Waiting for December, page 17
“She misses me,” he says.
She misses him. Is she here to get him back? Is he going to take her back? Does he miss her? So many questions fill my head, but I want the answer to one the most: Why are these possibilities making my stomach twist and turn?
Am I annoyed because I cut off my time with Sky to get to the fire with Jesse only to find Jesse hosting Madison and not thinking about me or the fire at all? Am I feeling protective of Jesse because I want to make sure he’s not going to get his heart broken again? Or am I . . . I don’t think I can finish the last thought.
But it pops into my head nonetheless.
Am I jealous?
My stomach sinks. Is this the real reason I kept pushing Sky away all night? Is this why I couldn’t get Jesse out of my mind? Do I have feelings for him?
“Is she staying with you?” I ask.
Jesse nods, and this bothers me way more than it should. So much so that it lets me know without a shadow of a doubt that I am jealous.
Shit!
“I’m sorry. I should probably get back inside,” Jesse says.
I just nod. I’m sort of relieved because I can’t talk right now. I need to think. Or cry. Or sleep. Probably a little bit of all three.
Jesse walks slowly to the door. I’m waiting to hear the twist of the doorknob, but instead I hear him say, “Harper?”
“Yeah?” Now I’m the one studying the deck. For the record, it’s not interesting.
“I did sit by the fire,” he says. Then he opens the door and steps inside.
—
I don’t know why Jesse told me that, but I can think of two possible reasons. One, he was trying to let me know he was hurt I wasn’t here and that our streak is over and it’s my fault. Or two, he was trying to let me know he did his part and that if I make another fire and do mine, we can still sustain our streak.
I do not want to make a fire right now. I want to head back to my room and crawl under my covers and not come out until I feel more sorted. But for a reason I don’t want to analyze too closely, I don’t let myself do what I want to do. I push myself to gather the wood and make an outdoor fire.
I set my timer once the flames get going and stand as close as I can to the heat because it’s late and freezing. I’m there exactly fifteen minutes. No more. No less. Then I grab a bucket from inside, fill it with water, and put the fire out.
twenty-three
I DIDN’T SLEEP well last night, which I guess was to be expected. While my heart was exhausted, my mind was wide awake, trying to decipher if I was tossing and turning because of what happened with Sky or with Jesse.
I woke up wishing I could call Sky, which I took as a good sign. It made me realize I am excited about our potential. I want to still want Sky. I want that new beginning on Christmas Eve. I hope that in his letter to me this week he tells me he still loves the idea too, and we really do go back to the way things were before he showed up yesterday and ambushed me.
But I also woke up wondering what was going on inside Jesse’s cottage, and praying that Jesse and Madison were doing nothing more than talking. Which is a bad sign because it means I do have feelings for Jesse. And I don’t want them. I don’t want to see him as anything more than a friend. The friendship the two of us have is good. Strike that, it’s great! It’s one of the best friendships I’ve ever had. I don’t want things with us to change, and they would change if I leaned into my feelings or ever admitted them out loud.
Besides, Jesse is possibly reconciling with Madison, and I’ve got Sky—and that only makes my feelings more complicated.
With all this commotion going on in my head, I tried to ignore my emotions all morning. As I was dressing, I did my best to focus on the present moment as I’ve been practicing in yoga. And when that didn’t work, I tried to focus on Sky. But no matter where I tried to direct my thoughts, I still found myself listening to the low murmur of conversation in Jesse’s cottage, and my stomach took a nosedive every time I wondered if (and when) I’d start hearing other noises.
Eventually, I decided I had to leave. I needed fresh air. I needed to get busy.
What I didn’t need was for Jesse to decide that today was “bring your ex-girlfriend to work” day. He invited Madison to join us in all of our usual duties.
She was there with us in the barn as we fed the goats and chickens. She was there when we made breakfast. And now she’s accompanying Jesse on his wood-chopping duty and other daily tasks while I check in guests and attempt to mentally check out from this hellish day that’s only half over.
I wish I knew how long Madison was staying and what was going on between the two of them, but I haven’t had a chance to talk to Jesse in private. I also wish Madison wasn’t so nice. I was hoping I wouldn’t like her so that if Jesse asked me what I thought of her, I could tell him it wasn’t worth giving her a second chance. But if he were to ask me at this point, I couldn’t say that in good conscience. I don’t know her well enough to know whether or not she is a good match for Jesse, and I still don’t like what Jesse told me about her leaving for New York without him, but I’m not seeing any major red flags in terms of her personality.
Which isn’t to say I want to become best friends with her. But I would like to go back to being best friends with Jesse, and if there’s any hope of that, I need to get away from the inn for a minute before these feelings I’m having grow even more complex.
As soon as I’m done hosting happy hour, I walk straight into town to get dinner. Alone. I finish my entire meal even though I’m not hungry, just to eat up time. Then I order dessert. I don’t attempt a single bite, but I stare at it for a while until the waitress comes over with a box and asks if I want to take it to go. I’d tell her I’d like to stay and stare at it for a while longer if the place weren’t about to close, but it is, and I’m the last one here.
Since it’s late, I call an Uber and have the driver drop me off at the inn. Once he does, I see the fire outside is made. No one is sitting at it. I don’t know if Jesse sat out there already or not. In case he did, I clock in for exactly fifteen minutes, again by myself. And then I hurry to my cottage and turn off the lights.
—
When I wake the next morning, I’m expecting to feel better, but I feel even worse than I did last night. I’m in such a bad headspace, in fact, that I do something I haven’t done since I arrived at the inn: I tell Jesse I need the day off. He’s in the barn with Madison when I walk in and say so. As soon as I do, he stops collecting the eggs and rises to his feet.
“Are you feeling okay?” he asks, approaching me.
“I don’t know,” I say, because it’s not a lie. I don’t know what I feel, but I know it’s not great.
“Do you need anything?”
Before I can answer, I spy Madison, out of the corner of my eye, picking up Xylo.
Not fucking Xylo!
This makes me way more upset than it should. But come on!
There are twenty-five other chickens, you know. Get your own favorite chicken, Madison!
I just had an argument with Jesse’s ex. Over a chicken. In my head. That very well could be my low point over the past forty-eight hours.
I decide then I need to go into town again.
“No, thanks, Jesse,” I say. “I’ll be fine.”
Not long after, I walk into Milk & Maple and get a latte, which reminds me of Sky. I check to see if he’s written me even though it’s not Wednesday. He hasn’t. I contemplate writing to him but decide that could be disastrous. My feelings are too all over the place. Until I nail them down, I should steer clear of expressing myself.
After that, I wander into the bookstore and select a novel, which reminds me of Jesse. I leave the bookstore at a near run, then wander into every other store in town. I text Zoe and Grace and tell them I can’t wait to see them next week. I don’t fill them in yet. I can’t even wrap my own head around it. I spend a lot of time wishing next week were this week. I wonder if Madison will still be here next week. I spend a lot of time hoping she’s not.
It’s a small town, and after a couple of hours I’ve done everything one could possibly do in it, so I decide to face the inn. I’m not sure what I’ll do there the rest of the day. Sleep, maybe, if my brain will let me.
As I’m walking, a car pulls up beside me and I hear its window roll down. I should look over. What if I’m about to be kidnapped? Well, at least then I wouldn’t have to run into Madison and Jesse again.
My sense of humor sucks right now.
“Harper?” I hear a voice from the car say. I know that voice, which means I know that there’s a green Jeep Cherokee beside me and that Jesse is driving it. The only reason I still don’t look over is because I’m worried Madison is in the car too, and right now, I don’t think my heart can take seeing the two of them together.
“It’s just me,” Jesse says a beat later, so I do stop and look. I don’t know if Madison left or she just didn’t accompany him on his car ride. I’m too afraid to ask because it will show that I care, and I’m afraid to show Jesse that I care because for starters, I’m not sure I should care. I still have feelings for Sky. Those didn’t just disappear, and these feelings for Jesse might. They came out of nowhere. What if they just as easily vanish? Sure, that seems unlikely, given that I haven’t just met Jesse. I know him—better than I know Sky. And I’m pretty sure my feelings are based on all that I know. Still, there’s a chance they could tone back down to a friend level. And I’m hoping that’s what happens. Because then everything can stay the same. Besides . . . what if Jesse doesn’t have any feelings for me? Then I’ll have embarrassed myself and ruined our friendship for no reason.
“Want a ride?” he asks.
“I’m okay walking,” I say, even though I’m tired of walking and tired of not talking to Jesse too.
“You sure?”
“Yeah, I’m fine.” These are the first lies I’ve ever blatantly told Jesse, and they feel terrible.
“Get in the car, Harper.”
“Okay.” I like that he knew I was lying. I also like that he called me out for it. I’ve never wanted to be called out for a lie before, but I did just then.
As soon as I climb into his car, he pulls a U-turn so he’s heading away from the inn. I don’t know where he’s taking us. I don’t ask. I don’t speak a word. And neither does Jesse. I’m not saying anything because I’m not sure where to start. So much has happened since Jesse and I have had a real conversation. Sky visited. Madison visited or is still visiting (I still don’t know). We went two nights without sitting by the fire together. I realized I have feelings for Jesse. The list goes on.
I have no idea why Jesse isn’t saying anything. I also still have no idea where he’s headed. I let him continue a few more miles before I finally ask.
“Where are we going?”
He doesn’t turn his head even though I’m looking at him. “Item number nineteen.”
“What?”
He takes one hand off the steering wheel and runs it through his hair. “A road trip with no destination in mind.”
My bucket list.
Jesse is helping me check an item off my bucket list. Right now. Even after everything over the past few days.
I want to hug him because this is exactly what I didn’t know I needed. But then it hits me that I also want to kiss him. The way he shows up for me, the way he knows me, the way he always seems to want what’s best for me—all of these things put together make it impossible not to have feelings for him. Even when I don’t want to have feelings for him. Even when I shouldn’t have feelings for him.
“Why do you look upset?” Now Jesse’s looking at me and I’m the one with eyes fixed on the road.
“I’m not upset,” I say. It’s my third lie. Jesse sees right through this one too.
“Fine, I’ll admit it first,” he says. “I’m upset.”
“You are?” I’ve never seen Jesse upset. Maybe this is why I didn’t recognize this emotion on him.
“You completely blew off the fire,” he says.
So he was disappointed. I knew it.
“I tried to apologize,” I say. “And I lit a fire and sat out there alone after you went inside.”
“I know,” he says. “I saw.”
“You saw?” He saw?
He nods. “I even set my own timer to make sure you didn’t cheat.”
That he did this and admitted it makes me smile. “I didn’t cheat last night either,” I say. “I sat out there then too.”
“I know,” he says, gripping the steering wheel tighter. “I sat out there last night before you, and I left the fire burning in case you showed up. I saw you sit down for fifteen minutes when that Uber dropped you off.”
Now I’m not smiling. I’m blushing. Both nights he was in his room with Madison, he was watching me, suggesting he was more concerned with maintaining our ritual than with what was happening between the two of them. Which makes me think nothing was going on with Madison.
“Did you get back together with Madison?” I can’t help blurting this out.
“Are you and Sky together?”
“I asked you first.”
Wait, why did he ask about Sky? Does he care if I’m with Sky? The tone of his voice implied he does care. Why would he care unless he was jealous of Sky the same way I was jealous of Madison? Was that why he was acting strange the whole time Sky was here? Does Jesse have feelings for me too?
Jesse pulls over to the side of the road. I look around. I have no idea why he’s choosing to stop right here. We’re in the middle of nowhere. I guess it is a road trip with no destination in mind. I conclude right then and there that road trips with no destinations are overrated. I’ll be sure to write that down when I cross it off my list.
“I told Madison I don’t have feelings for her anymore,” Jesse says. He doesn’t need to be concentrating on the road anymore, but he is. I don’t know if this is because the decision was difficult and talking about it is tough, or if it’s because he’s nervous to see my reaction to his confession.
I can’t say I care. I’m just glad he’s not looking at me because I’m so relieved, I can only imagine it’s written all over my face. If he were to look over and see that, he’d know how I feel, and I still don’t know if I want him to know.
“She kept trying to apologize,” he goes on. “And I told her I forgave her. I just . . . I wasn’t into her like that anymore.”
“Then why did she stay so long?”
Jesse takes his hands off the steering wheel and sets them in his lap, studying them as he answers me. “Madison’s always been confident. She saw the whole thing going differently in her head. She assumed I would want another shot. So she didn’t have a return flight. When I told her the first night she was here that it wasn’t going to happen between us, she tried to find a flight out the next morning but couldn’t get one until this afternoon.”
“So she’s gone?” I clarify.
“Yeah, she’s gone.”
After he’s answered me, he finally looks at me. “Why did you call me your coworker in front of Sky?”
I nearly shut my eyes just to hide from Jesse. “I . . . I don’t know.”
“Harper.”
“It just came out. I didn’t understand why I said it.” Except now I know things about myself that I didn’t then. “You know what you mean to me, but I think I . . . I—”
“—wanted to distance yourself from me in front of Sky,” Jesse finishes.
“Maybe.” I swallow. Then, in a rush, I add, “In case he was the jealous type.”
At this, Jesse says nothing.
Does he think I was just worried Sky would be jealous of any guy, or is he thinking it’s more specific than that?
Because now I know the reason I told Sky that Jesse was my coworker was because I didn’t want Sky to question my relationship with Jesse.
“What happened with Sky?”
I should have predicted this question. I reach up and rub my temples, feeling like a terrible person for sitting here so grateful that Jesse told Madison there was no chance of tomorrow when I didn’t say the same to Sky. I told him the opposite.
To cut myself some slack, my feelings for Jesse didn’t occur to me until after I told Sky I still want the promise of a someday. But in my next email to Sky, I intended to tell him that I’m still looking forward to Christmas Eve. I’ve been pressing forward, determined to keep our pact and hopeful about what could develop between us. Would this change if Jesse were to admit he has feelings for me? I wish I knew the answer, but I don’t.
“The trip didn’t go like either of us expected,” I answer honestly. “But I think we’re still considering sticking to our pact.”
Jesse doesn’t react. I wish he would so I could get a better read on him. Better yet, I wish he’d just confess his feelings for me if they exist. But how can I expect him to do something I’m not willing to do myself?
“I told you I was upset with you about the fire when Sky was here,” Jesse says. “But why were you upset when Madison was here?”
I swallow. I can’t answer that. Not without admitting my true feelings. But I also can’t deny I was upset. Jesse would see straight through that lie. I didn’t exactly hide it well.
I shift in my seat.
“Why, Harper?” he presses.
When I fix my eyes on Jesse, he seems to be sitting closer. Or maybe he’s always been this close and it just feels as if he’s closer because our eyes are locked and I’m sensing he wants me to admit I was jealous. I’m also sensing that if I were to tell him how I feel, he would kiss the hell out of me right here, right now. The way my heart pounds at the thought tells me I’d like that. A lot.
But would that be for the best? Or would it ruin everything?
So many answers are on the tip of my tongue. Why was I upset?
“Because Madison being here made me insanely jealous and realize that I like you as way more than a friend.”
