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“You’re not fine, Emma. You’re getting seen by someone else.” “Stop it!” I snap and sit up, swaying and grasping his wrist. “It’s dizziness, that’s all. I’ve had a shock, okay. You just told me you’re going to be a father, just after we … for fuck’s sake,” I snap, and he stops dead, paling visibly. He slumps down and exhales slowly.
“You’re not the only one, okay.” Ironically put.
“When did she tell you?” I try and sit up unaided, swaying a little but feeling less likely to keel over. I’m trying to figure out how long he has been seeing her.
Did he sleep with me behind her back?
“A couple of days ago,” he sighs, looking down at his lap.
That explains his monumentally shitty mood for the past couple of days and hints at how unhappy he is about this. “What are you going to do? Marry her?” My voice falters, so full of anguish.
Why do I sound so childlike? Oh, I don’t know, maybe because the thought of Jake marrying her is killing me.
I’m hushed by the twisted frown he throws at me.
Okay, maybe we don’t live in the nineteenth century anymore, but I’m sure Carrero Senior will have something to say about an heir being born out of wedlock. His father is a traditionalist, after all.
“No, I’m not going to ask her to marry me because I knocked her up, Emma. I’m not that stupid.” Jake has more sense. I remember him telling me about his father marrying his mother on a whim, realizing why. Thank God.
“What then?”
Why do I even care? I shouldn’t care.
I’ve royally fucked over my job, our friendship, and my life. It won’t be long before I no longer work for the Carrero empire. I shouldn’t care about this; I shouldn’t be experiencing that aching pain in my heart and chest at this fact. I’ve blurred the lines of how I should feel about him, and I need to bring them back into focus. My head is a complete mess.
“It’s complicated.” He looks torn, with a hint of a lost little boy, and it hurts me. Even after all this, I still care about how he feels. I’m pathetic.
“As complicated as what we just did?” I flush as I realize the voice that said it was mine.
Mouth, why do you hate me so?
“Contrary to what your crazy little head tells you, Emma, there was nothing complicated about that.” His flat tone and angry expression shut me up, and I redden, squirming under his scrutinous glare.
What does that even mean? Oh, wait, it’s just sex, Emma. Right?
I turn my face away and stare at my hands, tears burning my throat.
“It was Marissa,” he says, so quietly that I almost don’t hear him.
“What was?” My head snaps back around by his random declaration.
“When I was sixteen, you asked me about the girl I loved.” He stares at the floor and not at me, his hands flat on the couch. I’ve nothing to say. No words filter through my brain. I just gawk at him as he frowns back at me. I’m stilled by the shock and the heavy thud inside my chest, nausea swirling back up violently as each syllable registers, and I absorb the confession. I think my heart gives out completely.
I don’t want it to be her, anyone else, just not her. Why did it have to be her? Was that some female intuition all along inside of me screaming that she has meant more to him?
“I was with her for a year; I was mad about her.” He sounds like he doesn’t believe it himself, with dryness to his tone. I don’t want to hear this. I can’t bear it.
“What happened?” I croak.
Mouth? Were you not listening to my brain when it said I don’t want to hear?
He looks uncomfortable and gets up to walk across to the table near my bedroom door. He pushes around some weird modern wooden sculpture there, the tension running through him as he searches for the words. I’m frozen and holding my breath, a sea of emotions aching inside.
“She broke my heart, Emma. She fucked my best friend.” He drops the sculpture back in place.
Oh my god. Why would anyone want to cheat on him? I mean, look at him. Why would she want to hurt him?
I shake my head as if I can’t believe it. I don’t want her to be the one.
Is she the reason he’s the way he is? Why he keeps women at arm’s length, and it’s just sex and fun? Did having his first love savagely rip his heart open make him unable to trust any woman in his life? Keeping them all at a distance, the way I do with everyone else.
“Why did you start seeing her again?” It’s out before I can stop it.
Do I want to hear him tell me how he’s never got over her? No, I don’t.
He shrugs and gazes at me intensely.
“It’s complicated.”
When is it ever not?
“Stop saying that,” I wail, instantly on my feet and angry.
Why?
Because he is my Jake. Not hers. I want him to want me and only me. I know it’s never going to be that way, and it ruins every part of me. It rages and burns that once, long ago, she had exactly that, and she threw it all away. She was a complete idiot!
“Emma, what do you want me to say?” He moves toward me and pushes me back to sit down as he stands over me. “You think I planned any of this shit?” He looks broken, eyes damp and face unreadable, yet somehow sad.
“Do you love her?” I ask, almost sobbing it out in desperation, fear gripping me inside.
Don’t cry, please, don’t cry. Not here. Not now. Not in front of Jake.
Disbelief flashes across his face, and I can’t read it. I’m scared of his answer, so I cover his mouth.
“Don’t.” I’m shaking my head. “I don’t want to know.” He grasps my hands and pulls them away.
“Emma, it’s not what you think,” he pleads, his body trying to cage me in against him, but I resist.
No? What do I think? What could be worse than this?
“I can’t … I can’t right now. I just need to go.” I shove him away, lost in teen Emma mode, and reject contact while my heart is crushing in on itself.
“Stay, Emma, please. We need to talk.” He’s trying to pull my arms to him, but I’m pushing him off. Marissa is right there in the next room. She’s pregnant with his baby. She’s the first love of his life. She’s the reason he avoids relationships. She’s the reason I’ll never have a chance with him. What am I supposed to think?
“I need air, space. Jake, I need space.” I gulp down tears and panic and finally throw his hands off me. He lets me go and moves back, rejected; he’s letting me leave, but I don’t want to go anymore. I don’t know what to do. I hesitate.
He says nothing, just gives me his boyish wary look, his frown deepening. I can’t stay here, so I go into automatic pilot. I stalk toward the door, pulling up my hood, and I don’t look back, knowing that walking out is the only choice I have. I don’t look back, even when I hear him call my name.
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