IronMommy

Goal: Find a boyfriend, get married, buy a house in the suburbs with a white picket fence, and pop out 2.5 kids. Deadline: Sixty days. That's possible, right? There is no doubt that, this year, home for the holidays takes on a whole new, terrifying meaning. I have to travel from New York City - my home and safe haven for the last 15 years - to my tiny hometown in Vermont for Christmas, my baby sister's wedding, and my high school reunion.

Mabel "Maybe" Willis died a virgin at the very young age of 24. She leaves behind her parents, Betty and Bruce, her brother, Evan, a laptop filled with one too many Jason Momoa memes, and a Kindle library with more books than one human being could ever finish in a lifetime. Cause of death: a text message. Okay. So, I didn't die. But I may as well have. One minute, I'm a woman trying to find her way in the world, and the next, I'm the sender of six of the most embarrassing text messages that have ever been sent in the history of time - or the cell phone. Whatever.

When Rome Pierce moved to Bear Bottom, Texas, it was his intention to lay low. To find a way to heal his body and soul - as well as his son's. Nobody would know by looking at him that he used to play professional football. Not with the Bear Bottom MC cut covering his back. Nobody knows what drove him to leave the game he loved - nobody but her. She's the one person who has helped him make it through the dark days and even darker nights. She's the bright and shining star in his pitch-black sky. And he doesn't even know her name.