How Forever Feels

by Laura Drewry

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” Ellie didn’t even wait until Maya was seated. “How could you just let him walk out like that?”

  Regan nodded so fast it was like she could hardly wait for Ellie to finish so she could jump in.

  “Are you out of your freakin’ mind?”

  Jayne, always the peacemaker, lifted her hand slightly and pinned them both with a look. “Why don’t we let her sit down first?”

  And so they did, barely. Maya slung her jacket over the back of her chair and reached for her wine before sitting down. So much for the warm circle of “Kumbaya” she’d expected.

  “Hello to you, too,” she said, not even trying to hide her irritation. “And thank you, I’m fine, nice of you to ask.”

  “We’re sorry,” Jayne said, and at least she looked it, not like the other two. “How are you, really?”

  “Honestly, I’m a little pissed off. I came here hoping for some sympathy, maybe a bit of a ‘buck up little camper’ speech from you guys.”

  Ellie was already shaking her head. “That’s not gonna happen.”

  “Yeah, thank you, Ellie, I got that.”

  “He was the one, Maya. He would have done anything for you, without question, without expecting anything in return.”

  “Oh really? Then why didn’t he just tell me what happened? Why keep it a secret all this time? And why—if he’d have done anything for me—why let me go through with a marriage that was doomed to fail?”

  “Maybe because he was scared,” Regan said. “Maybe because Dickhead told him it was a one-time thing. Or maybe because it was a choice between losing his family or keeping you all together, and he couldn’t bear the thought of being the one to destroy everything.”

  “Doesn’t make it any easier.”

  “Of course it doesn’t,” Ellie snorted. “But trust us, easy’s overrated.”

  Jayne tipped her glass against Ellie’s. “True story. If Nick and I had taken the easy route, he would have married Lisa after Abby died, and they’d be living in a perfectly symmetrical split-level house with two perfect children and a swing set in the backyard. That would have been easy, that’s what everyone thought should happen, and God knows it’s what his mother wanted to have happen.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “No. There’s no ‘but.’ ”” Regan spoke each word slowly, precisely. “Carter could have easily taken one look at my situation with Mom and walked away like everyone else did, and I wouldn’t have stopped him, because if there’s one thing my mom’s not, it’s easy. And how easy do you think it is, knowing he and I will never have children of our own? It’s horrible, but we deal with it every single day, so don’t whine to me about wanting things to be easy.”

  “Regan…” Maya reached across the table, but Regan just shook her head.

  “I’m not looking for sympathy,” she said. “I’m trying to show you what the reality is. Yeah, yeah, whatever, so Jack didn’t tell you what a dick Dickhead was…yeah, that was wrong, he should have, but step back for a second and look at it objectively: Can you blame him?”

  “No, of course not. More than anyone else, I understand why he’s always been so loyal to that family. I get that! What I don’t get, what I don’t understand, is why I’m supposed to be okay with the fact that I got screwed over. And how am I supposed to trust myself to know who’s telling me the truth and who’s not now?”

  “Come on, Maya,” Ellie started, but Maya bulldozed right over her.

  “You guys think you know what this is like, but you don’t. I had my whole life planned out with Will. I mean, God, I was so sure I had ‘forever’ wrapped up with him; and if I was that wrong then, how am I supposed to trust myself to know what forever actually feels like? I’ve second-guessed every single decision I’ve made for the last two years, and then Jack showed up and all that stopped.”

  “See?” Jayne’s hopeful smile didn’t last long.

  “The only thing I see, Jayne, is that I was wrong again.”

  “But you just said you understood why he didn’t tell you.”

  “I do understand it, but I also understand that he made that choice not to tell me. He chose them over me, and while I don’t blame him for that, I’m not going to sit back and wait for it to happen again, either, and from what I know about Jack and the Carsons, it’s a pattern that gets repeated constantly. They will always come first to him.”

  “Maya.” It was all Ellie got out before she closed her mouth and sighed, and for a few long wine-sipping moments, there was nothing else said.

  Then Regan’s mouth twisted to the side a little and her cheeks pinked enough to highlight her freckles. “Okay, fine,” she muttered. “You’re not completely wrong, and I’m sorry I told you to stop whining.”

  Maya allowed herself a smile, small as it was, over the rim of her glass. “Thank you. Apology accepted.”

  “I’m sorry, too,” Jayne said. “We shouldn’t have jumped all over you like that.”

  The three of them turned to Ellie who just shook her head.

  “No way. I still think you’re out of your freakin’ mind.”

  —

  The second the highway opened, Jack was gone. Once he hit Seattle, he didn’t stop at his apartment or anything, just drove straight to TMJ and sat in his office staring out over the Puget Sound, with Pete lying at his feet.

  Anyone who thought dogs couldn’t frown had never met Pete. He’d been in a mood since they left Newport Ridge a few days back and Jack couldn’t blame him.

  Day after day they sat there in the office, Pete staring at Jack, who stared out his window trying to figure out what to do. And day after day his boss kept reminding him with increasing urgency that they needed the new missions and characters for Apollo4.

  Like he even cared about the stupid game at this point.

  God almighty he missed Maya. And it wasn’t just one thing, it was everything: her snort-laugh, the way she’d looked at him with so much trust, the way she’d get down on the floor with Pete and let him slobber all over her. The way she packed so much love into such a tiny little body.

  She wasn’t wrong to be so pissed at him; she hadn’t even been wrong to kick him out that day. He’d screwed up royally, and he deserved everything she’d said to him. Probably more.

  He couldn’t just let her go, though, not now. He needed to find a way to get her back, to prove to her that she’d been right to love him and that he’d do whatever he could to never make her doubt that again.

  But how? She wouldn’t talk to him, and he needed to respect that for now, to give her room to figure things out—but how much room? Not enough would make things worse, too much would give her time to move further away from him.

  There was no way to know how she was doing without contacting Jayne, Regan, or Ellie; and judging by the last look Jayne had given him, that probably wasn’t his best choice. All he could hope for was that the three of them were helping Snip and giving her whatever she needed so she could…

  Holy shit, that was it! They were what Apollo4 needed!

  Jack spun his chair so fast he collided with the corner of his desk and scared poor Pete. Scrambling for his pen, Jack’s ideas tumbled out of his brain faster than he could write them down.

  Across the board, focus groups listed Mercy as a favorite character among all players, but she was the hands-down favorite for the vast majority of female players. Most other games predominantly featured male characters, but fans had picked Apollo2 over them because Mercy wasn’t just a secondary character thrown into the game, she was a full-on, kick-ass character who didn’t need to hide behind Kingle or any of the other men.

  That’s what the gaming world needed more of, and that’s what Apollo4 would give them.

  Page after page, Jack scrawled ideas, scratched them out, rewrote them and then reworked them until he had them sorted out. Players would be able to choose from one of three new female leads in addition to Mercy: the peacekeeper, Justice; the renegade, R
ue; or the one with the overactive conscience, Ethos.

  Just like Mercy, each had her own strengths and each had her own weaknesses.

  For weeks he poured over the development of the three new characters, building their backstories, creating a history between them, and then plotting different obstacles to throw at them. Every line he wrote, every idea he had, circled back to the creation of Mercy, and Mercy would be nothing if it hadn’t been for Maya.

  The only person he talked to outside of TMJ was Will, and those conversations were still a little awkward.

  More often than not he ended up sleeping at TMJ, because everything was there, ready for him to write the next line regardless of what time of the day or night it was. And the sooner he got it all out, the sooner he could pack up and head north again. He could have left weeks ago and worked out of the Newport Ridge office, but he still wasn’t sure Maya wanted him that close, so he’d waited.

  He was done waiting.

  By the end of November, he’d almost finished and was just sorting out a few final ideas and options on the final mission when the call came in.

  “Yeah? Griffin? Yeah, hey, how’s it?…Good, yeah, I’m working on it right now.” Shit! How the hell could he forget to add Griffin-freakin’-Carr’s part into the game? And now he was going to have to do a little backpedaling. “No, absolutely, it’s still a go…Our legal department’s been busy is all. I’ll have them get in touch with you…Okay, sure, send me their contact info and we’ll let the lawyers hash it out…Yeah, it’s going to be great.”

  A little more back-and-forth, then Jack hung up and slammed his forehead down on his desk just as his boss walked in, snapping his gum like he always did.

  “Don’t tell me you screwed it up.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence, Spence.” Jack slumped back in his chair and grinned, knowing he’d just secured himself a spot on Spence’s Christmas card list for the rest of his life. “I promised a friend of mine that I’d write him into 4 and I kind of forgot, so I have to—”

  “Are you out of your mind? We don’t write people into games, Jack, especially friends! That’s a lawsuit waiting to happen.”

  “But this guy’s really keen.”

  Spence blew a bubble and let it pop before answering. “I don’t give a shit how keen he is. No.”

  “You sure? I just got off the phone with him and he’s ready to go.” Before Spence could say anything else, Jack turned his phone to show who the last caller was.

  Spence’s next bubble fell right out of his mouth onto the carpet. “But that says…no, you’re screwing with me, aren’t you?”

  He was still gaping when a new email chimed in on Jack’s computer. A couple quick clicks and he held out the printed message to Spence.

  “His legal team, they’re expecting our call.”

  “Ho—” Spence’s eyes were still bulging as they shifted from the page to Jack and back again. “Holy shit. How did you…no, don’t tell me, I don’t have time. I need to get legal on this.”

  He whipped around to leave, then jerked back, picked up his gum and pointed at Jack’s desk. “Get to work! We need to get this done before he changes his mind.”

  Griffin wasn’t going to change his mind, Jack knew that, but he still needed to get this part done—and fast. He hadn’t seen Maya in twenty-three days, and that was twenty-three days too long.

  He still didn’t know how, but he was going to get her back.

  Chapter 17

  “He’s her lobster.”

  Phoebe Buffay, Friends, “The One with the Prom Video”

  The footsteps on the stairs were too heavy to be Jayne’s; maybe it was Nick coming up to check something. But he usually called before showing up, so who…

  Maya pulled open the door and stopped dead in her tracks.

  “What the hell are you doing here? And how did you even get in?”

  Will inhaled deeply but didn’t make a move to come any farther than the tiny landing at the top of the stairs. “Jayne let me in. I need to talk to you.”

  “About what?”

  “Can I come in?”

  “About what?” she repeated.

  He blinked slowly. “About Jack.”

  Maya would have sworn every ounce of blood drained to her toes right there and then.

  “Is he…” She stopped, swallowed, and tried again. “Is he okay?”

  “Physically, yeah, he’s fine.”

  “Oh thank God.” With her hand pressed against her stomach, as though that would stop the flip-flopping, she stumbled back into the apartment. “Then what’s wrong?”

  Without waiting for her to invite him in, Will stepped through the door and closed it behind him.

  “Can I get you some water or something? You don’t look so good.”

  “Thank you,” she snarked. “Just what every girl wants to hear.”

  “I’m serious, Maya.” He was already moving around her toward the kitchen. “Go sit down.”

  She didn’t even argue with him, because she didn’t feel very good at all, and hadn’t for a few days, so instead she went into the living room to sit down while he rummaged through her kitchen looking for a glass.

  Leaning her head back on the couch, she pressed her palm against her forehead and forced herself to ask. “What’s wrong with Jack?”

  Will didn’t answer until he was standing in front of her with the glass of water.

  “He’s fucked up, that’s what’s wrong with him. And it’s all your fault.”

  “My fault?” she cried, sitting up so fast she not only sloshed her water but she made herself dizzy. “I haven’t even seen him since…since…”

  “Since the wedding, I know.” He lowered himself slowly to the far cushion, then leaned over his knees. “This whole thing, you and me, you and him, it’s…I don’t like it. I don’t. But I’m guessing you don’t really care what I like, do you?”

  “Not even a little bit.”

  He gave a halfhearted “what can you do” shrug and sighed.

  “I don’t expect you to believe anything I say—I wouldn’t if I was you—but I’m going to say it anyway.” He looked straight at her, his blue eyes never wavering once. “I’m sorry, Maya. I was a total dick, and the only excuse I have is that I was scared. I knew the two of us were wrong together but I was too much of a coward to say it out loud, and I’m really and truly sorry for that.”

  This was a Will she’d never seen before: humble and remorseful, and for a second she didn’t know how to respond. Her stomach churned, so she took another sip of the water, hoping it would help her feel better and give her a little more time to digest what he was saying.

  “I didn’t come here to talk about me, though. This is about Jack.”

  “What…what about him?”

  God she missed him. She missed the way his smile made her feel; she missed the way he looked at her, his eyes so warm; she missed the scent of him on her sheets; and she missed sitting with him on the couch talking about everything and nothing.

  “Okay,” Will said. “Understand the fact that I’m even here should be proof enough that this is serious, but I wasn’t kidding before: He’s fucked up. In twenty years he’s never done anything he thought might piss me off, and I know that for the first few years it was because he thought we’d send him back to that group home, but even after that. When he told me about you and him…yeah, I’m not gonna lie, I wanted to beat the living shit out of him.”

  She couldn’t help snorting at that.

  “I’m not saying I could do it,” Will said, smirking. “Just that I wanted to. But then I realized for him to actually tell me, when he knew how pissed I’d be, he had to want it more than anything he’d ever wanted before. You should’ve seen him, Maya. He was prepared to walk out of that room and never see us again if that’s what it meant.”

  “He was?”

  “Yeah! And then the next thing I know, you go and tell the poor guy to fuck off.”

  “I did
not say that.”

  “Maybe not in so many words, but we both know the only time you get that wound up is when you love something—or someone. A guy that big…jeezus, Maya, you brought him crashing down without so much as a blink.”

  “That’s not true,” she said, wishing her eyes would stop burning so much. “He’s the one…he…”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah, he knew about that chick at the bachelor party, so what?”

  “What do you mean ‘so what?’ He should’ve told me!”

  “But he didn’t because he didn’t want to be the one to break your heart.”

  “But—”

  “Stop, just stop.” He sat back and huffed out a breath. “You’ve got this backwards, Maya. I’m the one who screwed you over; I did it, not Jack. You can’t blame him for trying to protect you—or me, for that matter. That’s what he does. If you’re going to be pissed at someone, be pissed at me. It’s my fault, not his.”

  Her stomach did another roll, this time sending bile halfway up her throat.

  “Look, I’m not real happy about being here, but you have to know I’ve got no reason to lie about this. You think I want my ex-wife hooking up with my best friend? Fuck no, but bottom line, he’s my best friend, and after all the shit I’ve put him through over the years, I figure it’s my turn to have his back.”

  “I can’t…”

  “He loves you, Maya, so quit being so goddamn stubborn and call him.”

  Maya set her glass of water on the table, then pressed her fingers over her mouth. This wasn’t going to end well.

  “Will…”

  “No, don’t ‘Will’ me, just pick up the phone and call him.”

  Maya leapt off the couch and bolted, not for the phone, but for the bathroom. She made it, barely, and didn’t appreciate it when Will came in behind her with her glass of water.

  “Told you you didn’t look good.” He made sure her shaking hands had a grip on the glass before letting go, then tugged the towel off the rack and handed it to her, too. “So maybe wait until you’re done barfing and then call him.”