Jade
Chapter thirty-four
Imove the flight confirmation to the 'travel' folder in Mateo's inbox. He flies back to Baltimore in late January to sign the closing papers on his condo. He didn't even have to remind me to book business class this time. I'm getting better at this assistant shit.
And things are picking up for him. Now that he can drive and he's moving better, we've added quite a bit to his calendar. Mostly local high schools and a few meet and greets the team's new PR guy, Hudson, asked him to do.
I'm also getting the hang of his social media. It's about time too, because I think he was gearing up to ask Addie or Coop to take over.
"Did you call that real estate agent yet?" I ask.
Mateo looks up from where he lies on the floor. He's been taking his PT homework far more seriously, sometimes I think pushing himself a little too hard.
"Nope," he says.
"Why don't you build?"
He sits up. "Because I don't know what I need."
"Two bedrooms, three baths, a kitchen, a living room and a pool," I tell him, ticking each one off with my fingers.
"Why two bedrooms?" he asks, tilting his head as if he'd never considered it.
"Your bedroom and a guest bedroom."
"What if I get married and have kids? It wouldn't be our house. It would always just be mine."
He lays back down and props his feet back on the large exercise ball.
"And why do I need a pool?" he asks through an exhale as he bends his legs pulling the ball closer to him,
"Because then Coop and I can hang by the pool in the summer while I weed through your three thousand charity request emails."
He chuckles.
"Oh," I say. "That reminds me, you got an email yesterday asking if you'd talk to a youth support group? Something about parent-child re…fuck I don't remember, hold on."
"Reunification," he says. "Those are always a yes."
I type Mateo Hayes reunification into google.
It's the second time I've googled him. I know if I asked, he'd probably tell me, but it seems too personal for friends with benefits. There's a line there, and we've already blurred it enough.
Addie wasn't exactly thorough when she told me about her family or Mateo. I know they had adopted grandparents, and Mateo changed his name in high school. But that's the depth of what she gave me.
I click on the first link and instantly regret it. I'm on Mateo's laptop, and I'm not savvy enough to delete search history. Opening the browser on my phone, I search again.
"I didn't meet Dad until I was ten," Mateo says, startling me. "Mom spent a lot of her late childhood in foster care. She and Dad met in high school, and she got pregnant at seventeen."
"I didn't ask."
"It's not a secret, Jade." He stands and holds out his hand to me, helping me up. "Dad was a pitching star, even in high school. The short story is Mom didn't tell him about me and left so he could keep being a star."
"And the long story?"
"That's a whole ass book. One we don't have time for right now."
"Why's that?" I ask, taking his hand and getting to my feet.
Mateo pulls me to him. "Because I have to make up for four days of not kissing you."
He leans forward, brushing his lips lightly across mine. I could get lost in him like this, but I fight it with everything in me.
My phone saves me. Mateo groans.
"Hello?"
"Ms. Bennett?"
"This is her."
"Hi, this is Carla Mansfield from Triumph Art Institute, how are you today?"
Mateo presses his lips to my neck, and I swat him away.
"I'm good, how are you?"
"Wonderful, thank you. I'm calling to congratulate you. You've been awarded one of our Keep Art Alive scholarships."
"You're joking," I say.
She laughs. "I'm not. You'll be receiving an official email shortly with all the details."
I thank her and hang up.
"I got it," I say more to myself than to Mateo. "I got the scholarship."
Mateo's face lights up, more so than normal. "We need to celebrate."
I insist we don't, but in the end Mateo wins.
He's persistent like that. Which is how the three of us, Mateo, me, and Coop, end up sitting at the counter of an ice cream shop.
It's only a town over from Wilmont, but Coop and I have never been here.
To be honest, it looks rundown from the outside, dirty even, but the inside is like traveling back in time.
Mateo orders a chocolate malt shake for himself, and Coop orders mint chocolate chip on a cone.
"Gross, dude." Mateo sticks out his tongue in disgust.
The kid behind the counter laughs.
"It's my favorite," Coop says.
"Please don't tell me your favorite is vanilla?" Mateo leans on the counter, looking past Coop to me.
I gesture to myself.
"What about me, makes you think vanilla?" I ask with a raised brow.
The Adam's apple in Mateo's throat bobs, and the kid taking our order clears his throat.
"One scoop black raspberry, one scoop pistachio," Coop says.
I nod at the kid, and he walks to the back counter to start on our order. Besides the teenage couple in the booth in the corner, the three of us are the only patrons here. Because it's ice cream and it's fucking December.
"Pistachio is almost as bad as mint," Mateo says with a smirk.
"Better than vanilla," I say.
Coop reacts to the news about art school exactly the way Mateo expected him to and my heart lifts.
It's a balloon full of helium, and I'm unsure how to bring it back down.
It's easy to get lost in us—the three of us.
Too easy. I forget sometimes we aren't a unit.
I forget this is all off limits. But right now, I can't bring myself to care.
I want to listen as Coop and Mateo laugh. I want to feel Mateo's eyes on me and wish he were closer. Worse? I want to be allowed to want those things.
Maybe it's a bad idea, but I let myself have it, just for the afternoon.
Coop tells us about his day, and Mateo listens attentively. Hanging on every word. We talk about Mateo's upcoming trip to Baltimore, and Coop asks how long he'll be gone.
"Just a few days," Mateo says.
Coop grins.
We talk about Christmas at the lake house.
Charlie and Liam invited us last week, and Coop can't stop talking about it.
We went with Addie a few times over the summer, but we're both excited for Christmas there.
To be honest, I think Christmas with family is what we're looking forward to the most. Even if it weren't at the lake.
Christmas has always just been the two of us and a really horrible lasagna.
I wish I could say it's gotten better over the years, but I still suck at making it.
"Will we be able to ice skate?" Coop asks, climbing from the stool. "Well, not you obviously."
Mateo drops a small stack of cash on the counter and gives a small wave goodbye to the kid.
"Probably too warm still," Mateo answers. "It doesn't always get cold enough for the lake to freeze over."
Coop zips up his jacket, and Mateo pushes the door, holding it open. Coop skips out the door, and we follow, Mateo's hand at the small of my back.
Exactly what I wanted.
I'm officially screwed.