Chapter 30 Cal
After breakfast, I cleaned the kitchen, then rushed through a shower. The cuts on my arm were sore and a little red at the edges. Should I tell Jack about it? He’d want to know, and he’d be pissed. Hell, I was pissed, but I didn’t want to upset him.
I threw on sweats with a long-sleeved T-shirt and rushed downstairs, nearly tripping over Cara, who sat on the last step.
“Weirdo,” she mumbled as I slammed into the front window and peeked around the curtain.
Not a moment too soon either. Jack was on the first step. I rushed the few feet to open the door before he could reach for the bell.
“Hey.”
He grinned. “Hey.”
I stepped back so he could come in, but he slowed when he saw Cara. She waved. He nodded.
“I told her,” I said to him. To her, I chided, “You can go back to playing Barbies now that you’ve seen him.”
She rolled her eyes, her default setting since turning thirteen. “Whatever. Momma’s gonna be here any minute.”
“Good.” I pulled Jack to the stairs. “Bye, Cara,” I sang.
Her laughter followed us up the stairs. Jack trailed silently behind me, only speaking once we were alone in my room.
“Thanksgiving went okay?” he asked.
“Meh. Crowded.” I didn’t want to bring up any of the bad, but it clouded in, dampening my mood like the annoying ache in my arm. “Did y’all have big holidays before you moved here?” I asked. Stalled, more fittingly.
Jack kicked his shoes off near my bed, then shrugged. “Not really.” He wore a dark gold sweater and jeans, and the white collar of his undershirt peeked out a little at the neck. I licked my lips, wanting his pale skin between my teeth.
“Uh, it might rain tonight,” I mumbled.
“You really want to talk about the weather right now?”
“No.”
I launched forward as Jack did. We crashed into each other, chest against chest, and then our lips met in what I was beginning to think of as our mating dance.
He gripped my head in his hands as I fisted the material around his waist. Jack jammed his tongue in my mouth.
Had I not known it would happen, had I not been secretly begging for it, I might have choked.
Our fevered groping and kissing didn’t last long enough to erase the troubles in my mind. With a regretful sigh, I inhaled as I forced space between us. Maybe not the weather, but we needed to talk.
Jack swallowed, hearing my unspoken words. “Okay, yeah.”
I took his hand in mine and tugged him toward my bed. He sat beside me, searching my face as if he might find a clue as to what I would say.
“Sasha showed up.”
Jack paused as if that hadn’t been what he’d expected. “Why?” he finally asked between gritted teeth.
I squeezed his hand, then shook my head. “To cause trouble. I didn’t invite her.” I added the last in all haste, hoping he hadn’t thought I had.
Jack rolled his eyes. Okay, maybe he hadn’t thought that. “What happened? You tell her to fuck off?”
“I did. Well, I told her to leave several times.”
Jack nodded. “And she didn’t listen.”
“Nope.” I’d gone back and forth on whether I should show him or not, but since he already knew Sasha had hurt me before, would it be any surprise? I let go of his hand and pushed my sleeve high enough the scratches from Sasha’s nails stood out on my tan skin.
“The fuck, Cal?” Jack barked in contrast to how gently he cradled my abused forearm with his hands. “She did this?”
Sasha had left marks before, but in the face of Jack’s outrage, I wondered how numb I’d let myself become. Was this worse than I thought? I stared at the cuts. Ten of them. Small, red, and a few with tails like shooting stars where she’d raked my arm as I jerked free.
“Why? Why did she grab you at all?”
My vision blurred with hot tears not quite ready to fall. “I dunno. She’s a snake. I don’t know how to handle her. She comes at me, and if I move wrong, she’s cryin’ and sayin’ I hurt her.”
“Hurt her?” Jack gaped as he darted his wide gaze from my face to my arm and back. “Maybe she deserves it.”
“Jack …”
“No.” He surged to his feet and scrubbed a hand through his hair, pacing a short trek in front of me.
“If I’d been able to, I’d have fucked up those guys who attacked me.
Eye for an eye and all that. If she’s got the balls to shred your arm, then she should be ready to take the same. That’s bullshit!”
I shoved my sleeve into place, then held my arm to my chest. I wanted to agree, but I couldn’t. I didn’t want to hurt Sasha. I just wanted her to stop.
“That whole double standard or whatever is utter bullshit. What? You’re the guy, so you can’t fight back? But if it was the other way around, no one would fault her for slapping the shit out of you if you actually hurt her first.”
“Jack—”
He stopped in front of me, anger darkening his pale face. “What did you do? Anything? Or did you just stand there and take it?”
“That’s not fair.”
“No.” Jack dropped to his knees and took my arm into his hands. Even with the wounds covered, they still stood between us like beacons. “This isn’t fair. You need to find a way to stand up for yourself.”
He didn’t understand.
I stood and stepped around him, turning my back on him. “You don’t get it.”
“What?”
I spun around. “You. Don’t. Get. It.” He got to his feet, both of us breathing deeply now.
“You were the smaller one when those guys jumped you. You were at the disadvantage. It’s not the same for me.
I touched her once, and she said I hurt her.
I can’t …” I swallowed as the first tear fell.
“I can’t live with that on my conscience. ”
“She’s a drama queen and a liar. You didn’t hurt her.”
“But I don’t know that.”
“I do!” Jack shouted. “You’d never hurt anyone without being hella provoked. And fuck me, did I ever try, but you never came at me, not for real. You don’t have it in you.”
Jack stumbled forward and cupped my jaw in both hands. His kiss was chaste and soft and smeared the salty tracks over my lips.
“You are a nice guy, Princess. The sweetest, the most thoughtful, and the most selfless.” He kissed me again. “But you’re also very much a dipshit.” He chuckled halfheartedly. “Now’s the time to stand up for yourself, to be selfish. Show your dad. Tell your mom. Don’t let her do this to you again.”
At the mention of my parents, I coughed, and a fresh wave of tears let loose. “I can’t. They won’t listen.”
“Cal.” Jack pulled my head to his shoulder.
“Daddy thinks Sasha showing up is my fault. He told me to take responsibility.” Among other things. “He wants me to fix whatever I fucked up with her.”
“Did you tell him you’re fucking a guy and Sasha’s a monster?”
“I wanted to.”
Jack stepped back, and I nearly crashed forward into him. “Why didn’t you?”
“I … I got so mad and couldn’t get it together fast enough. Then, like always, Daddy shut me down. Yelling at me about everything: Sasha, me acting like Momma, and me staying here to go to college locally.”
“And give up on MIT?”
“He doesn’t want me to leave the state.”
“Fuck that. Tell him it’s your dream. You’ve got goals, Cal.”
“I did. He won’t listen.”
“Make him listen,” Jack growled.
“It’s not that easy.”
Jack turned his back to me, then dropped his shoulders.
“What?” I asked. He seemed mad. Mad at me. I couldn’t take it if he were. I couldn’t handle it. I’d break for sure.
“It should be that easy,” he said softly. “I’m trying to understand, but I just …” Jack whipped around, a mix of fire and sadness glaring in his eyes. “I can’t.”
I huffed and tucked my arms tightly across my chest. “What don’t you get?
” The words tasted as bitter as they sounded.
I wasn’t mad at him but couldn’t not fuck everything up.
Jack had become the wall I leaned against. The bright spot that made the world a little less gray. Please, don’t take you away from me.
“You.” He exhaled and deflated with it. “It’s okay to stand up for yourself, even if it means someone might not like it. Your parents, Sasha … They don’t get to shit on you, and you don’t have to take it with that blinding smile you show the world.”
“I’m not smilin’—”
“You sure as shit aren’t yelling and screaming.
What you should be doing.” Jack paced away and back, rage in every jerky move of his body.
“Stop letting them run over you. Take it to them. Hell, go to your dad’s job.
Make him face you. Go to Sasha’s house, take a witness, take me, get in her face, and tell her it’s over in front of her parents. Make it so she can’t weasel back in.”
I shook my head. “It’s not that simple. I can’t—”
“You. Can. But you fucking won’t.” Jack stormed to his shoes and stomped into them, grumbling to himself. “Can’t fucking trust … Always let you down … You know better …” I didn’t catch all of it but enough.
“Where’re you goin’?” I asked. Asked when I wanted to yell at him. When I wanted to wrap my arms around him and make him stay. When I wanted to throw him against the wall until he fought me off. I fucking asked. Politely even.
“Home.” Jack stood and marched away, throwing over his shoulder, “Let me know when your balls drop.” He flung the door open, then stopped, one hand gripping the frame and the other the knob.
With his head slightly turned, he added, “Their lives aren’t more important than you living your own.”
The quiver in his chin wrecked me.
I fell to my knees as he disappeared from view. When the front door slammed with such finality, such hopelessness, I jumped to my feet and punched the nearest wall as a roar ripped from my lungs.
“Fuck!”