Title: Back to Yesterday
Series: Bleeding Hearts #2
Author: Whitney Barbetti
Release Date: Oct 20, 2016
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The distance from Colorado to Maine is not far enough to escape the memories.
The time I've been away is not long enough to heal the pain.
I left Colorado, determined to discover who I am outside of my grief, but I fell apart along the way.
I'm lost again.
When Jude follows me, I can't turn him away. But I can't let him in, either.
Not all the way.
I know when he finds out my secret, the one I keep hidden in the darkest part of my heart, he’ll leave me.
Alone.
Like I was before.
The time I've been away is not long enough to heal the pain.
I left Colorado, determined to discover who I am outside of my grief, but I fell apart along the way.
I'm lost again.
When Jude follows me, I can't turn him away. But I can't let him in, either.
Not all the way.
I know when he finds out my secret, the one I keep hidden in the darkest part of my heart, he’ll leave me.
Alone.
Like I was before.
“Are you okay?”
He laughed, but it was without humor. He dropped his head and stared at his plate as I had minutes earlier. “Am I okay?” Shaking his head, he said, “No, I’m not fucking okay.” He pushed away from the table hard enough that the screech of the chair across the wooden floor startled me. Jude was always so steady, and while he wasn’t necessarily predictable, he wasn’t prone to outbursts of anger like this. He picked up his plate and walked to the sink and I stared at his back, willing him to talk to me. But I couldn’t ask that of him.
Picking up my plate, I debated what to do. It was surreal almost, being in Jude’s apartment but not touching him the way I wanted to. Finally, I joined him at the sink as he worked a sponge into a lather and swiped it across his plate. “Let me do it,” I said softly, reaching a hand in to take the sponge from him.
He let go of the plate and clasped my forearm as I reached into the sink. His touch was gentle as he turned my wrist over and rubbed a thumb slowly across the length of my vein, visible through my translucent skin. I could only hold my breath as he touched me like this, like he was memorizing the blue lines that ran the length of my forearm. His hands were warm, searching, and I realized that I’d been yearning for this, for the simple act of him touching my skin like it was delicate. His fingers moved down, and my closed fist opened to give him access to my palm, where he traced the lines in my hands. It was so intimate, even in its simplicity, that all I could do was watch him as he examined my hands. “I’ve missed you,” he said in a voice that was just short of a whisper. My heart turned over as he bent my fingers gently back into my fist and rubbed his soapy fingers over the knuckles.
When he let go of my hand and turned away from me, I felt goose bumps ignite across my skin. All I wanted was for him to keep touching me, but I’d hurt him. And he’d hurt me.
We had miles of pain between the two of us, and even though we were no longer miles apart, that pain existed between us like another person, holding both of us back.
“I missed you too,” I said too late, when I’d caught my breath again.
“Please,” he pleaded as he rinsed the plate in his hands. “I can’t hear you say that right now.”
Nodding, I backed away. I understood. This wasn’t the time or place, and we were little more than strangers right now. I was a new Trista, someone he had never known.
Likely, someone he didn’t want to know.
United Indie Book Blog Review
Reviewer: Michelle
Rating: 4 Stars
Back to Yesterday is the second book in a series. It is very important to read Into the Tomorrows before reading this story.
That said, there could be spoilers in this review if you haven't read the first book, proceed with that in mind.
This book picks up after Trista learned of Colin's unfaithfulness, Jude's lying and the revealing of their medical condition. Trista was so overwhelmed by it all, that she left. She decided she need to get away from it all, and she finds herself headed as far away as she could get from Colorado without leaving the country, ending up at an inn in Maine. She says she needs to figure her life out and needs to discover who she is. She was always Ellie's friend or Colin's girlfriend, it's time for her to figure out who Trista is on her own. And she hopes she can find that in Maine, even though she desperately misses Jude.
There, she seeks refugee and the owner of the inn, Maura, lets her stay there and work to help pay for her room and board. She struggles with the past sadness that Ellie left when she died and all the information she recently found out about those she cared about.
The story is told in past and present, alternating from what is going on with Trista in the present, and then flash backing to what has been going on the two years she has been away from Colorado.
It's a little hard for me to put into words about this story. It has some deep issues and situations that a lot of people seem to face these days, whether or not they admit it or get help for those issues. Depression is a real illness and it can affect people differently.
I struggled with the first book, as it seemed to just repeat a lot of things...how sad Trista was after Ellie, how she couldn't care less about her boyfriend, how she kept letting her mother belittle her and make her feel insignificant. It got a little tiresome reading the same things, so I was a little hesitant going into this book. And while, she does bring up those same issues, this book is more fast paced than the first and it held my interest more.
I am in no way belittling what Trista went through and her struggles to overcome her insecurities. I'm just glad that the second book picked up a little more pace and substance.
I really felt bad for Trista and what she went through, but at times I wanted just to yell at her to stop putting herself in those situations! Her mother is like poison, draining her of all her life, but she keeps going back for the abuse and the humiliation. And I wanted to slap her, no mother should treat their own child that way, make them feel as if they are inconsequential.
And it wasn't fair that she strung Jude along for two years while she 'figured her sh*t' out. Because when she had to come back to Colorado to deal with something, something that kind of set her on this path in the first place, it was Jude that was always there for her. Trying to help her and make her feel loved and important. Jude might be my favorite character of the story!
In the end, it was a fairly decent storyline and with serious issues that the characters needed worked on. It was good to see how they handled them in the end and was able to cope with what was going on. A work in progress, and aren't we all that? A work in progress, always having to deal with one thing or another. And I really liked the poetry in the story, it brought more meaning to the characters feelings and was very well done.
I am a wife to one and a mom to two humans and one cat. I have a deep and abiding love for nachos - especially the kind with the liquid cheese, like from Taco Bell (sorry). I run on less than four hours of sleep thanks to copious amounts of Diet Coke. (Note: this paragraph is not sponsored by anyone except my hungry stomach.)
As a Navy brat, I grew up all over the country, from California, up the east coast from Florida to New England and Colorado. I currently live in Idaho, where we have lots of potatoes and windmills.
I write character-driven New Adult novels, heavy on the emotional connection. I LOVE love. I love writing about broken characters who find their soul mates.
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