Chapter 33 Hailey #2
Hailey kept rubbing her head. “I can’t ride in the car,” she managed to say. Even getting up off this bench was more than
she could think of right now.
She sensed Jack’s pacing stop. “Is this, like, a brain tumor? Do I need to take you to the ER?”
She almost would’ve giggled if things weren’t all so dire, if she wasn’t in so much pain. She’d never seen Jack wrought up
like this. “No,” she croaked. “I just get headaches.”
“Are you sure? This does not seem right.”
“Yeah,” she said. “They’re tension headaches. Sometimes escalating to migraines. Not a brain tumor.”
More pacing. “Do you have anything in your car that you could take?”
“No.” She usually kept emergency prescription pills in her glove box and purse, but she’d used the last out of the glove box
and forgotten to replace them, and she hadn’t brought her purse. “Actually. Grab me a mint? Out of the glove box?”
“Yeah, sure.” She heard him leave, and she lay there rubbing her head. The pressure of the hard surface under her back and
against the back of her head was helping ease the pain a little. When she heard him come near again, she opened her eyes,
sat up partway, took the two mints he held in the palm of his hand, and popped them into her mouth.
“Thanks,” she said.
He still looked worried. “Do you want me to go get you something? Migraine medication or whatever? The Rite Aid might still
be open.”
She lay back down. She didn’t want him to leave her here alone. “No. Anyway, none of that stuff works. My prescription stuff
is back at Innisfree.” Even saying the name made tears pool in her eyes. She blinked and went on. “I just have to feel good
enough to get in the car.”
She felt Jack kneel beside her, felt the warm, gentle touch of two fingers against the side of her neck.
“I am still alive,” she said.
“I’m checking your pulse. Like to see if it’s too fast. Be quiet.”
She waited, still rubbing her head. She had the odd thought that his nearness was going to make her heart rate speed up, and
then he would think she was dying or something. What would happen then? Would he insist on taking her to the ER? She couldn’t
afford it; she would have to refuse. He’d probably offer to pay with his Silicon Valley money, and she’d have to refuse that,
too. It would be a whole disaster. “What’s the verdict, Dr. Westfield?”
“I think it’s okay. Maybe some oysters on the half shell would help,” he joked. “Wanna go to King Eider’s?”
Hailey groaned as her stomach flipped. Some of the best oysters in the world came from this very river, and she usually loved
them, especially in the cozy basement bar at King Eider’s Pub, which was a two-minute walk away, through the parking lot and
across Main Street. She wished she felt up to it. She wished a lot of things were different than they were right now. “Normally,
yes,” she said. “But. No.”
Jack took pity on her. “Would it help if I rubbed your head for you?”
“That would be amazing.” She rested her hands at her sides and waited. His fingers came lightly onto her forehead, tracing
gentle circles. “No,” she said, “you have to press really hard.”
He scooted closer. The pressure increased. “Better?”
She sighed. “Yes.”
“I can’t think of a single thing that could be stressing you out,” he said lightly.
She laughed, then moaned. “Stop making me laugh.” With the pain in her head slightly eased, now the pain in her neck was overwhelming.
She opened her eyes. The sky was black now, scattered with stars.
Though lights illuminated the opposite half of the parking lot, this side, near the river, was fairly dark, which was a relief to her eyes.
“Do you think you could rub my neck? The pain starts there.”
“Yeah, sure. You want to sit up?”
With effort, she sat up on the bench, hugging her knees. He sat behind her back, facing the river, but as he tried to twist
sideways to rub her neck, he realized he had no angle. “Okay if I sit behind you?”
She knew she shouldn’t be that close to him, but the pain was terrible. “Yes.”
He stood up and sat back down, this time straddling the bench behind her. Though he kept a few inches between them, she could
feel the warmth of him surrounding her. She yearned to lean back into him; she kept herself upright. He gently moved her hair
aside and began massaging her neck. The pressure of his fingertips made her want to moan, but she managed to confine herself
to the occasional small gasp when he hit a nerve.
“You know,” he said. “This is your body’s way of telling you that something’s wrong.”
“You think?”
He laughed a little, moved closer, and pressed harder at the base of her neck, making her gasp again.
After a moment, he asked, “Did you get a hold of your fiancé?”
“No.”
A pause. More pressure from his fingers. Another gasp. Jack spoke softly near her ear. “Maybe if you talked to me some more
about what all is bothering you, it would help.”
“Just this is helping,” she said. She didn’t want to think about Noah, or any of the rest of it. “Anyway, you know all about
me, and I know nothing about you. Let’s play the ‘what if’ game. It’ll distract me. I get to start.”
“Okay.” He sounded amused as he massaged the top of her shoulders, making her gasp again.
She caught her breath. “Okay. What if your dad insists that your grandma has to sell Seabreeze?”
Jack’s brief laugh had sorrow in it. “If my dad insists my grandma has to sell Seabreeze, I will buy it.”
“Oh!” Her surprise quickly morphed to sadness, too. “I wish I could afford to buy Innisfree. I’m sure Emma and Eli and Cody
don’t have any money, either. Ow!”
“Sorry,” he said, moving the pressure of his fingers to a different point on her shoulder.
“It’s okay. It feels good.” She sighed, leaning into his hands, forgetting for a second that she shouldn’t. “Okay, so what
if you lived in Maine all the time?”
He moved a little closer. “If I lived in Maine all the time, I’d have to travel to go surfing.”
She laughed.
“I would miss my friends in California. I’d have to buy some winter boots. I would not be able to work for Google.”
She was starting to feel better. “That’s definitely true.” She had an odd thought that she knew she shouldn’t say, but she
said it, anyway. “What about your girlfriend? Would you miss her? Would she move here to be with you?”
A pause. “I don’t have a girlfriend right now.”
“Oh.” Whoops.
Jack patted her shoulder and stood up, and she wished she’d listened to the sensible part of her that had told her not to
ask that question, because she didn’t want the massage to have stopped. “All right, Hales,” he said. “We’d better get you
home. I don’t think there’s anything more you can do tonight about your fiancé, and you need your medication.”
“Yeah,” she said. “True.” But the pain in her head was worse again already at the thought of leaving this peaceful riverbank
and reentering the mess that was her life right now.
But when Jack held out his hand, she took it and let him pull her up, because of course she had to deal with things. Still, she wished she could go back in time about four minutes, experience that massage again, that moment away from her worries.
Jack let go of her hand and headed for the car.
“Jack, wait,” she blurted. “I have one more question.” He turned to her, a mild smile on his face.
And, yes, she knew again that it was reckless to ask what she wanted to ask now. She was just so tired of trying to do the
right thing and be perfect all the time. And yes, life was long, the way Jack had pointed out in the cemetery, but somehow
the news about her grandpa also made it clear that it could be far too short.
Also, she might have a brain tumor! Probably not, but it was possible!
“What if I wasn’t engaged?” she said.
Jack’s quick, reflexive smile was just visible in the dim light. “Hales.” He drew out the sound of her name, admonishing her.
“That one’s not fair. Anyway, that’s, like, a question for you, not for me.”
She had to sigh at herself. Honestly. After everything that had happened today, she wanted to stir the pot a little more?
Yet, his response was somehow encouraging, and she went on. “No, it’s a question for you, and I’m sorry, but you have to answer.
That’s the rule.” It had been established years ago. No passes.
He laughed, then. “Dude. Seriously. You really have to ask?”
She wanted to laugh, too, hearing that, and her heart felt lighter, but she pretended to scold him. “That’s not an answer.”
He sighed and swung his hands together twice, his fist hitting inside the other hand. “Okay. Right. So. Here’s my answer.
If you weren’t engaged, you could do anything you wanted to. And so could I.” He stood still and let the words hang for a
second between them, then said, “Now, come on. Let’s get you home.” He headed for the car, as Hailey stood watching him, trying
to decipher what he’d said.
She decided: Okay, he’d just meant sex, right? Yes. Right.
Okay. She needed to get a grip. Focus on patching things up with her actual fiancé. The way Noah’d acted today had been an aberration, right? Probably brought on by stress.
Right. And, again, she could not disappoint her mom and dad about the wedding, especially not with everything else that was
going on.
She hurried to follow Jack, trying not to wish again that she could go back in time, trying not to remember how consoled,
how right, she’d felt when he was touching her.