Circle in the Sand (19 page)

“Dammit, Jax.”

She pops up from our seat in the sand and heads toward the water. I grab our cups
and follow saying, “Listen to me. Nothing happened, we just had…a moment.”

I wonder if she hears me above the crashing waves. But when I catch up to her, she
turns to me and says, “Oh, a moment. What the hell does that mean?”

Her voice isn’t angry, but something rises up in me—a kind of heat or fear. I’m not
sure why I should have to defend myself but I do. “She was upset.”

“About me?”

“Yes…but no, there was something else.”

Jax’s attitude changes instantly, her love for Sage is more important than anything
else happening here. It’s one of the reasons I admire her so much. “Is she okay?”
she asks softly. “What is it?”

Given Sage’s family history, I don’t want her to worry. At the same time, it’s not
my place to share Sage’s frozen egg situation with Jax. “Yes, she’s fine. It’s complicated,
but there is something she’s been struggling with. And it has nothing to do with you
or her grandmother.”

“But you can’t tell me.” She looks out to the ocean, folds her arms across her chest
as if she’s cold. “She mentioned her fears about not becoming a mother, so I’m guessing
it’s something to do with that. But I’m not asking for details.” The wind is strong
closer to the waves. Her hair wrestles around her head. I resist the urge to wrap
my arms around her. But now more than ever I want to hold her. “I understand, you
don’t want to betray her trust,” she says. “But what happened between you two?”

“She cried. I held her. You know how she is, keeping it all in until she can’t any
longer. It got intense, for a second, but nothing happened because I didn’t want anything
to happen.”

“Or she didn’t.”

I try not to get pissed at the comment, reminding myself that this reaction is not
unfounded. I’ve acted like an idiot in the past, being obvious about my attraction
to Sage. “We both didn’t,” I say. “I was only being a good friend to her when she
needed one. And since she didn’t have you…” I say, risking a beating.

She ignores the last comment, determined to get this out. “So you two have never hooked
up?”

Shit, she asks the tough questions. I hesitate, but when she turns to look me in the
eye I find it impossible to lie to her. I want her respect. I decide right then I
will answer anything she asks. I only hope she doesn’t ask the one question I don’t
want to answer. I stop and face her. “It happened a long time ago, a one-time thing.”

I gauge her reaction, hoping she’s not hurt. Her eyes are difficult to read under
the light of the moon and a distant light near the boardwalk. She stares at me for
a long time. Her expression changes and she finally says. “I’m sorry I pushed you
to tell me. I don’t know why I had to know.”

I let out a sigh and a grin that tells her I’m calling out the always-straight-forward
Jax. “I think we both know why.” I take her hand in mine. “It’s okay, Jax. I feel
it too. I’m not saying we have to do anything about it now, but something is there.”
I bring her hand to my chest, wanting to kiss her so badly, but resisting. For once
in my life, I must play it cool.
Use your head, jack ass
. I press her hand to my heart. “Here.”

Startled, Jax sucks in ragged air, shakes her head, then lets it fall against her
hand onto my chest. “Doesn’t that worry you a little?” she says, without lifting her
head.

“No,” I say, then pause. “It scares the shit out of me. I couldn’t stand it if I ever
lost what we have now.” I put my hand on the back of her head, and we stay that way
for a moment. My chest tightens, making it difficult to breath. Too much, too fucking
fast. I need to breathe, so I say, “I mean, yeah, you’re a pain in the ass sometimes,
but…”

Jax yanks her head up, pulls her hand away and punches me in the arm. Then she takes
off down the beach. “C’mon.”

We walk side by side in silence, our hands brushing up against each other a couple
of times before I finally grab hers, interlocking our fingers. We walk toward the
pier. I wonder if she’s cold, heading into the wind, but I have nothing to offer her
but my arms. After a few minutes, she says, “You don’t have to tell me anything else
if you don’t want to.”

“I want to,” I say even though I’m embarrassed. “It was junior year in college,” I
said. “I was dating DeeDee, remember her?”

“Oh yeah. Big rack, laughed sort of like a hyena?”

“Thanks, yeah, that would be her. She was pretty freaking smart, you know. I think
she’s a botanist now.”

“Very impressive. So you cheated on the future botanist?”

“No, I didn’t. Not really.”

“There’s so much gray in your world,” she says sarcastically.

“Do you want to hear the damn story or not?”

“Yes, please proceed with the damn story.”

I forget we’re holding hands for a second and wonder if I should let go for this part
of the story, but I don’t. “I went to visit Emily one weekend, without DeeDee. We
went out. Sage and Eric joined us. Emily went back to Eric’s place that night, but
I still needed to crash at her and Sage’s place. When we got there, Sage wanted to
keep drinking. I knew something was wrong with her that night, but didn’t say anything
until then.”

“She was upset about her mom,” Jax says. We all remember that time.

“Yeah, it was before the surgery, so she was pretty worried. And you know her freaking
family. No one seemed to give a shit what she was going through. She was trying to
be strong for Sierra who was I think twelve at the time.”

“So you were there to hold her, like last night? Only you didn’t stop things that
time.”

“Some of the details are fuzzy. We actually drank ourselves to sleep before anything
happened.”

Jax gives me a confused look as we veer away from the pier and head toward the boardwalk.
“So?”

“So my phone rang sometime in the middle of the night, but we were passed out. Sage
woke and answered it.”

“Let me guess. It was DeeDee.”

“Yep.”

I gave Jax a brief rundown on my conversation with my soon-to-be ex-girlfriend. How
she accused me of sleeping with Sage, and how it took me all of about five minutes
to convince her that I hadn’t. Because Nice Guy Ned didn’t do shit like that. Nice
Guy Ned was dependable,
predictable
. She actually used that word, and a second later we broke up anyway. Her decision.

“So you did it out of spite?”

“I’m not going to lie. I was pretty worked up. But after we were both awake at three
in the morning and Sage was finally ready to talk, she broke down. I wasn’t thinking
about DeeDee.”

“And who would say no to Sage, right?”

“That sounds so fucking pathetic, but that’s what happened.” We reach the boardwalk,
stop and lean up against a brick wall. “I regret it, Jax. Because if that was ever
going to happen, I didn’t want it to be that way. Especially…”

“What?”

I shake my head, not sure if I should say it.

“You might as well, finish. What do you want to say?”

“It’s like she blames the whole thing on me.”

“Do you really think she feels that way? How can you be sure?”

“Comments she makes, then she blows it off pretending she was joking.”

“I’m sorry,” Jax says. “You know Sage has to try and control everything in her world.
It probably just scared her that she was vulnerable.”

“I guess,” I say, unconvincingly.

Then Jax turns to face me, pulls me in for a hug, her head resting on my chest. “Don’t
let it get to you,” she says. “Let’s put it behind us and not talk about it again.”

“That works for me.” I’m relieved it’s out in the open, but because there is still
another secret between us, it leaves me worried. And the only person I can talk to
is Emily, so I suggest we head back to our cars before I do something else I’ll regret.

We stand in the church parking lot, Jax with one hand on her open door.

“So where do we go from here?” I ask.

She gives me a smile I’ve seen a million times before. But now it’s as though it’s
only for me. “We go home,” she says. “And think pleasant thoughts about each other.”

I lean down, plant a kiss on her cheek. “I can do that.”

She stands on her tiptoes to deliver one to my cheek. “Good.” Then she climbs into
her car. “Call me sometime. We’ll see what we come up with.”

●●●

Back at Emily’s, I find my twin awake on the couch, watching a DVR’d show that makes
me want to live in a third world country:
The Bachelor
. Some asshole with an already inflated ego, lets women compete for his attention,
for his love. And then, when he sends them packing, they bawl their eyes out as though
they’re surprised he didn’t pick them. It’s all so freaking automated.

My sister shushes me when I begin to vent about her viewing choice. I’m sure she needs
to unwind after today, so I leave for the kitchen to grab a snack. The rest of the
house is silent, kids and hubby already tucked in. Eric probably works in the morning.
I see whoever was in charge of the dishes after Jax and I left failed to complete
the task.

A leftover tub of popcorn from the party catches my eye.
Nice
. I slide it over to the dishwasher, ignoring the fact that a ton of grubby little
fingers probed through this and grabbing my own handful. I’m starved. Being honest,
admitting feelings, resisting urges, takes a toll on a loser like me.

I pull open the dishwasher door and slide out the bottom tray. Carefully, quietly,
I load plates and bowls into the tray with minimal clankage. If Emily hears me doing
this, she’ll run in and take over, defeating the purpose of helping my sister. When
I finish, I check out Sophie’s gifts, still piled on the dining room table. I pick
up the little guitar Jax gave her, smiling at how similar the two girls are. How my
niece is determined to copy everything Jax says and does. It wouldn’t be so terrible
if Sophie ended up taking after Jax. 

“Isn’t that adorable?” I hear behind me.

“Hey, sis,” I say, turning around.

Emily carries over a yawn and sits in a chair at the table. It pains me to see her
looking so drained—not fun party drained, but life drained. She always was the worrier
in the family, the
what if
girl. Always thinking something bad might happen. I contemplate bringing up the dreaded
topic, but this probably isn’t the best time to see if she’s given any more consideration
to therapy.

“So did Mr. Right find true love yet?” I ask, hoping to get a smile.

“No, maybe next week.”

I try again. “Well, once he has sex with each one of them, I’m sure he’ll discover
which is his soul mate.” Pause for effect. “And at least the losers got a romp with
a really hot guy, on TV, for everyone to see.”

Nada. I sit next to her, put my hand on her arm. “You should get to bed.”

“I will. I just need to get to those dishes.” She looks over to the sink, then back
at me, sleepy but smiling. “I love you.”

“I know. So did Sophie have a good time today?”

“I suppose she did. But she spent the majority of the party huddled in a corner with
her best friend Keeley. I could’ve saved myself some stress and money and invited
her over for a play date.”

“That’s the girl who moved?”

She nods.

“Sophie told me about her.”

“Yeah, actually only she and her mother moved. Divorce. Dad still lives nearby. So
what are you doing back here?”

“It’s nothing. Just wanted to see how you’re doing.”

“Bullshit, Neddy.”

“Such language from a mother. See how exhausted you are.”

“Now that I don’t have to tackle those dishes, I have some newfound energy. So what
is it? And bring me some of the popcorn while you tell me.”

She will drag this out of me, but still I hesitate. I retrieve the popcorn tin and
take a seat across from my sis. We both dig in as I try to figure out how best to
verbalize the mess in my head.

“Any day now,” she says with a mouthful.

“So…I know we’ve talked about this before, but do you think it’s completely idiotic
for friends to date?” Hearing the words come out of my mouth bring me back to fourteen-years-old
again. Emily may only be two minutes older, but somehow I always look up to her.

She rolls her eyes, swallows, and says, “Oh my God, Neddy. Sage again? I told you
you shouldn’t have gone to that party.” She slides the tin back to her, digging in
for another handful. “Please tell me nothing happened. I love Sage, but you two together?”

My mouth hangs open during this rant. I should have realized she’d assume I meant
Sage. This day is killing me. I shove my elbow on the table, let my forehead fall
to my fist, close my eyes. “No, not Sage. Last night was a favor.”