“I can only imagine,” I said dryly.
“Playing Dance Dance Revolution at the arcade.” Without warning, he flipped the car into a u-turn across three lanes of traffic.
“That doesn’t sound that great.” It didn’t really, but Jack thought it was the greatest idea ever, and that managed to convince me somehow. I was starting to realize that my feelings seemed to be mimicking his, and that should alarm me, but he wasn’t alarmed, so I was kind of incapable of being alarmed.
Chapter 4
Neither my mother nor Milo said very much about Jack, which I found rather odd. Jane had been exploding with the urge to prattle on about him since the moment she saw him, but she did have much less self-control than most people.
And in Milo’s case, he was probably trying to keep his feelings about Jack’s visit under wraps. I had gotten home very late from hanging out with Jack, as per usual. After the arcade had closed, we had loitered at a Blockbuster, before deciding that neither of us wanted to rent anything, then drove around for awhile before finally dropping me at home. Mom was gone at work, and Milo had gone to bed, so there was nothing to be said then.
When I finally roused the next day, I immediately went to talk to Milo about Jack. I hadn’t expected him to expound very much, but his very clipped, “He seems nice” did not do the night justice. I wanted to inquire further, but I bit my tongue. The fact that Milo was apparently hiding something so important from me made me feel uncomfortable, and I didn’t really know how to proceed with conversation. A part of me wanted to just bring it out in the open and demand that he tell me, but it was his thing and he had to come to terms with it on his own time, no matter how anxious it made me.
Because of my feelings of unease, I decided to camp out in bed all day, reading and listening to Death Cab for Cutie. When Mom got up, I went out to get a soda and find out her thoughts on Jack, but disappointingly, they just mirrored Milo’s sentiments. It wasn’t that I wanted her to go on and gush about Jack until I threw up, but their hesitance to even say anything real about him disturbed me. I knew that they’d probably been embarrassed about the way they had salivated over him last night and were going through a Jack-hang over of sorts, but still.
Once she confirmed that it was perfectly acceptable for me to continue seeing Jack, I gave up on it. At least she liked him, and I could do what I wanted.
Then I went back into my room to try and figure out why it was so important to me that I kept seeing him. I hadn’t fallen under his spell the same way most people did, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t under one. As he had pointed out, I was attracted to him, otherwise I wouldn’t be there. I just wasn’t attracted to him in the normal sense.
I sprawled out in bed and wondered if it was something like that bad Love Potion No. 9 movie with Sandra Bullock. They drank this potion, and suddenly, everybody wanted them. Maybe Jack had done that too. In some kind of weird government experiment. But we lived in Minnesota. Why would the government experiment here? Were there even like CIA or FBI headquarters here? That would be a really stupid test anyway. What would the practical applications of such a potion be? And does anyone really make potions anymore?
Eventually, I gave up on it and went back to reading my book. That managed to kill an entire afternoon, but I grew tired of laying in bed. I went out to the kitchen to reheat some of Milo’s lasagna and watch TV. Milo sat on the computer the entire time and barely said a word to me. I couldn’t tell if he was mad at me for ditching him last night, or just going through his own conflicted deal about his sexuality. Either way, I didn’t push him on it, so I ate quickly, and then spent the rest of the night in my room. I went to bed that night, feeling a little surprised that Jack hadn’t talked to me at all.
Since it was my last day of Spring Break, I decided to make the most of it by sleeping the entire day away. I knew that it would only make it harder when I tried to go to bed at a decent time or get up for school the next morning, but I didn’t care. When I finally rolled out of bed, I showered and got ready for the day. I still felt like avoiding Milo, so I text messaged Jack. Besides, it was my last day, so I had to get out and do something.
What are you up to today? I was sitting on my bedroom floor, painting my toenails dark blue, because I theorized that it would take Jack a long time to answer, even though it never did. It just seemed completely unfathomable to me that he didn’t have anything better to do then text me. Or hang out with me, for that matter.
Just woke up. He texted me back promptly, as I should’ve known he would.
Sorry. Did I wake you? It was after six o’clock, but from what little time I’d spent with Jack, I had a feeling he never went to bed before dawn, so it didn’t surprise me that he’d still be sleeping.
Kinda. But its ok. I needed to get up anyway.
So, did you want to do something today? Fanning my freshly painted nails so they’d dry, I stared at my phone expectantly. I loved texting because it made it so much easier to talk to people. I would have had to spend hours building up the courage to call Jack, but I hated how long it took to get a response.
Yeah. When?
Probably sooner rather than later. I have school tomorrow. Thinking about going to school in the morning was completely depressing. The break had gone by much too fast, and I knew part of that had to do with all the time I’d been spending with Jack lately.
Ridiculous!:(Ok. Let me shower and I’ll pick you up in an hour. Cool? Jack responded, making me laugh. The fact that I was going to school would impede his life in some way, and it made me feel a little special.
Cool. See you soon.
Once my toenails dried, I finished getting ready. I slipped on a pair of skimmer shoes, which completely covered up the polishing I had just done, but it was still too cold for anything open-toed. Applying eyeliner and mascara, I admired myself in the mirror for a minute. I would never be a stunning beauty like Jane, but I wasn’t terrible to look at. My eyes were an ever-changing hazel color (today they looked more green) and my dark hair went past my shoulders.
Frequently, I thought about getting it chopped off like Jane, but I’d never been that brave.
Milo was staked out on the computer like usual when I went out into the living room. I’d just put on a tee shirt and jeans, so I slipped on my white zippered Famous Stars and Straps hoodie over it. Even with that, I’d still probably freeze my butt off outside, but I thought my jackets were gross, so this was the better option.
“Going out?” Milo didn’t look away from the computer screen, and his voice was too flat for me to decipher.
“Yep.” I nodded. I really didn’t appreciate the lack of communication between us, but I didn’t know how to fix it. “With Jack. I won’t be out too late.
Cause of school in the morning.”
“Whatever,” Milo said noncommittally. There was no lecture or disapproval, and I sighed deeply.
“Okay. I guess I’ll see you later.” I started walking towards the door, but he didn’t say anything, so I waited to leave until he responded. He grunted something that sounded vaguely like “bye,” but I figured that was the best I would get, and I headed outside.
Jack had driven the Jetta again, and I wondered how he decided which car to take. He was singing along very merrily with Kanye West to “Stronger,” and he barely seemed to notice me when I hopped into the car. We sat outside the apartment building until the song finished, then he turned down the radio and grinned at me.
“So, I was thinking we would take a walk tonight,” Jack suggested brightly.
“Okay. Where?” The night was a bit chilly, but it wouldn’t be unbearable.
Just the same, he was wearing a hoodie and pants today, forgoing his normal tee shirt and shorts combo that seemed highly inappropriate for March.
“Loring Park.” He had started pulling away as soon as he said it.
The park was only about half a mile from where I lived, but because it was on the other side of the highway, it made it almost a nec
essity to drive to it. I-94 had split it in half, but it used to be connected to the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden, where they had that giant spoon with the cherry (Spoonbridge and Cherry) along with lots of other fancy little sculptures. We ended up going to the actual Loring Park, without all the sculptures, but lots of paths and trees and all the usual beautiful park standards.
After he parked, I got out of the car and admired the stars shining brightly above us. They were usually hard to see, thanks to the city lights, but the cold, spring air made them stand out sharply. I looked around for Orion, the only constellation I really know, but Jack started walking down a trail, so I followed after him, vowing to search the skies later on.
“So you really have school tomorrow?” Jack asked grumpily once I caught up with him. He shoved his hands in his pockets and stared down at his Converse as he walked, while I tended to admire the scenery and the stars.
“Yeah,” I grimaced.
I had a whole paper due on the War of 1812, and I hadn’t done anything.
In fact, the only thing I knew about the war was that it had happened in 1812. If Milo and I had been on better speaking terms, I’d probably go home and bug him about it until he just gave in and did it for me.
“So what time do you have to be home?” He kicked a stone with his foot, reminding me very much of a little boy who had just been told he’d have to go to bed early because he’d been bad.
“I don’t know. Before midnight, I guess.” That really wasn’t that much earlier than when I normally went home, but Jack sighed and grumbled something unintelligible. “What?”
“Nothing,” he mumbled, still looking at the ground.
“Did you have some big plans for tonight?” I asked, trying to figure out what had him so depressed. I was the one that had to get up at seven in the morning, not him.
“No. I just don’t like it when things are finite.” He sighed again, then looked up at the sky. That seemed to comfort him, since the stars were completely endless.
“That’s kind of weird,” I commented. Milo had a phobia of wet sand, and Jane hated the word kumquat (it sounded too perverse, even for her), but it was pretty strange to dislike anything that had a definite ending. “Everything ends.”
“I know. I mean, we don’t hang out forever anyway. It’s just…” He shook his head, then stared off at the Basilica of St. Mary. It was this huge, beautiful cathedral, and we could just see the top of it, arched out into the sky above the trees. “Mae wanted to get married there.”
“What?” I asked, confused by his sudden topic change.
“My brother’s wife.” He nodded at the church. “But Ezra didn’t want to.”
“Why not?” It was a stunning piece of architecture, so I understood the urge to marry there. I personally wouldn’t want to, but most of the time, I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to get married. It felt really traditional, and I wasn’t sure exactly what traditions I wanted to uphold.
“They’re not Catholic, for one thing.” There was more to the story, but Jack seemed hesitant to tell me about it. I couldn’t imagine what telling me about his brother’s wedding could implicate, so I just waited for him to finish.
Finally, he continued, “It just didn’t seem right. It was Mae’s second marriage.
So they found something else, and it worked out better anyway.”
“How long have they been married?”
“I’m not really sure,” he shrugged.
“Its colder than I thought.” Pulling my hoodie tighter around me, I shivered. Jack glanced over at me, and he didn’t seem even slightly bothered by the cold. Nothing really seemed to bother him, except my bedtime.
“Do you want my sweatshirt?” He started pulling on his sleeve, like he was going to take it off, but I held up my hand to stop him.
“No, I’m okay.” Since he had actually bothered to put on something warmer today, I knew it must’ve been for a reason. I wasn’t about to take it from him because I thought my jacket was ugly.
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” I insisted. Flipping up the hood over my head, I smiled up at him. “See? Fine.”
“If you say so.” Jack had started pulling down his sleeve, so he adjusted it back to normal. “Let me know if you change your mind.”
“I won’t.”
“I know,” Jack said, sounding a little exasperated. “You never change your mind about anything.”
“You haven’t known me for that long,” I scoffed. “How can you be so sure?”
“I’m just very certain of things,” he replied simply. That was true enough.
He didn’t always have an answer for everything, but the things he knew, he really knew. I was about to ask him what the deal was with his sixth sense about everything, but then his head shot up sharply. “Watch out.”
“Watch out for what?” I tried to keep my voice even, but the instant he got nervous, I was terrified. He had stepped in front of me to shield from me something, but I peered around him, looking into the dark for some lurking danger.
Then I saw it. At first, I thought it was a giant grizzly bear barreling towards us, but then it ran underneath a lamp on the path, and I saw it was just a massive brown dog. There was a dog park on the other side of the park, so I wouldn’t have thought anything of it if Jack hadn’t been on such high alert.
“It’s just a dog!” I told him, hoping that would somehow relax him.
“I know what it is,” Jack hissed. He seemed to be debating something, probably whether or not he should run or stay put, but the dog was approaching quickly, making his decision for him. “Ah, hell.”
The dog snarled at us, but it never even slowed down. Drool and slobber spewed from its mouth, and its eyes had this crazed, intense look I had never seen on an animal before. Without any provocation, it suddenly lunged at Jack.
He held one arm behind him, trying to protect me more from the dog, and he held his other arm in front of him, using his forearm to block the attack. The dog latched on it with a loud crunching sound that made my blood curdle, and I screamed. With one swift movement, Jack whipped his hand around, grabbing the dog by the back of the neck.
“Go back to the car!” Jack shouted. He had pinned the dog to the ground by kneeling on its back and wrapping his hands around its neck. There was blood streaming down his arm, and all the while, the dog was snapping and growling viciously. But I stayed frozen, gaping at Jack and the dog. “Alice! Go back to the car!”
“Why?” I felt incredibly nauseous and dizzy, but I didn’t want to leave Jack. If I did, I knew that something bad would happen, although I didn’t even know what that meant.
“Alice! Just do it!” Jack growled.
Adrenaline surged through my body, and my feet were happy to comply when I started running back to the car. Before I had even made it there, I heard the dog yelp, and my stomach dropped. My heart pounded erratically in my chest, and I wanted to throw up. I tried not to think about what was happening and just kept running. When I made it to the car, I fought the urge to just keep running and collapsed on the ground next to it. Jack had the keys, so I couldn’t get inside. I just sat on the pavement, gasping for breath.
When I saw Jack walking towards me, I felt instant relief, but also this intense sadness. I stood up and hurried towards him, but I stopped sharply before I met him. Part of me really wanted to hug him, but another part of me knew what he had done, and it scared the hell out of me. Irrational tears streamed down my cheeks, but I tried to ignore them.
“Jack, what did you do?” I asked plaintively, wiping at my eyes to erase the tears. “What’d you do with the dog?”
“Alice…” He closed his eyes, as if it would hurt him too much to watch me react. “I didn’t have any choice. You saw him. He was going to kill somebody!
What if you had been here by yourself or with Milo or a little kid?”
Everything he was saying was completely true. The dog had looked insane and probably rabid, and even bef
ore I left him, I knew that Jack was going to kill the dog. But it didn’t change anything. I’m one of those ridiculous people that sobs every time they play that ASPCA commercial. Hurting any animal for any reason would always reduce me to tears, especially when I had been some part of it. If I hadn’t been there, I know that Jack probably would’ve acted the same, but I still had to think that he’d done it to protect me. He had killed that dog for me.
“I don’t care!” I was crying harder now, and I wished I would just stop. It really seemed unfair to me that I would be angry with Jack for saving my life, but I couldn’t help it. He moved awkwardly, and I knew that he wanted to hug me, but he also knew that I would push him away if he tried.
“Alice,” Jack exhaled deeply, looking away from me. He wasn’t crying, but he had this agonized expression on his face, and he took a small step back from me. “Everything just got so much more complicated.”
“What are you talking about?” Finally, I was able to stop crying. I felt something shift, and a whole new fear ran through me. As upset as I had been over the dog, I hadn’t hated Jack, or even really been mad him. I was just upset because a dog had been killed, and I felt partially responsible.
“This!” Jack shook his head and walked past me. “Everything! This is so stupid. I am so stupid.”
“What are you talking about?” I ran after him, wondering what I had done that had been so terrible. I reached out for him, but he pulled his arm away before I even got close to it.
“I’m taking you home.” We had reached the car, but he stood outside of it, waiting for me to get in. I had stopped in front of it and refused to go any further.
“No!” I insisted. “Why?”
“Why?” He laughed, but it was humorless and sent nervous shivers all over me. Then he reeled on me, his face stone cold, and his voice harsher than I had ever imagined it could be. “I killed a dog — to save your life — and you look at me like I’m a monster!” He shook his head, then rubbed his temple, and I saw his hand was covered in blood. Somehow, I’d managed to forget that the dog had bitten him.
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