Play the Man

by Jaymee Jacobs

  But she had an alternative. Nick. He was willing to care for her, and Jenna was sure that he could do that well. Since they were so alike, Jenna knew that Nick could, and would, show his emotions in a way that Jenna needed. But would he be able to love her in the way she needed? They had chemistry; there was never any doubt about that. But that didn’t mean that they could withstand the test of time. What if Nick turned out to be a fling, and ultimately a bad decision? Maybe they were too alike to mesh well. Maybe they’d be too serious and never have any fun. Did she want to risk it and find out?

  Did chemistry trump history? Should history win out over chemistry? After all, Jenna knew that if she and Ryan could make it through eight years, they could make it through the rest of their lives. But would that be her best chance at happiness?

  Even after seriously thinking about it, Jenna was still no closer to a definitive answer. It was harder than it looked, to pick between the two men.

  Chapter 17

  Ryan knew that something was eating away at Jenna. It was obvious to him; that was the way she handled stress. She walled off and blocked out the world. When her finals came up, she locked herself in a quiet room and studied for hours and hours. He recognized the signs, but he couldn’t identify the cause.

  The guys finally had an off day. For once, there was no game, no practice, and not even an optional skate. Ryan was relieved to have a chance to relax; times like that did not come easy during the season, but the Blackhawks were playing well and the team deserved it. However, he didn’t get to spend the day the way he would have liked to. Since it was a Wednesday, he knew Jenna had class, so he thought that they could spend the morning hanging out together lazily. Maybe go out for brunch at Orange. She’d yell at him to do the yard work that he’d been neglecting while she was at the university for a few hours, which he would reluctantly do. And then they would spend a quiet evening at home followed up by a not-so-quiet night in bed. That’s what he had been hoping for.

  But Jenna had spent the entire previous day isolated in the den, door closed, and Ryan had left her alone. He’d gone off to bed early, since he had nothing else better to do that evening, and Ryan had expected Jenna to join him even if she were still mad at him. But when he woke up at some point in the night, he’d noticed she wasn’t there. The covers on her side of the bed were still neatly in place, too, meaning she’d never been there at all.

  That had been at around three in the morning. Ryan had tiptoed out of bed and down the stairs to check on her. The door was still closed to the den, so he quietly opened it and found her lying on the futon. Piles of used Kleenexes littered the space around her. He shook his head, wondering what could be bothering her so much that she thought she had to barricade herself away from him.

  He smiled to himself as he thought about it. Jenna was a complicated and complex person; he knew that. Ryan was the best person to know that, because he’d been a witness to it for so long. Hell, she studied art, and that was something that went right over his head. But Jenna was patient and understanding, and she could analyze things well. She looked at colors and lines and brushstrokes, and she explained what the artist was trying to do and what it meant. Whatever was going through her head, she’d figure it out. She was a puzzle-solver, an answer-finder.

  Whereas Ryan acted on his whims and fancies, doing as he saw fit. And at that moment, he wanted his fiancée in his bed with him. Scooping her up into his arms, he carried her up to their shared bedroom, where she belonged. Ryan tried to step gingerly and gently so he wouldn’t rouse her out of sleep, but she stirred without waking. That’s how she slept for the rest of the night, too. Usually, Jenna was a sound sleeper, only tossing and turning in times of stress. Trying to still her, Ryan put an arm around her waist and hooked his legs around hers. She seemed to calm after that.

  He was the type of guy who preferred to sleep until his alarm buzzed, and then hit snooze until he felt awake enough to deem pushing off the covers necessary. This particular morning, however, Ryan turned off the alarm five minutes before it was time to get up and carefully untangled himself from Jenna’s body. He changed quietly in the dark before he left for practice.

  The team had their morning skate at the United Center, and Ryan had his tennis ball in his pocket. He typically tossed it around just before getting dressed for the game, but he figured he needed to get his head ready for the game extra early today. Ryan wasn’t the kind of guy who usually had a lot on his mind, but it bothered him when something was bothering Jenna. They weren’t telepathic or anything—if they were, then he would have known what was on her mind in the first place—but it was like their minds were on the same wavelength. When she was stressed, he felt it, and his mood was similarly affected. Just like when he was relaxed, it influenced her behavior. They were tuning forks, picking up each other’s frequencies and vibrating in kind.

  Ryan bounced the tennis ball off the walls, off the floors, and threw it at teammates who would throw it back to him. It helped get his blood flooding, his heart pumping, and his mind focused. Alex would usually whip it at him, giving him a bruise or a welt, but then again, Alex would notice that he was tossing the ball around earlier than he usually would and ask him what was on his mind. For that, he was thankful that Alex wasn’t around since he couldn’t skate while he was knee was healing, but Ryan also wished that he had someone who was carefree around in order to get his mind off of Jenna and onto hockey.

  “Yo, Caveman,” Ryan said, sitting at his stall next to the blond-haired winger.

  “Sup, Biggie?”

  “Getting ready to beat the Preds,” he said, throwing the ball into the air and catching it.

  “Hey, you wanna help me prank Freeze? He creamed me last week, and I still haven’t gotten him back yet.”

  “He creamed you?” Ryan laughed and thought of all the disgusting ways that sentence could be taken.

  “Not like that, dude! You’re gross! Shaving cream! Are you gonna help me, or not?”

  “Nah,” he replied, tossing the ball a little higher and concentrating on it again. “I need to focus today.”

  “God, you sound like Marty.”

  “Excuse me?” He caught the ball and looked at him, curious about the meaning behind his almost-accusation.

  “He’s all moody and sullen.”

  “So?” Ryan asked with a laugh. “That doesn’t sound like anything new.”

  “More than usual,” he explained. But Nick always looked serious; hell, it was who he was. “That concussion’s really fucking with his head. I called him earlier to see if he wanted me to pick him up for the game tonight. I didn’t know if he could drive yet or not, so I figured I’d offer the ride. It was like he didn’t care. I know he can’t play yet, but since when doesn’t he care about the team?”

  Ryan shrugged and dismissed Brian’s comments, figuring that it was just taking Nick a little longer to get back to normal after that hit. He’d really been laid out, so Ryan assumed it needed a bit more time to heal. After all, Ryan knew that the only thing Nick cared about was hockey.

  Jenna woke up in her bed, unsure of how she got there. She knew that she didn’t voluntarily come into this room; not in this present situation that she had caused. No, she needed distance from both men in order to formulate her decision. The dreaded decision that she needed to make, but the right or wrong answers eluded her nonetheless.

  When Jenna would look at a painting, she would do so in several ways. Sometimes, she’d stand very close to it and notice the details, like the brushstrokes and the colors. And then other times, she would step back and look at the entire picture. Take in the scene, forgetting about all the little things and pieces that made the painting what it was and observing the image holistically.

  So maybe that’s what she needed to do now. Take a step back. Jenna tried to forget about it as she went about her morning routine. Even after a whole night of rest, Jenna felt more tired than she had before she had gone to sleep. She’d slept the entire nigh
t, but it hadn’t been a deep, refreshing slumber, and she really wanted to pull the covers over her head and ignore the world. However, Jenna knew she had to go to class, especially since she missed Friday and Monday. She showered, dressed, ate a modest breakfast, prepared Ryan’s pregame meal and stuck it in the fridge for him to warm up, and then drove to the School of the Art Institute, leaving the house early enough in order to avoid Ryan on his way home after the morning skate.

  She hoped that her class would distract her enough so she could forget about her errors in judgment and her betrayal. And most of all temporarily forget about the dilemma hanging over her head. Nothing like staring at slides of modern art for an hour to help her concentrate on something else for a while.

  Jenna took her usual seat in the intimately set classroom. The best part about grad school, she thought, was the small class size. At any moment, her professor could ask her a question or for an opinion, so she had to pay attention in case she was put on the spot. On normal days, she liked that, but she was especially grateful for that on this particular day.

  Katie slid into the seat at Jenna’s table. “Hey, girl. I missed you these past two classes, when you weren’t here. You know how Dr. Allen rambles, and I tried to take really good notes for you, since you couldn’t make it to class. How’s your little friend doing, by the way? Must be doing better, seeing as though you could make it in today,” she said as she dug through her bag, not looking at Jenna because she was too busy pulling out her notebook and a pen.

  When Jenna didn’t immediately start chatting away, Katie looked up curiously. Jenna snapped to attention. “Fine. He’s back home now, so he’s not my responsibility anymore.”

  “Well, that’s good, because you look exhausted,” Katie observed, noticing the dark circles under Jenna’s eyes that her make-up couldn’t quite cover. “Musta been hard work nursing him back to health.”

  Jenna tried to mock Katie’s laughter, not only to mask her mood but also because she thought that maybe if she did chuckle with her, then the happy feelings associated with laughter would soon follow suit. “Yeah. Not a difficult patient, per se, but uh, yeah. He really kinda messed things up for me,” she admitted.

  “Well, if he needs a nurse or a candy striper, you just point him in my direction,” she giggled, nudging Jenna with her elbow. “He was hot, and I need a man. I’ll take him off your hands for you.”

  Jenna honestly laughed that time, thinking that she would be happy if Nick suddenly found himself distracted with someone else. Then maybe she wouldn’t have found herself in this position. “Please do!”

  Dr. Allen and the remaining three students walked into the room, and class promptly began. Jenna threw herself into the discussion, listening raptly to every word and writing furiously to keep up with the lecture. By the end of the hour, her hand cramped from scribbling like crazy, and she had about ten pages of notes. That had to be a new record, even for her.

  “Damn. How do you manage to take so many notes?” Katie asked, peering over Jenna’s shoulder. “I get caught up in the discussions, and then I forget to even write anything down! Ugh. Would you mind if I....”

  “No, go ahead,” Jenna laughed, handing her notebook over to her friend and classmate.

  “I’m just going to photocopy this. I’ll be right back,” she said, running off to use the machine in the lobby down the hall. Jenna shook her head, thinking that the type of student she was and the type of student Katie was always seemed to meet in class. She was definitely more laid back than Jenna ever was, which is why Jenna suddenly got the idea to ask her for advice.

  “Hey, Katie,” she said timidly as she stepped back into the classroom, Jenna’s notes in one hand and the copies in the other. “This might sound a little weird, but… have you ever been in love?”

  “Uh, yeah.” She answered curiously, wondering where this conversation was headed. “Who hasn’t?”

  “Have you ever been in love with someone and simultaneously had feelings for someone else?”

  Katie froze. “Wait. Are you having second thoughts about getting married?”

  “I, well, um. I don’t know if it’s second thoughts about just getting married in general, or if it’s about getting married to Ryan. I always thought that it was going to be me and him, but you know all about how he was fighting tooth and nail about helping with the wedding. It was so aggravating, and I... I got caught up in the moment and started feeling things I didn’t—don’t—want to feel. About someone else who’s a little more sensitive.”

  “But you just can’t ignore the ways you feel about either of them,” she said, finishing Jenna’s thought for her. “If you feel it once, you can’t unfeel it.”

  “Yeah. Exactly,” Jenna sighed, glad to have someone who understood. Glad to have someone who identified with the situation and maybe could offer some valuable insight on her problem. Offer a solution. “Have you...?”

  “Kind of. Maybe. I mean, love is confusing. Movies make it seem so straightforward, that your heart just knows when you’ve met The One. But in the real world, it’s never so simple. Nothing is ever that easy.”

  “I just don’t know what to do,” Jenna moaned, running her hands through her hair. “What am I supposed to do?”

  Katie pursed her lips in thought before she answered. “I don’t know. I can’t tell you, but I think you should at least tell Ryan how you’re feeling. He deserves to know, doesn’t he?”

  Jenna nodded. Katie didn’t even understand the entire situation: that Jenna had not only felt those things but also acted on them, and yet she was able to see to the heart of the matter.

  Jenna arrived back at the house while Ryan was getting ready for his nap. She deliberately entered the building quietly, so hopefully she wouldn’t disturb him or notify him of her presence at all. However, her keys made their distinct clacking sound as she set them down on the table by the front door, and the noise echoed throughout the air and up through the living room ceiling and bedroom floor.

  “Jenna?” Ryan called out, speaking to her for the first time since she had arrived home the day before.

  “Yeah?” she asked back, moving to stand at the bottom of the stairs and looking up at him as he stood at the top. Jenna admired the way he looked: stripped down to nothing but a pair of boxers, his hair still a little wet from showering after the morning skate and sticking up like wild flames, and holding a toothbrush in his mouth. He’d had his pregame meal already, and now he was getting ready for his nap.

  Ryan looked so different than how he had when they’d first met eight years ago. When they’d met their freshman year, he was a scrawny eighteen-year-old kid; he’d reached his full height, but he didn’t have any of the musculature that he had now. No defined abs, no large biceps, and definitely not that ass. Ryan had been skinny and lanky, and it wasn’t until his sophomore year that he started to grow into his body. Jenna could still remember when they started fooling around in his dorm room, and he looked so awkward. Not at all like the man at the top of the staircase now.

  Back then, though, it hadn’t been obvious that he’d blossom into such a looker. That hadn’t been what had attracted her to Ryan at all. But then again, he had annoyed her at first when he sat beside her in Psych. He had never come to class prepared, and he would always have to ask to borrow a pen or to copy her notes. It wasn’t until week six that she realized he was trying to find a way to just talk to her.

  “Uh, how’s it going?” he asked, trying to find a way to ask about how she was doing without being too direct or putting any pressure on her. He didn’t want to scare her off, but he was desperate to know what was going on in her head.

  Jenna was supposed to be following Katie’s advice, but she couldn’t. She knew that telling him was the right thing to do; however, she literally could not make herself say the words. The truth could not pass her lips. She couldn’t hurt him—hurting Ryan was the last thing she ever wanted to do. Her actions would devastate him, and probably infuriate him,
too, and even though it was too late to take back what she had done, she didn’t want to do anything else to pain him. She’d make herself live with the consequences of keeping her secret so long as Ryan never had to find out.

  The bitter feeling of shame returned, and yet she couldn’t even stand so close to him after what she had done. They weren’t even standing that close, and she couldn’t bear to be around him knowing what she’d done. She was such a hypocrite. She didn’t want to hurt him, but she did. She still was. “It’s going,” she said cryptically, quickly leaving for the den.

  Ryan meandered back into the bathroom so he could finish brushing his teeth. He lay in bed but couldn’t sleep. Jenna was pulling away from him. It didn’t make sense; she was the one who wanted to get married and all that, but now that it was happening, she was growing increasingly distant. Maybe part of that was his fault because he didn’t appear to be as excited and as gung-ho as she was about it, but that didn’t mean that he didn’t want to. He had proposed after all. Just because it took him a while to get around to doing it, that didn’t mean that he was doing it only out of obligation.

  He said “I love you” to her every day. They had sex fairly regularly, despite this current... slump in which they found themselves. He made sure that she had whatever she wanted; he provided for her. Wasn’t that what men were supposed to do? So didn’t she know that he cared? Maybe he just didn’t say it often enough, or, better yet, show her. Get romantic. That sappy garbage from chick flicks.

  So if it weren’t enough to say that he loved her, then maybe he should do something to demonstrate it. A surprise. Something that would make her smile, because it had been a while since she had done that. But the question remained: what could he do for her? He knew she wasn’t a fan of big and flashy, so he tried to think of something a little more meaningful, so she would appreciate the gesture. And he came up with a blank.