dean
&
milly
still the one
dean orleans
Dean is your classic Cadbury Egg. Hard on the outside, but so soft on the inside that he doesn’t let many people close enough to damage that shell. While he and his mother have never gotten along, for reasons he can’t pinpoint, he had a warm if distant relationship with his father. His father’s death when he was eighteen was just one of the blows he experienced in his senior year of high school. He knows love is real, he just doesn’t think he’ll have it again. When the only girl he’s ever loved, Milly, is thrust back into his life, he pushes past his fear of being hurt again. He’s not a man to waste a second chance and grabs hold of it with both hands.
Books he appears in
Q & A
1.) Which talent would you most like to have?
I wish I could draw. Most things like singing, dancing, writing are what I call, pseudo-talents. Their less about innate ability and more about craft.
Becoming a successful visual artist, though is almost always about 30% craft and 70% vision. There’s something incredibly mind-blowing about someone who can pick use a pencil to create something no one has ever seen before. That’s what draws me to my clients. They may be classically trained, but their innate creativity is on full display in their work. They’re not selling a product, they’re offering an experience or emotion that you can’t get anywhere else. They embody an “it” factor that can’t be taught or bought.
2.) If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
I know I’m supposed to say I wouldn’t change a thing, but I can’t. I wish I was more patient and trusting. The lack of both get in between me and my goals, and people I care about more than anything else ever has.
3.) What do you consider your greatest achievement?
Going out on my own as agent and building a client base bigger than the one at the firm I left all on my own. Everyone said I was crazy. That I’d fail. I believed them at times, but I believed in myself more.
4.) What in your past feels like a ghost and continues to haunt you?
My father’s sudden death. It turned my life upside down then. Years later, all the unanswered questions he left behind still eat at me. There is so much I don’t know. There’s some I know but can’t believe and wish he could help me make sense of them.
5. ) Do you ever wish you had siblings
All the time when I was growing up but I don’t feel that way anymore.
millicent hassan
Millicent Hassan is a wife, mom and wedding planner who lives in Houston, TX.
She’s the oldest of three girls and takes her big sister role very seriously. Milly is strategic, compassionate, and resilient.
Blindsided by the end of a relationship, Milly has to reimagine her future and figure out who she is without a husband to take care of. She’s never gotten over her first love, Dean but they’ve got a mountain of baggage to sort through before they can begin again. Milly has to decide whether the love she wants to claim is worth a trip to the last place she wants to visit - her past.
Books she appears in
All for Love
Q & A
1.) Where would you most like to live
In the Caribbean. I’d build a house on the beach, with panoramic views and windows that let the sea air in. I know hurricanes are fact of life there, but they are in Texas, too. I love warm weather and love the water.
2.) what is your most valued possession
I have more than one - but they’re all basically the same thing. They are all gifts given to me by people I love. The ring on my right hand was a gift from Dean when we were in high school. The pendant around my neck is from my parents. The silver picture frame where I keep a picture of my favorite people was a mother’s day gift from my son.
3.) what living person do you most admire
It have to be Oprah Winfrey. Talk about a Phoenix. She’s such an inspiration and all the amazing content she curates for her magazine and website have been a constant in my journey to rediscovering who I am. I also love that she lives by her own terms and hasn’t conformed to society’s expectations of women.
4.) what do you splurge on?
Clothes. I’ll pay top dollar for something I love. I gift my sisters statement pieces of clothing and accessories for their birthdays or to celebrate an achievement.
5. ) if a crystal ball could tell you your future, would you want to know.
No way. I spent my whole life planning for a future I things that have taken me by surprise have been the best things that ever happened to me.