The Anatomical Shape of a Heart (14 page)

I stared at our hands, unable to think of a witty comeback.

As he folded the tips of his fingers over mine, the sun burnished tiny hairs on his forearm. For two people who'd mostly spent time together after dark, seeing him now, stretched out alongside me in warm daylight, was a luxury. Here, I could freely inspect all the small things, like the white half-moons at the base of his thumbnails, and the freckle on his elbow at the bottom of his lotus tattoo. And maybe the sun shone on other things I didn't really know were there, like the fierce knot inside my chest that had been tightening since the last time I saw him. But as I lay there with him in the grass, it unwound and relaxed, and the sun lightened all the heavy things he'd just revealed.

“I'm so glad you came looking for me,” he murmured.

I remembered what he'd told me in Alto Market. “If you leave vague hints about where you are, I
will
find you.”

“Did I really say that?”

“You did,” I confirmed.

He groaned. “You should've punched me.”

“It's not too late.”

His gaze roamed over my Roman orgy shirt and lit on my mouth. Everything inside me fluttered. Was he going to kiss me? Was he still staring at my lips? I couldn't tell, because I was staring at his, and they were parted, and he was breathing heavily, and I could feel his leg against mine, and
mother of God
, this was happening. This was definitely happening, and I could hear—

Scandinavian black metal.

Jack arched away from my hip as my phone buzzed inside my pocket.

Ugh. It was Heath. He'd changed my ringtone to play something that sounded like a screaming subway accident whenever his number came up. “Sorry,” I mumbled, sitting up and frantically fishing out my blaring cell, which everyone and their brother could probably hear through the trees. So much for our private hideaway. I finally managed to mute the phone, but not before my pulse cranked up to a zillion beats per minute.

“Wow. I'd never pictured you as an angry-shrieking-vocals kind of music fan,” Jack said with a bemused look on his face.

“It's my jackass brother.”

A text popped up from Heath:
Where the hell R U?

“Something wrong?” Jack asked.

“It's already five? How did that happen?”

“I thought you didn't have to work.”

“I don't. It's worse than that. It's”—I lowered my eyebrows—“family dinner night.”

“Oh,” he said, pulling his hand away from mine. Was he disappointed our near-kiss moment was kaput? I certainly was. “Do I need to drop you off?” he asked.

I didn't want to leave, not when I'd already spent more than a week away from him, and not when I'd just learned all this stuff about his mom. I remembered how cold his father had seemed outside the hospital, and wondered if Jack would go home to an empty house that night.

I leaned back on my hands. “What are your feelings about lasagna?”

15

Jack pulled Ghost next to the curb in a prime spot almost directly in front of my house.

“You can change your mind,” I said.

He stowed his sunglasses on the visor and stared at our front steps like a monster might come storming down them at any second. “And turn down a free meal? Never.”

“You say that now, but you haven't met my family yet.”

As traffic sped behind us, we headed up to the front door. On the other side of it, a trio of laughs floated from the kitchen on a fragrant cloud of tomato and melted cheese. It smelled freaking delightful. And Mom was in a superior mood, laughing it up and practically singing her curiosity when I called from the park to find out if I could bring Jack along. Now, if she just wouldn't put two and two together about the graffiti in the museum, and if Heath would keep his mouth shut about everything I'd told him about Jack, this might not turn disastrous.

I signaled Jack to follow me through the living room toward the chatter. Our kitchen wasn't fancy, having last been updated in an ugly 1990s shade of pale mauve, complete with fake butcher-block countertops. But it was pretty big for a city kitchen, with a long peninsula counter that separated a round four-chair breakfast table from the rest of the room. Mom was standing on the other side of that peninsula, and Heath was lounging at the table. And right as I walked under the archway from the living room, an African-American man as big as a professional wrestler stepped in front of me.

And when I say wrestler, I mean bulging muscle—beefy and corn-fed, with a few extra pounds of cushion, and tattoos snaking up both arms. He was dressed in a T-shirt with a fiery metal logo, and he had one of those wallet chains looping from the back pocket of his black jeans. To go along with all that, he had a full-on badass beard, like one of the big S&M dudes who walk around with nothing but a bullwhip and leather chaps at the Folsom Street Fair.

The whole package announced
You do not want to screw with me
, but the beautiful smile curving his lips was all sunshine.

“Beatrix?” he guessed.

“Noah?” I guessed back.

His rumbly laugh echoed around the kitchen as he scooped me up into a hug. “Damn, you're a little thing like your mama, aren't you?”

“And you're apparently made of mountain. Are you sure you're an engineer and not a lumberjack?”

“Last I checked.”

When he pulled out a chair, I widened my eyes at Heath, who was beaming so much he nearly blinded me.

“Well, I'm glad to finally meet you,” I said, moving into the kitchen to make room. “And while we're on introductions…” Jack stepped under the arch. “Jack, this is my family. This is Saint Noah, my brother's boyfriend. And that's my brother, Heath, and over there is my mom, Nurse Katherine the Great. Everyone, this is Jack.” I refrained from adding
the Vandal
.

Jack extended his hand to Noah, and then to my brother, who looked Jack over like he was a piece of cake as he purred “Hello, Jack” in a voice an evil cartoon cat would use on a doomed mouse. “I've heard
all
about you.”

Ugh. Kill me now.

“But I haven't,” Mom said, wiping her hands on a kitchen towel. “Come closer and let me get a better look at the person my daughter's been hiding under a bushel.”

Uh-oh. She was strangely cheerful and teasing, but it didn't stop my neck muscles from clenching. And poor Jack had no idea what he was walking into, but he strolled around the counter and shook my mom's hand, too.

“Thank you for having me. Hope it's not an inconvenience.”

She made a sweeping gesture toward two pans of lasagna cooling on trivets. “If we can eat all this, we should get some kind of prize. It's no inconvenience whatsoever. Do you go to school with Beatrix?”

“Your daughter and I met on the N line a few weeks ago,” he said. Which was pretty much true. “And I've seen her at Alto Market.” Also true, just not quite
the Truth.

“What's your last name?” she asked.

“Vincent.”

“Jack Vincent,” Mom said, leaning back against the counter to peer up at him. “Why does that name sound familiar? Oh, Mayor Vincent.”

“Yes,” he said, looking uncomfortable. “That's my father.”

His father … What?

A chorus of “oohs” swirled around the kitchen. Except from me, because
his father was the freaking mayor of San Francisco and he didn't tell me.
Sweat pricked my scalp under my looping braids. Jack coughed into his hand and sneaked a fear-filled glance my way. I did my best to keep my face blank.

“Well, well, well,” Mom chirped. She grabbed his chin and angled it for her inspection as though he were a patient; sometimes Mom forgets normal physical boundaries. “I knew you looked familiar. Handsome like your daddy, huh?”

Jack chuckled nervously.

“First a saint, now a prince,” Mom said, letting go of Jack's chin to grin at Noah across the counter. “God's finally listening to my prayers.”

“I don't know about that,” I mumbled. “Jack's a Buddhist.”

“O-oh,” Mom said, like it was the coolest thing she'd ever heard.

I suddenly felt like I were in a David Lynch movie and there was some bizzaro, surreal plot I didn't really understand unfolding all around me. I quietly had a heart attack while Mom and Jack and Heath and Noah all chatted about Buddhism and about how funny it was that Jack had shown up for dinner, because Mom had made meatless lasagna to appease Noah, who was apparently a pescatarian—which just meant he was a vegetarian who cheated and ate fish. And they talked about Jack's superstar father, who was serving his second term as one of the youngest mayors in the city's history, not to mention one of the most popular, but, no, Jack had no idea if the rumors were true that Mayor Vincent might be entering California governor's race in the near future. Blah, blah, blah.

For the love of Pete, how flipping stupid was I? To be honest, I always tuned Mom and Heath out when they started talking politics. Yet I'd known his last name sounded familiar. I couldn't believe I hadn't connected the dots when I saw his dad, but if I tried to picture him without the dark shades and the baseball cap, yeah, I supposed it was him, all right.

Everything made more sense now, like how Jack said his dad lived for his job. And the mayor was notoriously private about his family life, which was probably why I couldn't dig up much about Jack online. No doubt they lived in one of those six-million-dollar houses near Buena Vista Park—
not
the six-hundred-thousand-dollar ones. And the car that was waiting for Jack and his dad at the hospital that night? That was the freaking
mayor's car
. No wonder the man had been cooler than ice with me. He was the king of the city.

Which was why he'd forbidden Jack to talk about the schizophrenia. I vaguely remembered seeing pictures of the mayor and his wife together, but maybe I hadn't seen any recently because, you know, she was in the hospital. Keep up appearances, Jack had said. His father was worried it might hurt his political career. Pretty crappy attitude, if you ask me.

“You feeling all right, babe?” Mom asked, rubbing my back.

“Oh, I'm one big bag of sunshine and puppies.”

She squinted suspiciously at me and then spoke to Jack. “How are you at grating cheese, Prince Vincent?”

“My cheese-grating skills are second to none. I'm a fully licensed grate master.”

“Excellent. I'll need enough Parm grated to cover those baguettes. Bex will show you where the grater is. And, babe,” she said, talking to me, “do the garlic butter thing you did last time. Noah, I need your height to get an extra chair down from the hall closet. It's stuck sideways on the top shelf, thanks to your boytoy's inability to follow simple instructions.”

“Thanks, Mom,” Heath said drily. “You're a real hoot.”

The three of them chatted their way into the hall. I pulled out a block of Parmesan and some butter from the fridge. Jack stepped behind me as I unwrapped it on the counter.

“You pissed?” he said near the side of my head.

“Surprised. And feeling more than a little dumb. But in my defense, I'm used to seeing him in a suit behind a podium. And, you know, you might've mentioned it.”

“I wasn't thinking clearly when you saw us together at the hospital. I should've introduced you. It's just that everywhere I go, I'm always Mayor Vincent's son. I know, boo-fucking-hoo, right? But that's all I am to people at school, the neighbors, the hospital doctors.… Even one of the masters at the Zen Center has hinted that having my dad show up at one of the charity events would help raise awareness. I get so damn tired of it. And for once I just wanted…” He paused, searching for words. “I wanted you to see me and not my family—not the politician or the psych patient. Just me.”

I opened a bottom cabinet and rummaged until I found our ancient metal box grater. “To be honest, I hate politics. If you never mention anything remotely mayoral ever again, it won't hurt my feelings. Now, the schizophrenia? You can talk about that all you want, anytime. However, none of it changes the way I think about you.”

He didn't reply, so I figured the matter was settled. I tapped on the grater. “Now, I should warn you that Mom is a total freak about wasting food, so if you grate more cheese than we need, I'll be eating Parmesan on cereal for the next week. Just so we're clear, don't do that.”

I stepped out of his way and grabbed a bulb of garlic from a bowl near the stove. On the other side of the kitchen wall, a loud
boom!
was followed by laughter. Guess Noah got the chair down.

“Hey, Bex?” Jack said as he grated. “Just so we're clear, if we were alone, I'd probably kiss you right now.”

I gave him a swift glance as the hallway laughter made its way back to the kitchen. “Just so we're clear, I'd probably let you.”

 

 

Dinner was oddly pleasant. There was barely room for all five us around the kitchen table, but it was nice to be squished next to Jack, and we played elbow wars every time we bumped into each other.

And if Mom had detected any weirdness between us earlier, it was long forgotten—partly because Jack and I were fine now, and partly because Mom was too busy flirting it up with him and Noah. (Who knew all it took was a couple extra guys praising her cooking to turn Katherine the Great into a gooey pile of strumpet? It was almost embarrassing.)

And the pleasantness turned to joy for my mom when Heath announced he was moving in with Noah at the end of the summer. And the joy turned to outright glee when Noah announced he was going to help Heath figure out a way to go back to school. Not for nursing, but to become a vet tech. “We were looking at a veterinary program in San Leandro. He'd have to commute across the Bay on BART—”