To Be Where You Are, page 12
When the phone trilled on the seat beside him, his stomach contracted around the mixture of acid and antacid.
“Calm down,” he whispered just before a belch rolled up from his gut.
He grabbed the phone and flipped it open. “Yeah.”
“Jackson?”
Frowning, he couldn’t place the voice, couldn’t even tell if it was male or female. “Yeah.”
“My, aren’t we monosyllabic today. What’s the matter, handsome prince? Did I interrupt a liquid dream?”
Jackson let out a breath and just barely suppressed the burp that tagged along behind it. “Perez. Can’t you at least identify yourself?”
“Is that really necessary?”
Jackson smiled and shook his head. Normally it wasn’t necessary. “How’re you feeling?”
“Like the perky princess I am, thanks to you. That’s why I called.”
Jackson’s smile stretched and relaxed, as his muscles did. “Everything good now? Last time I talked to Noah, he said you were feeling a little disoriented for a while.”
“Yes I was. And being a woozy floozy just wouldn’t do.” Perez laughed, the sound both airy and throaty. No one laughed like Perez Pei. “So we detoured to Wanda’s place in KC on our way back. She and some other dollmakers fed me I-don’t-know-what and did some mumbo-jumbo and produced a big bubble-butt of white healing light—or maybe it was carnation pink; I can’t remember—and then I slept for an hour and I woke up feeling reborn and ready for my close-up.” He made a purring sound. “So Noah played Mr. DeMille, if you catch my drift, and then we were on our merry way.”
Just listening to Perez race through conjunctions made Jackson short of breath, but in a good way. At least he was smiling now. “I’m glad to hear it. So you’re at home?”
“Yes we are.” Jackson heard a light splash of water. “Lounging in the spa and drinking champagne after a marvelous breakfast. And we have you to thank for it.” Perez made kissing sounds, which sounded at first like he was slapping Noah with a soggy sponge. “Have you had that heart-to-heart with your boyfriend’s beard yet?”
Noah muttered something in the background while Jackson tried to figure out what the hell Perez was talking about.
“Oops, I’ve been corrected,” Perez said. “Apparently I was being crude. Have you talked to your boyfriend’s girlfriend yet?”
Jackson snorted when understanding dawned. As if being punished for his amusement, another belch rose up and threatened to embarrass him. He eased it out on a breath. “Just long enough to set up a meeting. I’ll be seeing her today.” He checked the dashboard clock. “In a little while, in fact.”
“Oh, then I’d better let you go. Dear Jackson, most manly of men, I’m eternally grateful to you. And Noah says to tell you that you’ve healed his heart.”
Hyperbole aside, the men’s sincerity was touching. “I’m just glad you’re safe, Perez. Please be more careful from now on. I can’t keep chasing your swishy ass all over the continent and bailing you out.”
Perez responded with light, good-natured laughter. “I’ve learned my lesson. Oh, before I forget, I’m making a special gift for you. And Noah’s cooking up something with the Phratry.”
Slowing the car, Jackson eased into his driveway. “The Phratry? What do they have to do with this?”
“It’s just something to repay you, honey. You’ll like it. Over the next six weeks … or is it six months?” Perez’s voice drifted away from the phone. “Noah…?”
The connection was abruptly terminated. Lowering the phone from his ear, Jackson stared at it. Perez probably dropped his damned cell in the hot tub. What the hell had he been blabbering about?
Jackson had neither the time nor the mental space to wonder about it. He’d find out soon enough. Right now, he had other things to think about.
Celia would be arriving shortly with his future in her hands.
*
The flat was clean. Relatively speaking. Jackson had spent the previous evening tidying up, scrubbing, and polishing. He didn’t want Celia thinking her precious Adin had been forced to fuck in a pig sty. When that thought had occurred to Jackson yesterday, it left him with a snarled mass of conflicting feelings.
Now, as he jogged to the front door to answer it, he wondered if he was clean. All he’d had a chance to do when he got home was wash himself up, gargle, comb his hair, and throw on come fresh clothes.
Don’t want Celia thinking her precious Adin has been fucking a pig.
Precious Adin…
The phrase kept echoing in Jackson’s mind as he pulled open the door.
“Hi. It’s been a while.” Celia gave him a demure and undeniably lovely smile. Her pixie-cut blond hair fluttered around a perfect oval face, expressive brown eyes, and flushed cheeks.
Jackson suddenly felt like a big galoot.
He dug around for his voice. And some words to lend it. “Yeah. Last October.” He sounded as if his voice were changing, so he cleared his throat. “You threw a great party.”
“Thanks. May I come in?”
“Oh shit. I’m sorry.” Stupidly, Jackson looked over his shoulder. Why? There was no reason to. “Yes, of course. I’m sorry.”
“You already said that.”
“The second one was for my language.” Jackson stepped back and to the side, allowing entry.
“Fuck your language, Jackson.” Celia cruised past him, looked left and right, opted for right, and took a seat at the dining table.
Jackson took a deep breath, puffing out his lips and cheeks as he expelled it. “Can I get you…?”
“Yes, please. Anything cold and wet.”
Jackson detoured to the kitchenette. Cold and wet. Fuck. The only combination he could think of was ice and his favorite hooch. He was suffering from brain lock. His stomach tried to make up for it by getting active again.
Pulling open the refrigerator door, he stared inside. Kosher pickle brine? That didn’t seem too refreshing. Beer? No, you didn’t shove a beer in front of a woman unless she was one of the guys. Well, Celia kind of was one of the guys, considering how many months she’d been in bed with him and Adin. Figuratively speaking.
Don’t get distracted, asshole. Jackson reached for the Gatorade then wanted to slap himself. What was he thinking? It wasn’t as if she’d run here from Woodbine.
His gaze shifted aimlessly over the shelves. Oh, wine! Classy women always drank wine. Didn’t they? He shuffled around some bowls and cartons, bottles and jars. He didn’t have any wine. Rahenna had drunk the last of it. Fuck.
“Jackson? Are you all right?”
“Yeah,” he called out. “How about ice water? I seem to be out of everything else.”
“That’s fine.”
He nearly wilted in relief.
Carrying two glasses of lemon-zested water and concentrating on not tripping, he finally joined Celia at the table.
She immediately took a drink. “Well.”
Jackson lifted his brows as he sat across from her. “Well.”
“It appears Adin is so much in love with you, he’s losing sleep over it. Again.”
A weird kind of pain stuck in Jackson’s throat. He wondered if he’d accidentally swallowed an ice cube. Or a rowboat. Face aflame, he stared into his glass. Direct Approach, meet Pussy.
“Oh, Christ, please don’t be embarrassed,” Celia said wearily. “This has been going on for seven months, for godssake. Or eleven years, if you count the time you weren’t sleeping with Adin but wanted to. You think I’m still not used to it?”
Couldn’t argue with that logic. Jackson pulled his lips between his teeth and nodded. Nevertheless, he was glad he’d taken those photos off the bookshelves.
“Jackson…”
He turned up his eyes. “I’m really sorry,” he said quietly. “I’m not sure how I’m supposed to act.”
“You’re not supposed to ‘act’ in any particular way. It’s not like there’s a rulebook for this.”
“No shit,” Jackson muttered.
“I hope you don’t mind that I’m in no mood to dick around. Please tell me how you feel about Adin, what he means to you. That’s what I came here to find out.”
Oh no. Jackson rubbed his face with both hands. “Celia, I don’t… I’m not good at talking about stuff like that.”
Her instant smile was full of sympathy. “You don’t have to spout poetry, Jackson. I know it’s hard for most men to articulate their feelings. Just lay ‘em out and don’t beat around the bush.”
He sighed deeply and corralled his glass with his arms. Without thinking, he let words drift from his mouth. “He’s my life.”
Eyes glistening, Celia blinked and nodded and looked down. “And you are his.” She was silent for a moment. “Do you want to be with him? All the time?”
“More than that.”
“It’s a need,” Celia said.
“Yes.”
“And not just physical.”
“No, not just—” Jackson quickly took a drink. “That’s probably the least of it.”
Another moment of thoughtful silence. Help me through this, baby. There wasn’t much chance Adin would pick up on the plea. Jackson wasn’t a mentalist like Noah.
He had nothing in mind to say. Nothing whatsoever. If Celia asked him a question, he’d answer it. Everything in between was just an endless red carpet of love for the man who wasn’t there.
“You belong with each other,” Celia said. It was more a pronouncement than an opinion. “I think I sensed that the first time I saw the two of you together—remember?—at my first house in Woodbine.”
Jackson nodded. It was over a year ago, but he remembered. He kept looking at Celia, thankful it was getting easier for him to do so.
She kept talking. “I’d never seen Adin that way. He became radiant the minute he walked into the kitchen and laid eyes on you.”
Jackson’s mouth quirked. “We hadn’t gotten together in a while, just talked on the phone.”
He’d greeted Adin with casual swagger that fateful evening, but his first sight of the man had made him weak in the knees. All those years of pent-up, secret desire…
“You’ve probably wanted each other from the moment you met.”
“Yes, I think so.”
“And loved each other nearly as long.”
Jackson swallowed. Oh fuck, why did she have to say that? He felt the sting he hated more than any sting an insect could deliver. “Excuse me,” he said, his voice clotted. He rose from the table and strode to the bathroom.
There, behind the closed door, Jackson braced his hands on the wall. Dropping his head, he drew shallow breaths to compose himself. “Okay, okay,” he kept whispering. He only had to sniffle twice. You know you love the son of a bitch. This is no epiphany. What’s your problem?
He stepped over to the toilet and peed, hoping to relieve his stress. He always felt more relaxed after he took a whiz. Only sex worked better, but that wasn’t an option at the moment. And he wasn’t going to try to rub one off with Celia down the hall and his dick no bigger than a butterfly’s proboscis.
Well, a little bigger, he thought, tucking it into his shorts. Credit where credit is due.
He splashed cold water on his eyes, dried them, and went back out to face more of the music.
“So anyway,” Celia said brightly, slapping her hands on the table, “it’s time I moved on.”
Just like that. She popped off with it just like that, as if she were saying, So anyway, it’s time I learned how to swim.
Jackson’s mouth struggled around a question. “What … what are you going to do?”
“Sell the house, for starters,” Celia said, skipping along in her newly adopted, matter-of-fact way. “Unless, of course, Adin wants to buy out my half of it. But I doubt that. A man named John Fell, the owner of a bar in Woodbine, has always had his eye on it. So the house is as good as sold.”
“But where…?”
Graciously ignoring the fact he was acting like a moron, and probably looked like one too, Celia continued to answer Jackson’s full and partial questions. “I have something in the works,” she said, becoming more hesitant. “It’s something I’ve wanted to do as long as I can remember. When Adin began seeing you, it seemed like a good time to check into it.”
“What’s that?”
“Do you know what I do for a living?”
Jackson had to unstick his mental gears. “Uh, yeah. You write science articles. For laymen.”
“I’ve been a science geek since I was a kid,” Celia said, leaning over the table. “And my biggest dream—don’t laugh—has always been to become an astronaut.”
Jackson had no desire to laugh. He just wanted to see where this was going. “A lot of young people have that dream.”
“But I’m in a position to realize it.” Celia’s eyes glimmered. With excitement this time, not rising tears. “I applied for NASA’s Astronaut Candidate Program for civilians. I realized I met the physical and academic requirements. So I thought, why not give it a try?”
“And?”
“I’ve been invited to a week-long orientation session. Medical screening, personal interviews, that sort of thing. If I make it to final selection, I’ll have to move to Houston for their two-year training and evaluation program. Even if I don’t make the final cut, at least I’ll know I tried.”
“Wow,” Jackson breathed. He sat back in the chair and flattened his hands on the table. “Wow, Celia!”
She smiled proudly. “Yeah, I think it’s wow-worthy. Anyway, I haven’t even told Adin yet. I got the notification just before he came down here last month. I knew I had a lot to think about before I said anything. And I knew I needed to talk to you.”
“But what do I have to do with it?”
Celia’s smile shrank, became more regretful. “I never expected Adin to schlep to Houston with me, Jackson. Not considering what’s been going on. That’s why I needed some reassurance about your feelings. I couldn’t live with myself if I just breezed out of his life while he’s so emotionally vulnerable and then he ended up getting hurt.”
Jackson thought of Ben, the appealing twink at Lucille’s eatery, and a sick feeling went through him. “I couldn’t stand hurting Adin,” he murmured. That truth suddenly smacked him good and hard. “But are you sure you just want to … you know … cut him loose?” Given the intensity of his own feelings, Jackson couldn’t fathom it.
Celia traced invisible designs on the tabletop. “What other choice do I have, really? Astronaut camp or no astronaut camp.” Her voice grew more fervid. “It’s pointless, clinging to somebody whose heart and mind are elsewhere, whose body is essentially elsewhere. We don’t have kids to raise, after all. I’d have to be a cruel, selfish bitch to keep him tethered to me. Or a pathetically desperate one.”
“Celia—”
She ignored him. “So, will you be asking him to move in with you? Or do you think the two of you would like to live apart?”
Dumbfounded, Jackson shook his head. “I don’t know. We’ve never talked about it.”
“Maybe you should.” Celia got up from the table and grabbed her glass. She went to the kitchenette and came back empty-handed. “I have to go now,” she said, checking her watch. “I have some friends here I haven’t seen in a while. I’m looking forward to hanging out with them. Once I get back to Woodbine, I’ll be too busy to do much socializing.”
Jackson rose to escort her to the door. He felt as if he’d just been flung around in a whirlwind that had abruptly died down. Celia looked up at him as they stood there, and then touched his face. “You know I have enormous respect for you.”
“Thank you,” Jackson said humbly. “And ditto.”
Without warning, Celia’s hand moved to the back of his head. She urged it downward. Jackson didn’t know what she was doing and didn’t know how to react. He caught a distinct hint of her perfume and realized vaguely how alien the smell of women’s fragrances had become to him. When Celia’s lips pressed against his, he was really stymied. Returning the kiss would’ve been bizarre and inappropriate, yet spurning it seemed rude. He let his lips flex subtly, but he kept them closed.
When Celia pulled back, she had a strange look on her face. “The sex must be out of this world.”
Again, Jackson had trouble meeting her gaze. He knew he was blushing furiously, as if she’d walked in on him and Adin while they were making love.
“Take care of each other,” she said, running a hand down his chest. She studied his face for a moment. “You don’t look anything like Christian Bale. I don’t know what made me think that. You’re definitely more Hugh Jackman. Actually, I don’t know what made me think a lot of things.” And with that bewildering observation, she was gone.
Jackson rested his back against the door once he’d closed it. He shut his eyes, shoved his hands into his hair, and started chuckling. Soon he was laughing. Laughing like a lunatic.
So this was what it was like to be drunk on happiness.
Chapter Fourteen
Jackson made his call to Adin. All he said was, “The coast is clear. Come on over.” Keeping his voice level, he’d tried not to give anything away. This news was the kind that had to be shared in person.
The beers he hadn’t offered his guest now beckoned from the fridge. Every once in a while, Jackson was aware of a stupid grin on his face. Maybe having a drink would wipe it off. He grabbed a beer and unscrewed the cap. Before he could even put the bottle to his lips, the tenacious grin snapped back into place. He let it have its way.
He took a drink then took a breath. His exhalation rode out on a happy sound. Jackson could hardly believe the sound came from his throat. It wasn’t even in his register.
Carrying his beer, enjoying the bottle’s solid, cold moisture within his hand, he plucked a set of keys from a rack in the kitchen, went outside, and halfway mounted the stairs that led to his building’s upper flat. There was a roofed, open porch at the top of the flight, but Jackson stopped short of it. He sat down facing the street.
Kids played on the sidewalks. Music boomed from a house down the block. Across the street, Mrs. Esquivez tended to a trio of flowerbeds not much larger than her window boxes. Jackson waved to her. She waved back. He tilted the bottle to his lips.
