by Amira Rain
Surprising me, Paul’s initial response was a short, sharp laugh. “Things can’t be fixed. Unfortunately. My family is far too set in their ways. So, I’ve come to realize that I can only fix myself. I can only make choices that I feel are right.”
I said that I understood, even though I only kind of did, and Paul abruptly changed the subject, asking me where I wanted to go for lunch.
“My treat.”
I thanked him, then asked if he’d mind if we picked up a boxed lunch from my favorite sandwich shop, and then took it to a certain park with a pond. “It’s a pretty place, and I always like to feed the ducks my scraps.”
Wearing a near-comical mask of surprise, Paul glanced over at me. “And you’re not yet sick of being surrounded by ducks just from being at your own home?”
The thought hadn’t even occurred to me, and I laughed.
“I guess not. Maybe Jen’s love of ducks is starting to rub off on me.”
About twenty minutes later, I enjoyed my lunch while sitting across from Paul at a picnic table in the little pond park. Across the street, children shrieked and laughed while playing on a massive jungle gym in the sun.
Once I had only a few scraps of bread left from my lunch, Paul and I went down to the pond and fed a few lucky ducks. On the way back to his truck, while we walked side-by-side, with me using only one crutch, our hands briefly touched, and next thing I knew, we were holding hands. It felt almost as good to me as kissing Paul had, and I was sorry when I had to let go of his hand when I got in the truck. However, once he’d backed out of our parking spot, he took my hand once again and began driving one-handed, caressing the back of my hand with his thumb every so often. I couldn’t deny that Jake was quickly beginning to fade off my radar.
When Paul asked me where to next, I asked him if vampires were too strong and tough for paddle boating.
He glanced over at me with the corners of his full lips twitching. “Not this one. I’d love to go paddle boating with you.”
Doing this activity was how we spent most of the afternoon, after having rented a paddleboat for two hours at the lakeside campground where Bucky and Phyllis stayed in the summers. However, partly because I couldn’t really work the pedals very well with my bum ankle, we didn’t really spend the bulk of our time actively paddle boating as much as we did just simply floating. Being that it was a weekday and not very hot, the lake was nearly empty, and hand-in-hand, Paul and I just floated all around the shallows, talking, laughing, and even doing a little kissing a time or two.
By the time we returned our boat to the rental stand, I couldn’t believe that I’d ever become so angry at Paul just for calling me a bookworm. I also couldn’t believe that just a few hours earlier, my thoughts had been almost exclusively focused on Jake. Now being so near to Paul, I was really beginning to forget why, specifically, I’d been crushing on Jake so hard. I remembered that he was kind and very attractive, but despite this, I couldn’t really muster the same feeling I’d had toward him, or even really recall it with much clarity. Not while holding Paul’s hand or kissing him, anyway.
We became even closer just while grocery shopping, stopping numerous times just to ask each other questions, or talk about something, before continuing on down the aisles. By the time we reached the checkout lanes, I realized that I’d fallen hard for Paul. And maybe I even had earlier in the day, when we’d kissed on the stairs.
Once back at home on the farm, he carried all the groceries inside for me, then helped me put things away. By this point, it was nearly five, and after glancing at a big wall clock adjacent to the stove, he said he should probably get going.
“I don’t want to push my luck with your dad.”
Reluctantly, I agreed that he probably shouldn’t, and he soon left after giving me a long, tender kiss that turned my insides to jelly.
Still in something of a daze from our kiss, I was eating a bowl of melon a short while later, sitting up to the island, when a knock sounded on the front door. Thinking that maybe Paul had forgotten something, I crutched my way out to the foyer. However, when I opened the door, it wasn’t Paul standing on the porch but Jake. And, looking into his vivid blue eyes, I suddenly remembered why I’d been crushing on him so hard.
CHAPTER 15
Mortified, I realized that I’d completely forgotten about what Jake and I had been texting about earlier that day. Thinking back now, I recalled that I’d asked when I could see him again, and he’d said that he’d see what he could do. Now I couldn’t help but feel terrible, wondering if he’d even been by earlier, while I’d been gone with Paul.
With my heartbeat accelerating, I invited Jake inside, telling him that I’d just sat down to have a snack. “Do you want to join me?”
He said that he did, although curiously, he didn’t look too happy about it. In fact, with his hands in the pockets of his battered jeans, and his shoulders hunched forward a little, as if he were dejected about something, he looked like he might have heard about my trip into Sweetwater with Paul.
Once we were sitting across from each other at the island, Jake confirmed this, saying that he’d heard about my “long trip into town” with “that one guy…what’s-his-face.”
Sure that Jake knew Paul’s name, I said it anyway. “His name is Paul…and we did go into Sweetwater to grab lunch and go grocery shopping.” Pausing for a moment, I decided to just be completely honest. “We went paddle boating, too.”
With his gaze on the granite surface of the island, Jake snorted faintly. “Wow. Things are worse than I thought, then. I came here on my break to see if you wanted to do some kind of a date-type activity with me, like go down to the creamery for some ice cream, but I guess you’ve already been on a date today. And maybe you don’t want a second.”
Realizing that he was really hurt, I also realized that I really didn’t want him to be. I liked him. A lot. In fact, now that he was sitting across from me, I couldn’t fathom just how on earth I’d all but forgotten about him that afternoon.
Suddenly deciding something, I reached across the island and took Jake’s hand. “I’d still like to go get ice cream with you. I didn’t get engaged to Paul this afternoon, you know.”
With his glum expression becoming one at least marginally brighter, Jake looked up at me. “So…the two of you aren’t….”
Jake seemed to be struggling to find the right word or words, but I was pretty sure I knew what he meant, so I helped him out.
“No. I’m not going to lie and say that Paul and I don’t have any kind of a connection, or that I didn’t enjoy our time together this afternoon, but we’re not officially boyfriend-and-girlfriend or anything like that yet. I guess we just…well, I guess we just like each other, and maybe we’re…I don’t know. Maybe we’re exploring the possibility of something, if that makes any sense. But, at the same time….” I paused, struggling to find the right words. “I really like you, too, Jake. And I want to maybe get to know you a little better…spend a little more time with you.”
Looking just slightly hopeful for the first time, Jake gave me a wry sort of look, although with his eyes twinkling. “So, you haven’t written me off just yet?”
After giving him a look that I hope expressed something to the effect of “come on,” I said no, and he began to look even more hopeful.
“Well, then, I hope we can spend more time together until you do write me off.”
I told him I wasn’t “writing anyone off” just yet. “I do want to spend more time with you and Paul both, though, as long as this isn’t a problem for either of you. This isn’t to say that I want to ‘play the field’ forever or anything like that, because that’s definitely not my intent. I just want to get to know both of you a little better for a short while. That’s all.”
Jake said that he didn’t have a problem with that. “Hey, the way I see it, may the best man win your heart. That seems fair. And in the meantime, you and I can just get to know each other a little better, and enjoy some time spent
hanging out together. No pressure. Just as ‘friends with a connection.’ Does that sound good to you?”
It did, and I said yes.
Soon I abandoned my melon for some ice cream and left the house with Jake, who offered to carry me to the creamery.
“Because I have to admit, I didn’t exactly hate carrying you the other night.”
After laughing briefly, I told him that I hadn’t exactly hated being carried by him. “I should probably just make use of my crutches this time, though. I’ve already taken a million days off work, and I can’t have my coworkers at the creamery thinking that I’m completely lazy.”
That was part of the reason that I’d declined Jake’s offer of a “lift.” However, it was only part. The other part, and maybe a bigger one, was that I didn’t want word to get back to Paul that I’d allowed Jake to carry me on the very same day that he, meaning Paul, had. You want this to all be very casual, I told myself. No more letting Paul and Jake carry you, and definitely no excessive kissing. Maybe just very brief kisses only. I had a feeling that this might be far easier said than done. Not to mention that I wasn’t even yet sure if Paul would be as content as Jake was to let me get to know each of them a little better before entering into any kind of a real relationship. I would have to text or call Paul later, I knew, although I was already dreading it.
While I ate my ice cream on a picnic table near the creamery with Jake sitting across from me, I tried to find out a little more about him, like I’d done with Paul. First, I asked Jake some general questions, like how he was liking the farm and his new house so far, and how he was adjusting to being a Watcher. Then, I moved onto a subject maybe a bit more serious, asking him if he was missing any family members or friends back in Indiana.
With his tousled golden blonde hair gleaming in the sun, he scoffed faintly. “No…not at all. By the time I took off, there was nothing left for me there. My mom died from chronic alcoholism a few years ago, and she was my last remaining family member. As far as friends, I had a few, although no one I’m missing terribly, to tell you the truth.”
“So, were you part of a coven before you came here, or do you mean human friends?”
Jake said vampire friends, but that after being turned, he’d never really been part of any coven. “I guess you could say that I knew a few different vampires in my area, but we were all pretty much lone wolves.”
“And how were you turned, if you don’t mind my asking?”
Jake said that he didn’t, but that it was kind of a complicated story. “In short, though, what happened was that after a few years of just kind of drifting around after high school, never really settling into a job for long, I was trying to start my own construction company. Since I didn’t have money for college, starting my own business was the only way I could try to lift myself out of the poverty I grew up in, as far as I could figure. And since I’d done some work in construction here and there, and knew a bit about it, construction seemed like a good fit. Also, at the time, contractors were in demand in Indianapolis because of all the new low-income housing developments going up around the city. So, off I went, trying to start my own company.”
“And was it successful?”
As if amused by the question, Jake snorted faintly, eyes twinkling. “Not even remotely. I was only able to get a bank loan for fifteen thousand dollars, which didn’t even buy me a fraction of the equipment I needed. And without the right equipment, it was very hard for me to take on certain jobs, let alone make bids to construct entire apartment complexes eventually, as was always my plan. But I couldn’t even get the experience. After six months or so, I found myself doing mostly handyman jobs around the city, unable to afford hiring even a single employee.”
“So, what did you do?”
“Well, you might say I made a deal with the devil. To greatly condense what happened next, I’ll just say that I fell in with some rough characters. We became drinking buddies, I guess, and I soon learned that they were into some dark stuff…occult stuff, like devil worship and all that. Well, one night, one of them told me that they had a friend named Maxim who was supposedly a vampire. He was looking to turn someone else into a vampire, in order to do some dirty work for him, which was basically killing a rival vampire in town. In return, he’d pay a hundred thousand dollars, which was just what I needed to really grow my business with the right equipment. So, even though all this sounded absolutely bizarre and unbelievable, my hope to improve my life through my business won out over my common sense, and I met up with this supposed vampire Maxim, soon finding out that he was very real, and very eager to hire someone to do this little job for him, which he was apparently unable to do himself, because he was a much weaker vampire than his rival. My Satan-worshipping friends told me not to take him up on his offer of money and immortality, because he couldn’t be trusted, but I didn’t listen. I let him turn me, and once I came into my full powers as a vampire, I killed his vampire rival, as promised, and I was able to do this with a fairly clean conscience, as Maxim was able to show me proof that his rival was hurting children…using them to film pornography and all sorts of other vile things that I won’t even tell you about.” As if even the mere memory disturbed him, Jake turned his face to the side for a moment or two, jaw clenched, before looking at me again. “I have a somewhat complicated moral code in some ways, but when it comes to people hurting kids…everything is very black-and-white for me. If someone does something reprehensible to a child as far as physical or sexual abuse, they’ve then forfeited the right to live, is the way I see it. Maybe this is because of my own experiences growing up in the trailer park with no one to defend me; but, at any rate, it’s just the way I see things, and the way I operate. But….” Jake paused to take a deep breath and let it out slowly before continuing. “Anyway. I killed Maxim’s rival; I collected my payment; and I planned to go on with my life, now with the money to really grow my business, not to mention all the time in the world to do it, since I was now immortal.”
Having finished my vanilla caramel ripple ice cream cone, I wadded up the wrapper and tossed it in a nearby trash can. “So, what went wrong?”
Jake sighed. “Everything. My friends turned out to be right…I shouldn’t have trusted Maxim. Wanting his money back from me, he turned more humans into vampires to make an army of sorts for himself, and eventually, I was robbed of my payment and pretty much chased out of town, with a warning that my life might be in danger if I ever return. At this point, I began just kind of drifting around the Midwest, just trying to figure out my next move. I was in Chicago when I became acquainted with a few other vampires, and they told me about how your dad was recruiting more Watchers. Having not even heard of them before, I did a little more asking around, eventually deciding that maybe becoming a Watcher was my destiny…and maybe that’s why nothing else had ever worked out for me. Maybe I was meant for something more heroic than just building a business and making money, I thought. Maybe I was meant to have an even bigger life, fighting the Warrens and keeping people safe.”
Liking Jake’s thinking, I smiled at him. “And, so, here you are.”
Showing his perfect white teeth, he smiled in return. “Here I am.”
We continued talking, and Jake asked me a lot of questions about myself. However, eager to learn more about him, I soon steered the conversation back in his direction, asking him if he thought he might be happy as a Watcher in the long-term.
He said yes, definitely. “Especially if I eventually find someone within the community that I want to spend the rest of my life with.”
Noting this, I asked him a few more questions, and soon he began telling me a story about how he’d gotten his first job at thirteen. The job was a paper route, and he’d kept it for three years, until he’d saved a few thousand dollars to “get his teeth fixed,” as he said, at the dentist.
“See, in the trailer park, in addition to being bullied and teased for frequently having a book under my arm, I was also bullied and teased for m
y teeth. A few were chipped, and I had very visible cavities everywhere, so the other kids used to call me all sorts of stupid names. And, trust me on this, when trailer park kids make fun of you for your teeth, your teeth are bad.”
Jake smiled, but I just couldn’t. Instead, with my heart aching for him, I asked him if his mom had been able to help him with the cost of his dental work.
He said no. “And, in fact, she was the reason that I had to save for it in the first place. See, the county we lived in offered free dental care for kids, but they required the parent to fill out all sorts of paperwork for it, and go into the welfare office for an interview, and my mom just could never be bothered. Apparently, she felt that her once-a-year appointment for food stamps was plenty.”
With my heart aching even worse, I reached across the picnic table and took Jake’s hand. “I’m just really sorry to hear this all. I’m just really sorry that your childhood was so terrible.”
Based on what he’d said earlier about kids being abused, and about no one ever defending him, I had the feeling that his childhood had been more terrible than he’d even already told me.
However, in response to what I’d said, he just smiled, giving my hand a squeeze. “I got through it all just fine, and everything that happened to me made me into the ambitious, driven person I am today. So, when it comes down to it, I’m grateful. I’m grateful for every single thing that happened to me as a kid.”
Liking him more and more every minute, I told him that he had an amazing and admirable perspective about things, and I meant it. In fact, my liking of him was evolving into something deeper than just “surface” liking of his looks and his general personality. I was actually beginning to think that Jake was not only someone I could continue crushing on, but might even be able to fall in love with someday.
However, earlier that afternoon, I’d also started to feel that way about Paul, which is why I forced myself to bite the bullet that evening and send him a rather lengthy text explaining things, and asking him if he might be okay with it if I took just a little time to get to know him and Jake both a little more before entering into any possible relationship more serious. Surprising me a little, Paul proved to be just as okay with all this as Jake was. Take some time, Paul wrote. I’m glad you’re not just throwing yourself headlong into something serious before you’re ready. However, just know that I really, really like you, Chrissy, and I hope it’s not too long before you’re able to decide if you want to start a relationship, and with who.