I grab the paper from Cassandra and toss it into the empty booth behind us. Avoidance is key. “Not before coffee,” I say.
“Too young to get engaged, huh?” Cassandra says, swishing her lips at me.
“Stop it,” I tell her, kicking her under the table. “This stuff is insane.”
“Yeah, but they were right,” Cassandra says. “Rainer does adore you.”
Jake leans forward. “You okay, PG?”
“Of course,” I say, smiling at him. “I’m just letting stupid BS get to me.”
Jake shrugs, and Rainer comes over with our food. We eat, but I feel Jake’s eyes on me. Something about the way he’s looking at me makes me feel like he can see something. Like he knows that in some ways I am decidedlynotokay. The thing that freaks me out the most is: If he can see it, who else can?
We have breakfast, and then we have to go back to the house so Cassandra and Jake can pack up. “I wish you were staying,” I tell Cassandra. The four of us are outside. The boys are loading luggage into the waiting town car.
“Some of us still have to attend school,” she says, her arms around me. “But I’ll call you as soon as I land.”
“You better.”
“You sure you don’t want me to drive you?” Rainer asks.
“I’d rather not have a camera in my face while I take off my shoes for security,” Jake says.
“What’s the deal with not springing for a jet on the way back?” Cassandra says. She pokes Rainer with her elbow. I love watching them interact. I can tell Cassandra really likes him.
“She’s demanding,” Rainer says to Jake.
“Dude, you have no idea.”
Rainer goes to say something to the driver, and Jake cocks his head to me. “C’mere,” he says.
I follow him a few paces over so we’re out of earshot. I’m hoping he’s not going to ask me any more questions. “Thank you for coming,” I say. “It really meant a lot to me.”
“We didn’t get much time to talk,” he says.
“I know. I’m sorry, but your girlfriend is kind of a hog.”
He laughs. “I know all of this can’t be easy. I just want to tell you that I’m here for you. Whenever you need me, okay, Pat?”
I see his face fall into his droopy grin, and then I’m smiling, too. Patrick has always been Jake’s nickname for me, but I haven’t heard him use it since before I left Portland.
He pulls me into a hug. I have to roll up onto my tiptoes to reach.
“You grew,” I say.
He laughs. “I guess some things have changed on our end, too.”
I watch their car until it has pulled out of the driveway, and then head back inside. The phone is ringing.
“You going to get that?” I ask Rainer.
He’s in the refrigerator, and he pokes his head back to look at me. “I didn’t even know we had a home line,” he says.
I find the phone on the counter. Some Bang & Olufsen model that has the weight of a penny and an impossible-to-determine mouthpiece. Which end do you talk into?
“Darling,” Alexis says when I answer. Her accent pours through the phone like honey.
“Hey,” I say. Is Jordan there? Is he lounging on her couch shirtless as she talks to me?
