15. Nat #3
He popped the top off a beer and handed it to me before doing the same with his own.
I took the drink gratefully. “How was your night?”
“My night? Great. It was great. What about yours?” His delivery was stern, almost as if he didn’t actually want to know. Why was he acting weird?
“It was… great.” Apparently, awkward was all that was in the cards for my night. “It was a good date,” I lied, the same way I did most times people asked me how I was doing. It wasn’t like things were terrible, but they definitely weren’t wonderful.
“I’m glad.”
Confusion marred my thoughts as I admitted, “That was my first date in a while. I think I forgot how to do it.” Was it just me, or did Jack’s eyes brighten at that? “I should have known better. These things don’t often go well for me. What about you?”
“I don’t date.” He peeled the label off his bottle and left it on the coffee table, but I didn’t have it in me to fight right now. Then his words sank in.
“Really?” It was a bit of a surprise. The man was objectively handsome and usually not the bane of people’s existence.
“Yeah.” He didn’t elaborate, just gave me very direct eye contact, as if he knew all my secrets. It was unnerving.
“Well, that’s a shame.”
What was I saying? The way he was acting was definitely strange and had me running through every scenario where he could be annoyed or frustrated with me.
I landed on the worst of all worst-case scenarios: wondering whether I’d put my vibrator away after cleaning it this morning.
Oh. God. I scanned through my memories of this morning, stopping on the one where he squeezed my throat during my fantasy—I cringed at that thought—and remembered washing it in the bathroom sink, shaking it dry, putting it back in my suitcase.
I let out a puff of air. Okay, that couldn’t be it.
But maybe he had seen my awkward goodbye?
“What were you up to?”
Jack took a sip of the beer he’d placed on the table. “I stayed in. Finished the dishes. Talked with my mom for a while.”
“Must be nice.” Apparently, the wine had gotten to me. I hadn’t meant to say that out loud.
Jack didn’t miss it, unfortunately. “What do you mean?”
“It’s nothing. I just haven’t spoken with my mom in a few years. The last time I called, she sent me to voicemail.” I twisted the hair tie from my wrist, and it snapped against me. Ow. “I talk to my sister, though.”
Jack did me a kindness by not asking why that was. “I didn’t know you had a sister.”
Really? Because you sure do know everything about me. The tone in my head was laced with resentment. I didn’t care if it was spiteful.
“She’s actually my stepsister. We’re seven years apart. My mom and stepfather, Dean, married when I was twelve. But Mandy’s my favorite thing about them getting together.”
“What’s she like?”
I leaned my head back on the couch and smiled.
“She’s sweet. Loves baking and reality TV.
And she’s funny. She was always putting on these plays when she was little.
I occasionally contributed, but I don’t have an acting bone in my body.
She can do anything. She’s working her way through the company at an alarming speed.
I just hope she chooses to forge her own path, you know? ”
“Are you concerned she won’t?”
“I’m worried she’ll become a little clone of our parents.
” I didn’t usually reveal this information, but this was one of the only times Jack and I had ever had a heart-to-heart, and I figured I could give him something.
Plus, it felt nice to say out loud instead of internalizing everything.
“I worked for their company for years, until I quit to travel blog full time. Then I was no longer welcome at home.”
Jack stared, his lips slightly open. “They disowned you?”
“Disowned me, shunned me, whatever you want to call it.” I took a sip of my beer, my cheeks warming at my admission.
“The Breckenridge reputation always comes first, the business a close second, and like a lot of families in our social circle, anything else was unacceptable. Mandy might not share our last name, but she’s an honorary one, just the same.
In this circumstance, I just want to be able to see my sister for the holidays.
Even if she thinks I need to extend an olive branch first, also known as coming home with my tail between my legs.
Who knows? Maybe someday they’ll get over it and welcome me back, but I don’t see that happening any time soon. ”
“And you’d want that?”
His question caught me off guard. I was surprised an answer rolled off the tip of my tongue. “I mean, they are my family.”
“Yeah, but not everybody deserves a second chance.”
I blinked a few times and considered this. I’d taken the first step in calling them, but I didn’t have a real plan after they’d answered. I was almost desperate enough to apologize, but I didn’t know what strings would come with that apology.
“Maybe. But enough about my family. What about yours?”
He took a long sip of his beer, and I considered getting up. It was hard enough to reveal my darkest secrets without any reciprocation. But then he offered something in return.
“My family isn’t perfect either. My parents had a pretty awful divorce when I was a kid, so I ended up having to pick a side.
I actually moved to Palo Alto in my twenties to spend some time with my dad and work for his construction company, but it didn’t strengthen our relationship any.
He still blames me for picking my mom when I was fourteen.
It was like he took it as a personal betrayal that my brother and I stayed.
I just didn’t want to leave my mom and friends to start over at a new school, but he never seemed to get over that.
He is known to blame everyone but himself anyway, so we never really recovered.
But my mom is wonderful, and so is my brother.
Sometimes I wish I saw my dad, but also, with how we left things, he doesn’t deserve a second chance until he reaches out, and it’s been years.
So I guess in that way, we’re in the same boat.
” He took a deep breath, and we let a long moment sit between us before he continued.
“So yeah, I have a shitty dad, but at least he’s still around.
I can only imagine what you went through when you lost yours. ”
I hadn’t expected that. When I met his steely blue eyes, he seemed unsure if he should have broached this topic with me or not. I put my hand over his for a second before returning to run my glittery nails along the empty beer bottle’s label.
I was glad to talk about my dad. It had been a while since someone had asked me about him.
“I miss him like crazy. He had this way of making you feel like you were the most important person in the universe. He didn’t have the easiest life as a politician’s son, and he gave me the attention he never had himself.
He never lost his cool or made me feel like I didn’t matter.
” I turned to face him. “You’d be a great dad, you know. ”
Jack raised an eyebrow. “What makes you think that?”
“The way you are with Jordy. The way you are with your friends. I get the feeling they could come to you with any problem, and you’d solve it.”
“Wow, Nat. That’s one of the best compliments I’ve ever received.”
“I just thought it was obvious.” It was hard not to think about how I didn’t have anyone I could go to like that, and it didn’t look like that was going to change anytime soon. I cleared my throat. “Do you want kids?”
“I love kids. But I don’t know if that’s in the cards for me,” he said with a twinge of resignation. I wanted him to elaborate, but he turned the tables on me before I could ask for clarification. “What about you?”
“I’d like the same, but I’m hopeful. I’d love to be someone’s person. And I’d love to raise my kids to know they can do whatever they want to do, and I’ll still love them no matter what.”
Jack smiled softly as if he understood exactly what I meant by that admission. “I’m sure you will.”
I felt cut open, and yet, Jack didn’t take advantage of my vulnerability. Instead, he offered me understanding and a tenderness that felt foreign and necessary. My heart pounded with the realization.
I needed to put some distance between us. “Well, I think I’m going to go take a shower.” Maybe I could wash away the awkwardness that coated me after that date. “Night, Jack.”
“Goodnight, princess.”