Chapter 31
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
JACE
He wanted to make her laugh. He wanted to sit and listen to her talk about books until his ears fell off. But all these were things he could not want, because they were things he could not have, and wanting what you could not have led to misery and madness.
Cassandra Clare, Clockwork Prince
“Y ou’re hitting like my great-aunt Shirley.”
I dodged Sam’s punch and backpedaled, making a signal for time. I’d felt off since Polly left the club after her brunch this morning.
When Polly arrived for brunch, surprise kept me rooted in place as I opened her car door. Her pink and white dress fell in soft layers to just below her knee. I bit back a laugh when she handed me her keys with a smirk and a quarter. Her wavy blonde hair cascaded in loose waves to her mid back, swaying as she walked into the club. She looked different, lighter. Like someone had turned a light on inside of her.
My face instantly fell when I turned to see my pubescent coworkers watching her with interest. Something deep inside my chest had growled at their looks. They thought she was beautiful now, but they didn’t get to see my Polly the way I got to see her, sitting on the couch in a thread bare T-shirt over leggings that molded to her shape, hair up in a bun and laughing at something I’d said. She wasn’t perfect, not like the mask she wore here, but she was perfectly real.
I cleared my throat, causing their heads to snap in my direction. Nodding sharply to them, I said, “Boys.” My eyes, on the other hand, told a different story: Hands off, kids. This one’s mine.
Forty minutes later, Polly’s father left, barking at one of the guys to collect his car. Worry had filled me. I’d wanted to run into the club and check on Polly, but I couldn’t. I bounced up and down on the balls of my feet until she emerged a few minutes later, eyes bright and cheeks red. I tried to talk to her, but she only gave me a brief smile and a nod when I asked how her brunch went. Her behavior wasn’t dismissive, nor was it sad really, or even angry.
She seemed distracted. What had her father said during their brunch? What if she was so distracted on the ride home that she got into an accident, or like, hit a deer?
Fuck. She could be on the side of the road right now, unconscious.
“What’s wrong with you, Romeo?”
I snapped my head up from where I’d been standing with my hands on me knees in the boxing ring. “Fuck you, too.”
Sam shook his head in exasperation as he punched his gloves together.
“That was me asking how you’re doin’, asshole. Relax.”
Breathing out, I tilted my head back and forth, trying to keep my shoulders loose. I’d been on edge since Polly left the club, and now I was snapping at my best friend.
“Sorry.” I bounced on my feet and hit my gloves together. “Let’s go.”
Sam got in three more punches—three more than he should have—before he stopped and put his gloved hands on his hips. “Jesus, Jace. You sick or something?”
While some friends may take advantage of their best friend on their off days, Sam wasn’t one of them.
“My head’s not right today. I think I’m gonna take off.” I started toward the ropes, Sam falling into step with me.
“Anything I can help with?”
I glanced at him out of the corner of my eye. “If I tell you something, can you keep it to yourself?
Sam grinned around his mouth guard. “I knew it. You’re hitting that, aren’t you?”
I growled and started stalking toward him as he backed up. “Joking, joking.”
“Forget it,” I mumbled, taking off my gloves. “I gotta bail. I have to mow my parent’s lawn and then get back to home.”
I blinked, realizing it was the second time I’d called Polly’s home, my home.
Luckily, Sam didn’t pick up on my slip up. “I’m sorry, ok? Come on. Tell Uncle Sammy.”
“Don’t call yourself that again.” I hopped down from the ring and Sam quickly caught up to me in stride, wisely saying silent, for once.
As we walked to the locker room, I reluctantly admitted, “I quit my job at the club this morning.”
Sam stayed quiet.
“And I’m thinking of applying to college again. I’ve been turning over the idea of teaching for long enough. Working with kids every day, making a difference in their lives. Sometimes all it takes to change a life is having one person in your corner. I think I’d like to be that person.”
Ever since I’d worked with Max on magic, seeing his face light up with every trick he learned, I could feel it: this is what teaching would feel like.
Sam scratched his neck. “You’ve never told me your decisions ahead of time before. Usually, when you want to do something, you do it.”
“Your point?”
“I don’t think it’s quitting your valet job, or even college that’s bothering you. You haven’t been acting like yourself for over a month now.”
Sam had a point. He also wasn’t an idiot.
“It’s the girl.” Sam stopped short, just before the locker room, crossing his arms.
I narrowed my eyes. “She’s not just a girl.”
Wry smile in place, Sam rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, I know. I figured that out when I was moving a ton of flowers behind a shed in the middle of nowhere.” I was silent as he continued. “And I also figured out that you’re not just in it for the puss—” his words cut off at the sharp look I sent him.
“My point is,” Sam started again, “Is that I figured out she’s not just some chick ’cause I’ve never seen you this way. And I’m a little relieved, just saying,” Sam held up his hands. “But can you do us all a favor and stop being a chickenshit and get on that already?”
My best friend turned toward the locker room and pushed the door open, murmuring under his breath, “Before you drive us all insane.”
* * *
After giving my parents’ lawn a mow, I sent them a text and made my way back to Polly’s. I’d been checking my phone obsessively, wondering if she’d text me, worrying if she’d made it home safe. Glancing in the rearview mirror, I noticed a black SUV. It’d been behind me since leaving my parents’ place. But it was too far away for me to make out the license plate. I stepped on the gas, putting more space between me and the SUV, and on the next turn, it kept going past me. I shook my head. I was being paranoid.
About ten minutes later, I was walking into Polly’s house.
I froze in place when I stepped into the kitchen. Music blared from a speaker on the table, which was completely covered in boxes, plastic bowls, and towels. Ryla was sitting on the table, swinging her legs and singing her heart out. Tinfoil pieces wrapped around random strands of her hair. The tips of Polly’s hair were similarly wrapped in foil. She stood behind Max with a bowl of what looked like blue paint in one hand and a small brush in the other. Max’s hair had a blue spiked strip down the center. And they all were wearing plastic sheets draped like capes around their shoulders.
“What’re y’all doing?” I grinned, walking toward them.
“Jace! We’re dyeing our hair!” Ryla shouted.
“You don’t say?” I rubbed my chin. “I thought you were making tinfoil hats.” Ryla giggled and Polly’s eyes flicked to me then back to Max, a small smile on her face as she continued to dye Max’s hair.
I leaned back against the island. “When did y’all decide to do this?”
“Momma came home with all of this stuff and said she’s dyeing her hair and then shouted about who was with her and then Auntie Leah called her nuts.”
“Ryla!” Polly scoffed, laughing lightly.
“Anything special bring this on?” I asked Polly, whose small smile hadn’t left her lips since I walked in.
“Belgian Waffles,” she said quietly, almost to herself.
“I love this one!” Ryla exclaimed and hopped off the table. Max giggled and Polly’s eyes flashed with delight as Ryla started to sing.
Watching Polly and her kids, seeing her elbow deep in hair dye as Max giggled happily at his sister’s antics, who was using a paintbrush as a microphone, it was like something finally snapped into place.
I didn’t feel aimless, anymore. I felt found.
Who knew it’d be with this little family?
As much as it pained me to admit it, Sam was right. I was on edge because I knew what I wanted. I wanted Polly, but I wasn’t sure if she felt the same way about me. There’d been a few little looks between us the last few days, and then a palpable moment last night when I swore, she was looking at my lips, just like I was looking at hers. After I put a sleeping Ryla in her bed, I waited on the stairs for Polly, resolved that as soon as she came out of Max’s bedroom, I was going to kiss her and to hell with the consequences. And then, I lost my nerve. I didn’t want to be another person that demanded something of her, forcing her into a situation she didn’t need or want.
Looking at her now, seeing how happy she was, I was glad I didn’t attempt anything last night. At best, she thought of me as a friend. So, if she needed a friend, I could be a friend. Even if it meant my balls were going to be blue for the next decade.
An hour later, after washing the kids’ hair in the sink, Max had blue hair sticking up every which way and was using the extra hair dye to paint at the table while Ryla sat on a stool as I attempted to brush her hair.
Polly was taking a shower. I was trying not to picture it.
“Ouch!”
“Sorry, lil’ miss.” I sprayed more detangler in her hair. I’d always thought my hair was thick, but Ryla’s was next level: thick and strong, snarly, extra sensitive, and not to be messed with. Kind of like Ryla herself.
“You have to start from the ends,” Ryla explained.
I gingerly started at the ends and sure enough, that did work.
“The pink looks really pretty,” I told her as I was finishing up.
“I’m gonna show Eric tomorrow and he’s gonna be like whoa and I’m gonna say, yeah, my mom did it.”
“Is that right?” I asked her softly.
“Uh-huh. Max wanted blue like Boyfriend, of course, and I wanted pink because that’s the best one, and Mom chose purple. We have red, too.”
I waited, figuratively hearing her gears turning. Four dyes. Three heads. One person left.
“We could dye your hair!” Ryla shouted as I placed the brush down.
“Have you seen this hair?” I pointed at my curls even though she couldn’t see me.
As if sensing my unease, Ryla turned. Her eyes were brimming with mischief as she sensed the weaker prey in front of her.
“It’d be so fun! We could be twinsies!”
I looked at the pink streaks in her hair. That’s what I was afraid of.
But then she pressed her hands together, stuck out her bottom lip and begged, “Pleeeeease?”
And like the weaker pretty I was, I asked, “Is red the only color left?”
Ten minutes later, I was sitting on a chair with a plastic sheet draped around my shoulder. Max grinned from his spot in front of me as he clipped the drape together and nodded to Ryla, who was standing on a step stool behind me.
“This is washable, right?” I eyed the red hair dye on the table with trepidation.
“I have no idea,” Ryla answered honestly.
I was picturing myself looking like Ronald McDonald, when Polly burst into the kitchen in shorts and a white tank, the lavender tips on the ends of her blonde locks fell to just above her breasts.
There are kids here. You will not get excited. You won’t even twitch.
“Ryla! What in the world? What are you doing?” Polly asked, every dip and curve of her lithe body on display in her outfit as she walked toward us.
Fuck.
“Jace said he wanted to dye his hair red!”
Polly crossed her arms. “Oh, he did, did he? It was all his idea?”
“Uh-huh,” Ryla lied.
Polly raised her eyebrows at me. “Are you sure about this?”
I could only nod in response. All of my blood rushed directly south of my equator when she crossed her arms, causing her tits to push up higher.
Polly’s lips upturned on one side.
“Ok then, Ryla. Scoot over. We’ll do this together.”