Chapter Twenty-Three #2
“I think it’s getting worse,” Lila says. “I worry about him.”
I know how out of character it would seem for me to agree with her, to commiserate with how much I am also worried about her brother, but since Jack and I haven’t discussed what we’ll tell our siblings…
“Does he say much about it?” Lila asks me, drawing me out of my thoughts. “At home?”
I feel a telltale flush trying to creep its way up my neck, and I clear my throat as I shrug noncommittally. “I can tell it bothers him,” I admit. “But he tries to act like it doesn’t.”
“That’s what I thought,” she says with a nod. She lets out a sigh. “I wish he would just get it treated. This doesn’t have to be his last year if he doesn’t want it to be. Just because Ian wants to leave next year, doesn’t mean he does.”
“So Ian is for sure leaving?”
Lila nods. “I think so. With the wedding planning, and with Kyle…We both decided it might be the right time. He got to play his last year with his home team, and I think he’s content with that.”
There’s a small twinge of hurt that I’m hearing this from Lila and not my brother, but I try to remind myself that it’s entirely possible they just decided this, that he simply hasn’t had time to tell me about it.
Besides, Lila is always going to come before me.
I’m not stupid enough to believe otherwise. I don’t even fault him for it.
“How is living with Jack, otherwise?” Lila asks, changing the subject.
That heat is back at my neck, but I keep my breathing steady, trying my best to not look too guilty.
“It’s…not as bad as I thought it might be,” I tell her carefully.
Lila barks out a laugh. “That bad, huh?”
“No, it’s…” I frown. I don’t like the idea of implying that living with Jack is some hardship, not with everything that’s happened lately. “It’s really all right.” Lila eyes me curiously, and I shrug quickly. “I mean, with our schedules, it’s not like we see each other all the time.”
“That makes sense I guess,” Lila says. She chuckles under her breath. “You’ll have to tell me if he starts being an idiot. I’ll beat him up for you.”
“He’s not an idiot,” I say sternly, surprised by the sharpness of my tone.
Lila’s brows shoot up, and I immediately feel that rush of heat I’ve been keeping at bay creep into my cheeks.
“I mean…” I try to correct, feeling a little flustered under her scrutiny. “I just mean…” I rub the back of my neck. “I was having a bad day yesterday, and he really helped turn it around. I guess I’m still feeling a bit grateful.”
And a lot sexually satisfied.
Lila studies me for a moment more, finally nodding with a small smile. “You’re right. I know he isn’t really an idiot. He just likes to pretend sometimes.”
“Now that I can agree with,” I tell her.
“I’m glad the two of you are getting along then.”
I clear my throat again, nodding. “Slowly but surely.”
“I was worried when you first moved in,” Lila tells me. “But I’m kind of glad you did now.”
“You are?”
“Mhm.” She turns her attention back to the game below, but since I have no idea what’s going on down there, I just keep looking at her. “I think it’s a good thing for him not to be so alone. He never did well with that.”
“What do you mean?”
“When we were kids,” she tells me. “He was always worried about me, doing his best to look after me. But I think part of that was because of how alone he felt after our parents died. He was really close to our dad, you know? They were practically best friends. I was so young when they passed, but Jack…” She shakes her head.
“I know he seems like the world’s biggest goofball half the time, but I think a lot of that is a front for how lonely he is. ”
I turn my face to stare down at the bench where Jack is still watching the game intently, thinking about the story he told me about his dad and the aquarium. About his time at the orphanage. All the little things he’s shared with me over the last few weeks.
And knowing all that…the idea that Jack might be lonely underneath all his bravado doesn’t seem so far-fetched at all.
It’s possible that we’re more alike than I thought.
“Maybe you’re right,” I manage quietly, my voice almost lost to the crowd around us.
Lila peeks over at me from the side, and I don’t miss the question in her eyes, one I know I can’t answer. At least not yet. So I change the subject.
“So tell me what’s happening now.”
She laughs. “One of these days, you’re going to have to learn the rules of this game.”
“Maybe someday,” I say with a wince.
“Okay, okay,” she concedes. She points down to the ice. “So Jankowski is setting up for a hat trick—that’s three goals in one game. It would be his second of the season if he gets it. He just has to—”
The sound of her voice becomes a low buzz in my ears as my attention once again falls on Jack down on the bench, and even from here I can see the way he rubs at his arm, clearly in pain but trying so desperately to appear as if he isn’t.
It hurts my heart, seeing him deal with it alone like he is.
There is a large part of me that wants to push him like his sister and Ian—to try to convince him to give the rest of the season up in favor of seeking treatment—but I know what it’s like to be told what to do.
To be pushed into something that isn’t what you would choose for yourself.
I know, because of that, I won’t ever be able to really ask that of him. Suggest, maybe, but never ask. Not when I would have given anything to be able to make my own choices when it came to my father’s misdeeds.
I suppose all I can do is support him, try to help him in whatever way I can.
I almost laugh at the thought. A few weeks ago, I could barely stand to be in the same room as Jack, and in such a short time, now…now I can’t seem to get him off my mind. In fact, lately, it seems that most of my days begin and end with thoughts of Jack Baker.
And no one is more surprised by that fact than me.