“I invited him,” she said. “And he happens to be very charming company.”
“You must not know Jackson very well,” Alex said. I couldn’t tell if she was teasing or not because her expression didn’t change. Although I knew Alex had never been Jackson’s biggest fan, I was still surprised by her coldness.
“Well,” Mom said. She clapped her hands together once, sensing the tension in the air. “I have a long flight home tomorrow, so I think I’ll head back to the house and get some beauty sleep.”
“I’ll come with you,” I said.
“No,” Mom shook her head and squeezed my shoulder. “Stay with your friends, have fun. I won’t be any fun asleep, anyway. I could use the rest.” She hugged Alex tight, then turned to Jackson who was still waiting politely behind us. “It was very nice to meet you,” my mom said. I figured she’d shake his hand or something, but she opened her arms for a hug instead, and he obliged. Alex and I exchanged a look. I couldn’t tell what she was thinking. Hell, I wasn’t even sure what I was thinking.
“The spare key is under the mat,” I told Mom and kissed her cheek. “I’ll see you in the morning to take you to the airport. Love you.”
Chapter 20
Jackson
I knew Grace wasn’t happy with me. She’d made that clear from the moment I’d shown up on the doorstep, but I didn’t much care. I’d enjoyed Sidney’s company, she seemed like a good woman, a good mother, and I could tell that she and Grace were close. I was envious of their relationship. It had been years since I’d been able to spend any quality time with my own mother ... I wished it was that easy in our familial relationship.
“How about a drink?” I asked Grace. She was still scowling at me, but she took a seat at the bar anyway, and I ordered us a couple of beers. Alex eyed me over the counter as if trying to get into my mind to see what I was thinking. I wanted to wish her good luck because even I wasn’t sure what I was thinking.
“Your mom is nice,” I told Grace. She scoffed and took a long swallow of her beer.
“What do you want, Jackson?” she asked. She wouldn’t look at me.
“I want to have a drink with you,” I said.
“Oh, we’re friends now?” When she finally did look at me, I couldn’t help but to wish she hadn’t. “Not like in high school when you mocked me with your friends, huh?”
“You have got to let that go,” I said. “That was years ago, and I was a jerk.”
“You didn’t even remember!” Grace cried. “You didn’t even know who I was, Jackson, even though I spent all four years of high school being bullied and taunted by you and your asshole friends.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. This seemed to catch her off guard, because her mouth snapped shut and she looked away from me.
“Was that so hard?” she asked after a moment. Her voice was quiet. “Earlier you acknowledged the fact that you were a bully, then you showed up uninvited to my house, and between now and then that is the first apology I’ve heard.”
It was so obvious now, as I watched her fingers trace an invisible line in the wooden countertop. She was angry for more reasons than just the one. And it made sense, it did. I’d admitted to her face that I remembered bullying her, and I’d barely uttered an apology.
“Forgive me?” I said. Grace looked up from where she had been staring down the counter, and a half-smile flickered on her face.
“We’ll see. You might have to make it up to me.”
I considered this for a moment. “Fine, what do you want?”
“You’ll have to give me time to think something up,” she said. I didn’t like the look on her face, and I almost regretted agreeing to it.
“You’re in it now,” Alex said. I had almost forgotten that she was still hovering around us, listening in.
“I’m a man. I can take it.” I raised my beer to my lips and took a sip. “Oh, Alex, Kate wants your number.”
“Kate?” Alex repeated.
“The girl at my party last night. You know, the one you were all up on.” I was amused when an actual flush crept up on Alex’s cheeks. Not much seemed to fluster her, but this did. I wasn’t lying, either. I didn’t remember much from last night, but I did remember Kate coming up to me sometime during a game of beer pong and asking about Alex. I’d almost forgotten to tell her. “Do you want me to give it to her?” I asked.
“Of course she does,” Grace said. “She wouldn’t stop talking about the girl in between the half a dozen times she puked up the tequila shots last night.” If possible, Alex flushed an even darker shade of red.
“Okay,” she said. “You can give it to her.” She scribbled down her name and number on a piece of scratch paper and handed it to me. She hesitated, then nodded once at me, just slightly. “So, um, thanks.”
“No problem.” I slipped the paper into my pocket, relieved that she was no longer giving me the death stare. I turned to Grace as Alex moved away to serve another customer.
“Are you coming to the next game?” I asked her. She shrugged, not looking at me.
“I haven’t decided yet.”
“Don’t you have to?” I asked. There was no way to word it without sounding like an ass. I found I had become rather good at that; sounding like an ass.
“I don’t have to do anything,” Grace said, and I leaned back just a little bit so that if she decided to swing at me, she might not fully connect.
“Isn’t it your job?”
“Can you shut up?”
“Someone is on one tonight,” I said, whistling between my teeth. “Don’t have an aneurysm.”
“God, you’re just everywhere, aren’t you?” Grace said. She finally turned to look at me, glaring between two slits for eyes. “Don’t you have other friends?”
“None of them that I really like,” I admitted, and fortunately for me, this made Grace almost crack a smile.
“Find some,” she suggested. I tilted my head at her, and then at Alex.
“I thought I had,” I said.
“Whoa, bro,” Alex put her hands in the air and shook her head. “Don’t drag me into this little after school club you two have going. I want nothing to do with it.”
“Alex has no friends except for me,” Grace said. “She’s dead inside.”
“Aww, thanks, baby.” Alex blew Grace a kiss; then she looked back at me. “It’s true, though. So, piss off.”
“I have to be better than that Shawn kid, aren’t I?” I asked. “At least I’m tolerable.”
“Hey now,” Grace said. “Shawn isn’t intolerable.”
“Sure he is,” I said.
“He is,” Alex agreed. “But I can’t say you’re any better.”
“It takes time for me to grow on you,” I told them.
“How much time?” Grace asked. “Because I’m still struggling.” I snickered and sipped my drink, then shrugged.
“As much time as it takes, I guess.”
Chapter 21
Grace
The airport was packed. Men and women and children hurried through the terminals with their luggage, desperate to catch their next flight. Business men and women in nice suits and ladies in tropical dresses scurried the halls, anxious for their long-awaited flights to their vacation destinations. I wished I was going somewhere fancy with them, somewhere far away, where I wouldn’t have to do homework or deal with Jackson. Aruba, maybe. Or Alaska. Alaska would be nice, and nobody would want to join me there.
Mom and I sat together in the airport’s quaint but tacky little coffee shop, people watching and chatting. I was so sad to see her go already, but I knew even a night with her and part of the day was more than I could have asked for, especially since it was a surprise visit. Her flight was leaving in less than an hour, and I wanted to take advantage of what little time we had left.
“Give Doug and Aidyn my love when you get home,” I said. I sipped my pumpkin spice latte, a favorite for both Mom and me, and picked at my blueberry scone. Total white girl status.
<
br /> “You’ll have to come to California for the next visit,” Mom said. “We’d love for you to stay with us.” She smiled at me and reached across the table, resting her hand on top of mine. Suddenly I wanted to cry, but I knew that if I cried, then she would cry, too, so I looked away from her instead and took a deep breath.
“California is lame,” I said. “It’s warm and tropical and on the beach. Gross.” I cracked a smile for her, and Mom chuckled.
“Grace,” she said. “You seem happy with life. I’m proud of you every day. You do know that right?”
“Of course,” I said. “Thanks, Mom.”
Silence settled over us, a comfortable silence that allowed us to finish our coffee. A moment later Mom spoke again, looking intently at my face. “Your friend Jackson ... he seems like a good guy.” She stared me now, her striking blue eyes reading the lines etched on my face like the master daughter-manipulator she was.
“Jackson?” I repeated. I scoffed for good measure. I drained the dregs of my Latte, wishing with all my might that this conversation wasn’t happening right now. “Jackson is whatever. He’s a dick sometimes.”
“Is he?” Mom asked innocently. “How so?”
“He just is.” I could sense the aggravation in my tone, and I knew Mom could, too, but she didn’t let up.
“Is there something going on between you two?” she asked. I shook my head and looked away from her, trying to focus on anything else but this incredibly uneasy moment of mother and daughter bonding.
“Nope. He’s just a friend. If even that. I report on him for football, that’s it. He’s not my type.”
“What is your type?” Mom asked.
“I don’t have a type,” I said. My irritation was growing. I felt cornered, stalked by a wild animal who wasn’t about to let up until she got what she wanted from me.
“Everyone has a type,” she said.
“Men are pigs,” I said, and looked her straight in the eye. “They are mean, arrogant, and controlling. I don’t need a guy to complete me, Mom, that’s your department.”
The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them, but my mom didn’t react negatively. She smiled sadly and shrugged her shoulders.
“Not everyone is your dad,” she said quietly.
Having to say goodbye to my mom was rough, so after her flight took off, I jumped in a taxi back to campus and had them drop me off at the bar for a drink before I went home. I never realized how much I missed my mom until she came and then had to leave again. I’d always been a bit of a mama’s girl, even now, and my only solution to missing her more was to do what every college student did; drown my sorrows in booze. It was obviously the adult thing to do, and I was becoming impressively good at it. Alex was working, and that was enough to keep me there even though Shawn was already sitting at the bar playing on his phone. While I cherished his friendship, some moments made Shawn harder to deal with than others.
“At least she came to visit, yeah?” Alex said, mixing me up one of her famous concoctions. I didn’t ask what was in it because I feared to know what I was about to drink. With Alex, it was never something simple. “That must have been a pleasant surprise.”
“It was incredible,” I said with a sigh. “I wish she lived here, though.”
“It’s okay, babe, you know you’ve got me,” Alex said with a smile. “Although, I can understand how that might not be a comfort.” She slid me the drink she’d conjured up and winked. After tasting it, I made sure she’d turned away before I allowed the overwhelming taste of alcohol to dribble out of my mouth and back into the cup.
“And me,” Shawn added. He didn’t look up from his phone, though, which made it clear he really did mean it.
“Aw,” I said.
“And Shawn,” Alex said. “And from the looks of it, it seems like you have Jackson Tate, too.” Her words caught me off guard, and since I was in the middle of braving another taste of her vodka/whiskey/rum concoction, I nearly choked on it this time around. Shawn, too, looked up abruptly, suddenly interested in the conversation like someone had thrown a comic book in his face.
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“Yeah,” Shawn agreed. “What does that mean?”
“Not much,” Alex said with a shrug. “It’s just that you’ve been spending an awful lot of time with him.”
“Here we go again,” I said. For some reason that I couldn’t quite pinpoint, I felt defensive suddenly, like Alex had caught me in a nasty act of sexual fantasies. “So?” I said. “It’s my job. Besides, we’re friends.”
“Are you?” She leaned over the counter, squinting at me. “Just friends?”
“Just friends,” I insisted. “I have no feelings for the douche whatsoever.”
“I know that,” Alex said. “But are you friends? I mean, does he treat you like a friend should treat another friend?”
“What are you talking about?” I took a sip of my drink, afraid to hear the answer. This time I managed to get my first swallow down, but only since I’d held my breath.
“What kind of friend stuff do you do?” Alex asked. “I mean, aside from dinner with your mom or drinking here. Do you do fun stuff together? Friend stuff? Movies? Bowling?”
“Are they friends or are they dating?” Shawn asked. It didn’t seem like he’d be pleased with either answer. Alex ignored him.
“Have you met his friends?”
“I don’t want to,” I said. “I met one of them, and that’s plenty.”
“Ah,” Alex said. “So, you guys are secret friends.”
“They know about me,” I said.
“They know you’re reporting on him, right?”
“Why are you such a bitch?” I snapped. I hadn’t meant to lose my cool, but Alex seemed hell-bent on making sure any acceptance I’d felt towards Jackson was nipped in the bud.
“I’m just saying.” She raised her hands in the air as if surrendering. “I don’t want you to get close to him and then get hurt. I think he’s using you.”
“Using me for what?”
“Stardom,” Shawn said, before Alex could answer. He reached for his glass of water, got a hold of some ice, and crunched it loudly. “The more awesome articles you write about him, the better he looks to everyone else. He’s reaping the benefits, and you’re just there to make him look good.”
“Thanks a lot, guys.” I gulped my drink, not even having to hold my breath this time. I was both hurt and angry, but only because I knew that Alex and Shawn were probably right, and I hated that. I had become comfortable around Jackson, too comfortable, but it seemed too early in the game to trust him. He was acting sweet, and nice, and charming and funny . . . but why? Why me? Because I made him look good, that was why, and we all knew it.
“He thinks he’s all that. Like he’s the coolest thing since sliced bread. Every girl wants him, and every guy wants to be him.” Shawn sniffed loudly and rubbed his nose.
“Yeah, well, it suits him,” I mumbled. I was only half-heartedly paying attention at this point. All Shawn ever had to say about Jackson was nothing but bad, so I was used to it.
“He’s just so immature. Like, what do women see in him? He’s not smart, he just—”
“Someone sounds like they could be jealous,” Alex said. Despite her dislike for Jackson, there was a pretty good chance she liked Shawn even less.
“Me? Jealous of that jerk?” Shawn turned to glower at her, completely taken aback. “Please. I have standards. Jackson is such an asshole that it’s a shame anyone ever gets involved with him. I think he’s—”
“You think he’s what?” I asked. “You think he’s egotistical and a womanizer and a closet jerk?”
“Not a closet jerk,” Shawn said. “He’s the kind of guy that probably picked on people like us in high school.” I exchanged a look with Alex, wishing I could defend Jackson’s honor and tell Shawn that, no, Jackson Tate was different to other stereotypical jocks who bullied people for fun. But I couldn’t because i
t was true.
“Bro, do you ever stop talking?” Alex asked suddenly.
“Look, all I’m saying is, people like Jackson Tate are the reason kids commit suicide in high school.”
“No one has ever committed suicide because of Jackson,” I said and hoped to God that was true. Even if I had spent my after-school days holed up in my bedroom with tears streaming down my face as I surveyed my “cow stature” in the mirror, I’d never entertained the thought of suicide.
“Maybe not because of him,” Shawn said. “But because of people like him.”
“People change,” I insisted. I was starting to sound desperate even to me. “People grow up. High school is hard for a lot of us, but it’s the real world that determines who you are.”
“Did your dad change?” Shawn asked, and both Alex and I whipped our heads over to look at him. My jaw dropped as I stared at him.
“Why would you say that?”
“Did he? Did he ever grow up and stop hurting you and your mom?”
“Shawn,” Alex said. “Stop.” Something in her voice made him put his hands up in surrender, lips pursed. He couldn’t look at me, and that was probably a good thing because I was considering punching him in the face. When I’d met Shawn our Freshmen year, he’d been my only friend before I found Alex. I’d told him things that I never, ever thought would he’d repeat.
“How dare you—” I started to say, but Shawn was distracted by something else.
“Speak of the Devil,” he said, and for some weird and insanely awkward moment, I thought he was talking about my dad. But when Alex and I looked up as the front door to the bar opened, it was only Jackson that came in, hands in the pockets of his jacket as he approached us.
“Well howdy, friends,” he said, grinning broadly. Much to Shawn’s displeasure, he took a seat on the empty barstool between Shawn and me. Had Shawn not been such a pushover and a bit of a baby, I’m sure he would have hit him. Or tried to, anyway. I was glad for the interruption because I had been ready to take Shawn down myself.
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