I’ve waited years, chasing the idea of the Jace who lived in my head. And now he’s here in real life, not perfectly the same but still the standard. He’s told me he’s not sure if he’s ready to pursue us, and I need to respect that. But for now, I need him to know that he’s seen.
“Thank you for catching me,” I say softly, so quietly I wonder if he’ll even hear me, but he does. Something flashes across his face, another hint of the man I first met, the man he was before he claimed that he was broken, when his heart was more clearly visible.
He nods, a softening around his eyes I haven’t noticed before. In one swift motion, he sits up, my hand falling to wrap securely around his warm neck, his arm wrapped tightly around my waist. I shift my legs until I’m almost straddling him, embarrassment creeping over my face, but I don’t care. Jace grins, a rare gleam in his eyes.
“I thought you said you were a pro at this,” he challenges, a teasing tone in his deep voice. I let out a laugh, the realization that he cracked a joke warming my heart.
“Even the best fall down sometimes,” I reply with a shrug.
“Okay, Howie Day, let’s get you back on your feet.”
Mortification courses through me as I use all my remaining energy to push myself off him, kneeling on the ice, in need of help to pull myself to standing again. He saved me from a gnarly fall, and I’ve been resting on him like I’m a creature finding a place to hibernate for the winter.
“Whoa, whoa,” Jace coaxes. “A real person here.” He chuckles, and the sound is as satisfying as slippers sliding across a dance floor. “Steady, Starlight.” Casually, he moves to his knees, his hands on either side of my arms. He lifts one knee. One not privy to the cause of this clumsy experience (on my part) could think he was proposing, and while this is in no waya romantic gesture, I know this is the image that will stick to my thoughts when I’m fighting sleep later tonight.
Only seconds pass, but when he stands to his full height and looks down at me, a shiver runs up my spine.
“Are you cold?” Jace asks.
I can honestly say that I’m not. A shake of my head, a wringing of my hands, and I stand to my full height, assisted by his outstretched hand, my chin lifted high to meet his gaze.
He nods, eyes roving over my face like he’s studying me. I want to move, but I feel like I might ruin the picture. His gaze takes me in like he’s an artist painting this very moment in time, and it would be a shame to mess it up now. When his eyes linger on my mouth, my face heats. I swallow, a reaction to his intensity, wondering if he’s also thinking about how much I remember the chemistry in our kiss. There was an absolute magnetism in our connection that long ago altered any chance of truly fitting with another person. I’m a book whose spine has been creased, coffee beans that have been ground. Jace changed the structure of who I am. What’s done has been done, and there’s no way to undo it.
Scared to move, I reach out with my still-gloveless hand. Without looking at it, his hand finds mine. The touch is gentle, but I feel the strength behind it. It’s not a promise, but it’s an acknowledgment. To my delight, his mouth lifts enough to flash a hint of his dimple. I smile in response as he pulls me to skate again, our bodies warming with the movement of skating across the ice.
A few more people have stepped onto the rink, and I’ve missed all of them until now. They spin or practice their glides, and we skate, hand in hand, sometimes picking up speed. Mostly, we find a rhythm in which his much longer legs move in sync with mine. We don’t speak but only skate, the evening passing into night in the comfort of his presence. It’s only duringthe fifteenth or the fiftieth lap that I think I hear him humming the song “Collide.”
∞∞∞
“So, what are you going to do about your scholarships?” Jace is sitting next to me at the bar at Aesop’s Tavern, holding a bottle of handcrafted root beer and looking much too good in his classic, long-sleeved black t-shirt that must be made of some sort of wonder fabric that hugs his muscles impeccably. He’s one of the rarest of men who can make athletic wear look like high-end fashion.
Jace told me he doesn’t drink anymore, but Aesop’s is more than a tavern; it’s a place to connect, an increasingly rare anomaly in our modern society. And everyone in town loves Clark, the owner, who happens to be working tonight. Tinsel hangs around the bar and through the rafters, the Christmas lights looking like hanging stars over our heads.
I sigh a bit, trying to rein in my train of thought. “I’m going to pray that the committee will see how valuable they are and allocate some of the funds that would have been used to upgrade our already functional recycling bins to be utilized for my students instead. I know that everything in this town is important, so I’m not trying to say one thing is more beneficial than the others, but I can’t say no to children who want to dance. But I also can’t keep saying yes. Studio rent in this town is expensive. I consider it worth it, though, if I can get more students to find the outlet of dance that I had.”
Jace furrows his brow.
“Don’t get me wrong,” I continue in his silence, “like I told you so long ago, everyone here is so wonderful. My parents, mybrother . . . they’ve all made it so that I feel their support without ever having to ask for it.”
Jace stiffens slightly at the mention of my brother, and the movement gives me pause.
“But?” Jace asks, lightly tapping my shoulder with his own.
Shaking my head, I offer him a crooked smile, meeting his gaze. Pulling my shoulders back, something about the way Jace rubs his thumb over the logo, back and forth as if he could be granted three wishes if it were a lamp, makes me resolute in my decision to open up to him more—or, in this case, again.
I begin again. “But I’ve always had this feeling of loneliness hovering around me. Never fully consuming but at the edges. The feeling of a void that I’ve never quite found a way to fill. There was hope once—” My voice almost gives out, my meaning rich and hovering throughout the air. As always, his proximity pulls on the threads of my emotions in a unique way.
Jace nods, head tilted. “For what it’s worth, I’m proud of you for working so hard. You don’t have to, yet you do.”
“I want to. This is my life, Jace. If Grey taught me anything about her love of books, it’s that you get to write the story that you want. Be the character that you want to be in your own tale of life.”
He hums in acknowledgement. “And what if you don’t like the story you’re writing?” His eyes are heavy as he looks at the amber bottle of root beer in his hand, nearly a match to the color of his eyes when they hit the light. Then his eyes close completely, a pained expression on his face.
I don’t answer his question, sensing that it was more rhetorical than seeking an answer.
His arms flex beneath his shirt as he grips and then releases the bottle over and over, again and again. “I don’t know how you’re still single, Ivy,” he says to the counter instead of me. “And I’m sorry that you’ve been lonely.”
Genuinely, his eyes lift to mine, and I nearly fall off the stool. He’s serious.
