Chapter Eighteen Emily
Chapter Eighteen
Emily
“Oh my gosh, this is such a horrible idea,” I say, crouched behind the little stone wall of Bart’s house. We parked down the road and walked what felt like eighteen miles to get here, which was rough on my body that has been doing nothing but sitting all day. The second after I read Jack’s text about sending my chapters to Colette, I edited the shit out of those first eight chapters. Tomorrow morning I’ll be sending my book through the ether to land in Colette Menton’s inbox, and it could change my life forever. Colette is worlds bigger than Barbara, and although I’m a little hesitant to sign with an agent with so many clients and whose bio said she prides herself in selling books of higher-than-average caliber, it feels good to inch a little closer to turning a dream I’ve kept stuffed away into something tangible. I can’t fully process it yet.
“Yeah, it’s a bad idea for sure.”
I whip my head in Jack’s direction. “You were supposed to make me feel better by saying we’re not doing anything wrong because we’re not actually going to steal anything.”
“No, we’d still go to jail if we get caught.”
“Maybe you’ll go to jail, but I will remind Sheriff Tony that I bought fifteen boxes of his daughter’s Girl Scout cookies this year and get off with a warning.”
“You’re not even going to attempt to get me out with you?”
I shrug. “Why should I?”
“Because I’m pretty,” he says with the sincerest expression. “And you’d miss my company.”
I squint. “Debatable.”
“Let’s test it.” Jack stands and dusts his hands off against his navy pants. It’s actually the most somber I’ve ever seen him dress. Between the pants, brown boots, and gray Henley, there’s not a pop of color on him. It makes me think I should have worn something sneakier too. Instead, I’m in a pair of high-waisted jeans and a red-and-white floral top with cute little pearl buttons lining the front. Very impractical for a heist. But very cute. I regret nothing.
When Jack takes a step, the main floodlights of the backyard flare to life. My heart pounds as he brazenly walks right up to the back door.
“Jack!” I whisper loudly, but he just waves for me to follow.
I scurry up behind him, checking over my shoulder like a SWAT team is going to suddenly pounce from the woods and arrest us. So far so good, though.
“How are we going to get in there? Oh—are you picking the lock?” I ask as he drops to his haunches.
“I’m sincerely flattered that you think I could pick a lock.” He reaches under the little frog gnome by the door and withdraws a shiny key.
I gasp in delighted shock. “How did you know that was under there, Sherlock?”
“My senses were tingling. Also last year when Bart was out of town he asked me to come put a package inside his house. Key is in the same place it was then.”
Jack inserts the key inside the lock and turns it. It opens easily and my stomach swoops with anticipation. A wave of cool air-conditioning billows out to welcome us. The grin Jack tosses me over his shoulder, however, is far more welcoming. I don’t know what to do about the fact that I seem to have a full-blown crush on Jack.
Or no. Not a crush. Something bigger and scarier. I think about him constantly. If anything funny happens, I want to email him or text him or run next door and demand he hear about it. If I can’t sleep, I find myself tiptoeing toward the front door, my greedy little feet set on scuttling across our lawns like a hermit crab until I end up in his bed.
I don’t like change. And I’m terrified of relationships. But I find myself contemplating both of those things with him. Which is why I must resist. You need more time, I chant to myself like a witch over a cauldron. Let the feelings cook before you act on them. There’s no rush. And if they’re still there in a month or two, maybe I can consider it. Safety is key here.
“After you, Emily Stalker,” says Jack, extending a hand for me to pass through before him.
“Quit calling me that. I am not a stalker, and someone might get the wrong idea.”
His fingertips brush mine as I walk by. “Says the woman currently breaking into a house in the dead of night.” Once we’re inside, he softly closes the door behind us, and we’re plunged into darkness.
“It’s nine p.m. , hardly the dead of night.”
Jack and I click on the flashlights we brought and shine them around the kitchen. “I’ve actually never been here before.”
“Really?” He illuminates a giant rooster print above the little breakfast table. There’s an apple print border wrapping the room, with blue-and-white-striped wallpaper covering the lower half of the wall. “I’ve been here twice.”
I shine the flashlight at Jack’s face, and he grimaces. “When was the second time?”
“To have breakfast with him.”
“You had breakfast with Bart?”
“Why does that shock you?” I like how his voice sounds a little like sandpaper when he’s quiet.
“Because other teachers have invited you to do at least a hundred things with them and you always declined and gave a bogus reason like your dog was sick and needed to be taken to the vet.”
“Taking a sick dog to the vet is a valid reason.”
“Sure. If you owned a dog.”
His quiet laugh is delicious. “Busted.”
After verifying that there’s no laptop anywhere on the counter, we meander into the next room. A formal dining room. Equally dated as the kitchen. Wallpapered in burgundy. Large china hutch on one wall, full of dishes.
“I always wondered why you never did hang out with any of the teachers outside of school. I know you were invited to Hank’s several times. And Rachel’s murder mystery party. I thought for sure you’d go to that.”
He shines his light in my direction but not quite in my eyes because he’s nicer than me. “What’s your guess? I know you have one.”
We’re on opposite sides of the formal dining table and slowly meeting around the far side. “Zoe was jealous? Didn’t want you spending after-hours with other people?”
We stop right in front of each other. Close enough that I can hear his hint of a laugh. “You really didn’t like Zoe, did you?”
“She made you feel bad about your glasses.” I reach up to touch my index finger to the side of the frame like I’m petting my favorite animal. “I hate her.”
He smiles. “I know you’re not gonna like hearing this, but she wasn’t an evil person. She had her good moments.”
“Did she cheat on you?”
He squints. “Yes. But I don’t believe the fault was all hers. I contributed to the problems of our relationship as much as she did.”
“Was her cheating a onetime mistake? Or was it an affair?”
He sighs. “You’re a relentless pain in the ass when your nose catches a scent.”
“Thank you. Answer the question.”
“An affair.” He looks away and then back. “She was cheating for a year. It’s part of why she wanted us to move to Nebraska. He had moved there first.”
My stomach bottoms out. “ Jack. ”
“No. Don’t do that. You don’t know the ins and outs of our relationship. I was just as much at fault as she was.”
“Why? Did you cheat too?”
He looks appalled by this concept. “No.”
I groan and turn away. “See. You’re too nice.”
He’s trailing behind me. “Something I never thought I’d hear you say.”
“What do you think you could have possibly done that would have warranted her cheating for an entire year and moving you guys to Nebraska to be closer to the man she was cheating with?”
“I was distant. I never really opened up to her. I never loved her like I should have because…well…I didn’t love her.”
We’re in the living room now. “You…didn’t love her? Why did you stay with her for so long?”
In his silence, I count four ticks of the grandfather clock down the hall. And then…“When I was a kid, we moved away from the house I was raised in and into a big fancy one in a gated community. I hated it there. It didn’t have my favorite worn-in carpet or cool secret hiding place under the stairs. And I made the mistake of telling my parents. I told them I hated it there and I wanted to go home.” At some point during this speech, I’ve gravitated closer to Jack. “My mom started crying immediately because she felt so bad I was unhappy, and my dad couldn’t stand when my mom showed emotion. He told me to look at what my being a spoiled brat had done to my mom. He said he was only trying to make our lives better, that I was being ungrateful, and that he didn’t even want to talk to me if I was going to act so spoiled. He slammed the door to his office, and then my mom went in her room and bawled because she couldn’t make anyone happy.”
“Oh, Jack…”
“I think that’s the first time I remember feeling like I’d rather bury my own feelings than be the cause of so much pain again.” He shrugs. “It got worse over the years, and every step along the way has been a snowball of that moment. Little by little I shut myself down. Avoided confrontation because facing it felt like I was being chased by an imaginary bear rather than just an argument.”
“Do you feel like that when we argue?” I hold my breath waiting for his response. If he says yes, I’ll never forgive myself. And I wonder when exactly this happened. When did Jack go from someone I hoped would step on a nail to a man who has warm flesh and blood and a golden heart beating under his cozy knit shirt. A heart I very much care about.
His smile is so soft it’s made from the same silk as my favorite PJs. “I never feel that way when we argue. It’s always been different with you.”
“Why?” I need to know.
“I think because when we would fight, I’d show you my absolute worst again and again, and you kept coming back for more. You never shut the door on me. My thoughts and opinions have always been safe with you. And God, Emily, I can’t tell you how good it is to always know exactly what you’re thinking with no mind games in the way.”
I know what he means. I feel the same way. I have freedom from perfection with him, and that’s the best gift I’ve ever received from anyone.
“But to answer your earlier question, no, Zoe didn’t keep me from socializing with the teachers. I did that all on my own because I don’t…I don’t like to get too close to people. I always have this feeling like something will go wrong if I do—so it’s been easier to keep to myself. Even with Zoe. So that’s what I mean when I say it wasn’t all her fault. She probably felt lonely in our relationship too. That’s why I can’t hate her.”
I have to turn away so I don’t wrap my arms around him and squeeze. He’s just so…he’s so good. His heart is kind and empathetic. And I really, really like him. It’s a big problem to have when I’m trying to convince myself not to do anything about my feelings. “Listen to me, Jack. No matter what you say, you did not deserve to be cheated on. If she was lonely, she should have ended it before moving on to someone else or communicated with you to fix it. Don’t take on the responsibility of her mistake.” I pause. “But if you don’t want to hate her, fine. I’ll hate her enough for the both of us.”
“Thank you,” he says with a soft grin, then shifts uncomfortably on his feet, clearly ready to be finished talking about Zoe. “All right, let’s find this damn laptop.”
We both leave the living room and walk down the hallway. I shine the flashlight against the wall of photos and find a slew of images of Bart as a young man with a woman I don’t recognize.
“Strange to think of Bart with a wife, right?” Jack says, coming to stand beside me.
“I’ve never seen a picture of her before.” All I know is that she died at some point in the ’90s.
“Yeah. And he doesn’t talk about her much. But that morning I came over for breakfast, he did tell me he hasn’t changed a thing since she passed. That’s why the house looks frozen in time.”
My heart squeezes with recognition. I know that kind of pain. The grief that makes you terrified to let go of the time you were once happy. Suddenly I wonder if this will be me one day: living in a home that I’m afraid to change, afraid to grow in because I’m so scared of leaning into the pain of change.
It feels lonely in here. And maybe it’s just because the lights are off, but there’s an eeriness to it. I don’t want to live in a house like this one day.
But I’m not quite as stagnant as I used to be, am I? I wrote a book. And I’m taking a chance on myself and sending it to the best agent out there. And I’m breaking and entering with my ex-nemesis who is now my friend. There’s hope for me yet.
“Emily,” Jack calls from down the hall. I was so lost in thought I didn’t even realize he had walked away. “I found his laptop.”
The relief that floods my body could rival a tsunami. I hurry in the direction of his voice and hang a left into the home office where Jack is seated behind Bart’s desk. The screen lights up, illuminating Jack’s face when he opens the lid. He looks like a cartoon character who’s just discovered a treasure chest.
“Is it password protected?” I ask, coming around the side of the desk.
Jack’s slow smile is all the confirmation I need. “Nope.”
“God bless Bart and his trusting heart. Do you see the email?”
Jack doesn’t get to answer me. In the next moment our gazes snap to each other as the sound of a key rattling in a door lock trickles through the room. “Is that…?”