Back To Us (12 page)

“I’m gonna miss you, too.”

I wiped back a tear as Linnea left. I liked every kid I met over the summer, but Linnea had become special to me.

By the end of the day I was in a dark mood. I knew I should go and look for Justin and say good-bye, but I didn’t think I could handle it without crying and making a total fool out of myself. Deep in thought I didn’t even notice when Don poked his head into my room.

“Jessica, Mrs. Connor asked me to tell you that she wants to see you in the break room before you leave.”

“Ok. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

I retrieved my purse from my desk drawer and went to look for Mrs. Connor. The door to the break room was closed. I knocked and then pushed it open. The room was covered in streamers and balloons and besides Mrs. Connor, Justin and Don were there along with a few other community center staff and students.

“What’s all this?” I asked turning a bright shade of pink.

“We wanted to throw you a good-bye party,” Mrs. Connor said. She walked up to me and gave me a hug and I almost started to cry.

“We need some music up in here,” Don said and went over to the radio.

One by one people walked up to me and gave me hugs and wished me well. Mrs. Connor had ordered pizzas and also bought a cake and, before I knew it, I was having too much fun to be sad. After telling jokes and eating and telling more jokes, one by one people began excusing themselves until only Justin and I were left.

He pulled something from his pocket. “I have something for you.”

“What is it?”

“A good luck present.”

“You mean a good-bye present?”

“No,” he said softly. “Because I’m really hoping we’ll see each other all the time.”

“What did you get me?” I asked, steering the conversation in a different direction.

Justin handed me a small black velvet box that I was pretty sure meant jewelry. Curious, I opened it. It was a necklace. I gently lifted it out of the box and held it up for a better look. It was a thin platinum chain with three small blue jewels that dangled from little balls that matched the chain. It was beautiful and perfectly elegant.

“Did you know blue was my favorite color?”

“Of course I did. I remember everything you’ve told me about yourself.”

“Justin.” I put the necklace back in the box, closed it and held it out to him. “I can’t accept a gift like this, it’s too much.”

“I want you to have it.”

I loved the necklace, but I didn’t think I could bring myself to wear it. It would remind me of Justin and what might have been if only he’d had enough faith in me and in himself.

“I’ll be scared riding the train home wearing it. What if someone tries to snatch it off my neck?”

“Then put it in your purse and wear it whenever you want. You don’t need to put it on now.”

I hesitated for a moment before putting the box in my bag. I looked up at Justin. “Thanks. It’s really beautiful,” I said, trying to sound upbeat even though the same sadness I woke up with was creeping back. I pulled my bag onto my shoulder. “Well, I guess I’ll see you around.”
Or not.

I turned to leave. There were a million things I wanted to say to Justin, but without a guarantee that he’d respond the way I wanted him too, I was too afraid.

“Jess.”

“Yes?” I was almost at the door.

Justin hopped up on the table behind him and rested his feet on a chair. I waited for him to talk. “I’m scared,” he finally said.

“Scared of what?”

“That you’ll break me.”

I walked over to Justin slowly and stood in front of him. “You don’t believe I care about you?”

“I do. But feelings change, people change.”

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to be saying right now. I was the one who asked you out. I was the one who told you I was interested, but you turned me down,
twice
.”

“Because I’m an idiot.”

“Justin. . .”

“Just hear me out, okay?”

“Okay.” I took a step closer to him and he reached for my hand.

“All this week I kept thinking that soon I wouldn’t get to see you almost every day like I have all summer, and I couldn’t stand it. When you asked me out I wanted to say yes more than anything, but by the time I realized you were actually serious and not just asking out of pity I’d had too much time to think about all the ‘what ifs.’ Like what if you saw my legs again and felt disgusted, or what if something happened and I was stuck in a wheelchair again? How would you handle that? Would you feel like it wasn’t fair that you were stuck with me? But life is all about taking chances, and if you still want to I’m hoping that you’ll let me take you out for a movie and dinner.”

“I want to,” I replied without hesitating.

“Come here.” Justin pulled me closer and wrapped his arms around me which was a good thing because my legs were starting to feel like jelly. Justin’s hand smoothed the back of my hair as he pulled me tightly to him. “You smell so good.”

Justin did too, but I was too tongue tied to say anything. After another minute Justin pulled his arms back and looked into my eyes. “Do you have plans for tomorrow night?”

“No,” I said, shaking my head.

“Then can I take you to a movie?”

“Tomorrow? Hmm, let me think,” I teased. “Yup, that works for me.”

“When you decide what you want to see, call me and I’ll meet you at your house.”

“You don’t have to. . .”

Justin held a finger to my lips. “I know I don’t have to, but I want to. It’s a date and I’m doing it the right way. I’ll meet you at your house, and we’ll go to the movies together, and after to dinner, and then I’ll bring you back home.”

It all felt too good to be true—everything—the party, Justin’s gift, him changing his mind about dating me. My commute back home seemed to last minutes instead of over an hour. All I could think about was Justin and the crazy way he made me feel when he had his arms around me.

I had to share my news with someone, I felt like I would burst if I didn’t tell anyone. Since my brother wasn’t home, I called Susan.

“Guess who’s going on a date tomorrow?”

“With who?”

“Justin.”

“Oh my God,” Susan squealed into the phone. “So who asked who out this time?”

“He asked me. The staff at the community center threw me a going away party and after it was done he told me he realized he’d miss me, and that’s when he asked.”

“So when are you guys going out?”

“Tomorrow, he’s taking me to the movies and dinner.”

I knew I sounded like I was still in high school and going on a date for the first time, but I didn’t care. It’s how Justin made me feel, and even if I wanted to sound cool and aloof, when it came to him, I didn’t think I could.

Getting ready for my date with Justin seemed to consume most of my Saturday afternoon. After I got home from doing laundry, I took a shower and then carefully went through my closet trying to search for something to wear. Eventually I chose a short black skirt that was kind of velvety and paired it with a red top. People always told me I looked good in red, and I hoped Justin would agree when he saw me later. Earlier I’d called Justin to tell him what movie we were going to see. I wasn’t sure what to pick. Romance was a no-no for a first date, too awkward, and I remembered what Justin said about war movies, and I sort of figured that rule applied to any movie with guns and shooting, so action was out. Luckily, there was a comedy that looked like it was going to be good.

At four, Justin arrived and I met him outside. Because it was a Saturday night, the movie theater was crowded.

“Do you mind if we sit towards the back?” Justin asked.

“No. I don’t mind.”

As the movie started, Justin reached for my hand. He held it while we watched the movie. I kept wondering if he was going to do anything else, which made it impossible to pay attention to the movie. That didn’t matter to me, though, I still couldn’t get over the fact that I was actually on a date with Justin—that I was sitting next to him in a movie theater, and he was holding my hand.

“You don’t mind if I decide on where to go for dinner?” Justin asked as we exited the theater later.

“Wherever you want to go is fine with me.”

Justin took my hand and we stood by the curb while he hailed a taxi. It took us to an Italian restaurant in the village. I tried to act cool as we walked inside and not make it too obvious that it was probably one of the fanciest places I’d been too. The truth was, I hadn’t had too many opportunities for fancy in my life.

Justin and I were seated at a table in the corner of the restaurant and given menus by our host. I scanned the menu nervously trying not to gape at the fact that an order of grilled fish cost over thirty dollars.

“Just pick whatever you like,” Justin said noticing my discomfort. He’d gotten good at reading me.

Our waiter approached just as I settled on the tortellini. After our orders were taken, the waiter tucked our menus under his arm and walked away leaving Justin and me alone in the corner of the restaurant.

“This place is really nice,” I commented.

“It’s my dad’s favorite.”

“Do your parents know you’re out on a date tonight?” I asked. I reached for my water glass and wrapped my hands around it letting the coolness of the water slick away the sweat from my palms. 

“I told my dad I was going on a date, and knowing him, that means my mom knows, too,” Justin said. He took a sip of water. “What about your brother, does he know you’re on a date?”

“No, but that’s just ’cause I haven’t seen him since yesterday morning.”

“And you’re not worried?”

“He spends most weekends at his girlfriend’s house.”

“Are the two of you close? You must be if you share an apartment.”

I shrugged my shoulders. “Yes and no. My parents had sort of a divide and conquer mentality when it came to raising us. By the time the two of us left home we practically hated each other, but we got closer after.”

“Really? How?”

“It’s a long story.”

Justin gave me a look that said
not again.
For some reason it made me smile. I supposed if we were dating I’d need to get over myself and start opening up to him. “I still want to hear it.”

“I didn’t see my brother for like two years after the two of us left home. Then one day it just dawned on me that he was the only family I had in New York, and we lived so close, and we hadn’t seen each other in years, and something about that felt really wrong. So I called him one day and we started hanging out every now and then,” I explained.

“Okay, let me get this straight. If you guys weren’t living together back then, who did you live with?”

I almost forgot I hadn’t told Justin about that part of my life. “Umm, well. Basically, before I went to college, I lived in a group home.”

“Really?” Justin’s eyes widened in disbelief. I knew he was familiar with what a group home was, several of the kids who came to the community center lived in one. “Wow. So your parents moved to Croatia when you were only fourteen, and left you behind to be cared for by the state? That’s awful. I can’t believe they’d do that to you.”

“Well, believe it, ’cause it’s true.”

“But why?”

“It’s hard to explain my parents. My dad was in the military when he was younger and my mom said something happened to him that messed with his head. He had a bad temper and would go off on someone at the drop of a hat. Especially me and my brother and my mom,” I said. “Anyway, one day he got angry with me when one of my friends was visiting. Her mom had just come to pick her up and my father started screaming at me. He pushed me and I fell down on the steps in our house. When my friend’s mother said something to him about it he went off. He started calling us all whores and told my friend that she wasn’t allowed to step foot in his house again. Half an hour later the police showed up. Then a few weeks later OCFS came. My dad wouldn’t let them in the house, but he told them if they wanted his kids to take them, so they did. Mike was already eighteen so he moved in with a friend and I went to a group home.”

“Oh my God,” Justin said. He reached for my hand and I was happy to let him hold it. It was never easy to talk about my father.

Out of the corner of my eye I spotted our waiter bringing our dinner to the table. After he set our plates down in front of us I took a bite of my pasta and gulped down some water. I knew more questions were coming.

“What about your mother?” Justin asked. It was the question I always got after I told anyone about my life. “She couldn’t have been okay with your dad handing you over to the state.”

“I don’t know if she was okay with it or not, but she never tried to stop him. She never tried to stop any of the things my dad did. She only made excuses for him.”

Pity filled Justin’s eyes. Even in the dimly-lit restaurant I could see it. I tried not to let it bother me, I could hardly expect him not to react to the story I’d just told him, but I hated when people felt sorry for me.

“So you lived in the group home until you were eighteen?”

“Almost eighteen,” I said between bites of my dinner. “I left when I started college and moved into the dorms. My birthday’s at the end of September.”

“Wow. That makes me feel lucky to have the parents I do.”

“You should feel lucky.” I didn’t know that much about Justin’s parents, but I knew they were better than mine. Most people’s were. They came through for Justin after he got hurt, when he really needed them. If I got injured the way Justin had, I doubt my parents would’ve lifted a finger for me.

“My parents are really nice, but sometimes I can’t help but feel like they’re disappointed in me.”

“Disappointed in you? How is that even possible?”

Justin frowned. “My parents were
really
unhappy about my choice to join the Navy. They wanted me to go to college, but it wasn’t what
I
wanted. My dad tried to convince me to at least get a degree first and join the military as an officer, but I didn’t listen to him. I’ve always known I wasn’t really a desk job sort of guy, I wanted to see the world, I wanted adventure, not some boring job as an investment banker—that’s what my parents both do in case you were wondering.”