Sandcastle Daze - A Short Story

By Mona Ingram

Author's note: Unlike my regular romance novels, this short story is intended for Young Adult readers.

Sometimes it takes an outsider to make us see what's right before our eyes

Carolyn Butler likes Todd  Keating but he won't let anyone close enough to find out what he's really like.

And then Diego Lopez comes to town to compete in the sandcastle contest. His sculpted lips, brooding eyes and ripped body take Carolyn's breath away.

Is it any wonder Carolyn is lost in a sandcastle daze?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mona Ingram
• Release date: Sep 21, 2017
• ISBN: 9781386683483

Mona Ingram

Mona Ingram loves to make up stories and is the author of more than four dozen romances. Most mornings she can be found at her computer, trying to keep up with the characters in her current work, many of whom invariably want to go off in a completely different direction than she planned. But that’s the joy of writing. An avid bird watcher, Mona is particularly happy when she can combine bird watching with travel.

Book preview

Sandcastle Daze

A SHORT STORY

by

Mona Ingram

©2015 Mona Ingram

All rights reserved

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter One

D on’t look now, but Todd Keating just drove in.

As if I care. Carolyn sometimes wished that Julie would quit going on about Todd. The truth was, ever since he’d asked her to dance on graduation night, her best friend had been on ‘Todd alert.’ She was still puzzled about why he’d walked across the dance floor, stopped in front of her and held out his hand. It might have been different if it had been a slow number, or if he’d asked her for a second dance. But no...he’d escorted her back to the table with that sauntering, long-legged walk, a faint smile on his face. She’d been sitting with Julie and Heath, an awkward third person without a date.

Well hear this, my friend. While you’re busy pretending not to care, he’s headed this way.

Why today, of all days? Carolyn shoved her fingers through her hair. It had looked great on the night of the dance, but since then, her hair had reverted to its usual mass of unruly curls. She pinned up the last of the plastic flags, determined to ignore him. Even now, more than a month since they’d danced together, she wondered if he’d been toying with her, but it didn’t really matter because she hadn’t seen him again. At least to talk to. He was hard to miss around town, driving that big 4x4 pickup with the massive off-road tires. The truck was always mud-splattered, as though he needed to remind everyone that it wasn’t just for show.

Beats me, but he’s headed right this way. Julie handed her a stack of paper. Here, look busy. Start folding these info sheets.

Carolyn moved to the far end of the table and started folding, but her fingers wouldn’t work. And to make things worse, a breeze sneaked in from the ocean, threatening to scatter the papers all over the park. It was bad enough, the way her heart was trying to jump out of her chest. If she dropped the papers, she’d die of embarrassment. 

She raised her eyes. Julie was right. Todd Keating was strolling across the manicured lawn as if he owned it, and in a way he did. Here on Vancouver Island, the logging industry employed a large percentage of the labor force – including her father – and Keating Logging was the largest of them all. She should have expected Todd to show up. After all, his father’s business had co-sponsored the sandcastle competition for years. She gave herself a mental smack. They were called sand sculptures now. Even the humble sandcastles of her youth had morphed into something else. Something commercial. But Oceanside was famous for the yearly competition as well as for its beaches, and the artistic creations drew in thousands of tourists over the several weeks they were left on display.

Todd’s progress was slowed as he exchanged words with someone at a picnic table. She couldn’t take her eyes off him. At school, she refused to be lumped in with all the other girls, the ones who cheered his every move during basketball, listened with rapt attention when he spoke in class, who bragged for days if he offered them a ride in his truck. One day he’d commented on Joyce Madden’s blue sweater and the next day every girl in the class showed up in a blue sweater. It was enough to put you off blue for life. That is, every girl except Carolyn. And Julie, who had eyes for Heath and no