Chapter 30
BEFORE
May, Ten Years Ago
Just like the time we pretended the conversation on New Year’s never happened, Jackson and I didn’t talk about the argument we had in the car when I dropped him off at Sophie’s a few weeks ago.
And to be honest, I don’t think he even remembered it.
Either way, I couldn’t talk about it, because he was starting to break my heart.
On Monday we went back to school like nothing happened, and for the next two weeks, the only thing we talked about was the restaurant or prom.
We hardly worked together anymore, taking opposite shifts throughout the week, and even if we worked a weekend shift, there weren’t any moments we were truly alone since Sophie was still coming to the restaurant if we worked a shift together.
She didn’t trust the two of us alone since the fight she witnessed between us in the car.
I was driving myself to school now, and taking myself home from the restaurant.
Jackson and I were drifting apart, and it was probably for the best.
Jackson, true to his word, still bought my prom ticket and helped me pick out a dress of Julie’s for the event. Before the dance, we took pictures at the Delvecchios’ house with a group of Sophie’s friends.
Jackson was looking handsome in a black tux with a black bow tie to match Sophie’s princess-style ball gown. Her red hair was in long curls down her back, and she had on these clear heels that made her look like Cinderella. She was radiant.
I was wearing an old dress of Julie’s; a form-fitting light-green gown that tied in a criss-cross up my back. Marie had pulled my white-blonde hair up into a French twist, and I was wearing my black high-top Converse with the embroidered pizza slice.
I stood off to the side during pictures, claiming that Mrs. Delvecchio needed help with the camera, and adjusting where everyone should stand.
She forced me to take a picture with Jackson against my wishes, and I could barely manage to smile through the daggers Sophie was throwing at me with her glare.
I couldn’t shrug his arm off my waist fast enough after hearing the shutter click.
Jackson drove Sophie and I to the dance, Sophie squeezed in between us with the tulle of her dress overflowing onto my lap and Jackson’s. It was one of the most uncomfortable situations ever, and not just because of the dress.
When we got to the venue the prom was being held at, things went exactly as I suspected they would go.
Everything was awkward, and filled with tension.
Sophie and Jackson argued throughout dinner, and their bickering continued into the evening.
I tried to ignore it, but it was difficult when I knew they were arguing about me.
***
Toward the end of the night, Jackson and I were sitting at the table, rapping along to the song “The Night Is Still Young” by Nicki Minaj while simultaneously eating our second serving of cupcakes.
My feet were crossed at the ankles on the edge of the table, and I had a hand out like I was spinning a record.
Jackson cupped his hands around his mouth, tilting his head up toward the sky while he screamed, “The night is still young, and so are we!” Everyone else was dancing like their lives depended on it.
I was having so much fun with him; it was just like how things used to be when we would sing at the restaurant with Julie. It had been months since we did that together.
Sophie was on the dance floor with her friends, and when the song changed to a slow one, she tapped her way over in her heels. I could feel the storm brewing.
“Jackson, come on, just dance with me one time,” she begged.
I couldn’t look up at her. I felt so bad for her; Jackson had been a dick to her all night, refusing to dance, and huffing and puffing whenever she asked him to take pictures.
She had been on the dance floor most of the night, jumping around with her friends, trying to get just a little bit of his attention. It hadn’t worked.
After an uncomfortable silence I finally glanced up at her. For once, she didn’t look mad—she looked fucking heartbroken. I had looked at Jackson that same way plenty of times, and I couldn’t handle seeing it on her face.
“Jackson, go dance with your girlfriend,” I said as I ripped his cupcake out of his hand.
Sophie gave me a death glare, even though I was trying to help her out. Even though she was mad at Jackson, that in turn made her mad at me. It wasn’t fair.
Jackson stared at me with an angry look and shoved my feet off the table before finally pushing out his chair and joining her on the dance floor, looking like we stole his lunch money.
I watched them dance to a slow song, but instead of kissing or pulling each other close like the other couples around them, they were just arguing back and forth about something.
When the song ended, they both headed in different directions, Jackson coming back to the table with a red face while Sophie rushed toward the bathrooms. He loosened his bow tie. “Come on, let’s go to the restaurant. I need a drink.”
I didn’t question him as I grabbed my purse and we left the venue. I was so done with their drama.
I hopped into the passenger seat of his truck, undoing my hair and letting it fall down over my shoulders in loose waves. The song “In Too Deep” by Sum 41 played on his phone on the way there.
By the time we got to Delvecchios’, everyone who had closed the restaurant was already gone.
We let ourselves in through the back door with my key, turning on the lights as we went.
Jackson plugged his phone into the speaker, “Sex” by The 1975 playing around us while we searched for a bottle of wine behind the bar.
We walked across the dining room and sat down on the floor with our backs against the wall—something we hadn’t done just the two of us in a long time.
Jackson turned toward me, eyes traveling from my face to my shoes and back up again. “I didn’t get a chance to tell you that you look stunning tonight.”
My stomach did a huge flip, and with such an explicit song playing in the background, the energy around us felt like it was crackling with tension.
“Thanks,” I said as I put my hair behind my ears, trying to act like it was a completely normal compliment from a friend. I took a sip of the wine before giving it to Jackson.
“So, what happened with Sophie at the dance?” I asked, reminding him he had a girlfriend.
Jackson took four large gulps of the wine before passing the bottle back to me.
“It’s just always something with her. I don’t want to talk about it,” Jackson said, grabbing the bottle back impatiently. “Let’s just have fun.”
I didn’t press him, and when the song switched over to “Pursuit Of Happiness” by Kid Cudi, he started bopping his head to the beat with a smile.
I couldn’t help myself from singing along, too, and he ran to the kitchen to turn the volume all the way up.
He came back to join me on the floor, his hip pressed against mine.
We took turns drinking the wine until it was almost finished.
I felt the alcohol all at once, and we couldn’t stop laughing.
The song was blasting from the speakers so loudly that we could barely hear one another giggling and screaming the lyrics. We didn’t notice that someone had come in through the back door until it was too late.
The music shut off abruptly, and Jackson cocked an eyebrow as we both stood up with wobbly legs to walk toward the kitchen. I was walking behind him when he stopped in his tracks, causing me to walk straight into his back.
“Watch it, Jackson.” I laughed as I went to side-step around him, only to find his mother staring at the two of us from across the room. We were fucked.
My heart started racing as I watched Mrs. Delvecchio’s eyes bounce back and forth between me and Jackson, before they settled on the almost finished bottle of wine in Jackson’s hands.
Shit, shit, shit. We had never been caught stealing the wine before, and he wasn’t even trying to hide it.
I took in a large breath of air, trying to act as sober as possible.
“Are you kidding me, Jackson?” Marie’s nostrils flared, and I could see how red her face was, even with the dimmed lighting in the dining room.
I was suddenly terrified of this woman—I had never seen her look like that before.
She was hardly five feet tall, but I only felt about two feet tall with the way she was looking at us.
“I’m sorry Mrs. D—” She didn’t even let me say her full last name before holding up her hand to stop me from talking.
She walked toward us, and I braced for impact as she grabbed the bottle out of Jackson’s hands.
“When will the drinking stop!” Marie screamed so loud I flinched back, my hands involuntarily reaching for my ears to protect them from the sound. “Stealing our wine! Drinking every damn night! And you’re supposed to drive Addie home? You could kill her! You could kill yourself, Jackson!”
I was terrified. I had never seen this sweet woman yell like this.
The way she yelled instructions in the kitchen during a rush didn’t hold a candle to how aggressively she was shouting now.
But it didn’t feel like anger spewing from her anymore—it felt like fear.
I wasn’t used to this type of screaming. The kind that came from being worried.
“Good!” Jackson yelled.
My mouth dropped open as I swung my head to look at Jackson.
How could he say something like that? Good that he could kill himself by drunk driving?
How could he act like he had no problem with doing something so reckless—with dying?
His face was red with anger now, too, his jaw clenched as he stared down at his tiny mother.
I could never have predicted what happened next. Marie screeched so loud that I dropped to a crouch in terror as I watched her throw the wine bottle across the dining room. It shattered against the wall, and the remainder of the wine splattered like blood across the clean tables and floor.
She raised her left hand, and my first reflex was to run. I didn’t want to watch her hit him—I couldn’t. I didn’t want to watch him yell at her, either. I couldn’t hear him say he wanted to die again. I wasn’t just scared—I was absolutely petrified.
I was out the door and down the street, my sneakers smacking across the pavement, when I felt a hand grab my shoulder. This time I was the one to scream at the top of my lungs as I blocked my face, preparing for impact.
“Jesus, Addie. It’s just me,” I heard Jackson say.
I was crouching on the ground again, my hands covering my ears.
Jackson grabbed my wrists to slowly take my hands away from my head, and when I opened my eyes, he was in the same position in front of me.
He had a red welt growing on his right cheek; his mom must have slapped him with her left hand—there was a perfect mark from the band of her wedding ring.
I couldn’t believe she actually hit him.
His eyes were heavy with remorse as he looked at me.
“Hey . . . Hey, don’t cry.”
I didn’t even realize I had started crying until Jackson reached forward to wipe his thumbs across my cheeks.
“I can’t. I can’t be around that,” I choked out.
I flashed back to Peter in the kitchen at Christmas, smashing the dishes and destroying everything in a rage. The time he tried to drag me down the street outside of Delvecchios’. Him and my mom having screaming matches over my head as I grew up.
“I’m sorry, Addie. I’m so sorry.” And then he was hugging me, rocking us back and forth and trying to calm me down. “Just let us take you home. Come on, Marie’s waiting in her car.”
I shook my head against him. I couldn’t be in the car if he was going to fight with her more. “I don’t want to hear you both yell again.”
“We won’t, I promise. I promise,” he whispered against my hair.
I heard the crunch of tires in the road, and Jackson helped me stand up. I hurried to wipe the snot that was leaking from my nose as Marie pulled her car up.
Jackson opened the back door for me, and surprised me when he slid in beside me.
He tucked me into his side, and for the first five minutes of the drive, none of us said a word.
I could hear Marie sniffling, and every time I heard her try to suppress a sob, it made silent tears fall from my face.
Jackson wiped each one away with his thumb, pressing a kiss to the side of my head each time.
I thought I should tell him to stop—that his mom could see us—but I couldn’t make myself speak.
“I’m sorry you had to hear that, Addison,” Marie said as she pulled into the driveway. Everything felt wrong. I felt like I was slipping away from this family; like I was stuck in a bad dream, trying to run toward something but my legs wouldn’t move.
“Please,” I started to say before I choked on a cry, “don’t hit Jackson again.”
She choked out a sob and I opened the car door before anything else could be said, rushing toward my front door.
“Addie, wait.” I turned around to find Jackson standing on the path with his hands in his pockets.
His bow tie was still loosened around his neck, and the top three buttons of his dress shirt were undone, my mascara smeared across the white of it.
The porch’s automatic light flickered on, and I suppressed another cry when the welt on his cheek was illuminated by the light. Everything was falling apart.
“Jackson, don’t ever say you want to die again,” I managed to say before turning around and walking through the front door, locking the deadbolt behind me.