Changing Course (31 page)

"What do you love, Brett?"
You
. Oh for fuck sake, what is wrong with me? This is dating. Get your shit together asshole and answer the center of your world’s question. Jesus Christ. I'm getting all poetic now. I need to shut up and get in the car before my mouth starts spewing Shakespeare.

"I love that your name is Jesse James. I have every intention of chanting it later tonight." Sex. Yes, sex is a safe topic. Let's stick with that.

"Oh...um, yeah. I like the sound of that." She tries to pretend she isn't disappointed by my answer. I can see it in her eyes. I know she was hoping for more, but I have nothing more.

"Come on gorgeous, I owe you dinner, drinks, and dancing." She stays silent and disappointment paints her face.

Damn it, this was supposed to be a good night, but once again I've screwed everything up. I need to bring her back to me. So I leave out the questionable parts and tell her the truth.

Backing her into the side of my car, I tell her some things she doesn't know. It's not what she wants to hear but hopefully it’s enough to make the spark flicker back into her eyes.

"Gorgeous, look at me," her eyes immediately flash up to mine. "I love spending time with you. I love watching you wake up in the morning. You always do this adorable little stretch, and roll away from me so I can't smell your morning breath," I laugh and she just rolls her eyes. "I love watching you cook, because even when there is no music, you always shake your ass to an imaginary beat. I love watching you lay on the couch pretending to like football." She tries to interrupt me, so I lean forward and place a soft kiss to her lips to keep her quiet. "I've known for weeks that you don't like football, but I love that you pretend for me. I have no idea how you beat me in those bets a few months ago, but it’s obvious you aren’t really a football shark. I love that too." I look down to see tears pooling in her eyes.

The tears confuse me. I'm giving her the only substitution I have for those three magical words I can't possibly begin to say.

"Brett, all of those things are sweet, and there are a lot of things I love about you too. Most of all, I just love...you." I suck in a breath, knowing things will never be the same again.

"Jesse..." I start to say something, but I have no idea what. Luckily she stops me first.

"I love you. I'm an idiot, and I know you don't feel the same, but I freaking love you. I promised myself a few weeks ago, I was going to give this thing with you my all, and that includes my heart. If it falls apart so be it, but at least I'll know I tried. I won't say it again, but I needed to say it just once before I had a chance to chicken out. So there you have it. I love you. Do with it what you want. Run, hide, file it away under crazy things psycho girlfriends say, I don't care...but at least now I know it's out there." She pauses to wipe away a single tear.

"Jesse..." I try to think of something to fix this, but come up empty handed.

"Can we please go now? I have a sudden urge to get drunk, and I'm not talking sexy drunk. I'm talking, drunk enough to forget the last twenty-four hours of my life, drunk. It's open bar right?" I just nod and pull her into a deep apologizing hug.

I can feel her shoulders shake as she begins to cry into my dress uniform. This is not the way this evening was supposed go. Outside her apartment, standing in the freezing cold, I hold her, giving her all I have to offer: a heartless, warm body.

"I'm done." My nonexistent heart lurches into my throat at the possible meanings of her words.

"Umm..."

"Are we going to be okay?" she timidly asks, not wanting the answer any more than I want to give it. "I mean, can you handle that I'm in love with you? Or is this the end?"

"Can you handle the fact that I can't tell you the same thing?” I ask the bigger question.

"Look, don't mess around with me here. Please. If this is a point you will never get to, let me go now. I don't want to go, but if you know this isn’t something you want, then please let me go before I lose myself completely in you."

"Jesse..."

"Stop saying my damn name and talk!" she yells, frustrated by my inability to communicate.

"I don't know what to say! I can't make you any promises, and I'd be setting us both up for failure if I tried. Gorgeous, I want to be with you. I want to see where this goes. I can't tell you those magical words, but I'm not ruling out that one day I will."

"What the heck does that even mean?" She begins to pace.

"It means we could go round and round, but I don't have any answers. The only thing I know is I don't want to lose you. I'm sorry I'm a douche bag who can't give you what you deserve. Fuck, I want to give it to you. If I didn't care about you, I would look into your eyes and tell you the words that mean everything." I throw my hands up the air. "If and when I know I will tell you. Jesse, when I say them, you can trust that I will mean it with my entire soul. I want to give you that one day. And if that never happens, I'll be the one who loses. I will be the dumb ass." She finally gives me a small one-sided smile. It's fake, but at least I'm one step closer to holding her again.

"Can we pretend again? Can we do what we did at the game and pretend I didn't say anything."

"Absolutely not." Her head snaps to the side. "Gorgeous, those are the most beautiful words you can say to someone, and I'll be damned if I'm going to forget the sound of them coming from your lips. I'm sealing this into my memory for the rest of my life. I just hope that one day I'll be able to give that back to you."

"Do you promise to tell me if you realize you'll never be able to fall in love with me? You know...not string me along."

"I swear on my life."

"Do you promise to tell me the split second that you realize how stupid you are, and that you have loved me all along?"

"I look forward to it."

"Do we have time for me to go fix my make up?" she asks, running her fingers through the black mess under her eyes.

"I'll wait forever if I need to."

She looks down at her sexy shoes and shakes her head, "The sad thing is...so will I."

"Jesse...I won't make you wait forever. Just give me a little more time to get my head straight." I worry that if I don't touch her now, I might not ever get the chance again.

Reaching out, I circle her into my arms and kiss her head. I don't want this to be sexy. I just want to give her back even an ounce of what she has given me tonight, but she pulls away all too quickly.

"Okay, I'll be right back." She heads up the stairs leaving me alone standing in the cold, and feeling like a total jackass.
Very fitting
.

A few minutes later she returns looking more beautiful than ever. A smile plastered across her face. A smile I know isn't real, but it still manages to steal my breath.

I swing open the passenger side door as she slides inside without a single word. "Jesse James, are you ready for some horrible banquet food?" I ask, trying to lighten the mood.

"Brett, promise me something." Her voice is stern and serious. I prepare myself to make her yet another heartfelt promise. Hell, I'll promise her anything at this point. "If dinner sucks, promise me we can order room service."

I laugh, leaning my head back in relief. "I swear. Actually, even if it's not terrible, we should at the very least order dessert."

"Maybe we can get into our pajamas and order one of those chocolate cakes with the melted chocolate inside."

"Absolutely, well...except for the pajamas part. No pajamas." She finally gives me a genuine Jesse smile.

Jesse

Two weeks later…

T
HINGS HAVE
surprisingly been great since I opened my big mouth confessing my love to Brett. I figured it would get weird, or it might even scare him away completely. But if anything, he's started coming around more often. It's as if showing up almost every day is his way of proving to me that he does care. I think he might feel guilty for not sharing my feelings. Just what Brett needs, more guilt.

He and I live in a perfect little world of denial. We don't talk about Sarah or our feelings. We definitely don't talk about a future together. We just exist, hanging out and talking about our days, but never our tomorrows. Somehow it works. I keep telling myself that I should ask about Sarah. Maybe try to help Brett move forward, but I always chicken out at the last minute and end up having sex with him instead. At least we're good at the sex part.

Last week, Brett shocked the heck out of me by asking me to spend Christmas with his family. I used every excuse I could think of to get out of going. It's not that I didn't want to go...okay, it was completely that I didn't want to go. I'm not ready to meet Brett's family. What if they look at me like the other woman? I'm sure they were close with Sarah. What are they going to think of him seeing someone new now? But Brett pulled out the trump card, and invited Kara first. She of course jumped at the opportunity to spend the night with the Sharp family. When I informed her later that he doesn't have any brothers, she was pretty disappointed.

Today, I'm going to the station to meet Caleb on his lunch break so he can help me shop for Brett’s Christmas present. I'm buying him size fifteen bowling shoes. Every time we hit the lanes he always limps for days afterward. They don't offer rental shoes that big so he crams his feet in a size too small. Caleb agreed to help me pick them out. At least this way if he hates them, I can blame it on Caleb.

"Hey, baby girl." I hear Caleb say as walk into the front of the police station.

He’s sitting on the desk flirting with the sixty year old receptionist. I look around equally hoping to catch a glimpse and trying to avoid Brett. I'd love to see him in his work element, but I don't want him to know I'm going shopping with his best friend.

"You can relax, he's not here."

"Oh, um...okay," I say disappointed. "You ready to go?"

"Yeah come on back, I need to grab my jacket." He leads me around a surprisingly quiet police station.

He stops on one side of two desks pushed together. "Give me just a minute, I need to send out this email and close out my computer." He nods to the desk facing his, "That one is Brett's. Have a seat."

I slowly walk over trying not to look too eager, but inside I'm dying to see what pictures are inside the two frames propped on his desk. I feel a rush of relief when neither of them are of Sarah. One is a family photo of a herd of beautiful people. Caleb wasn't wrong, that is a good gene pool. The other is a picture of him with his parents at his graduation from the police academy. God, he looks so young, but he's way better looking now. He's filled out and looks more like a man than the boy in the picture.

I sit in his chair and study his workspace. He's a pretty neat guy. His apartment isn't immaculate, but it's always tidy. His desk is no different. All the papers are in stacked baskets, pens all stored in a Chicago Bears mug, and his paper clips cling to a magnet next to his keyboard. I want to open all his draws and get a closer look at this professional side of Brett Sharp, but I'm relatively sure digging through a detective’s desk is frowned upon in the eyes of the law.

Out of the corner of my eye, something under his keyboard catches my attention. I can tell it’s the edge of a photo and my heart drops. Ah, this must be where he hides the picture of Sarah I so feared he would have. Unable to stop myself, I reach forward uncovering it.

My breath hitches with what's revealed. If finding the picture hadn't already stolen my breath, the beautiful image in front of me would. It's a picture of us at the police ball. I have no idea who took this. It's not posed. It's just us standing talking. I'm staring up at him, and he must be saying something dirty because my cheeks are flushed-his thumb caressing the red. He's wearing a sexy smirk, and my face is glowing. I don't remember standing there with him, but I can feel a rush of the million emotions captured with one click of a camera.

The corner of the picture is slightly worn where someone frequently handles it. It may have been hidden, but it's obvious he looks at it often. I get an idea and quickly slide it into my purse.

"You okay, Jess?" Caleb draws my attention away from grand-theft-photo.

"Yeah, I'm great. Why do you ask?" I try to be smooth.