Jack Who? (Silver Strings G Series) (3 page)

“Don’t be mad...” The breath of his whisper brushed her face.

Mad? Was there a word for this ugly spectrum of emotions suddenly churning and charring her insides? She wanted to scream in frustration and cry in shame. He was famous. She was a regular person— not even a hot groupie. Had she really thought someone like him would–

Extracting a paper, he laid it on the counter top. Pridefully, she blinked away the ache behind her eyelids to peer as he prompted her attention to the typed paragraphs. Her peripheral vision perceived the tiny box of foil packets in the same drawer.

“I have to do this...” His halting explanation seemed regretful. “And there is no right time or way...believe me...”

Somehow, her senses and her mind calmed enough to read, and afterward
, she raised her eyes expecting hidden camera men, announcing some sort of comic reality show, to pop out of one of the many paneled doors. Most likely, her expression was comical enough for ratings, but Jack’s return look was earnest and even slightly pleading.

A minute later, she scrawled her name and date into a blank line declaring
in writing that she was a willing participant of this passionate encounter; and two minutes later, she lay tangled with him in a full-sized bunk, the brief intermission forgotten. Maybe she should have felt offended, but more eminent was the previous pact of his lips, tongue, and touch– not legal jargon on a paper.

“Mmh... wait...did I sign off on...this...” she teased once, barely managing the utterance, and his next action pleasurably punished her taunting words.

In college, she and her girlfriends had often compared their hook ups to carnival rides, analyzing each on a scale with the carousel being slow but boring. Jack was a coaster, beginning fast but slowing many times before those wild and anticipated thrills of the track.

When their breaths mingled as something besides gasps and groans, he dropped his head touching his lips to hers for yet another mind-twisting kiss before moving slightly away. A hand maintained contact resting on her hip.

This was always the awkward moment. The memories of hook ups from years ago were suddenly fresh. The moment of pretending to sleep so one person can sneak out or–

The dog. As if knowing the indecency was over, or maybe he had watched, she sure wouldn’t have known, Rusty peeked his head over the bunk.

Seeing the trajectory of her gaze, Jack turned admonishing his pet and then swung out of bed grabbing strewn clothing. As he pulled on his jeans, she admired the view, including the contrast of the tan line at his waist, and possessively assessed the slight curving intentions her nails had caused in the pale skin he was about to cover. Rusty playfully scampered off with a sock just as Jack reached for it, and an amused smile tipped her lips.

“Least it wasn’t anything of yours,” Grinning back, he courteously began to scoop her things up and leaned in for another quick kiss as he dropped them to the bed.

With a finger, he indicated a door and offered the shower beyond it. If this was his typical lay, he was incredible at every phase including a non-awkward afterward.

The terry towel she used a quarter of an hour later had the thread count of a flower petal as it moved over skin still tingling from every touch and kiss. She was sure he hadn’t planned on joining her, but he had, and it had been
once again amazing. Realizing that he was waiting for the towel, she passed it over and concealed her disappointment when after drying, he wrapped his waist.

She couldn’t help but wonder if this connection was something out of the ordinary for him also, or if maybe it had just taken her years to discover that such chemistry could exist.

Leaning into the mirror, she scrubbed at a raccoon eye until it was gone, and automatically he passed a brush and rubber band over. Leaning in his former stance against the counter, he watched with, a gleam of admiration in his eyes. She found herself wishing that he were just a normal guy that she could see again.

Once dressed, she turned back to him as she checked her pockets for her license, money, and keys while scanning the floor for anything that may have fallen out.

“Thanks for the stage fright cure...” Although his words were jesting, his eyes seemed solemn.

“Anytime.” Giving in to an impulse beyond her control, she stood on her toes placing a kiss on his jaw
and then knelt to give Rusty a pat before turning to the door.

“Oh, Mariss, wait...”

Never would she forget the shortened sound of her name as he spoke and groaned it during their short acquaintance. In bed, he had used it liberally without resorting to ‘girl’, or ‘damn girl,’ that she remembered from college one night stands.

When he pulled open a cabinet, she humorously wondered if there was something else she needed to sign, perhaps ‘satisfaction accomplished’ or something similar. But, what he passed over was a CD.

“Listen to it...you might like it.”

Stars in heaven couldn’t match the twinkle in those dark eyes.

“Thanks, I have no doubts that I will.” It was the truth. Just hearing his voice would always take her back to this time. Yet, a parting gift of his album made her feel like a groupie, which cheapened their time together.

Who was she kidding? Sternly, she squared her shoulders. ‘Put it into perspective’ might be the better realization. The tryst was tawdry. There was no sugarcoating this no matter how sweet it had felt.

“Is it cool if I get your number?” The husky rumble had her chin jerking in disbelief to his.

That was one way to cure the sleazy tramp feeling
. Silently, she handed her phone over for the swap. Instead of reaching for it to text himself from it, he shot her one of those quirky grins she had come to know in such a short time.

“I, um, actually, already got it. Kind of assumed, then figured assuming was asinine of me.”

When? Before following her into the shower? While she had put herself together afterward? Not that it mattered, and she returned the smile. “No, it’s cool.”

Cool was an understatement. He might never contact her
, but this mixture of consideration and rock stardom was intriguing.

Next, he was the one to drop a parting kiss to her lips before extending an arm to gallantly assist her down the steps.

With a last wave and much determination, she turned away for good, but her heart didn’t slow until she knew she was out of sight. Weaving around the trailers, she jabbed a text to Olivia and kept her fingers around the phone waiting for her friend’s return text.

Dusk was falling fast
, and the crowds around the stages were now shadows illuminated by strobing rainbow colored laser light lines. Within the hour, the voice on the west stage would be one she intimately knew, and she began to debate whether to watch that show.

One thing that she did not debate was her future.

She had missed and mourned her unfaithful fiancé for the last time. There was a better relationship waiting for her, somewhere, someday. It had taken a lost Jack Russell terrier and a screamo musician to open her eyes.

HER PHONE JINGLED
, vibrating in her hand, and she turned the lighted screen to view.

510-214-2480

Staying for the show?

9:26 PM

Maybe

Sent 9:27 PM

510-21-2480

You better ;)

9:31 PM

Oh really?

Sent 9:33 PM

Her retort apparently didn’t grab his attention enough to answer back, or possibly, he was too busy pre-show, and while waiting in vain
, she added this number to her contact list under the amusing alias ‘Russ.’

RUSS

Hey

2:12 AM

Hey

Sent 7:01 AM

RUSS

Hey

11:35 PM

Hey

Sent 11:36 PM

Hesitantly, her fingers brushed at the screen of her phone before typing in a return greeting. After pressing send,
she suddenly felt queasy when the smell of melted ice cream assaulted her already hyper senses, and she pushed at the carton until it was on the other edge of the sofa table. The message had waked her from a dead sleep. She was still in her clothes on the couch in front of a flickering television.

RUSS

How ru

11:36 PM

How was she? Not well, but he was the last person that needed to know.

Okay you?

Sent 11:37 PM

RUSS

Ok

11:39 PM

RUSS

ru wearing red?

11:45 PM

This flirtation coming, now of all times, was laughable, and she glanced down at the now wrinkled black blouse hanging loose to cover the weight she had gained lately. He was speaking of the red lingerie in his memories, which was also amusing. With the extra pounds, she was now spilling out of her bras. Unfortunately, she was also spilling out of everything. Unable to listen to his lines, she jok
ed to throw him off, playing on the fact that it had been so long since their last texts.

Who is this?

Sent 11:53 PM

RUSS

Jack

11:53 PM

Jack Who?

Sent 11:55 PM

RUSS

Riiight

11:56 PM

;)

Sent 11:57 PM

RUSS

So what ru wearing?

11:58

Obviously, he was not deterred from his one-track lines, and her mind slipped pleasantly back to how seductive he could be. While she was mulling over this bizarre situation, her phone buzzed and blinked again with the next text.

RUSS

u dont have to be wearing anything ;)

11:59

Lol.

Sent 11:59 AM

RUSS

No loling! pic PLEASE

12:00 AM

RUSS

waiting ;)

12:01 AM

As you will be forever

Sent 12:01 AM

RUSS

come on you got to give me something…

12:02 AM

Jack was no amateur at seductive texting. Pushing to a sitting position, she fished the remote from the cushions to mute the loud infomercial then pecked at the keys.

I don
’t do sexting

Sent 12:05 AM

RUSS

u lie

12:05 AM

He was right. She would for him– if she weren’t currently a cow.

How would you know? Ever sexted or even texted me?

Sent 12:09 AM

Scowling at the display, she easily discounted the couple of past short text sessions he had left hanging, and she nervously rested her phone on her pudgy abdomen. Before she could even turn the t.v. off and take herself to bed, the phone again came to life, this time with a ringtone.

Five months ago, after the best hour or so of her life, she had promptly come home to her tiny apartment, listened to the album he had given her, and eventually chopped a ringtone from one of his songs.

Never had she heard the reality of that ringtone until now.

Accepting the call, she
nervously spoke into the device voicing what had become their standard greeting in print. “Hey!”

The voice from so many of her dreams, both day and night ones, returned, “Hey!” Just as she remembered, it was warm, husky, and sweet. “Does calling count?”

Smiling into her phone, she rested her head to the back of the couch. Letting her eyelids fall closed, she brought his face to the forefront of her memory banks. “It does. Equals at least ten texts.”

“Only ten? I was thinking twenty easy.” The humor in his voice fluttered at her insides.

“Fifteen.” The compromise left her amused lips.

“Ok fifteen,” he was agreeable from his end. A few seconds of silence ticked by, then his next words were startling. “Come see me.”

Her eyes shot open to unseeingly stare at the dust beasties on the blades of the ceiling fan. For a few months, she had been constantly tired and had let the cleaning go. “Where are you?”

“LA. The next leg of the tour doesn’t begin for a couple of months.”

The assumption that he was making the invitation because he was nearby on tour was wrong, and she let out a sigh of relief as well as disappointment. “When?”

“Now. Tomorrow. Whenever.”

Her laugh was nervous, disbelieving, regretful. Her heart filled with so many nondescript and indescribable emotions. When she didn’t jump at the offer, he wheedled, “Come on, I’ll show you the sights.”

The only sight she wanted to see was him, but she was a sight he certainly did not want to see; he just did not know it yet. “It sounds great, really. But I have work...”

Jack was not easily deterred. “You have sick days right? Vacation?”

“Actually no,” The lie was slight. Regarding vacation, the two precious weeks due would be used in a few months.

“Call in sick anyway. Or tell your boss that a dude in LA will throw a t.v. off a balcony endangering innocent tourists if he doesn’t see you. Do whatever, just do it!”

The historical image of Zeppelin’s enraged drummer tossing a television from a suite window made her smile, and she even wondered if Jack was currently lodged at the infamous hotel himself. However, reality soon stole any amusement.

“I wouldn’t be paid.” That much was true, as her sick days, rarely used in past years, had now been used up in just a few months.

“Let me worry about that.”

“I can’t.” If he was offering to pay for her missed days, as well as the trip, the offer was generous. She had pride, but the real reason for her decline rooted deeper. A reason she could not reveal.

The lack of an explanation and hollow excuses created another bout of silence
, and then he asked ever so quietly, “Can’t or won’t?”

With all of her being, she wanted this, but fate had already intervened long before this phone call. The Marissa in his head was not the Marissa he now appealed to. “Can’t. You know I want...to.” With an attempt at humor
, she changed won’t to want.

“Are you married?” The blunt question was his next attempt at ascertaining any reason in the situation.

“What? No!”

“Then come. I don’t see the problem. Even if you are going out with someone, you should take a free pass.” He was back to joking so she was caught off guard when he quietly confessed, “When we kissed...you are the first person I kissed in a long, long time...”

“That’s hard to believe.” Her answer was honest and somehow calm while her heart raced. A guy like him had sex every night. There was no way she would believe him if was trying to tell her different.

“Not really,” he continued and clarified, “I’m not saying I haven’t been with anyone. I’m saying I don’t kiss random women. At least I didn’t, until you. A kiss and sex aren’t the same...”

He was right about that. She and Kel had all but stopped kissing months before their breakup. Sex had turned into almost passionless quickies, and it rarely involved kissing...

“I don’t know why I wanted to kiss you so bad. But, Maris, that kiss and everything that happened was– was something I think about a lot.”

It was something she thought about every day and dreamed about all night.

She could not believe the conversation was at this level. Why, after so many indifferent months
, would he admit such things? Did it change what she was hiding? Her eyes dropped to the extra weight she had put on since seeing him. He wouldn’t be accepting; she was sure of it.

“I want to come
. I really do. But I–” Trailing off, she tried to sort her feelings into words.

“But?” The prompt came softly after a very long pause. His next words were notably cooler. “Since you can’t or won’t tell me what the deal is, have a nice life Mariss.”

“Wait–” But her appeal was to dead air. And hearing him say his shortened version of her name, a nickname that had come from knowing him for less than two hours, months ago, released a torrent of tears.