23. Maya
Maya
I just want us to be better.
Jamie’s words echo in my head like a jackhammer.
Of all the things I expected to happen at work today, this conversation would’ve been at the bottom of the list. Jamie is here, letting me tattoo his muscular thigh and apologizing.
After the time we spent together two days ago on Christmas, I was hopeful, but I was also at least fifty percent sure he’d regress and go back into hiding from me.
“What would us being friends look like? Surely you aren’t still racing Hot Wheels cars around your bedroom.”
For the first time in—well, I’m not sure how long—I see Jamie laugh, my comment catching him completely off guard.
“You know you loved playing with the cars when you came over,” he says, smiling over at me.
“I plead the fifth. But you certainly didn’t grow out of it,” I tease, exaggerating a stare out the front window of the shop at his black Camaro.
“Hey, now, don’t be making fun of my baby,” he says in mock offense before sobering. “On a real note, I’d be okay with anything you’ll give me. Coffee. Going back to the park. Hell, I’d even let you practice tattooing on me just to sit here and talk more.”
“It’s really what you want? To be friends?”
“Or….more?” He says it like a question, voice ticking up at the end. “I have hockey, I have the boys. But I haven’t let myself have anything else, and I think that’s what I need to work on.”
“You might also need to let yourself have some therapy,” I say, only half joking, but Jamie chuckles anyway.
“Yeah, I’ve been considering that, too…”
He trails off, and we fall into a more comfortable silence while he watches me work for a bit.
“How come, before, you didn’t want me to call you ‘Jamie’?” I run my hand over his thigh, pulling the skin for my next pass, relishing the sensation of his firm muscle under my hand.
“No one’s called me Jamie since my mom died.
My dad…he always says Jameson or James. Then, through school and when I came here, everyone started calling me Booker.
It just…it felt too real, I guess, when I heard you say it.
Like nothing had changed and I was the same old Jamie you remembered.
That might not even make sense.” His explanation is soft and guarded, but incredibly sincere. I hear the conflict in his voice.
“It does make sense,” I assure him.
“I haven’t felt like myself in a long time, and it was like you were the first person to see me. Not Ross Booker’s son, not the future Flyers player. Just me. And you were the one person I couldn’t let myself be close to.”
“How come you didn’t introduce yourself as Jamie when you met your friends?
Just because your dad didn’t use the nickname didn’t mean you couldn’t.
” My heart breaks for him. I can feel the battle raging inside, feel how hard this is for him.
I think, if I didn’t have the needle and ink to his leg right now, that he would be tempted to bolt rather than explain himself.
But he owes me some answers, after everything, and he knows it.
He shrugs. “My father used to say Jamie was a girls’ name when I would bring it up. Eventually, I guess I gave up. There’s no real reason for it, I just got sick of fighting with him about it.”
I look up, meeting his soft gaze. “I’m sorry you haven’t been happy. It looked like, from afar, you had everything a person could want: fame, money, talent…”
“Maya, you’re the last person who needs to be apologizing to me. I did this to myself—isolated myself. But I want to try to…be better.” He smiles softly, a faint crack in that hard exterior.
“What about my dad?” I ask, cautiously changing the topic. Starting a conversation that could upset him while I’ve got the needle to his leg is risky, at best.
He doesn’t tense up like I expect him to, knowing he’d be gambling with the accuracy of his tattoo if he moved. But he does close his eyes and clench a fist, shutting himself back off for a moment.
“I…I still don’t know how to feel about your dad.
I don’t think that anger is just going to go away.
I was never mad at you, I just had this misconception that I couldn’t let myself be close to you anymore.
It’s different with your dad. It may not be rational, but I’ve been mad for a long time. Still am, truthfully.”
“But…there was nothing he could do.” I say, confused.
Jamie doesn’t respond, and I can see in the set of his jaw and the scrunch of his brow that he’s still trying to come to terms with that fact. He and my dad are going to have to have a bigger conversation, whether they want to or not.
Deciding to put him out of his misery, I change the topic again.
“So…can we talk about how you’ve got nearly seven million followers online and haven’t shown your face once?”
Jamie’s eyes fly open, staring at me as if I just discovered his deepest, darkest secret. “How…?”
I laugh at the expression on his face, explaining how I noticed the scar on his hand in the last video—leaving out the part where I’ve been crushing on him unknowingly this entire time.
“Also, the tattoo on your shoulder—the lightning—it’s very distinct.
Seeing you without a shirt on in the locker room only confirmed it. ”
Jamie doesn’t miss a beat. Smirking down at me, he goads, “So, you watch my videos close enough to notice those little details?”
Stuttering under the sudden scrutiny, I reply, “No! I mean—I wouldn’t say that—”
He laughs, his deep voice filling the shop with warmth. “I’m just teasing. Congrats on being the first person to figure it out, though. I would’ve expected the internet freaks to have worked out who’s account it was a long time ago.”
“Why have you kept it anonymous?” I ask, genuinely. People would understand the son of a celebrity having a large internet presence.
Jamie shrugs again. “My regular account has a few hundred thousand followers; both from dad’s fans and hockey fans.
I expect it’ll go up when I really start playing for Philly.
But I guess I just started the other account for fun, and it turned into a way to prove to myself I was talented; that people liked me for reasons other than my name. ”
Laughing, I say, “Yeah, they like you for those freaking abs.” My face sobers before continuing. “But I understand how hard it must be to have so many eyes on you all the time.”
Jamie shrugs. “It’s not so much the eyes as it is the insincerity behind the people who try to get close to me. That’s why I’m lucky with the guys on my team; they don’t make a huge deal about it. Although, they ask about my dad or the parties or whatever occasionally, and it can get old.”
For the rest of the time it takes to finish his tattoo, we talk casually, leaving the hard, uncomfortable conversations in the past and letting ourselves get to know these new, older versions of each other.
Hours later, after cleaning and covering the final product, Jamie stands. His frame towers over me, and the musky, clean scent of him floods my senses.
“Thank you for doing this, Maya. It means a lot; both the tattoo, and for giving me another chance.” He puts his hands in the pockets of his shorts, looking unsure about what comes next.
Without thinking, I step forward, wrapping my arms around his middle in a strong embrace. “I missed you, Jamie.”
His arms come around my shoulders, a large hand encasing the back of my head, holding me to him. I feel a shudder to through his chest as he lets out a relieved sigh.
“I missed you, too.”