By Degrees (42 page)

“I told you I’m not eating dinner with you,” I say louder.

“Italian it is!
 
I can never get decent Italian outside of Chicago for some reason.
 
I think I’m cursed.”
 
A few seconds later he’s talking to someone and putting in an order for lasagna and spaghetti with meatballs.
 
When he hangs up, he comes over to sit with me again.
 
“Which do you like better?
 
Flat pasta with sauce and cheese or squiqqly pasta with sauce and cheese?”

“I’m not eating with you, you stubborn ass.”

“Sounds like spaghetti to me.”

My heart is thawing even more with his persistence, much as I’m trying to resist.
 
He’s like the waves crashing against the rocks eventually turning them to sand.
 
I hate him and love him at the same time for what he’s trying to do.
 
I don’t want him doing this to me, but it doesn’t diminish the love I know he’s sharing.
 
I don’t deserve someone this amazing in my life.

He puts his arm behind me and scoots closer until his bent knee is touching my thigh.
 
“So, what’s on the boob tube?
 
Anything good?
 
Wanna watch a movie and make out?”

I drop my head back onto his arm and stare at the white ceiling.
 
“Why aren’t you listening to anything I’m saying?”

“What are you talking about?
 
I’m listening to every single word.”

“I told you to leave.”

“No, you told me to stay and never leave.”

“I told you I didn’t invite you here.”

“No, you told me to please come and rescue you from your pain and loneliness.”

“I told you I didn’t want to eat dinner with you.”

“No, you told me that you were starving for love
and
food and that you prefer spaghetti.”

I turn my head and look at him, the smile I’m trying to hold back making my mouth twitch unattractively.
 
“You obviously have a hearing problem.”

He leans in until his face is resting on the back of the couch right near my face.
 
“Nah.
 
Thing is, I listen with my heart, not my ears.
 
It’s a better receiver of the true message being sent.”

I roll my eyes to the ceiling once more.
 
“God spare me the company of rocker poets.”

“Get over here, you,” he says, pulling me into his arms as he lies back against the arm of the couch.
 
I fall against his chest and just stay there.
 
Struggling will take too much effort.
 
“Close your eyes and rest until our food gets here,” he says.
 
“I plan on asking you tons of personal questions over dinner.
 
You’ll need your strength.”

My eyes drift closed at just the thought of a rest.
 
I’ve done nothing but sleep for a couple weeks, but that doesn’t stop me from being exhausted.
 
His fingers slowly stroking my arm only make my eyelids feel heavier.
 
“I told you I’m not eating with you,” I mumble as the dark closes in.

“That’s not what I heard,” he says.

Chapter Forty-One

AFTER A FEW BITES OF spaghetti, I’m done eating.
 
I watch Jack shovel all the lasagna and the rest of the noodles into his mouth like he hasn’t had anything to eat in a week.

“Where do you put it all?” I ask.

“I have to feed the machine.
 
All that boxing I do burns off every calorie I can possibly eat.”

I smile.
 
“You’re still with Charlie?”

“Of course I’m still with Charlie.
 
All your boys are.”

I look at the couch, feeling both proud and sad over the idea of ‘my boys’ continuing on the road to happy lives once I’m gone.
 
I wish the first boy I ever had was on that road with them.
 
I hate that I can’t let that thought go, that it’s a shadow over everything I do.

“What’s the matter?” he asks me, putting his empty plate on the coffee table with all the empty styrofoam boxes.
 
“Why does that make you sad?”

“It doesn’t.
 
Well, it does.
 
I don’t know.”
 
I sigh.
 
“Sorry.
 
My brain just isn’t working anymore.”

“Tell me what you’re thinking.
 
Come on.
 
No judgment here, you know that.”

I think for a little while before speaking, trying to figure out what exactly it is that’s bothering me.
 
There are too many things swirling around in there, making it hard to get a clear picture in my own head.
 
“I guess I’m angry at Austin.
 
I’m angry at myself.
 
I feel guilty about Scott.
 
I feel guilty about Tarin.
 
I’m mad at Tarin too.”

“Whoa.
 
That’s a lot of anger and guilt to carry out in that little head of yours.”

“I know.
 
How do I get rid of it?”
 
I smile because I know the answer, but I don’t really want that answer.
 
I want a different one.

“Slay the beast.
 
Get it out of hiding, confront it, take your sword out and cut its head off.”

“Sounds like you’ve been watching
Lord of the Rings
or something.”

“
Once Upon A Time
… TV series, actually.
 
But whatever.
 
It works.
 
Guilt and anger doesn’t do anything but hurt the one having the feelings.
 
Don’t waste your time with it.
 
Come on.
 
Slay the dragon.
 
Let’s start with Austin.”

“Why Austin?”

“Because that’s where this all started, right?”

I lay back on the couch, resting my head on the arm of the seat.
 
“I’d rather sleep.”

“I have a feeling you’ve slept enough in the last couple weeks to last you the next few months.
 
Talk now, sleep later.”

“Doesn’t matter,” I say, blinking my eyes a few times to keep them from getting teary.
 
“Won’t take long anyway.
 
Austin broke my heart.
 
I let him down. Story over.”

“Come on, you can do better than that.”
 
He takes my foot in his lap and plucks at my toes.
 
It strikes me that everyone who knows me seems to have figured out I’m a sucker for the foot massage.
 
I’m a lucky girl to have this many people willing to touch my smelly feet.
 
Life does not completely suck.

“I used to just worry about how I let Austin and Scott down.
 
Now I’m not sure if I’m more mad at myself or Austin.”

“Do you feel like you’ve wasted a lot of anger on yourself … like maybe it should have been directed elsewhere?”

“Maybe.
 
I guess it’s that all this time I thought I knew … that I absolutely
knew
what happened with Austin, what he was doing when he was away from me, what his life was like.
 
But really the only thing I knew was this stupid reality I’d created for myself.
 
And that just makes me the biggest hypocrite on the entire planet.
 
Here I am, being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to get people to wake up to reality and live in the real world, when the entire time I’m over there in la-la land.
 
I’m a fraud.”
 
I throw my forearm over my eyes, too embarrassed to look at Jack anymore.
 
“I’m a fraud.
 
I hate myself for that.”

Jack reaches over and pushes my arm back to my side.
 
I turn to look at him.

“Stop that,” he demands.
 
“It’s me sitting here, okay?
 
And listen … I don’t accept that.
 
You’re not a fraud.
 
You think you’re the only one who creates their own reality?
 
Hell … we all do that.
 
Right now I have this reality that I have a shot with you … that I can come in here, sweep you off your butt and make you fall in love with me.
 
But in the back of my mind, I have a feeling you have a completely different reality where we’re concerned.”
 
He shrugs, like he didn’t just lay out the blueprint for heartache.
 
“That’s the way life goes.
 
Sometimes your reality meshes with the person you love, sometimes it doesn’t.
 
The key is to realize that we all see the world through our own fucked up lenses, so you need to roll with the punches when those lenses shift and see something that throws off the balance.”

“How’d you get so smart?” I ask, my throat rough with emotion.

“I have this amazing friend who helped me see past my own nose so I could wake up to the people around me.
 
I owe her my life.
 
I’d do anything for her, you know.”
 
He leans down and kisses my big toe.

“Even kiss her smelly toe?”

“Yeah.
 
I’d suck it too if I thought it would get me anywhere.”

I kick him and pull my feet towards my butt.
 
“Stay away from my toes, you perv.”

“Seriously, though.
 
Any chance I could get a piece of that action over there?
 
I’m just asking.”

I kick him harder this time.
 
“Stop.
 
You know I don’t feel that way about you.
 
I’m stupid like that.”

“I could kiss you real sexy like and maybe change your mind…”
 
He wiggles his eyebrows at me like a crazy lech.

I cringe.
 
“It would be like kissing my brother.
 
Sorry.”
 
I reach out and pat his shoulder.
 
“You know I love you, though, right?”

He sighs and throws his arms over the back of the couch while slumping down in the seat.
 
“Yeah, yeah.
 
Story of my life.”

I laugh.
 
He’s so good at throwing himself a pity party it’s comical.
 
“You could have your pick of ten thousand women five minutes after walking out that door.”

He turns his head to look at me over his arm.
 
“The only problem is that you’re one in a million.
 
Ten thousand options isn’t going to cut it.”

Tears come to my eyes.
 
I’m in friend-love with the one guy who would adore me forever and I poured everything I had into the guy who cheated on me and took the easy way out of life.
 
I have to be the stupidest woman to ever walk the earth.

“Don’t cry.
 
I’ll get over it.”

“I’m not crying because of that.
 
I’m crying because it’s so unfair that it wasn’t someone else realizing this about me … the one person I was born to be with.”

Jack rolls his eyes and snorts.
 
“Oh, for shit’s sake, Scar, give it a rest would you?”

I’m so shocked by his careless anger, I stop crying.
 
“What?”

He sits up and spins to face me, suddenly full of energy for some reason.
 
“Tough love.
 
Brace yourself.”
 
He pauses and then unloads on me, his words coming out in a rush.
 
“Austin was a good guy before he became infected with the fame virus.
 
And guess what?
 
You couldn’t have saved him.
 
He was a lost cause from the word go.
 
The word selfish was designed for him.
 
He didn’t just leave you behind, he left Scott behind.
 
That kid worshipped him.
 
Hell, he even tried to drag Scott down with him.
 
Bet you didn’t realize that, did you?
 
No, Austin was no saint.
 
Did he love you?
 
Sure.
 
In his own way.
 
But the love he had for the fame was stronger.
 
And he didn’t like himself at all.
 
Nothing you could have said or done would have changed that.
 
You’re a saint, you’re a miracle worker, yeah … but you can’t change people who don’t want to change.
 
He wasn’t interested.”

I’m too shocked to respond.

“Now don’t go all girl-nuts on me, okay?
 
I had to say it so we could move on.
 
Now I’m moving on.”
 
He pauses a microsecond and keeps going.
 
“Tarin.
 
This guy … he’s fucked up.
 
I mean, you know, he got bit bad by the fame dragon, but he’s on his way to figuring this stuff out.
 
You jumpstarted it, but Scott’s doing awesome.
 
The kid is strong.
 
So strong.
 
That’s you that did that.
 
You’ve been his mom, his sister, his mentor … but even with all that guidance coming from your end, he knew you had shit going on under the surface.
 
We talked about it.
 
He’s been worried for a while.”

“What the hell, Jack.” I’m more than a little stunned.
 
“The blunt honesty is wearing out its welcome over here.”

“Then I’ll hurry up and finish.
 
Scott says you need to take some time off and mourn the loss of Austin.
 
You never did.
 
You went from dealing with the aftermath to working to save the lives of the lost boys.
 
Now it’s time you find the lost girl and bring her back.”