Chapter Fifteen

Veronica

I got in the shower after Jude left and stood under the stream of water with my head tilted back and my eyes closed, letting the droplets glide across my skin. I concentrated on the rhythm of each one against my body, letting the pattern lull me into a state of relaxation so that I could let my mind free to think through what had happened. I felt like I was still trying to process it, to reconcile it with how I had been feeling since before Christmas. Finding out about Jude's wife had given me pause. That was something I felt like I couldn't compete with. I wasn't just trying to reach out to him and get through the cold, hard exterior that so many others saw. I was trying to reach through something that was at once intangible and unmovable. Realizing that he had been married before and that he had lost her felt like closure to me. That moment in the courtyard of his house had been a breaking point and that information had felt like it pushed me to put my time with Jude behind me and move forward. I had thought that in trying to get him to celebrate Christmas, it would be a way to bring us closer and to finally establish a true relationship with him, but instead it had felt like the reality check that I had needed to make me realize that that was never what I was going to have with him.

Things were different now. Suddenly I couldn't trust what I'd been feeling and I didn't know what I should do next. I had stayed away from him throughout Christmas and even over the new year. I hadn't reached out to him in any way and I hadn't even listened to the messages that he left me. I had worried what they were going to say and how much more deeply he could have hurt me with them, but then he appeared at my house. He did exactly to me what I had done to him, breaking through the barrier of anonymity and privacy that we had maintained to force me to listen to him. When I saw him standing there on the porch I felt for a brief moment that I might understand, at least to a small degree, what he had felt when he realized that I was at his house. It was a strange and unbalancing experience. I felt vulnerable and exposed, as though he were seeing a part of me and a part of my existence that had been kept from him and that had somehow guarded me from making our connection real. That hadn't occurred to me until that moment. I hadn't understood just how much we had kept from one another until I realized that I now didn't have a place that I could go to that he hadn't seen and that didn't hold memories of him. Somehow that only amplified everything else that I still hadn't shared.

It was what he had said that had an even bigger impact on me, though. He had humbled himself in front of me. He admitted that he was wrong and apologized. Hearing those things from him made me realize that I had never expected he would do that. I never expected him to be the type of man who would say he was sorry. That shift in my perception changed everything. Suddenly I didn't know how I was feeling anymore. Instead of coping with the sense of sadness at closing that chapter in my life, I was feeling drawn to him again. The pull was back in my stomach and the craving to be near him dominated each breath.

I stepped out of the shower and had wrapped myself in a towel when I detected a strange and somewhat unnerving smell. It was acrid and hot, reminding me of the greenery smoldering on the courtyard stones. I rushed out of my bathroom and into the hallway only to hear Javi letting out a high-pitched scream as he ran past me, leaving a trail of dark gray smoke in his wake. I heard the front door open and close, muffling the sound of his scream. A few seconds later the door opened again and he came back in, silent now. When he walked back into the hallway I saw that he was holding a pot in one hand and a dish towel in the other. He waved the towel around in front of him trying to dissipate the smoke, then looked at me as if he didn't realize that I had been standing there.

"There you are," he said.

"Thank you," I said. "I was wondering where I was."

"Well, I was," he said. "I've been home for more than an hour. I thought maybe you had dissolved away like one of those fuzzy bath bomb things, then washed down the drain."

"So, you thought you would celebrate with a ritualistic burnt sacrifice?" I asked.

Javi eyed the pot in his hand and then looked back at me.

"Oh," he said. "No. That was popcorn. I thought that I would make us up a batch of the old-fashioned kind and we could spend the evening watching the Don Knotts movie marathon on TV. Apparently, though, when the little instructions on the bag say that you should only use a quarter of a cup of kernels and enough oil to cover the bottom of the pot, that's what it means."

"How much did you use?" I asked.

"A quarter of a cup of oil and half of the bag of kernels. I thought that that didn't sound like enough popcorn to get through The Incredible Mr. Limpet and The Ghost and Mr. Chicken, much less all four of them. Unfortunately, the combination of too much oil and thinking that turning the stove on to high would make it pop faster was not an example of my best decision making."

"Apparently not," I said. Something occurred to me and I looked down the hallway, following the path that he had run. "Why did you go out the front door?" I asked.

"I thought that it would be better to get the smoking eruption of popcorn out of the house before it burst into full-fledged flames," he said.

"No," I said. "That was probably a good choice. I just I wondered why you didn't use the back door. It's a lot closer to the kitchen and it would have made less of our apartment smell like a singed movie theater."

"The back door?" He asked.

"Yeah," I said. "The back door. The door on the back of the house. The one that you so elegantly covered with the tapestry you brought home from that Renaissance Faire when you thought that you might be able to seduce the lead in Romeo and Juliet? Even though I told you it most certainly wasn't going to happen."

"Yes," he said. "Because everyone sees a man wearing tights and mascara at a Renaissance Faire and immediately thinks there goes a man who is straight as an arrow. I guess that was just such a traumatizing experience for me that I chose to block it out and it made me forget about the back door."

It was a ridiculous explanation even for Javi, but I knew that it was probably the best that I was going to get.

"Funny. I didn't think that you would ever forget about a back door."

I smiled at him, but he looked back at me suspiciously. He lifted his chin and then glanced me up and down as if he could somehow see into me and was reading my thoughts.

"Your awkward and deeply uncomfortable attempt at a gay joke leads me to believe that you're not telling me something," he said. "What's going on?"

I groaned and turned back toward my bedroom.

"Hold on," I said.

"Where are you going?"

"I'm going to put actual clothes on before having this conversation."

Feeling strangely chilled and wanting to feel comfortable, I stuffed myself into my favorite black sweatsuit and thick socks before coiling my hair on top of my head and clipping it into place. Javi was already sitting on the couch, a bowl of pretzels that I could only imagine was his popcorn replacement sitting in his lap.

"Pizza will be here in twenty," he said.

"Good."

I looked at the screen, nibbling on a pretzel, and felt his eyes on me.

"What's going on?" he asked again.

I turned toward him, curling myself onto the couch cushion.

"Jude came over," I said.

"What?"

I nodded.

"He just showed up at the door."

"So, the man has an absolute meltdown because you showed up at his house, but then he does the same thing to you? Do you not see a problem with that?"

"I do," I said, surprised by Javi's immediate negative response. "But I didn't really give him much other opportunity."

"To do what? Have a little tumble and then pretend like it didn't happen?"

I narrowed my eyes at him.

"To apologize," I said. "He came here to tell me that he was sorry for the way he reacted."

"And you believed him?"

"As a matter of fact, I did. He told me that the holidays are really hard for him and that he was out of line. He even said that he missed me."

"Hallelujah!" Javi cried out. "Lay out a mattress for me and get me my good hat because I think I'm about to get the spirit and fall out."

"What's wrong with you?"

"Can't you see what he's doing?" Javi asked. "He's manipulating you, Ronnie. You stood up for yourself, even if that just meant leaving him alone for a while, and now he's doing everything that he can think of to get back in your pants because it does something for his head. He likes knowing that he has you and he likes even more making sure that no one else knows that he has you."

"He didn't even try to touch me while he was here. And he asked me to go to his house on Friday night so that I can actually see the inside."

Javi's expression changed from one of sarcasm and anger to one of concern.

"Ronnie, please. I need you to think about this."

"Think about what?"

"I know that you've been thinking a lot about him and that you've missed him, but don't let that take over everything else. You need to really take some time to evaluate your feelings for him and what you think you could get out of this relationship. Does this really seem like something that could be real?"

I felt offended and defensive, but also taken off guard.

"You were the one who told me that I should find out more about him," I pointed out. "After everything that happened at his house, you are the one who said that I should find out about his wife and learn more about him. Then when we found out that she died, you are the one who said that maybe I should think about the fact that that could be influencing the way that he acts."

Javi nodded.

"I did," he said. "But not because I thought that it was going to keep you open to him. I thought that finding out more about him would make it easier for you to get over him."

"You are the one who said that he was the sexiest and most mysterious Professor on campus and thought I should go after him."

"Part of him being sexy and mysterious is that he's untouchable. Nobody gets close to him. Nobody knows him. Just because I thought that it might be fun to have a little fantasy about him doesn’t mean that I thought you should let yourself get wrapped up in him. I need you to remember how he made you feel."

"I do remember how he made me feel," I said. "I remember how he made me feel in his office. I remember how he made me feel in the dance studio. I remember how he made me feel in the classroom. I remember how he made me feel in the park. And, yes, I remember how he made me feel in the courtyard at his house. But I also know how he made me feel when he stood here in the living room and told me that he was sorry and asked me to forgive him."

"You just need to be careful," he said. "You need to protect yourself."

"And why do you think you know so well to tell me that I need to be careful around him? You don't even know him."

"Neither do you," he said. "I saw him tonight. He came to the bar where I was meeting up with some friends and he demanded to know where you were. He was pissed as hell when I wouldn't tell him. I might not have interacted with him much, but in the few minutes that I did I saw how aggressive and pushy he can be."

"He's forceful," I said. "He knows what he wants."

"And it doesn't matter what he has to do to get it," Javi said.

"You make it sound like he's some sort of monster."

"I'm not saying that," he said. "But I am saying that you deserve someone who you can open up to and care about without worrying. You deserve someone who isn't afraid to tell anybody else how they feel about you."

"He's not afraid," I said.

"If he's not afraid, what is he? Ashamed? Unsure? Indifferent? Are any of those any better?"

"I know that it's hard for you to understand and that maybe you don't see it, but Jude is a good man. When we're together, he's attentive and passionate. He's fun to be around and he makes me feel good about myself. It's not just about sex. We do other things together."

"Like what?"

"We take walks. We shop. We talk."

"Talk about what? You didn't even know about his wife. Does he know about Nana? How about your parents? Lessie?"

I felt my heart clench painfully in my chest. I gritted my teeth against it and shook my head.

"Why are you doing this? I thought that you wanted me to be happy."

"I do want you to be happy," Javi said. "I love you, Ronnie. You are my best friend. You mean everything in this world to me. And that's why I don't want to see anything happen to you. You need to take care of yourself and protect your emotions. I want nothing more than to see you have a happy life and get everything that you want, but I don't think that Jude will ever be the type of man that you really want or need, or who could ever make you as happy as you deserve. If I'm wrong, I will readily admit it. And I hope I am. But you have to ask yourself if you really want a big question in your life. Because trying to make things work with him would be just that. A question. Do you really want to be with a man who won't even admit that he has feelings for you?"

"I want to give him the chance," I said. "You're wrong, Javi. It might not have happened yet, but we just need the time to get to that place when it's right for us."

I said the words with all the confidence that I could force into my voice. I knew what Javi was seeing, but I believed that there was more to Jude than that. I wanted to find it and I wanted to give him the chance to show it to me.

I walked out of my apartment with my keys in my hand Friday evening, rushing to make up for the time that I had lost trying to choose what to wear. I was digging through my purse when I heard my name. Startled, I stopped in my tracks and looked up. A long, shimmering black car was parked at the curb, and the man who had helped me at Jude's house, Aaron, was standing beside it.

"Hello," I said.

"Good evening, Miss Parish. Mr. Ford sent me to give you a ride to his house. "

He gestured toward the car as if I could have somehow missed it. I stood staring at it, surprised that he would have done that. It felt so thoughtful and indulgent, and I felt a smile come to my lips as I walked toward the car. Aaron opened the door and I slipped into the backseat. He got behind the wheel and looked at me in the rearview mirror.

"Are you comfortable, Miss Parish?"

"Yes," I said. "But please call me Veronica."

I realized what I said as soon as it came from my lips. It was the first time in as long as I could remember that I had introduced myself as Veronica rather than Ronnie. It was strange but at the same time exciting, as if I had just discovered something about myself, though I couldn't yet define it.

We were silent for the rest of the ride and I found myself wishing that he would say something. I wondered what Aaron was thinking. I knew that it was impossible that he would have forgotten the last time that we saw each other and I wondered what he thought about how it all unfolded. I was sharply aware that he had known Jude for much longer than I had and knew him far better. This was one of the people he had talked about when describing the staff who he gave time off for the holidays. This man was an important part of Jude's life and I felt the need for him to acknowledge me, and the desire for him to tell me more about Jude. He didn't, however, and as we approached the house I realized that what I really wanted was for him to prepare me, to help me know more about Jude as if it would create a bridge between us.

The house looked even more intimidating as we drove slowly along the drive, even with the gate standing open, and I felt a tightness in my breath when the car stopped and Aaron opened the door. For a brief moment, I wondered if this wasn't Jude trying to spend more time with me but another opportunity to confront me, to show me the devastation that I had created and force me to listen to more of his explosive anger. As I turned away from the car and toward the house, though, I could see him standing on the front porch, a slight smile on his face, and the fear drained away.