he turned around. “What do you mean?”

  “I just work, sleep, eat, game, work, sleep, eat.”

  He laughed. “Well, we’re only nineteen. We have our whole lives ahead of us, right? There’s getting married. Kids. Family. Stuff that we’ll do eventually. Oh. College—can’t forget about that. For you, of course. I already have it figured out.”

  “What? The magazine?”

  “Yeah, Dude. I love my job. I won’t ever punch a clock.”

  “You don’t know that. The magazine could go under or you could get fired.”

  He shook his head. “They’re here for the long haul.” He turned back to his game and resumed playing.

  “Yeah. I’m going to head up to The Abby.” I stood up and headed for the door.

  “All right, see ya.”

  Pulling my hood up and over my head, I dipped my chin and hurried out the door and through the blowing snow out to my car.

  On the drive up to The Abby, I turned the radio on. Listening to an acapella version of Holy Night, I thought of that girl that I had seen the day before at the church. Man, she was beautiful, I thought to myself. Remembering the stage, I realized there was Christmas related stuff behind her. I got to thinking that maybe they had a Christmas service I could attend. Maybe I could see her again. She did smile when she looked at me, and she even laughed. My chances were good, but I didn’t enjoy the fact that she was a church girl. Dating someone religious didn’t particularly interest me, as they usually desired like-minded people for relationships or to convert the ones who weren’t.