I waited five minutes and then I excused myself to follow Jacob into the taxidermy room.
Nobody noticed we’d left the table. The party was in full swing. Jeremiah was belting “500 Miles” on the stage and everyone was singing the chorus. I slipped into the house and made my way down the hall, and that’s when I heard the voices. Jacob’s and Amy’s voices. They were arguing.
My heart sank.
I backed up against the bookshelf to listen, barely breathing. “It was never that I didn’t want you…” Amy said.
More muffled fighting.
“…one-sided conversation for the last two and a half years.” Amy again. “You were! Thank you for finally noticing!” he yelled.
I’d never heard Jacob angry. I’d never seen him upset. I didn’t even know he was capable of it.
But of course he was capable of it. Because it was her.
This was just like all the times I’d stumbled onto Kelly and Nick arguing. Fighting because they couldn’t be together. Fighting because they were in love with each other and frustrated because it hurt. You don’t argue with someone you don’t give a shit about.
He was still in love with her. Jacob was not over this.
But the worst part of all was that neither was she.
Amy must have followed him in here. Waited until she could get him alone to come corner him when Jeremiah wouldn’t notice.
Or maybe she didn’t. Maybe he’d cornered her.
And just like that, my Maybe I Could Date Him turned into a resounding No.
And I was so, so disappointed. Like a rug had been pulled out from under me.
I was instantly reminded that this arrangement was exactly what Jacob said it was—an arrangement.
He hadn’t been falling for me. None of this was real. He was pining over someone else. And that someone else hadn’t resolved her feelings for him, despite being engaged to his brother.
I wanted to cry. It was so fucked up.
Something in my gut told me they’d get back together. That I was witnessing the moment they both realized that seeing each other with someone else was just too hard.
She’d probably gotten jealous seeing us together. This was probably getting too real for her—the wedding was barreling toward her, Jacob had “moved on,” and she was getting a reality check realizing that she and Jacob were truly over—and she couldn’t handle it.
I already knew how he felt. He told me the day I agreed to our charade: I love her.
Unresolved love always circles back. It lingers. It festers. It builds inside of you until it has to come out, and it putrefies everything else. It makes you resent who you’re with because they can’t be the one you really love and never will be. It makes you compare and feel disappointed every time you realize no one is as good as her.
I knew this better than anyone. I’d already lived it once. Something crashed behind me.
“Peekaboo, cocksucker! Bieber! Bieber!”
Jafar had knocked a frame off the shelf. I’d been so focused on listening I didn’t even see the bird fly in.
I tore around the corner before the door opened and went back to the party.
Half an hour later Jacob and I drove home in silence. He’d come out of the house quiet and anxious. Amy came out a few minutes later, looking like she’d been crying.
He was so obviously bothered I didn’t tell him I’d heard his fight with Amy or ask him what was wrong. Honestly, I was too upset to ask.
I wondered what I’d done to be cursed to relive the dynamics of my shitty marriage over and over and over again.
It wasn’t Jacob’s fault. He’d been clear with me right out of the gate that he still loved his ex. I’d known this going in. I couldn’t even be mad. But it sucked. All I wanted to do was get home so I could dwell on it and feel sorry for myself in private.
He had lipstick on the collar of his shirt.
It was next to a red flower on the print, so it wasn’t super obvious, but I
saw it. Amy was wearing red lipstick.
I swear I could smell her perfume on him. It was probably just my imagination, but I kept getting the faintest whiff of peony when he moved. I wanted to throw up.
Had he kissed her? Had she kissed him? What had happened in that room? I stopped breathing through my nose and just stared out the window.
What had happened was none of my business.
He pulled up to my house and I barely waited for the truck to come to a stop. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” I said flatly, getting out.
He didn’t say bye.
When I got inside, Benny was in the living room with Justin. “Hey,” I said, going straight to my room.
I’d have to do his dialysis. But I wanted out of this stupid dress and the stupid flower I had in my hair. It felt tainted, like the whole night had been.
I’d felt pretty today. And now I felt invisible. Because the only one I’d wanted to see me didn’t. He only saw her.
I yanked the flower out of my hair and tossed the dress onto a chair, then washed my face and flung my bra into the hamper. I put on the highest- waisted grandma underwear I could find and my fleece pajamas with a ratty Vote for Pedro shirt.
When I came out to hook up Benny, he nodded at me. “Hey, your boyfriend is pacing on the front porch.”
“What?” I said, turning on the machine.
“He’s been out there like twenty minutes. My Ring is blowing up.”
I blinked at him. “He’s just walking back and forth across the porch?” “Sometimes he jogs down the steps and then comes back.”
Justin snorted.
I pulled out my phone and opened the app. There he was. Pacing. Like a weirdo.
Technically he was only about fifteen feet away. I could open the front door to talk to him. But instead I turned on the app’s speaker. “Jacob? Why are you out there?”
He stopped and looked at the Ring.
“I have a Ring Doorbell,” I said. “I can see you. Doing whatever it is you’re doing.”
“Can you come outside?” he asked.
I let out a long breath. Fine. I tossed my phone on the couch.
“Don’t spy on me,” I muttered to my brother and his minion. Then I let myself out onto the porch and closed the door behind me. “What’s up?” I said, crossing my arms.
He looked twitchy. His anxiety was high. Probably the Amy fight/makeout thing and he wanted to talk about it, which really was the least I could do considering we were friends and he was giving my brother an entire organ. But I had to emotionally brace for it anyway.
He didn’t start. “Jacob?”
He swallowed. “I uh…I wanted to ask you…” He paused to lick his lips. “I wanted to ask you if you would like to go on a date with me. A real one.” His words hit me like a ton of bricks. Knocked the wind right out of me.
I felt instantly sad and defeated. “Jacob, no.”
His face fell. I had to close my eyes and let out a centering breath.
“Why?” I asked, looking at him. “Why do you want to date me? What is your reason for asking me. Here. Now. On this particular night.”
He looked almost confused. “I…I like you. I like spending time with you. I—”
“Let me guess. You’re ready to move on from Amy? Time to get back out there, put that relationship behind you?”
He blinked at me. “Well…yes.”
I sighed. He wasn’t asking because he actually wanted to date me. He was asking because he’d just had some messed-up, dick-punch interaction
with his ex. He was frantic to get over her and wanted a distraction that would make him feel better. And I was here. A living, breathing consolation prize. Some desperate next-best-thing thing.
I didn’t want to be Jacob’s in-between solution. I didn’t want to be what he did while he tried to work through this or figured his shit out.
I didn’t want to be his second choice.
“Jacob, I know how hard this must have been for you to ask me this,” I said, trying not to let him hear the fracture in my voice. “But I’ve done the ‘Love the One You’re With’ thing. I’m never doing it again. Let’s just get through the next few months. Do what we agreed to do. Be harmless to each other. And then the wedding will be over and you can date someone else for real. Okay?”
His expression went blank. Totally blank.
I knew the wheels were turning. Probably working overtime. And I felt terrible that he’d probably worked up the courage to ask me this and I rejected him, and he was probably regretting ever bringing it up. But I had to be clear. I was not going to be his rebound or his fuck buddy or his friend with benefits.
I’d only be his friend.
“I’m sorry,” he said finally, his voice flat. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. I’ll never ask you this again.”
I felt like crying.
The fact he didn’t say anything else—anything about feelings—was almost an admission of guilt. Like he was acknowledging that his reasons for asking were exactly what I thought they were.
I looked away from him and nodded. “Thank you.”
He paused another moment, peering at me. Like I might give him a different answer if he just stood there long enough and waited for it.
“Good night,” he said.
Then he turned and walked to his truck.
I went inside and put my back to the door and buried my face in my hands. I wanted to claw my throat out. Throw something, scream into a fucking pillow.
I hated this so much. I hated it.
“Why’s your boyfriend asking you on a date and you said no?” Benny asked.
I looked up and glared at him. “I told you not to spy on me.”
“I didn’t, you left the Ring app open on your phone. I turned it off when I realized.”
I rolled my eyes and cleared the space to snatch my cell off the couch. “Seriously, why’d he ask you that?”
“Just…don’t bug me right now. Okay? It’s complicated.” He studied me for a moment, but he let it go.
I guess I should be happy that my brother was enough of himself again that he gave a crap about what I was doing.
God.
I set up Benny’s dialysis, doing my best not to cry in front of him or Justin, who was still sitting there with him watching TV. When I was done, I went to my room and called Alexis.
“Hey,” she answered on the first ring. I sniffed. “Can I come over?”
She was doing dishes. “Sure. When?” “Tonight.”
I could picture her looking at her watch. “You won’t get here until midnight.”
“One. Maybe one-thirty. I have to finish Benny’s dialysis. You don’t have to stay up. Just leave a blanket on the porch swing and let me in when you get up in the morning.”
“What happened?”
I pulled the phone away from my mouth for a second while I choked down the lump in my throat. “I can’t tell you now or I’m gonna cry. I can ask Benny to go to the dialysis center for a few days. I have two more days off work. I just need to get out of here and be somewhere else.”
I heard her shut off the water. “Okay. But I’m waiting up.” “No, seriously. Don’t. Just leave the door unlocked.”
We hung up. I packed my bag, finished Benny’s dialysis, and left.
Jacob didn’t text or call me like he usually did at night. It made my stomach hurt. I felt like I’d just gone through a breakup.
Up until now I’d been able to pretend that maybe Jacob had spent so much time with me because he was actually a little interested in me.
And maybe he was. I believed that feelings could overlap. That he could be in love with Amy and maybe also have a crush on me.
But that wasn’t enough.
I didn’t want to share space with another woman inside of the man I loved. I’d done it one too many times. I was tired of making excuses for why it was okay to accept less than I deserved. At the very least I deserved to be with someone who had worked through their own shit. And Jacob hadn’t. Clearly.
I got to the Grant House around one-fifteen in the morning—and Alexis opened the door before I got up the front steps.
“Ugh. I told you not to wait,” I groaned.
She hugged me against her baby bump. “I’m a wartime consigliere. We don’t sleep on the job.”
Daniel greeted me with the dog when I got in the door. He’d waited up too. Now I felt even worse. He hugged me. Then he kissed his wife on the side of her head and went to bed.
I wanted her to go to sleep, but she hustled me into one of the guest rooms, lit a candle, settled onto the mattress next to me, and punched a pillow under her head. “Tell me.”
And I did.
I told her everything. And I cried like a baby.
“I really liked him,” I said, sniffling, wiping under my eyes. “And now you don’t?” she asked.
“I do. But I let myself get all twitterpated and I forgot what we were doing. I’m here to do a job, it’s not real. You know I was actually thinking that maybe I could date him?” I let out an incredulous noise. “But he’s not into me. He just wants me to help him get over her.”
“Did he explain himself? Tell you about the fight with Amy?”
“No. And I didn’t tell him I heard it. What would be the point? All he’d do is deny it. Try to convince me I didn’t hear what I think I did—or he’d confirm everything, tell me that Amy would always be the love of his life, but that he’s really ready to move on, which he’s not.” I shook my head. “You should have heard how upset he was. The way they were arguing. He doesn’t get like that, Ali. He’s all measured and reserved. Quiet.”
“What’s she like?”
I rolled my eyes. “Perfect. She looks like Rosamund Pike, but somehow prettier.”
“You’re pretty too,” she said, closing her eyes. “Ha.”
What did it matter if I was pretty? Or smart? Or if he liked to spend time with me and confide in me and lean on me.
Because just like with Kelly, I still wasn’t her.
