“I’m Nell Becker,” I say, trying to erase some of my anger, to be polite. Only her face changes at the sound of my name, like I said the wrong thing. She pulls her hand back quickly and retakes her seat, busying herself with her drink.
I don’t know what I did.
“Mom,” Jackson says, standing right behind me. “Nell’s the girl I’ve been dating all summer. You know that, right?”
“Yes, yes,” Mrs. Hart says dismissively through sips of her drink. I feel like she’s purposely not looking at me, to the point when I have to wonder what exactly I’ve done. Was it one of those days I came in with Jackson and kept him to myself all night? Or maybe she knows I didn’t bring him home after he got his concussion.
I comb my hand nervously through my hair.
“Jackson,” she says, as if she can see right through me to him, “get me some more before you run off, would you?”
He nods and walks over to the fridge. I keep chancing glances at Mrs. Hart. Before, I’d only ever seen her from afar at school events and fund-raisers and ceremonies. But she doesn’t have any makeup on right now, more wrinkles visible on her face, her roots showing on top of her lank hair. Jackson reaches over the counter, pouring the flute nearly full of champagne and then topping it off with some orange juice, as I suspected.
He puts everything back and says, “Come on, Nell,” so I follow him back out through the great room and up the stairs.
“Is she okay?” I ask under my breath.
“She’ll be fine,” he tells me nonchalantly.
“Did I do something?”
He closes the door behind me as we go into his room. He tosses the box of condoms on his bed. I’d almost forgotten that was why I was here. “She doesn’t want me to date anyone right now,” he says, and that sounds like a lie. “It’s not you.”
“She sure seemed chipper before it was me.”
He rubs his hair with his palm, back and forth. “The condoms—I just. They were in my bag that I was bringing over after baseball practice because at the time, I assumed we’d need them.”
“That doesn’t explain how they got left in my room. You can’t stop yourself, can you? From always ruining everything.”
“Nell!” he exclaims, throwing his hands up in exasperation. “I wasn’t thinking straight, in case you don’t remember. They probably fell out of my bag when I was getting dressed or something and I didn’t notice in my concussed state. I don’t understand what you’re so pissed about. I was trying to be responsible.”
“I didn’t find them,” I tell him. “My mom did.”
He leans back against the bookshelf right behind him, releasing a breath. “Oh.”
“So now she knows. About us.”
He crosses his arms, not saying anything for a minute. Finally, he says, “Good.”
My heartbeat picks up considerably. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me loud and clear. Good. I’m Jackson fucking Hart. I’m first in our class, I’m going to whatever college I want, and I’ll grow up to live in a huge house just like this one,” he says, opening up his hands as if to show me around. “I’m not the kind of person you need to keep a secret.”
I shake my head. “You’re unbelievable, that’s what you are. Things don’t belong to you just because you were born this way!” A beat. Too long for me to sharpen my response. “I hate you like this.”
He pulls back, struck. The look on his face changes. “But I’m so damn tired,” he replies, softer. “What do I have to do for you to take me seriously? How can I prove to you I don’t want to own you?”
I sit back, watching him.
“Look at me, Nell. I’m desperate.” He takes a long, slow breath. “What do you want from me? For a change, can you tell me what you want?” He trails off then, giving it all to me. The decision. The control.
He’s always known what I like.
I hear Mom in my head telling me I’m smarter than this, than him. Sometimes, I can see the elegant way he weaves stories, pulls people into him. He’s so good that he’s won most games before the cards have ever been dealt.
But then I see the cracks. Like walking past a series of fun-house mirrors until you are finally standing in front of your true self and suddenly don’t recognize it at all. That is what it’s like, looking at Jackson.
I do everything right. School and sports and life. I love the adrenaline rush of competition, always chasing the high of a victory.
But when’s the last time I gave myself all the way into something? I’m always calculating.
And I’m so damn tired of it.
“Say it,” he says like he can see everything written on my face.
I breathe in and out like I’ve just gone on a long run. “I’m in love with you,” I say.
Everything about his body language changes, comes to life. I can feel it like a palpable energy, the way the dark blue in his eyes softens; he straightens and comes over to me, putting one hand on my lower back to bring me closer to him.
“Say it again,” he tells me, every spot our bodies touch like a live wire.
“I love you,” I say. I close my eyes, scared, and almost laugh. “Goddammit.”
He tilts his head, ever so slightly, barely pressing his lips against mine. “I love you, too, Nell Becker,” he whispers right next to my mouth.
And then we kiss for a long time after that.
Game. Set. Match.
32
Not much changes after that. Well, strictly speaking, that’s not entirely true. We were already spending most of our time together, but now it feels like we’re rarely apart. I stop lying about meeting Lia and start telling my parents where I am and who I’m with. Dad doesn’t seem to mind much, aside from insisting he meet Jackson, and Mom keeps her word. She won’t try to stop me. Soon I hope to work up the courage to ask her to take me to the doctor, but I’m not ready to see that disappointed look on her face yet. Lia never says much when Jackson’s name comes up, but I can’t help but feel like she’s avoiding me—her schedule has suddenly gotten much fuller.
Jackson drives an hour the next weekend to our volleyball tournament. He doesn’t say anything to me, just sits up in the stands the whole time with his hands in his pockets, watching. Columbus is with him, but there’s too many people around for me to ask Lia how their relationship is progressing. I feel like we’re living worlds apart.
We don’t post anything on social media, either. Not because it’s some big secret but because right now, it still feels like it’s just ours, something no one else can have. Only our best friends really know about us and part of me wishes no one knew at all.
I did lie last night, though. I told Mom that Lia and I were going to a slumber party at Michonne’s but I spent the night at Jackson’s. Mom didn’t believe me anyway, so I’m not sure why I bothered.
I wake up to the dull sun shining in through the shades covering the massive window at the front of his room. I reach an arm out for him and come back with nothing.
He’s missing from his side of the bed, but his phone sits on the nightstand as if signaling he’ll be right back. I get up and dress, heading for his bedroom door. I open it, but stop at the sound of voices, echoing up from the kitchen.
Someone is crying.
“Mom, Mom, it’s fine. I’ll clean it up,” Jackson is saying, and I hear something that sounds like broken glass being shifted around. Shit. His parents weren’t supposed to come back last night.
“I told you, Jackson, I don’t want that girl sleeping in my house.”
I lean my forehead against the doorframe, listening.
“We are not doing this right now,” he tells his mom, and I hear the sound of glass falling violently into a trash bag.
“You want to be like him?” she demands. “After everything.”
His voices goes lower. “This isn’t about that.”
“You’re supposed to be my baby, Jackson,” she says, and she starts absolutely wailing then, so I can’t hear
anything Jackson is saying to her. I close the door as quietly as I can, going back over to sit down on the bed.
It’s at least fifteen minutes before Jackson comes in, looking tired.
“Oh,” he says, seeing me immediately. “You’re up.”
“Yep,” I say.
“Look.” He rubs the back of his neck. “That was…”
“Why does she hate me?” I cut back over him.
“She doesn’t even know you,” Jackson says quickly. “She’s just going through a lot. Can you imagine what dealing with my dad is like?”
“I can’t imagine sitting in my bathrobe crying about it all day,” I answer icily. “You told me this would be okay. You’ve begged me all summer to stay with you, and then your mom acts like I’m some kind of trash you dragged in off the street.” I can feel myself trembling, trying to hold it together.
“Don’t do that,” he says, a warning in his voice.
I grab my purse and stand up. “I’m leaving,” I tell him. “I’m obviously not wanted here.”
“Wait, wait, wait,” he says, backing up and stretching his arm across the doorframe to stop me. “Don’t worry about that, okay? I’ll figure out some way to put it right, it’s just going to take time. Let’s go do something fun—me and you. No Doug or Columbus or Tristan.”
I relent slightly. “What do you want to do?”
He gives me a smile. It looks a little wicked.
* * *
The boat club is on his side of town, not that it would be anywhere else. I wait while Jackson and one of the boat hands gets the Harts’ boat ready for the water, untying ropes and checking fuel levels.
I stopped at home to get a bathing suit. Mom saw us walking into the house together and didn’t say a word, despite Jackson’s “Hello, Mrs. Becker.” I emerged from my room fifteen minutes later dressed for a day on the water and she’d taken a look at me.
“Don’t you have volleyball practice this afternoon?”
“I’ll be there,” I say.
She glanced over at Jackson, and then turned back to the morning show she was watching. He said, “Good-bye, Mrs. Becker,” and we left.
“That’s as good as it’s going to get,” Jackson says, passing the boat hand a tip. It’s a speedboat, with two long bench seats running up on either side to meet at the bow in the front, and a canopy covering the captain’s and passenger seats in the back. I set my bag down in the shade and go lie out on one of the seats at the front of the boat.
It’s a perfect day on the water, a crisp breeze in the air. It’s a Wednesday, so the water is almost completely clear of boats, save for some rentals from the marina and a couple of retirees fishing. After we drive around for a bit, taking in the sights, Jackson finds a spot to anchor at a sandbar on the edge of one of the many islands on the river. We’re utterly alone, my favorite place to be.
He walks up to where I’m lying down, my body stretched out on the seat. “Hi,” he says, leaning down and nudging my hip so he can crowd onto the edge next to me, even though there’s really no room.
“Hi,” I whisper back.
“I missed you,” he tells me, because we are so that couple now. I grab his sunglasses off his face so I can see him. In return, he grabs the string tied around the back of my neck and tugs at it until the bow comes loose. One of his fingers trails down my collarbone after the tumbling string of my bikini.
I try to reach out for him, but he stops me. “Don’t,” he says. “You trust me, don’t you?”
“Why should I?” I ask, my voice tripping over itself in my effort to be cool.
He laughs. “Because I want you to.” His finger trails down the center of my chest, over the middle of my now-loose bikini top, down my stomach. I close my eyes for a moment.
“I could give it a try,” I say, gazing back up at him.
His eyes light up, the dark blue after a storm. “Well, try not to make a move. Let me.” He tugs at the strings of my bikini bottom, and I grip my fist into a tight ball at my side, digging my fingernails into my palm to resist the urge to take back control.
He trails his hand lazily over the bottom of my stomach, and I hold on to what’s left of my good sense with everything I have. Don’t let go. “Make sure no one’s around,” I say to him, trying to catch my breath.
“No one’s around,” he answers, and then dips his hand to touch me. He takes his time, watching how I react to him. And I’m afraid he might notice at last. That my walls are down. That it scares me.
In one movement, he shifts over me, his knee between the seat’s backrest and me so he’s straddling me, still with one foot on the floor of the boat. The situation is out of control in a way that both thrills and terrifies me. He leans over me, pressing his mouth into mine, hungry.
“Let me touch you,” I tell him.
“You can’t,” he says. His voice sounds like he might laugh. “That’s the game.”
“You picked something I can’t win,” I say, shifting my body up to more fully meet his. “It’s not fair.”
I can tell he doesn’t enjoy the next words as much. “I didn’t bring a condom,” he admits, and I hear the regret in his voice, the frustration he’s trying to hide.
“Pull out, then,” I tell him without thinking about it.
“Nell…”
“I trust you,” I say again, more forcefully this time, more truthfully. “Please, Jackson. That’s what you want to hear, right? I trust you.”
The words do him in. I feel the way they make his body change, like this, right now, is all that he has. I know I’m going to get what I want. He draws his hand back and I want like no one has ever wanted before, like I can’t believe I thought something was important before this, and then finally, thankfully, the wanting is over and the having is happening. He plants a hand next to my face, his other pressing into the hot skin of my cheek, my neck, and I can feel the way his fingers dig into the seat, the way our bodies find each other, desperately, searching for a place in between.
There’s something I’ve never felt before, an intensity that is so alive between us, and it has nothing to do with the physical act of it. Trust, I think, but not too hard. It feels different. Some barrier is down that was between us before, something that wasn’t truly and really right until this moment when I finally surrendered the thing I held closest—control. I can tell he feels it.
I feel it.
“Nell,” he’s saying, and I’m lost in it. The air and the water and every breath in between. “Nell, I can’t—”
I don’t let him go. A moment too long.
He pulls away from me, grabbing a towel from the floorboard. “Shit,” he says. “Shit.”
I press my fists into my forehead, still reeling. “Oh my God,” I say. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t—I just…”
He sits back down on the edge of the bench. “No, no, it’s not your fault.”
“Yes, it is,” I tell him. “I’m the one who…” But I can’t finish it. I’m too embarrassed. I completely let the situation get away from me. I let down my guard and now …
“It takes two,” he says, but I still think he might be mad. I don’t blame him. But he just leans his elbows on the top of his legs and puts his head down. “Shit.”
“It’s fine,” I say, thinking as fast as I can. “I can go get Plan B in the morning. It’ll be fine.”
“Are you sure?” he asks, looking at me, hope in every line of his face. “You can do that?”
“Yeah,” I say, even though the idea makes me a little nauseated. Not the actual Plan B—just the being that girl. “I Googled it. It’s easy.” That girl who doesn’t use a condom. That girl who doesn’t protect herself. I had Googled it, but just in case a condom broke, not in the case of me turning into a hormonal idiot.
“I’m sorry,” he tells me. “It was dumb.” He reaches down to retie my bathing suit for me, now that we’ve solved the problem I created. I watch him do both sides of the bottom.
“I’m sorry,”
I whisper.
He sits up, reaching his fingers expertly behind my neck to fix my top, and then presses his mouth to my sweaty forehead once he’s done. “Everything’s fine,” he tells me then. He presses two fingers against the pulse point of my neck. “Are you okay?”
I breathe in and out slowly. He must’ve seen the attack coming on. Nell. Breathe. Nell. Think. Nell. Rationalize. “Yeah,” I say at last. He sees me. I know he sees me without me having to say the words.
He stands up, looking down at me. “Have you ever told anyone about your anxiety?”
My eyes flit away from him, out to the water. “Lia knows.” He’s still watching me, I feel it. “Look, I’ve researched it. I use techniques, I’m fine.”
“You don’t always have to be fine. Sometimes, you can ask for help.” I want to bite back at him, tell him he sounds like a television therapist, but I can’t find it in me to lash out.
I’m tired.
Finally, he lets it go and moves to lie on the other bench seat opposite me so that our heads are next to each other, and if we were to hold hands across the deck our bodies would form the shape of a letter A. We stay like that together for a while, faces to the sun, not saying anything. I keep replaying the incident over and over again, from when it started to when I stopped thinking to his last words. I don’t want help. I don’t want to need help.
After a while, Jackson reaches out to play with my fingers. “What are we going to do when we go back to school?” I ask him.
“What do you mean?” he says. I look down at our hands; his skin is significantly darker, tanned by hours in the sun at baseball and on the riverbank, mine pale in comparison from too much sunscreen and time in the volleyball gym.
“Things are going to be different. I mean, I have all the volleyball stuff now but double that once we have school and varsity. We’re going to win the state championship, so I’ll be busy. Not to mention college applications.”
He laughs. “Nell, come on. I know you’ve already got all your college applications filled out.”
Winner Take All Page 19