“But—”
He shakes his head, and it’s his turn to silence me with gentle hands. “I know how to keep myself sane. You just gotta let me do it.”
Chapter Nineteen
Tanner
A nightmare kicks me out of bed. It’s not the worst I’ve ever had, but it’s enough to have me pacing my apartment as sweat cools on my skin and wishing I’d given into the soul-deep craving in my bones and followed Jax home after work. It’s official: I don’t like being alone anymore, and maybe I never did. But it’s not a good enough reason to wake him up at two a.m., so I stayed home, and now here I am, playing chicken with old ghosts.
My heart pounds against my ribcage. I make the tea Jax says tastes like a muddy puddle and will it to stop. It doesn’t, so I take a shower and switch the water temperature between hot and cold until I don’t know which way is up.
Shivering, I pad from the bathroom and find my cooling tea. Heating it up again gives me something to do. I won’t drink it, though. I know this as I take it to the couch and set it on the coffee table, but I do it anyway. Rituals, yo.
I flick the TV on. NHL highlights fill the screen. I think of Jax, but it reminds me of sleepwalking him to my bed, so I try and think of Rainn and his unreasonable hate of all things hockey instead. I fail, though, naturally. Sleepwalking isn’t my best hook-up line, but I can’t regret it. Sharing my bed with Jax is the best thing I’ve ever done. Purging my soul to him half-lit on Shipley cider? Yeah, I’m not so sure about that, but it’s too late. I can’t take it back.
Man, I miss him. I haven’t seen him much since Thanksgiving. Actually, that’s not true. I’ve seen him most days, but our time together has been limited by his campouts on the trails and the crazy hours I’m pulling at the bar. I haven’t seen him awake since the weekend. I wish we lived together.
And I wish I had the balls to tell him so. I definitely don’t want to think about the fact that his contract at Wildfoot is finite. That there’s every chance he’ll move on when it runs out. But it’s ass o’clock in the morning, and I have zero control over my anxious brain, so I think about it every second till I pass out on the couch.
Buzzing wakes me in the morning. I lunge for my phone, thinking it’s Jax. But it’s not. It’s a message from Kai Fletcher, of all fucking people. Why the hell do I still have his number in my phone?
Kai:Sorry for getting up in your grill before the holidays. Meant it tho. Job here for you if you want it. We can take it slow, ease you back in. Or maybe you can help me train new guys? Whatever man. Call me.
I delete the message on impulse, my stomach in my throat. Then second thoughts hit me like a train, and I don’t know what the fuck is going on in my head. I don’t want to work mountain rescue in Vermont. I never did, or I wouldn’t have gone to Alaska in the fucking first place.
But why did you go to Alaska?
It’s not a question Jax has ever asked, but I hear it in his voice all the same. And for once I know the answer. I went to Alaska because my arrogant self had decided Vermont was boring. That the terrain wasn’t dangerous and exciting enough to draw me out of the storm already brewing in my depressed brain.Wow, I was an idiot back then. I’m still an idiot now. I’ve learned to love my job at V and V, but the sense of wasting time creeps up on me some days until I remind myself the wilderness holds no place for me.
Not even with Jax out there with me.
I spend my morning working out and making my best attempt at grocery shopping. Jax talks in his sleep. The last whole night we spent together he told me all about some cookies he used to eat as a kid—something to do with wheels, wagons, and jam. That boy and his jam. I find something fitting the description in the global foods section at the grocery, and buy him some actual jam too, because he’s run out and we’re domesticated as fuck right now.
Then I go home and dump it all in my apartment before I head down to work.
I have a busy day. Payroll and staff schedules keep me occupied right up until the bar opens for happy hour. I’m not in the mood for people, or faking a sunny disposition. I dodge the bar and roam around, restless, checking my phone every ten minutes to see when Jax is coming home, and where he’s planning on laying his head for the night. I rarely ask him to stay with me, I let him choose, but tonight I just need him close. I don’t know why, I just do.
So tell him.
No. Because that would mean missing out on hours of yearning for something he’d willingly give me if I’d just fucking ask, and where’s the “fun” in that?
Happy hour has passed by the time my phone buzzes in my pocket. I’m on the bar, covering staff breaks, and I don’t get a moment to reach for it. Resentment seeps out of me, and I struggle to keep up the facade of caring what the whole damn world wants to drink. My bland smiles start to hurt.
Rainn gives me a look. He’s better at this than I am. Dude can charm the birds from the trees when he wants to, and I gladly let him take my place.
Away from the bar, the tension in my chest fades. I finally find my phone and read the three messages Jax has sent me in the last hour.
Jax:Back at HQ. Might be a while
Jax:Leaving now
Jax:You’re busy. I’ll be next door for a bit
Next door. It takes a minute to compute that he means the Veritas side of V and V, the bookstore I rarely have cause to visit. I give Rainn the signal that I’m stepping out, then I follow the pull in my chest out of the bar and into the cozy space where it all began for V and V. Even without spotting Jax at one of the tables by the window, I get hit with an instant wave of calm. I’m not a book person, but this place has good vibes, man.
Then I do spot him and I feel like I’ve swallowed a fucking benzo.
I weave my way through the shelves and tables to where Jax is folded into an armchair, ear buds jammed into his ears as he glowers at his laptop on the thick wooden desk in front of him. The scene is all kinds of cute. I wonder if he’s watching the lynx footage for the thousandth time. I take a peek over his shoulder and see a freeze frame of my own face. Awesome. That’ll teach me.
