Page 139 of First-Time Caller
Yeah, I fucked up. Not just by staying silent but by encouraging her to be with someone who isn’t me. I lied to her face and hurt her in the process. I thought I was doing the right thing, but I was just shoving her away to protect myself. She got too close and I panicked. Simple as that.
I was selfish.
I scratch at the back of my head and stretch out my legs. “If I told you it had to do with Lucie, would you launch an inquisition?”
“That would be my right as your father.” His voice softens. “This is part of it, Aiden. This is where you try.”
I pick up the tiny airplane again. “Okay.” I let it fly across the room. “Then, yes. It has to do with her.”
My dad hums. “Tell me what happened.”
And for the first time in a very long time, I do.
I spend my Saturday deteriorating on my couch in an old pair of sweatpants, a carton of Chinese food on my chest. I spread the cushions out on the floor and watchTemple of Doomall the way through, then when the credits start to roll, I start it all over again. Lucie hovers at the edges of my awareness, traces of her body lotion on the cushions I’m starfished across. A hair tie she left in the studio around my wrist.
I wonder what she’s doing.
I hope she’s thinking about me.
I hope I haven’t fucked it up too much.
On Sunday I wake up at an unreasonable hour, slip into my running shoes, and drag my boneless body over to Jackson’s house. I collapse on his front steps and stare at two pigeons duking it out over a pizza crust in the middle of the cobblestone street while I wait for him to come out, trying to organize my sleep-drunk thoughts into something reasonable and productive.
Instead, all I can manage is a gruff “What the hell are you wearing?” as soon as he opens his door.
Jackson hardly spares me a glance. He bends to adjust his socks, then straightens the straps of the . . . backpack thing . . . across his shoulders.
“It’s a canteen.” He tilts his head and takes a drink from the straw. “So I can hydrate mid-run.”
I squint in the morning light. “Water bottles exist, you know.”
“So do these portable, hands-free options.”
“It looks—”
“Don’t finish that sentence, Aiden. I know how you are in the morning. I could probably kick your ass without effort right now.”
He gives me an unamused look and finishes his prerun rituals. There’s a rainbow sticker on the band of the water bottle backpack thing and I wonder if one of his little sisters put it there, then realize how long it’s been since I’ve asked about his sisters. How long it’s been since I’ve asked about anything in his life.
Lucie isn’t the only one I’ve been an ass to in my quest to bubble-wrap myself. I came over here this morning to make amends. The Aiden Valen apology tour, I guess.
“Why are you darkening my doorstep?” Jackson double-checks that his front door is locked and jogs down his steps. I still haven’t managed to lift myself into a vertical position. “I thought you didn’t crawl out of your lair until midday.”
“You go for a run in the mornings.”
“Yes. And? That doesn’t explain why you’re here.”
“I thought I’d join you.”
I haven’t gone for a run in years, but he doesn’t need to know that.
His eyes narrow, suspicious. “You don’t run.”
I swim at the gym five days a week and I do a pretty regular weight-lifting circuit. I speed-walk around the parking lot at the station when I’m stressed, if that counts. I’ve been doing a lot of speed-walking lately. “I can keep up.”
He studies me for another extended minute in silence, his lips in a firm line. I let him look, hoping he can see the good intentions and not the exhaustion and exasperation.
“All right,” he finally says. He doesn’t wait for me before he sets off down the street. “Let’s go.”
