The Long Goodbye

by Rhonda Hanson

Overview

THE LONG GOODBYE is dedicated to anyone who has ever become its victim, and who may even now be unable to move ahead without looking back. It is for those who will one day find themselves faced with the difficult decision to be willing to be part of another's journey of transition, even though it will be painful to watch them go through the door. Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.

"Clarissa, I have something for you."

There was a quality in his tone that alerted her to the fact that he was here as a reluctant messenger. Rather than question him, she stood gazing up at him, her eyes lowering as she watched his hand reach into his pocket for the letter.

He stopped and looked at her intently. "Where is your phone? May I use it?" He took it from her and added himself as a new contact, then messaged himself from it, before handing it back to her. Things were beginning to feel nightmarish to the beautiful, anxious woman.

He reached for her hand and gave her fingers a slight pressure, then lifted it and placed the envelope into her palm. She stared down at it and recognized the artistic, but unsteady penmanship, and prophetic tears immediately rushed to her eyes.

He moved toward the door and heard his name cried out in a broken, panicked, watery voice. When he turned back to face her, the same pain was in his own eyes. She watched him leave, then stared back down at the envelope. She could hear the faint sound of a tear splashing down on it.

"I can't," she whispered to herself. "I can't."

She lifted her eyes and saw a stark, pale, ghostly version of herself in the antique hall tree mirror. There was an envelope in that strange woman's hand as well. Clarissa turned away, bowing her head and allowing a soft moan to escape her lips.

He was finally going to tell her.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9798218593612
Publisher:	Grace Under Pressure Publishing
Publication date:	01/31/2025
Pages:	270
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.57(d)

About the Author

Rhonda Hanson is one of a pair of twins, the youngest of ten siblings, raised on Black Bayou in Louisiana. For much of her childhood, she lived without the luxuries of indoor plumbing and electricity. Growing up without the Internet, devices, or television, she was left to discover the exciting worlds that can only be discovered within the pages of a good book. She is a collector of vintage children's books, and is not embarrassed to admit that she will reread the same book over and over, if it makes her happy. Her own imagination began to be challenged at an early age, and she would pen practically anything and everything that fermented in her mind, much of which is sadly lost or left back in her youth, probably in some old trunk in someone's barn. Today, Rhonda is a novelist, recording artist, songwriter, musician and speaker, but her most crowning achievement is being "Grammy" to her two granddaughters. She spends her days in middle Tennessee, writing, convincing feral cats that the Hanson Hotel is open for business, bragging to anyone who will listen about her grandchildren and tearing all her MacBooks apart and rebuilding them, because of her stubborn refusal to upgrade. Her first completed novel was "Father's Choice", book one in the three-book Father series, followed by Father's Wings and Father's Song, and the linked novel Father's Friend. Rhonda is also the author of a children's book, "The Adventures Of Pahwoo And Her Friends", which is the narrative of an ongoing bedtime story she regularly told her grandchildren, for a period of over seven years. Other books include "The Master of Hawthorn Manor", "Buying The Farm", "Once Upon An Altar", "The Art Of Letting Go", and "Dancing to an Elegy for Eden".