Chapter 13 Jessie
Jessie
It’s been an awful week. It’s been fucking horrendous and that’s putting it mildly.
I haven’t known what to do with myself. I called my mom yesterday and asked if she missed me.
She said, “Of course, baby,” but she didn’t sound as convincing as I hoped she would.
She was running late to meet Neil, so she couldn’t talk for long.
She sounded distracted. She’s one of those people who can only really focus on one thing at a time.
All my life it’s made me feel choked with anger when she shifts her focus off me.
It makes me feel crazy. Like I don’t exist. I felt like I had a weight on my chest and my eyes stung when she hung up.
I didn’t even have time to ask her if she wanted me to come home, which was pretty much the whole point of my call.
By Friday I’m feeling so fucked up that around three in the afternoon I head over to the main house to raid the fridge. It’s groaning with food, but we’re shit out of beer. Just my luck. I go to the entertainment room and raid the bar. I find a bottle of vodka and crack it open.
“Whatcha doing?” says Luke, swinging himself in through the doorway with such force he’s only a few feet away from me by the time he’s able to stop himself.
I pour a large measure of vodka into a glass and knock it back. I look at him as I swallow, smiling thinly and say, “Nothing.”
He looks at me with an uncomfortable blend of concern and judgement. I don’t like it. It irritates me. I take another shot and stroll over to the pool table. I pick up a cue and chalk it. “Wanna play?”
I wince as I hear the words leave my mouth. They echo the words I said that night in his room and this time they make me feel empty. And angry.
And yes, I do fucking know the difference between anger and sadness, thank you very much.
“Sure,” he says, never one to miss an opportunity to move a ball from A to B.
“I should warn you, I’m pretty good.”
“Don’t feel like you need to go easy on me.” His tone is amiable but his gaze could cut steel. My dick takes it the wrong way and starts to stiffen.
For most of the first game I think I’m not drunk enough for peak performance, and I rectify that by adding copious amounts of vodka to the equation. For most of the second game I suspect I might be a little too drunk to let my raw talent shine through.
Luke starts making helpful suggestions, saying things like, “try this line” and “would you like to take that shot again?”
I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with me. I meant what I said. I’m usually pretty lethal with a cue in my hand.
Jesus. Why am I letting this guy affect me like this?
I find my stride in the third game but before I can get cocky about it, Luke leans over the table, taking his time to line the shot up.
He holds the cue lightly, even so, his biceps bulge and indent a lot more than my dick considers ideal.
When he takes the shot, he looks away before the cue ball connects with his target.
Holy shit.
Is he letting me win?
I refuse his offer of a fourth game to even things out. I take a seat on a barstool. I sit down a little more heavily than I usually would. My lips feel warm and my head spins from the quick change in altitude. “Wanna drink?”
“No thanks, I don’t drink hard liquor.”
I’d like to rip him to shreds for that. Ordinarily I definitely would.
I’d love to mock him. God knows he leaves himself open to it.
Ordinarily I’d enjoy seeing the flash of hurt in his eyes.
I don’t know why I let it go. I hope it doesn’t have anything to do with the way he’s looking at me right now.
He’s a few feet away from me. One knee is bent, and that hip is cocked at me.
He has his eyes on my face, studying me like he’s looking for evidence or proof of something.
Most of me hates it, but part of me doesn’t.
His eyes wander down. His lids lower as his gaze travels down my neck and then down my chest. He gets stuck at a certain point and seems unable to move on.
“What?” I demand.
“Nothing.” I glare at him and a tense, uncomfortable silence takes hold. I’m determined to ignore it, but he can’t seem to do the same. “Can I ask you a question?”
“You kind of just did, but sure, ask away.”
“What made you decide to come and live here?”
“Ha! An excellent question, Pookie. An excellent question.” Oh shit.
The alcohol is loosening my tongue. “The answer is threefold. Firstly, I needed a change of scene.” Those were my mom’s words, not mine.
“And secondly, I did it ‘cause my mom wanted to stick it to my dad. He pays for my education and tuition fees here are around five or six times the cost of tuition in Australia.”
Holy shit. Did I just say that out loud?
Luke nods thoughtfully. He doesn’t seem remotely surprised by my admission. “What’s the third reason?”
“Third reason?”
“Yeah, you said ‘The answer is threefold.’”
God, there’s nothing worse than sober people when you have shit for brains.
I wave dismissively. “Can’t remember the third reason.”
The third reason is that I can’t stand my mom’s new boyfriend and she can’t stand having me around cramping her style.
She said she was sad to see me go, but she drove me to the airport and then went straight out to meet Neil and his mates.
The memory of her all but shooing me out of the car at International Departures makes vodka and a cocktail of emotion spin in my gut like ice and booze in a blender.
“I have a question for you, too.” I’m surprised to hear myself say it. I don’t have a clue what I’m going to ask. It’s one of those instances where it feels like I’m going to be just as surprised as anyone else by the next words that come out of my mouth, and that’s always a worry.
“Shoot.”
“Were you just looking at my nipples?” My voice is louder than normal and I can hear the effect of the vodka in my speech.
Why the hell am I asking him something like that?
Ugh. I think when it dawns on me. Just what I need. Shit-faced Jessie has made an appearance.
“Yeah.”
“Why?” Shit-faced Jessie loves asking stupid questions. It’s kind of his thing.
“’Cause I find them very attractive.”
Shit-faced Jessie feels a deep pull of arousal and a strong spike of excitement. He has a thing for doing stupid shit as well as asking stupid questions. I use all my concentration to attempt to bring Sober Me back to the helm.
“Did anyone ever tell you you don’t have to say every single thing you think out loud?” It sounds almost like something Sober Me would say.
“Lots of people have tried. It’s not an accident I’m like this. I don’t want to hide who I am or how I feel. I want to be like this.”
“You want to be soft? You want to have your emotions splayed all over your face, and when that’s not enough you want to go around telling everyone how you feel all the time?”
“Yep.”
“Seems fucking stupid to me.”
“Spending your life scared shitless of admitting how you feel and getting hurt regardless doesn’t seem all that bright to me either.”
Hmm.
He has me there.
I manage to put Shit-faced Jessie on mute, but only because of the intense effort it takes to pour myself another shot of vodka. I manage, but the effort isn’t pretty and sees a good amount splashed onto the bar next to the glass.
“Are you just going to sit here and drink all afternoon?” he asks mildly.
“Are you just going to sit there and judge me all afternoon?”
“I’m considering it, yeah.”
There’s something very different about Luke right now.
He looks the same. Easy smile. Sunkissed skin, eyes the color of faded blue jeans, soft lips and a slight hint of a cleft on his chin.
I only noticed the cleft a few days ago and since then I’ve found it harder and harder to think of anything other than pressing my thumb into that little groove on his face when I’m around him.
His words are different, though. They’re nowhere near as sweet as they usually are.
They’re witty and sharp. They give me a terrible feeling.
A terrible, sinking feeling that maybe, just maybe, I’m sparring with someone in my own weight class.
Not an equal exactly, but a competitor, nonetheless.
The thought of that should scare the shit out of me, but fortunately Shit-faced Jessie has taken the wheel and he doesn’t scare easy. Case in point, the garage door opens, sending minor tremors through the house as the motor cranks the roller door up. I smile dumbly and say, “Our folks are home.”
“Go to the guest house.” He picks up the shot I poured and throws it back, grimacing as he swallows.
“Whatcha do that for?” I slur.
“So if they ask, I can honestly tell them both of us were drinking.”
Oh shit
What if he’s not just a competitor? What if he’s something way worse?
A worthy adversary
Yes, I do have a bit of a headache today. Why do you ask?
I’d love nothing more than to stay in bed and nurse my hangover, but while I was having ‘an early night’ last night, Luke made plans for both of us to go for a run with my dad this morning.
“Come on, let’s get going,” calls Luke from the hallway. His voice is too loud and more grating than usual.
“Don’t want to,” I groan, burying my head in my pillow.
He opens my bedroom door and peers in. He has a firm, no-nonsense look on his face that annoys me immediately. “Come on, you have to. Your dad was pumped when I told him we’d both come with him. You’ll enjoy it once you’re up.”
“I fucking won’t,” I mumble. “Don’t want to run. Would rather be stung on the balls by an Australian box jellyfish.”
No-nonsense gives way to amusement, it creases fine lines around his mouth, though I can tell he’s trying to suppress the smile.