17 JANIE
JANIE
Samantha: First rule of being married to a billionaire: DO NOT CHECK THE TABLOIDS!!!!
Kat: First rule of hitching your wagon to a billionaire: DO NOT READ THE TRASH RAGS. Those “journalists” should take a ride to the Train Station, if you know what I mean.
No, I don’t know what she means. But she has a few small-town phrases I don’t understand. One thing is painfully clear.
I need to check the tabloids.
I swivel in my kitchen chair from my breakfast to my open laptop with last night’s number-crunchin-sesh still pulled up. I open a new tab and dare to google “Benedict Clark.”
Trouble in Paradise Already?
No Honeymoon for These Two!
The Billionaire and the B*itch: A Cautionary Tale…
Okay, that last one stings but…wow. The photos.
Why do I look so angry? Was I that angry? All the tendons in my neck are pulled so tight, my neck looks like pulled noodles.
Big yikes.
And, I mean, did I yell the entire time? Where are the smiling moments from the beginning? What about the almost-kiss?
I take a deep breath.
Chills break out all over my skin.
As much as I’d like to blame the temperature in this 1950s era brownstone— thanks Gran for never fixing your million-year-old-radiator —I don’t think it’s that.
I think it’s my body’s memory of how time slowed down and the world faded away and it was just me and Benedict and those deep blue eyes that were scanning me, studying me.
It was like I was naked, body and soul, and he wanted to see every single centimeter.
It was suddenly, unbearably, unbelievably hot. I am not used to him like that, calm and attentive. Still, focused. A little angry. He’s so energetic, always laughing, joking, bouncing around. I bet he doesn’t even need caffeine like I do. But in that moment, it was like he was frozen.
And I was freaking melting in his hands.
I’m not sure what was hotter, the head-holding with a side of tender-thumb-wiping or the moment he lurched in between me and the nail gun like he was a knight defending my very life.
Ugh.
This is bad.
I cannot think my temporary husband is hot.
Temporary, Janie, temporary!
Not to mention, he’s an infamous player. Charmers gonna charm. Love bomb, then get bored. I have lived this over and over. He admitted it himself. He was just acting for the group of photographers. Which is why he asked to kiss me in the first place. For show.
My phone starts buzzing. I know at the sound I won’t be able to eat any more breakfast. The texts have slowed, but not stopped. Even though I know it’s probably my friends, the rapid buzzing in succession is a huge trigger now.
I can’t look. Later I’ll get back to Sam and Kat and probably my pretend husband himself.
And there’s one message I’d risk looking at my phone for.
Ugh, how I’d love Skye to send me a message right now that cuts through the crap like we used to with each other.
A screenshot of my angry noodle neck with WTF written over it would be perfect right now.
But she won’t.
I inhale and decide to read the worst-looking article.
Oh.
Oh no.
Mother f—
My phone vibrates with a call and this time I don’t ignore it.
“I’m sorry, I realize my face is pretty bad,” I say to him, skipping the hello altogether.
“What? Your face is beautiful. I was calling to tell you not to look,” Benedict says, calm and happy as ever.
“Well, I did,” I sigh.
He clears his throat before asking, “So did you see the bit about the houses?”
“Yes.”
“Then you realize we’re going to have to, you know, live together.”
Every cell in my body tenses up, “I figured.”
“Just for a while, alright? We’ll make a big show of it at the end of this week when I’m back, then some adorable apple picking, as per your schedule,” I hear what sounds like him moving his mouth like he’s looking away, “some kissing, some walking home hand in hand and that’ll be it.”
I smirk, “Don’t think I didn’t miss how you threw kissing in there.”
“Oh, heard that, did you?” I snort and he teases, “Listen, love, I’m just trying to solve the problem.”
“The problem I created. I get it.”
“Well, there was the issue of the unread spreadsheet,” he goes on, clearly smiling. “Joint effort all around.”
“True!” I smile back, “but only one of us has a zoomed-in pop-out feature of their neck in every tabloid in America.” He doesn’t say anything. “Crap. And the UK! And…oh, okay, I get it. Every tabloid in the world. Awesome.”
He chuckles, “It’s usually a very sexy neck.”
“It was having a bad day.”
“Well, its husband didn’t watch a single YouTube video about how to make a scarecrow. What can one expect really?”
I laugh again. We discuss logistics for apple picking this weekend and then say our goodbyes.
I lock my phone and close my laptop, feeling better. It’s amazing, really. After talking to him I always feel better. Every time. I knew he was fun. Funny, too. But I didn’t expect the…comfort of him.
Weird.
And bad!
Alert!
I cannot find him handsome—which is only okay in an observation from afar kind of way. And I cannot start thinking he’s hot—which takes any feels from my brain straight down my body. And I most definitely cannot think a combination of those AND find him comforting. Feels explosion!
I have got to get a handle on this.
I can think of one sure-fire way to do so.
I pick my phone back up and go to the old, saved album I keep just for moments like this.
_____
“Hey, Gran, it’s Janie,” I try. My grandmother looks out the window, somehow shorter and skinnier than when I last saw her two days ago.
Her dark brown hair is completely gray these days, pulled back in a low ponytail.
I have my dad’s eyes, meaning I have her eyes, a very light hazel.
I hope I see some recognition in them. Her nurse called and I hurried over, in hopes that her good moments after breakfast might last a while longer.
“Janie?” She turns and, thank God, breaks into a huge, soft smile. “My favorite grandchild.”
“Granddaughter, Gran. You mean granddaughter. You have Jack too.”
She glares hilariously, “I said what I said.”
Gran.
I rush to hug her, my eyes welling with tears. This woman raised me, taught me, loved me. Took me and Jack in when she was supposed to be living her golden years. Never complained. Just showed us the ropes. Gave us everything she had.
And I left.
And then, well before I was ready, she left. Her mental clarity just up and disappeared. Like my mom so many years ago. Now, also like Mom through the years, her brilliant mind comes and goes as it pleases.
I sniff.
“What’s wrong, honey?”
“Nothing, just missed you.”
“Too much time in that city. You know they just pile the trash up in big heaps on the sidewalk. It’s uncivilized.” I nod, not bothering to correct her about me moving home from New York. To her, right now I could be eighteen or any age since then.
“I know, you warned me. It smells like shit.”
“Language! Heaven help me, you really are a New Yorker now. But it’s been what, seven, eight years there now?”
I relax a little bit, she’s present. Here, with me as my twenty-seven-year-old self. I’m not sure if she remembers that I’ve moved back home but it’s not worth upsetting her. I keep things vague.
“Gran, I have some news.”
“You must have if you’ve come all the way to visit. A boy?”
I roll my eyes, “A man, yes.”
“Thank God. We’ve just been counting down the days until you would move on from that artist boy. Bobbie said it should’ve been quicker but Kim reminded her it’s not everyday someone gets left at the altar,” she says, angry.
“Theo and I never made it to the altar, Gran.”
“Close enough!” She starts coughing so I hand her her water.
I make eye contact, hoping she’s still with me, “Anyway, his name is Benedict. He’s amazing. Handsome, funny, British.”
“British, with the accent?” If she was wearing pearls I think she would clutch them.
“Yup.”
She narrows her eyes, “Sounds charming.”
I grimace, “He is. But I promise he’s different, genuine. He really cares. I want you to meet him.”
“Alright,” she softens a bit, “I’m sure he’s not good enough but I’ll give him a shot.”
“Thanks. So,” I look out at the gorgeous fall day. “It’s really nice out today, want to go for a walk?”
“Of course not,” she says. “Exercise is for the young.”
“C’mon, Gran,” I say, taking a step toward her. But something triggers her, either the step or the idea of walking or maybe just my face.
I may have my dad’s eyes, but everything else is the spitting image of my mother. I usually like my appearance, it’s unique. I normally appreciate my dark honey skin tone with light eyes, my wide nose and full lips, but not right now.
“Jacquelyn, I said I don’t want to.”
My heart sinks into my shoes.
At least I had a few minutes.
“Alright,” I say, hands lifted in surrender. I don’t tell her I’m not my mother, Jacquelyn. Understandably, she never forgave my mother for leaving us. Honestly, I’m not sure she ever forgave my mother for being, well, charming.
Gran was ahead of her time. She didn’t care that her soft-spoken, All American Boy son had fallen for a Black Jamaican girl from one town over.
Gran instantly loved her grandkids who weren’t exactly the spitting image of her son.
But my mother was young, alluring, artistic and free-spirited.
She tried to convince my dad to leave Juniper Falls over and over, and when he wouldn’t, she started drinking.
When he died, she left without hesitation.
I sniff as I watch the woman who raised me turn and give me her back. I say, “I’ll visit again soon.”
“I wish you wouldn’t,” she spits back.
She’s talking to mom, not me.
I long to hug her again. I ache to tell her I love her, tell her I miss her more than I can even say with stupid, measly, little human words, but the moment is over.
There’s no point. To try to reorient her, try to convince her or explain, to go on at all, for myself, will only bring her discomfort. I won’t do that to her.