Chapter 19 #2
My eyes jerk up from his pierced navel.
Oh my!
“Are you coming?” Jayden leans into one of the posts with a cocky smirk that has the pronounced thrum of my pulse hammering through me as I meander to him, sticking to the glass balustrade, as far away from the pool as I can get.
Maybe this wasn’t a good idea.
I know I’m not doing anything wrong, looking isn’t bad. Still, that unknown pang hits me harder. A twist in my belly that has all my muscles tightening around my bones.
“You can help yourself to anything from the kiosk. It’s fully stocked with drinks, snacks, and towels. There’s also light beer on tap and Prosecco.”
“I don’t drink.”
“I know. But if you ever want to bring Christina up here, she might like it,” he retorts, unwinding a rope from the post next to him so that a hanging table lowers in the middle of the sun bed.
As he goes about laying out our drinks and his book on the polished wooden plank, he asks, “Eli doesn’t drink alcohol either, is that also a thing where you’re from? ”
“Your body is a temple and—”
“Didn’t Jesus turn water into wine?” He levels me with a challenging quirk of his brow.
“Jayden, the Bible is like any other book. Words designed to tell a story, to make you feel, and believe in something.” I flick through the dog-eared pages of the book he lent me to a heavily highlighted and annotated spread. Holding it between us, I tell him, “No different to this.”
Jayden smiles, a warm glow flushing his cheeks while he sinks down onto the blue and white striped mattress. That unknown wrench twists tighter, like it’s pulling at a place inside me that’s just as new.
“I believe in science.”
“Me too.” I sit opposite him, across the table, crossing my legs the same way he crosses his while he opens our sodas. “Science is fact. It’s undeniable, right?”
My eyes drop to the half-heart, silver pendant hanging from his neck by a black and silver beaded chain.
“Yeah, science is fact,” he nods, twisting the ring on his thumb.
“Doesn’t fact always start off as faith?” I take a sip of my soda, enjoying the way the sweet burst fizzes on my tongue while he watches me pensively.
“Faith? Like God?”
“No. Just faith. Belief that something is possible. That it exists. That if we keep searching, we’ll find it or if we keep trying, it’ll happen.”
Jayden’s stare fixes me with a frown. I should probably look away or say something lighter. Maybe comment on the worn state of his books so I can swerve the conversation into comfortable territory. I don’t.
Holding his gaze, I take a long gulp of the orange soda. Just when I think I’ve gone too deep for him, Jayden’s mouth stretches into a slow grin that grows wider than I’ve ever seen it before.
It’s cute and my insides go all gooey.
The breeze murmurs through the warm rays of the early fall sun, lazily blustering through my messy hair. It doesn’t feel like fall with the sound of the waves in the near distance and the brine of the ocean salting my lips. The only thing that would make it any better is Elijah.
I’m closing my eyes when Jayden shifts. Bracing himself on his forearm, he reaches for his book, but at the last minute he grabs my journal.
“What do you write in here?” He asks, holding it up like a trophy.
“Words. Sometimes I draw and paint, too.”
He narrows his eyes on me. “Like?”
“Depends on what I’m feeling.”
Jayden makes no move to open the notebook when he rests it on his thigh. He’s looking at it like it’s going to tell him my deepest, darkest secrets. As though it’s going to give him a side of me he doesn’t have.
“It’s not a diary.”
“Can I?”
The hopeful optimism in his eyes gives him a puppy-like expression that has my chest squeezing while I take him in. Thick, wavy hair that’s as dark as the long lashes framing his bright eyes. Brown, green, and amber with the rare speck of blue that I’ve never noticed before.
“Sure. Go for it,” I tell him, trying to distract myself from the fact that I’m admiring him too much for too long.
That’s not okay when I’m here for Elijah. When he’s the only man I’ve ever wanted or had eyes for.
I love him.
“Metanoia,” Jayden reads aloud, bringing my focus back to him as he reads the pretty words I’ve written along with their meanings. “Noun. The journey of changing one’s mind, heart, self, or way of life.”
“Seemed fitting for a new beginning. New journal. New life.”
“New friends,” he says, glimpsing up at me from the dotted pages with a grin.
“Yeah,” I swallow down the choking sensation that burns in my chest, “friends… friends.”
The echo of my words wrenches with a guttural pull that feels all kinds of wrong and sad. It doesn’t make sense which only adds to my confusion.
Jayden’s finger traces the scatter of stars to the edge of the page before he turns it. He pauses, taking in the wisteria border framing the spread pages. His thumb smooths over the water-warped paper from the watercolors I used.
“Yonderly,” he reads with a knowing snicker that morphs into a sigh. “Adjective.”
“Mentally and, or emotionally distant.”
“Gloomy or morose.” His stare flickers to mine. “It’s a good description of him. In locker room terms it would be asshole.”
I chuckle at his playful remark. “It makes him sound mean.”
“Are you sure you’re from a hockey family?”
“Umm, not how it works in Havenview. My parents support my brother because of what his profile does for The Fellowship. It makes them look good in the eyes of the congregation. Like they’re blessed and favored by The Lord.
But I’m just… me.” I shrug, suddenly feeling aware of the information I’m giving him.
“What does it mean to be you?”
When I shrug again, he pats the space beside him, beckoning me to his side. I shouldn’t move. I should keep our physical distance, except that Jayden makes me feel safe and comforted. Not so alone.
Although I keep some space between us, the closeness feels warmer than it should. Like his body is calling to mine. His heat pulling at the unspoken loneliness in my bones.
“You’re quiet and nerdy, which even though it sounds silly, is a surprising combination for someone that’s beautiful.”
My attention flashes directly to his. Blue to hazel. Cool to warm. So warm that my temperature creeps up with my pulse.
Before he continues, Jayden takes a drink from his soda, and like I’ve lost all sense of propriety, I gawk at him. There’s no other way to put it, and I’m eternally grateful that he doesn’t comment on it because at this point, I’m a lost cause.
With every gulp, I follow the downward pull of his Adam’s apple as his throat constricts. When he tips his head back to finish it off, I glimpse up at his profile. It’s perfect. From the slight upturn of his nose to the chiseled set of his cheekbones.
As soon as he turns his focus on me again, I look away. Too embarrassed by my brazen curiosity.
It’s only when I chance a glance back that he breaks the silence. “I think you’re aware of your looks, but you’re afraid to acknowledge it because maybe it’s not the done thing in Shitville and… or you believe it makes you some kind of person. But it’s simply fact. Science. DNA…”
Jayden falls silent as I stare at my journal splayed on his thick thigh. Stretched out alongside his, my legs appear slimmer and shorter, even though they’re a good part of my five-foot-nine height.
“We can’t help it, Lucky.” I don’t need to look at him to know he’s grinning; I can hear it in his voice as he turns the page. “Atelophobia, tristful… Ooh, I like that.”
“Sounds sexier than it is.” Jayden peers at me and I flush, my heart beats harder, thrumming into my lungs at my choice of wording. I can’t even blame Christina because it rolled off my tongue like melted butter. “It’s… umm… it’s the name for that feeling when…”
God, I should stop talking before I sound like a love-crazed and deprived loser.
“The feeling when…?”
Drawing in a deep breath, I reply, “Romantic melancholy. Like being in love but it’s not enough or you’re not enough.”
“Atelophobia,” he murmurs, tracing his finger over the weeping willow on the edge of the page while he reads the description. “Fear of not being good enough.”
The way he’s staring down at the page has me shrinking into myself for fear of being judged. I don’t want him to think less of me or to see me as this pathetic person that’s lost and overwhelmed, and incapable of making sense of the world out here without questioning the rightness of it all.
What Jayden Morrow thinks of me shouldn’t matter. How he sees me shouldn’t be something I pay any thought to. But I do. And it does matter. Even if I don’t know why.
“This is how you feel?”
Knotting my fingers together, I nod. “Not all the time. I’m not depressed or… you know, sad. When I thought about being out here, I guess I made preconceptions about what it would be like, and now the reality is intimidating.”
“I meant about you and Eli. Do you feel like you’re not good enough for him?” I shrug, and he continues, “What if that’s how he feels, too?”
“What?”
That’s absurd. Elijah is the most incredible person I’ve ever known, and the way he loves is unlike anything I’ve ever felt. Lately it’s different, though. I know he loves me, and I love him, but there’s a barrier between us that I can’t get past or knock down.
“Obviously I don’t know him as long as you, but I see him every day. Eli’s basically my left hand at this point. So, I know how he gets in his head about things. He closes himself off when people get too close, not just emotionally, but physically too.”
I glance up at him. And there it is that moroseness that’s etched deep beneath his surface...
You and him...
You go where he goes...
He goes where you go.
You’re always together.
Always freakishly in sync, and…
“Collywobbles.” He clears his throat.
Oh, Jayden.
My stomach wrenches at the conclusion that I have known all this time. That has called to my own melancholy.
I’m not alone after all.
I’m not the only one painfully in love with Elijah. With my best friend.
Shifting closer, I lean my head on his shoulder and breathe him in as he stares down at the page.
“So, collywobbles?” Jayden chuckles, turning his face toward me at the same time that I lift my head.
“Collywobbles,” I whisper, incapable of finishing the sentence when his stare flits to my lips and then back to mine.
Oh dear.
My body twists toward him, mirroring the motion of his.
Jayden really is gorgeous and warm and—
“Yo, Nano…”
I yank away as Jayden pulls back. Slowly and calmly like we weren’t seconds away from doing something we might regret. Or maybe we wouldn’t.
Would we?
Jesus Christ, what is wrong with me?
“Oh, shit. Sorry, man…” Green eyes narrow on Jayden and me as Auguste Broussard pauses by the edge of the pool, taking in the scene. “Were you… fuck, dude…”
“Hey, Bruce, Finley’s teaching me new words… expanding my vocabulary,” Jayden replies with more cool than I’ve ever possessed in my life while he holds up my notebook. “Do you know what collywobbles means?”
“Colly—what the fuck now?”
“Butterflies in the stomach. How about morosis?”
“Sounds like moron, which you obviously are.”
Jayden laughs, batting the empty can at Auguste, who catches it.
“Stupidest of stupidities, actually,” he says, rolling off the sun bed and pushing to his feet.
With one last glance at my notebook, he closes it and hands it to me with a gentle smile that morphs to a mischievous grin when he saunters towards Auguste.
“How was the community skate?” Jayden asks him. “Anyone get hurt?”
Auguste laughs, like they’re sharing an inside joke. Whatever it is, I’m grateful for it because it instantly dissipates the awkwardness of the moment.
“Nah, not this time. Although, the kids have definitely improved and they’ve brought a coach in from Portland that’s going to set up a training program.”
“Seriously?” Jayden’s voice booms with excitement that pulls on every single one of my pores with a buzz.
I sit back into the cushions and swap my notebook for the Hardy novel while they continue talking about kids’ hockey leagues.
It’s only when Auguste mentions Elijah that I tune back into their conversation.
Even though I’ve been stealing glimpses of Jayden as the two of them settled on the edge of the pool, I’ve kept myself to myself.
Which surprises Auguste when I ask, “Is Elijah back, too?”
“No, he stayed back. Turns out he knows the new coach from junior league.” A certain heaviness settles on my shoulders at his furrowed expression. “Have to say, given the way he reacted when the guy greeted him, I’m surprised he hung back.”
“What do you mean ‘the way he reacted’?” Jayden asks the question burning on my tongue with a worried glance my way.
“He seemed kind of uncomfortable…? I don’t know. Like, not the usual Sylkes sulk... dude was pale as fuck.”
“He is pale,” both Jayden and I blurt.
“Not like this. He looked like he’d seen a ghost.”
While Auguste continues telling us about the situation, Jayden comes back to me, grabbing his phone from where he placed it on the table earlier, he hands it to me.
“Call him,” he tells me before giving me his passcode. “Zero-four-one-nine. Kailey’s birthday.”
Sitting down beside me, he watches as I ring Elijah and wait for him to pick up only for the call to go to voicemail.
Maybe it’s the nagging memory of the last time he didn’t answer his phone to Jayden. Whatever it is has me on edge when Jayden takes the phone from me and tries again. When it goes to voicemail, he grumbles out a gruff curse while he stabs out a message only to delete it.
“I swear to God if he pulls that fucking incommunicado shit again…”
“He’ll call back,” I tell him, my hand automatically clutching his for support. For comfort.
Although I’m not certain, I’m hopeful. That right there is the blackhole of all my worries. One I spiral down when Auguste sits with us on the sun bed. He and Jayden fall into gameplay conversation, and I pretend to read my book even though I never turn the page.