4. Chapter 4 #3
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, because what else am I going to say?
I broke horrible news about someone who he wanted to be his wife.
This was miles away from Nana’s sweet little fortune telling game.
The worst thing she ever predicted for me was a disappointing loss in the annual art contest in eighth grade.
I never even entered, and I always thought her readings were pretend anyway, so no harm done.
But that night on the roof, I played what I thought was a game and ended up messing with someone’s whole life.
Jamie tips his head to his shoulder in a half-hearted shrug. “It was supposed to happen, right? Everything you told me came true, Noel. The good and the bad. It’s incredible.”
“Mr. Bishop?” The tie-dye nurse returns pushing an empty wheelchair. “Time to get fitted for some crutches.”
Jamie drops his head into his hands and groans.
Being in a car with Jamie Bishop is one of the more awkward experiences of my life. After another hour, he’s finally discharged with a list of instructions and, based on his glassy eyes, a high dose of painkillers.
On the way in, he was in too much pain to do much more than slump in his seat and whimper whenever I hit a bump, but this time, we’re entirely more aware of each other.
My Jetta is so small, our arms keep brushing, sending me cowering into my door panel, and his new crutches had to be propped on the console between us to fit.
He’s wearing his hoodie with nothing underneath but that nasty bruise wrapped around his side, and it’s impossible not to think of him in the dream, his bare chest beneath soft white sheets. His hair mussed, cheeks pink from sleep or sex. The ink on his bicep flexing as his hand moved beneath the—
I jab at the AC, suddenly boiling from the inside out.
Luckily, it’s only a few blocks before Jamie motions for me to pull into a gravel parking lot. I put the car in park and peer at the dark windows of what looks to be a bar.
“Thanks for the ride,” he mumbles, reaching for the door handle without a glance.
“Jamie, wait.” Even if I don’t care to see him again, it doesn’t sit right, this tension. I press my fingers to my temples, then drop them when I realize I look like I’m trying to summon something. Jeez .
“Look, ah, that night, on the roof? It’s just that nothing like that has ever happened to me before. It was a fluke. A glitch in the Matrix. I don’t know what it was, but you have to understand it was terrifying .” Goosebumps pop up on my arms just thinking of it.
“So was you passing out on my porch in the middle of the night, by the way.” I smile playfully in an attempt to thaw this ice. His quiet chuckle is a win.
“I guess I can see that.”
“Anyway, I freaked out, okay? It was a normal human reaction to something so… not normal. That’s why I lied about not knowing you and I’m sorry. Really.”
He leans back against the headrest, finally sparing me a glance. “I just assumed you were used to it. The psychic visions or whatever. I thought maybe you were a witch.”
He smirks and I shoot him a look, but I deserve that soft jab. “Definitely not.”
Jamie’s quiet for a beat, those moody brown eyes I remember from the party swimming with contemplation. And narcotics. “So you’re saying… I mean if that was the only time, then… It’s only ever happened with me?”
I nod once in response, and his eyes widen before he schools his expression and nods back. “Wow.”
“Yeah. Wow.” I wrap my arms around myself. “We were totally screwing around that night, joking. For the last two years, I’ve convinced myself it was a dream.”
“Or that I spiked your drink.”
I wince. “ Yeaah , I guess since I’m apologizing...”
“Hey, you brought me to the hospital instead of letting me bleed out on your porch. Let’s call it even.”
“That’s dramatic. You would have gone into a coma from the concussion before you bled out.”
“Comforting.” He gives me a bashful smile that’s somehow familiar to me even though I don’t think I’ve seen it yet, and a shiver snakes through my shoulders.
“This is my taproom,” he says, gesturing out the window. “I have an apartment upstairs.”
Oh . I’m unprepared to find myself face to face with the brick and mortar version of my brain blip.
My heart is in my throat as I peer through the windshield for a better look.
It’s a two-story converted industrial building, navy blue brick.
Long picnic tables and Edison lights sit outside in a parking lot beer garden.
It’s very Portland cool. The type of place I would hang out if I lived here.
Then I see the sign—Fortune Brewing—and my arms break out in gooseflesh. Somehow, I know it’s a nod to me. The fortune teller he thinks I am. And why wouldn’t he?
I’m going to need a minute to wrap my head around this. Alone. Elsewhere.
Or maybe I won’t. Maybe when he climbs out of this car, we can just chalk the whole thing up to a weird story and go back to being complete strangers. “Okay, well if you’re all set getting in… ”
“Wait.” Jamie touches my wrist and I practically jump through the sunroof.
“Sorry,” he says, pulling back.
“It’s okay. It’s just, I don’t know when it might… We probably shouldn’t touch.”
“Right.”
There’s no psychic flash when I meet his eyes, though. Instead, I’m surprised by a sort of desperation on his face that would be clear to anyone, no sixth sense needed. “Come back tomorrow night.”
“What?” No .
“To the bar. It’s sort of a big night and I want you to see it.”
I glance at his hand wrapped around his ribs. “You’re working?”
“I don’t think so.” His shoulders sag like I’ve reminded him of an assignment that he forgot to do. “I was supposed to, obviously, but we’ll have time to talk now.”
I’m shaking my head before he even finishes.
I am sorry I was rude to him, but this isn’t something I want to play with.
Jamie’s charming, sure, and there’s obviously something weird between us, but I don’t have a good handle on whether it’s a good weird or a bad weird.
I definitely shouldn’t go out of my way to hunt it down. “It’s not a good idea,” I tell him.
“Why not? It’s Friday night. Beer is on the house, of course.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
“Does that mean you’ll come?”
“Jamie…”
“Please, Noel,” he says. “I just want you to see it.”
I pull my lip between my teeth. He looks defeated and desperate the same way he did on that roof. And just like that night, a soft spot for him appears. “Okay. I’ll try.”
“Come at seven,” he says. “If you like music, that’s when the band starts.”
He winks at me and then he’s gone.