Progress (The Progress Series) (24 page)

“Jess, c’mon. You know what I want to ask you.
Are you going to make me spell it out?” Her pulse races as her skin thickens, preparing herself for his rejection.

“I…well…I mean, it’s not…” his words stumble and then he groans. “What? What do you want to ask me?”

“Tell me what you’re thinking here, Jess. I see the way you look at me, and you don’t give anyone the time of day, but for some reason
I’m
different. Everyone keeps telling me that they see you watching me when I’m oblivious to your presence in the room--”

“Charlie, wait.” He stops her and takes a step forward.

Her breath catches and she begins to tremble. His eye contact breaks after he feels the intensity of the moment reach its climax. His brow furrows and he mumbles.

“What? I
didn’t hear you,” she says.

“You can’t keep asking me to touch you…and then stand just outside my reach
…” he whispers.

Suddenly a voice in the distance calls his name.

They both turn to see Jake approaching. It is now or never. The conversation can’t wait. She turns to him with an urgent expression and Jess takes a large step back.

“I told you, it’s easier to be alone like this. We’re friends, rig
ht?” It’s a question, not an answer.

No, it
is
her answer.

“Well then, congratulations! You’ll be the first person in the history of mankind to have an easy life.” She turns away from him and walks toward her car, nodding at Jake as he passes her.

*

Once home, she gets undressed and looks at her naked body in the mirror. She turns right, then left. It is several minutes before sh
e starts getting cold. Wrapping herself in her sheets, she cries herself to sleep.

Charlie
dreams for the first time in years. She is naked in a football field. No one knows or acknowledges her. Suddenly Jesse is there with her; standing in front of her, laughing. Then he slits her throat.

She wakes, her pulse racing, and doesn’t fall back asleep after that.

All Charlie wants to do the next morning is call in sick, but she doesn’t. She never does. It’s an unwritten rule that every server must comprehend and respect: If you call in sick, you lose your job, so it better be worth risking.

“Hey gurrl,” Angie says as she walks into the dining room, tying her apron around her waist.

“Hey.” Charlie still isn’t over last night’s embarrassment with Jesse or the nightmare in the football field. She yawns.

“What’s wrong?” Angie asks.

“I’m sure you can guess.”

“What the fuck did he say to you this…you know what? No. Just stop. Why won’t you end this? I don’t know why you put up with it,” Angie shouts, looking around.

Two people sitting in booth twelve look up at her and glare.

“Shhh! Keep your voice down, Angie!”

“Seriously, Charlie. I mean, why?” Angie says more quietly.

“He’s different when we’re alone.” She feels as though Angie is scolding her.

“Dos!” The cook shouts as he places the food on the counter.

Charlie grabs the food and is grateful for the distraction. She doesn’t want to have this conversation again; it’s exhausting.

After her shift, Charlie is changing into her street clothes in the employee bathroom when she hears a knock.

“I’ll be out in a minute!” she shouts.

She hurries herself and throws her uniform into her bag. Opening the door, she finds Jess there.

“Hey, Red!” he says with a big grin.

He is wearing a tight T-shirt defining his torso; his beautiful, toned, tanned body had been sweating on the bike ride over.
When will he stop having this effect on me?
She is starting to get annoyed with herself.

He removes his shirt on his way into the bathroom, and closes the door still grinning
. For the first time, he exposed a scarred torso near his side and under his left arm.

Jesus! Where did he get those from?

“What are you doing here?” she says through the door, trying to ignore his scars.

“I’m filling in for Jon. He called in sick. I’m a busser tonight!” he yells back.

She walks away and finds Angie to say goodbye.

“Hey. I’m gonna take off. I’ll see you later.” She fakes a smile and starts walking away.

“Charlie?”

She turns around. “Yeah?”

“Are you in love with him?” Angie asks.

Charlie rolls her eyes and looks around to make sure no one heard. “
Love
? At this point, I don’t even know if I
like
him,” she says on her way to the back.

“Hey, where are you going?” Jesse asks as Charlie is heading out the door.

“Home.”

“Don’t you work tonight?”  He sounds disappointed, but she is already out the door and decides not to answer.

“Hey, Red!” he shouts from the employee entrance.

When she still doesn’t answer, he runs out to her. She is opening her car door when he is suddenly behind her, slamming it shut.

“Hey. I was calling you. Is everything…are you…what…?” He can’t find the right words and starts to fidget; he keeps his eyes to the ground.

“Is there a question in there?” She looks at him sardonically, trying to make eye contact with him.

Avoiding her eyes, he exhales and takes a step back.

“What, Jess? What? You’re allowed to push me as far away from you as possible, but I can’t do the same to you? Well, get used to it! Remember that you’re not the only one with problems here. I’m just as fucked up as you are!”

She takes a deep breath and starts over. “Jess, tell me something. What happened to you? Where did you get those scars on your side?”

Jesse is taken aback by her question. “Oh…it’s nothing.” He swallows and shakes his head. “A stupid bar fight,” he says, brushing it off.

“See, Jess. This is one of our problems.” Wetting her lips, she scratches the back of her head. “Do you think I’m an idiot? You don’t get scars like that from a bar fight, unless the bar happens to have boiling water or hot grease available to the public.” She chews the inside of her cheek, thinking the worst of his scars. “I’d rather you say nothing at all than lie straight to my face. You can’t seem to talk to me about anything important, so what’s the fucking point anymore?”

He takes a deep breath in and opens her car door for her, then skulks back into the building without a word.

She shakes her head.
Nope, not gonna cry another tear for this guy.

I still feel horribly. It isn’t his fault he doesn’t have feelings for me. I’m acting like a teenager, but I don’t care.

As she drives away, her cell phone rings and it’s work. There is no way she’s returning and picking up a shift, so she doesn’t answer it. She needs to go home and collect her thoughts.

Once home, she waves at her parents and walks straight to the basement. She prepares a pot of coffee, changes into her tank top, and crawls under the sheets with her notebook.

As she begins writing in her journal, her thoughts are interrupted once again by her phone. Looking at the caller ID: it’s Jess.

“Oh God, why? Why can’t he just leave me alone?” she says, shaking her phone like she’s choking it. Not knowing what to do, she goes with her gut.

“Hello?”

“Hi.”

“What?”

“I need to see you.”

“Why are you whispering, Jess? And I thought you had to work tonight.”

“They didn’t need me. And I’m whispering because this isn’t easy for me. I just need to see you, talk to you, and make sure we’re okay.”

She sighs. “We’re fine, Jess. Just go home. We’ll talk tomorrow.”

“No! Don’t hang up. Are you still there?”

Softening, she replies, “Yeah. I’m here.”

“Come over,” he says. She can hear his smile.

“I’m half naked and under my sheets.”

“I want you half naked under
my
sheets. Come over.”

Please stop teasing me.

“Hey Jess?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m sorry,” she finally says.

“Don’t be. I’m an ass,” he says.

“Yes. That’s true,” she chuckles. “But…but I can be, too.”

“Then we’re even. Please come over.”

“Ugh! Okay. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes. But I won’t stay long.”

*

She arrives at his house and he greets her at the door. Looking at her with sad, gray eyes, the same eyes he had the first night she saw him, he wraps his arms around her.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers into her ear.

An inner glow warms her stomach and moves outward to each limb and through her fingertips.

“I don’t think you’ve ever hugged me,” she says, appreciating the sensation, ecstatic she hadn’t started to tremble. Taking in the scent of crisp soap and deodorant, she closes her eyes and
allows herself to feel like he’s real.

He holds her for what feels like several minutes. And too soon, he pulls away.

“Can I get you a drink?” he asks, taking her hand and guiding her upstairs to the kitchen.

“Whatever you’re having is fine.”

“Hey, the delivery manager position is opening up at work. What do you think? Think I stand a chance?” he asks.

“Sure, why not? Although, you’ll have to come up with something pretty damn good to make them forget about all the shifts you screwed up.”

“Yeah, you’re right.”

Charlie leans against the counter, and a silver shimmer catches the corner of her eye. Lifting a few pieces of paper to expose it, she takes two glances at it before realizing what it is. Her lips part slightly and she looks at Jess. He’s pouring her a glass of water and looks up at her just as she is about to ask him why he has it.

“What…I mean. Why? Why do you have my necklace? I’ve been looking all over for this thing,” she asks, still puzzled.

Horrified for a quick second, he hands her the glass of water. “Because it’s yours,” he says.

There is a long silence as Charlie tries to process his words.

Suddenly he speaks as if it’s been well-rehearsed and a heavy burden lifted. “I don’t know how to explain what’s going on between us. I don’t know how I feel and I don’t want to lead you on. I don’t want to have to explain it to anyone and I don’t do the girlfriend thing. When I start to have…when I get…well, I start…I mean, listen to me! I’m an idiot!” He pauses. “
She
left me broken. They’ve all left me broken.”

“I’m fine, Jess. This game we play, this torment, is fun and exciting. It drives me crazy. Good and bad crazy. I just want to make sure that we’re not doing any permanent damage to each other. That’s what I’m not so sure of.” Charlie speaks like it’s a brand new revelation. “I feel like I’m walking on eggshells with you. The smallest thing could light a fire under your ass and you’ll make fun of me, insult me, and use things I say against me. I’m fragile, too. I don’t think you take that into consideration sometimes. But you were right when you said I want you to touch me, then push you away. I hadn’t realized I was doing it all this time,” she says.

He takes a step toward her and she pretends not to notice. There’s a long silence that is getting charged with their energy, and he’s just a foot away from her now.

“Don’t let my words fool you, you terrify me,” she whispers.

“You scare me, too.”

“For the first time in my life, I
feel
beautiful. I just don’t want that to be the only reason that you…” She trails off, not finishing her sentence.

As he takes another step toward her, she stares at his feet, trying to think about something else in order to cool the pulsing heat of her skin. Fisting her hands, she starts to feel a slight tremble in her fingers.

She wants to touch him. She wants to reach her hand out and rest her palm against his chest, wrap her arms around him again and feel the definition of his back and shoulder blades. But most of all, she just wants him closer than he is right now.

She opts for something a little less risky. “What does this mean?” She reaches out and touches the tattoo on his forearm and softly traces it with her index finger. What she hadn’t noticed before now, what had seemed to be just abstract wavy lines, had been an optical illusion; his tattoo is of a small ballerina. A tiny dancer.

His jaw clenches and his eyes grow dark. Pulling back his arm like she is running a blade through his vein, there is an instant shift in his posture and demeanor.

Bree. The one that got away.

In the same instant that he closes his eyes, he closes his mind. Fear blankets him and his throat runs dry. He can’t break this never-ending circle, this chain of stabbing disappointment. If he lets her in, she will hurt him. It’s inevitable.

“Get out. I can’t do this with you. Not you,” his voice is hushed and ragged.