Wild Child (26 page)

I don’t want my life to be like this
. Full of relationships so shallow because she was scared to talk about the things that mattered, the things that kept her up nights. The things that made her Monica.

Who will know me if I don’t let them in?

“It can’t be easy talking about that night,” he whispered, giving her an out.
It’s okay
, his voice said.
We don’t have to talk about it
.

“You know,” she laughed, to cover the dark bruise forming on her psyche, “it’s not. It’s not at all. It’s awful. But it’s helped me see where some of this ‘I am an island’ bullshit I’ve been telling myself came from.”

“You are an island?”

“Or a lone wolf, depending on how I feel that day.” Joking about it was a defense, she knew that, but she was opening herself up in baby steps here.

“What about Jenna?” he asked. “Your friend.”

She ran a hand through her knotted hair, the small snags distracting her from the larger ache memories of Jenna brought up. “We were very close while I wrote the groupie book. We pulled each other out of the lowest points of our life and then, once we had our acts together … we drifted. I think the memories that each of us carried for the other were really painful, so it was
easier to let each other go so we wouldn’t have to be reminded of that part of our life. But then she came to a signing in Nashville and we had dinner. And she told me she was sick and … everything kind of snapped into focus. I realized how alone I was and how alone she was, and I didn’t want that for her at the end.”

“You’re a good friend,” he said.

“I think … I think I just did what I would want someone to do for me.”

He ran a finger across the back of her hand. “I understand feeling alone.”

“Oh, please,” she said. “You’re surrounded by friends. By people. Everyone in this town loves you.”

He stared at her for a long moment, a kind of bewildered surprise on his face, but then it was gone, vanished behind that smile he wore so easily.

“You’re right,” he said and took a drink, waving her off. “I’m just addled by great sex.”

Immediately she realized what an asshole she sounded like. Who the hell was she to shrug off his loneliness just because it didn’t look like hers?

“I’m so sorry, that was unfair of me.”

“Well, trust me, I know how ridiculous it sounds but sometimes, like tonight, I can be in a crowd of people who are my friends, who have known me my whole life, and I feel … alone. Part of it is my own fault, I know that. When I first moved back, everyone wanted to help and I held them all at arm’s length, you know. I just circled the wagons and concentrated on my sister.”

“You isolated yourself.”

“Well … I don’t know how much of it was a choice, and how much of it was just the way things turned out.”

She wanted to ask if he really believed that, but she could tell by his face that he did. He was somehow distanced from all those choices he’d made and the long-term ramifications of them.

“How did you become mayor?” she asked.

At his sudden tension, she guessed she’d brushed up against one of his electric fences. And she wondered if he’d brave it out to answer her, or if he’d even consider that brave. But then he relaxed, his leg resting against hers. The hair above his knee tickled, so she pressed harder against him. Past the tickle, until it felt … right.

“I had a degree and a year of law school. When I moved back, there was nothing for me to do. Besides, obviously, take care of my sister. But I was living in a house that smelled like my mom. Pictures of my dad were everywhere but I had nothing of my own. What twenty-two-year-old does? After the initial shock wore off and Gwen got a little more settled, I did some odd jobs for the city. But I was just … passing time. I wasn’t
doing
anything. Dad was mayor when I was a kid and I remembered watching him walk through town …” The smile he gave his coffee cup was beautiful. Sad and sweet and young and a million years old, all at the same time. “Well, it seemed like it would be an all-right job. So, I ran for mayor and walked into that office to a disaster. I mean, a disaster. And I tried to contain it as much as I could.”

“Contain it?”

“It’s not like it’s a secret, but the details and how bad it really was, I tried to keep under wraps.”

Of course he did
, she thought.

“So who knows?” she asked. “Who really knows how hard you’re working to keep this town afloat?”

“You.” He kissed her shoulder.

“I’m serious, Jackson. Who else knows?”

“The city treasurer. City Hall staff. Shelby. I don’t know, why does it matter?”

“Your sister?”

He shot her an incredulous look. “Why in the world would I tell her?”

It said so much, that look on his face. About his relationship with his sister. The town. The distance between him and everyone else in his life.

“This is a bad heavy secret and you shouldn’t have to carry it on your own.” Secrets were isolating, she knew that. Had been locked behind her own for years.

He made a face, clearly uncomfortable, and she knew she should stop pushing him. But she had this strange knowledge on the other side of her own secret. This delicious weightlessness.

“Tell me what you’re going to do after you save this town. What does Superman do for an encore?”

“I’m leaving.”

“What?”

“I’m leaving town.”

“Forever?”

“If I can. Yes.”

Monica blinked at him, stunned. She couldn’t even pull her mouth closed.

“What?” He laughed—he actually laughed. “Gwen’s going to college, so there’s no reason for me to stay.”

“Where will you go?”

“I don’t know. Maybe I’ll backpack through Europe. Go to Vegas. Hide out on some beach in Mexico.”

“When?”

“Election’s at the end of August. Seven weeks away.”

“And then … you’re gone?”

“Gone.”

Ah
, she thought, bundling the sting in her chest in the comforting embrace of sarcasm.
And here I was starting to feel something for the man
.

“Don’t make that face at me, Monica.” She realized she was making a face, something between shock and horror. The current between them got colder and she pulled the sheet up her body, suddenly aware of her nudity. “It’s not selfish. It’s not juvenile. My life got cut short. You said it
yourself. There were things I wanted to do. Places I wanted to see and now, with Gwen going to school, now I get the chance.”

“Does she know you’re leaving town?” He turned away, color on his cheeks. Monica gasped. “You haven’t told her.”

Jackson stood and began pulling on his clothes.

“She won’t care. She’s independent. That’s what every single counselor said. She’s older than her years.” So much of what Gwen had told her about the adults in her life made sense now. Even if Jackson hadn’t told her, she clearly knew he was keeping secrets.

“Don’t you think it’s weird you haven’t told her?”

“No. I’ve just … I’ve just been waiting for the right time. She’s been in this mood, and now with the show there just hasn’t been the right time.”

“A mood?” Oh, she was so offended on Gwen’s behalf. “Don’t trivialize her because you’re a coward!”

“She’s leaving!” he cried. “Why should she care what I do?”

“Because you are her home, Jackson.”

That made him pause, as if he didn’t quite understand what she was saying or didn’t want to, but then he shook his head.

“We don’t have that kind of relationship.” He pulled his shirt over his head.

And whose fault is that?
she thought.

“Have you ever talked to your sister about your parents? The accident?”

“All we did was talk,” he said, sitting on the edge of the bed to pull on his socks. “For like a year it was endless counselors. Endless talking. We processed the fuck out of Mom and Dad dying. How long are we supposed to talk?”

“I think forever, Jackson.”

He glanced at her over his shoulder, pausing for a minute
in his readiness to flee. And when he stood she saw a new edge to him, something defensive and angry, and she braced herself for the slice.

“You learn that on your island, Monica? Two bullshit writing classes and you think you know my sister? You think you know us?”

Being prepared for it didn’t make the pain any less intense. She breathed through the sting.

“I know what not talking does,” she said. “I know the wounds that fester. Look at your sister, Jackson, and tell me something’s not festering.”

His silence was all the answer either of them needed. Jackson might be a fool, but he wasn’t an asshole, not quite.

“I’m sorry,” he said, standing like razor wire at the foot of the bed.

“No. You’re not.”

“Monica—”

“Thank you for the sex, Jackson. Go talk to your sister.” The shame in this situation wasn’t hers, and she met his eyes for a long time.

“This … this isn’t how I wanted it to end,” he told her, his hand flung out toward the bed with its wrinkled sheets, the smell of their sweat drying in their folds.

“Me neither. But you can’t insult me and think you’re welcome back in my bed.”

If only she’d had this strength ten years ago. It was so damn astounding to stand here on her own terms, despite the pain, despite the part of her that wanted him back in her bed no matter the cost to her.

“Go, Jackson,” she said, lying back down. The sheet slipped, revealing her breast, a nipple puckered in the cool air, and she let him see it, a reminder of what he’d just thrown away. Never in her life had she played hard-to-get—never had she held herself out as a prize to be won. “You’re not the man I thought you were.”

*   *   *

The next morning, Jackson wanted to wake up relieved that Dean and the film crew were gone. He wanted to walk through town, proud of himself. Confident that he’d done all he could. But instead he’d barely slept, and his alarm clock rang while he was staring up at the ceiling—Monica’s words in his ears.

You’re not the man I thought you were
.

He kicked off the sheets, tired of this endless argument he’d had with himself since walking away from Monica last night.

An hour later, Gwen came shuffling downstairs in baggy shorts and her Bishop Swim Team tee shirt, her black eyeliner smudged under her eyes. Bubba, the dog, a black shadow behind her.

“Sleep well?” he asked, trying for a joke but landing near sarcastic. He opened the kitchen door and let Bubba out in the backyard.

She ignored him as she opened the cereal cupboard.

“We’re out of Fruit Loops?” She grabbed a box of Cheerios and sat down in front of the bowl he’d put out for her. “That sucks.”

Jackson bit his lip, her attitude rankling so hard on his doubt, his sleepless night. But starting a fight over breakfast cereal wasn’t what he wanted.

“Hey … can I talk to you about something?”

She stiffened, eyeing him warily.

“When you go away to school, I was thinking of … of leaving town.”

Her breath went in, hitched, and he found himself holding his own breath, waiting. It was like being lost, that held breath, but still believing the next turn would lead him home. That everything would be okay.

But then she exhaled on one of those head-exploding
sighs, implying everything about him was just one big burden for her to bear.

“Where are you going to go?” she asked, shaking cereal into her bowl.

“I’m not sure yet.”

“Well, have a great time.”

“I don’t want to fight—”

“Who’s fighting?”

Try again
, he told himself.
A different way, this time
.

“It’s not like we’re not going to be in touch or—”

“You going to sell the house?” she asked, not looking at him.

“I’m … I’m not sure.”

Her eyes rose to his, quick and furious, an opinion burning in those blue depths.

“No,” he said, quickly, wanting to squelch that angry hurt on her face.

“I don’t care,” she said, the angry hurt morphing into bitter indifference in a heartbeat. So fast she hid her heart from him! “Do what you want.”

“I won’t sell the house, but do you care if I leave?”

Quickly, she stood, the stool screeching against the tile. “I don’t give a shit what you do, Jackson.”

“Hey!” he cried. “I know I’m not Dad, but you don’t talk to me that way.”

“Whatever,” she sighed, and it was like a match to kindling. He hated that word; he hated that tone in her voice.

“Don’t brush me aside.” He put a hand on her arm and she pulled herself away so violently, she stumbled. And in the air she left behind, the small current created by her body, he smelled alcohol. Stale beer coming out of her skin. “Have you been drinking?” he asked, stunned more than angry.

“So what if I have?”

“Gwen, come on. Drinking, the makeup … this isn’t you.”

She took advantage of his slack-jawed astonishment and pulled her arm free.

“How the hell would you know?”

His sister ran upstairs before he could think of what to say.

The impulse to heave her bowl against the wall was nearly uncontrollable, but he turned toward the sink and held onto the ceramic lip as if his life depended on it. Outside, his mother’s tea roses bloomed in direct opposition to the ugliness in this house. The ugliness in his life.

His sister.

Monica.

How was he going to fix this?

Monica stared at the flowers held in Jay’s hands.

“They were delivered for you,” he said, thrusting them toward her, over the open threshold of her door.

She didn’t have to ask who they were from. They were the same fragile pink tea roses that grew in such abundance outside Jackson’s house.

“Thanks,” she said and took the thin branches, tied together with a white ribbon.

Jay vanished back to his post at the front desk and Monica slowly shut the door, taking in the pleasures of getting flowers from a man for the first time in her life. She touched the edge of a pink petal, slightly crumbled, slightly yellow.

A lifetime ago she would have sneered at such romance. Such an old-fashioned, trite apology. As if flowers were going to be enough to get him out of the doghouse and back into her bed.