by Mary Strand
We didn’t hear from Alex or Charlie in the next couple of days. No calls, no emails, not even a drive-by shooting.
Jane pretended to be serene; I was annoyed. I know, I know: I was at least five years behind other girls my age when it came to lingerie. Like Jane kept saying, it was no big deal. Still, I stuffed my new lingerie in the back of my drawer, then yanked it out and stuffed it in the farthest corner of the closet. In a bag. Underneath my basketball high-tops.
Did I even want a guy who’d want a girl who wore stuff like that to get his attention? I had no idea. I’d sailed through high school with my share of dates, wearing jeans, T-shirts, sweatpants, gym shorts. Sports bras and Jockey underwear. Running shoes. In college, my T-shirts had just gotten older along with me.
What did I want to be? A tomboy? Perfect like Jane? Slutty casual like Lydia or slutty rich like Stephanie Bingham? I didn’t have a clue, and it didn’t matter. Guys weren’t pounding on the door. Right now, they weren’t even pounding on Jane’s door.
As it turned out, Jane didn’t plan to take the situation lying down.
On Friday, when she and I got home from school around five, she suggested I might want to change, since she’d invited a “few” people over.
“With Mom and Dad here?” I grimaced. “No way.”
The one time we’d thrown a party, for Jane’s high-school graduation, Mom fluttered around, on the lookout for both smuggled-in liquor and couples who might even be thinking about doing something wicked, and Dad stared forlornly at his yoga mat rolled up in the corner of the living room. It wasn’t pretty.
Jane waved a hand in the air. “I took care of it.”
Sure enough, a little after six-thirty, Mom stunned me by slipping out the back door with Dad, mentioning a movie they wanted to catch. Mom? Who never went to movies? Had Jane bribed her?
At seven on the dot, the doorbell rang. Charlie and Alex. What? Jane invited them? Despite the stalking bit—bizarre as it was, especially for Jane—she’d never actually asked a guy out in her life. Even over to our house. As I stared at Jane, I wondered if she’d invited only Charlie and Alex. From the looks they kept exchanging, so did the guys.
A few minutes later, though, other people started to trickle in, and soon twenty of Jane’s and my friends—plus Mary and Cat—packed the kitchen, hanging around the fridge and stove and center island, sniffing and sampling and, with all the cartons from Kowalski’s deli in full view, pretty much blowing Jane’s claim that we’d cooked.
Alex was quiet again—no surprise there—so I spent my time keeping an eye on Jane and Charlie. He hovered at her elbow, fetching her drinks and food and anything else he could possibly fetch. It reminded me of my original opinion of Charlie: he made a cute puppy.
But I tended more toward fiercer animals. One was across the room, watching my every move. I glanced at Alex, who stared back. I hadn’t flaunted myself with the stuffed bra tonight, so he wasn’t looking at my boobs. I looked down, wondering if I’d spilled spinach dip on my shirt.
I glanced back at Alex, who grinned. Jerk.
Sandwiched into a corner near a couple of girls I’d gone to high school with, Alex squirmed and looked like he was trying to break away, but they kept hemming him in. He just swilled his beer and—worse—finally stopped trying to get past them. I decided that if he didn’t speak to me in the next fifteen minutes, I’d give up on him for good.
I glanced down at my watch and started the timer.
Almost as if he could heard it ticking, Alex started toward me. And stopped, caught by another cluster of irritating twits. And started again. When he made it within five feet of me, Mary grabbed my arm.
“Don’t worry, Liz. After what happened to Lydia, I think we should stick together and keep the wolves at bay.”
I frowned when I couldn’t easily loosen her grip. “What if I don’t mind the occasional wolf?”
She sniffed, looking at me over her glasses. “That’s what Lydia thought, and look what happened to her.”
“No one compares Lydia and me. And now that she’s at—”
Someone grabbed my free arm, and I looked up into Alex’s chocolatey-brown eyes. He extracted my other arm from Mary’s grasp and pulled me into the practically-deserted living room. I glanced down at my watch; he’d made it in twelve minutes. I didn’t feel like telling him he’d won a prize, though, since he didn’t seem to consider me much of one.
He still didn’t say a word—which was really weird after grabbing me like that—and I couldn’t think of a thing to say. Finally, Mary tracked me down again, which sent Alex packing.
Argh!
“Sorry he got you away from me, Liz, but I’ll be more vigilant next time.”
“Don’t do me any favors.” I groaned. “Please. I can take care of myself.”
I walked away, but next thing I knew, Alex and Charlie were at the front door, giving lame excuses for taking off early. Jane lingered at the door with Charlie, probably wanting to leave with him, but I stayed where I was. Alex had found me in twelve minutes, but he didn’t have staying power.
And I wasn’t going to beg.
Charlie showed up again late on Monday afternoon, about thirty seconds after Jane and I got home from school. I wondered if he’d been idling his car around the corner from our house, on the lookout for her.
As he walked up the front sidewalk, Mom started shrieking. “Jane? Charlie’s here. What are you doing?”
Jane shot down the stairs in about two seconds, either to prevent Mom’s heart attack or the one Charlie would have if Mom opened the door. I was quicker than Jane, though, and flung it open.
Charlie stood on the steps. Alone.
After a rotten attempt at looking cheerful, I bit my lip, wondering what had happened to Alex and hoping it wasn’t named Stephanie. But I refused to ask. Jane did, though, in a loud voice. Charlie answered, also loudly, like I wasn’t right there, that Alex had to fly back to New York.
As I processed that, Mom grabbed Jane’s arm. “Jane, I have something for you to do.”
I stepped between Mom and Jane, breaking Mom’s lock on Jane’s arm. Jane needed help, even if she never asked for it. “I can do it. Whatever it is.”
Mom reached for Jane’s arm again, refusing to give up, as I danced between them. Charlie had to be wondering if everyone in my family was nuts—yeah, now that you mention it—but Mom finally gave up. Huffing out an exasperated breath, Mom finally headed to the kitchen as I followed, glancing apologetically over my shoulder at Jane. From the look of her, Jane didn’t have a clue that anyone except Charlie was in the house.
The minute Mom and I reached the kitchen, she stormed out the back door, grumbling loudly about uncooperative daughters.
I locked the back door after her.
I returned to the front hall, where Jane and Charlie hadn’t moved an inch. No, actually, they’d moved a few inches closer to each other. I think I caught them in pre-liplock mode. Oops. I backed off, tossing apologies toward deaf ears.
The lovebirds soon slipped out the front door. Next thing I knew, it was two hours later, and Jane floated back inside.
I found her as she was about to drop her keys in the toilet. “Jane? Don’t you want those keys? Or is this a new way of trading in your car?”
She flinched, looked down at the keys dangling over the bowl, and whipped her hand back. “Sorry. I—I wasn’t thinking.”
“Obviously.” I grabbed the keys out of her hand and led her to our room. She followed, her face a little flushed, but she didn’t say a word until we got upstairs.
Finally, inside our room with the door tightly shut, she turned to me. “Liz, you won’t believe it. He asked me!”
I gulped. Things were moving waaay too fast. “He asked you to marry him?”
Laughing, Jane slugged my arm. “You dope. He asked me out on an actual date!”
I spied a worn copy of Pride and Prejudice everywhere I went these days: in Mom’s bedroom, by the kitchen sink, anot
her time next to the toilet. Curious, I opened it. She’d marked the page where Bingley proposed to the eldest Bennet daughter, even highlighting some of the passages in yellow and scribbling angry, frantic notes in the margins. The parts about Elizabeth and Darcy were unmarked, though. Even more weird, she’d simply crossed through anything about Lydia and Wickham.
Apparently, Mom worried only about The Book happening to Jane. She kept shrieking at Jane whenever Charlie wasn’t around—and sometimes even when he was. Mom was going off the deep end, thanks to a hard shove by Jane Austen.
But Jane and Charlie seemed fine. The first “real date” led to a second and a third and more, night after night, and Jane kept staying out later and later. She quickly figured out that a romance might be better pursued outside of our house, and she kept Charlie as clear of Mom as possible.
Smart girl.
She was also a lot happier than me. Alex’s trip to New York had already turned into a week. I started to wonder if he’d ever come back at all. The more time that passed without Alex returning, the more I figured he’d started hanging out with other friends. Like, say, Stephanie.
So I spent a lot of time in my room. Jane spent her free moments with Charlie, which was fine, but it left me with Cat and Mary, and I don’t need to explain why that didn’t work.
But Sunday evening, late, after Charlie left, Jane and I grabbed a couple pints of Ben & Jerry’s and headed up to our room for a long-delayed chatfest.
“Oh, Liz. Everything is so fantastic.” Jane glowed, and I plastered a smile on my face. I was happy for her. I just wasn’t particularly thrilled for myself. “Thanks to you.”
I tried to remember when I quit pushing them apart and actively started helping them out. “What did I do?”
And why, the selfish part of me asked, had I done it? I’d lost my apartment roommate and my only decent chance at escaping this zoo.
Jane chewed on her lip. “Charlie told me everything. I told you I didn’t want you to do anything, but you called him, and emailed, and Lord knows what else.”
I shrugged. “I did it for you.”
“Even though I wasn’t exactly honest with you.” No kidding. “What did you think—I couldn’t handle it myself?”
I stared at Jane, not wanting to lie. There’d been enough lies between us already. Sighing, she gazed at the floor.
“I guess I understand, but it hurts that you didn’t trust me to take care of myself.” She glanced up at me, a sad smile on her face. “Well, you’re the least of my troubles. As it turns out, Stephanie might be, er, a bitch.”
“Jane!”
“She never told Charlie you called, and she apparently sent you some snotty reply to the email you sent to Charlie, pretending it was from him.”
“She admitted it to Charlie?”
Jane scrunched her nose as if she’d smelled Mom’s cooking. “After you talked to him at Alex’s, he quizzed her about it. He didn’t know she’d also told me he had ‘a certain someone’ in his life, which was totally not true. Well, except maybe for me.” She blushed, looking so sweet, so unlike a stalker, I hoped I finally had my Jane back. “She denied everything, but he pieced it all together and fired Stephanie.”
“No way!”
“Well, he didn’t do it directly. But he strongly suggested that Stephanie go back to school or get a real job.” Jane bit her lip. “I don’t understand, Liz. Why did she work so hard to keep us apart? She wanted someone better for Charlie?”
“There isn’t anyone better for Charlie. Luckily, I knew that, which was why I called and emailed him.”
Jane positioned a dab of Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough on the edge of her spoon, drew it back, and let it zip at my face. I somehow caught it in my mouth. Yum. “Thanks!”
“You’re incorrigible.” Jane shook her head, but her eyes twinkled. “Anyway. Charlie said he felt something last November before he left, and more when I saw him after Christmas—” She broke off as a flush stole across her face. “—but he stayed away because I told him to.”
I shrugged. “Well, I guess everyone gets one free mistake. You’ve both used yours.”
I was glad Jane put all the blame on Stephanie, and none on Alex, which meant Charlie hadn’t squealed on Alex. Jane had already come close to consigning Stephanie to a slow burn in hell—or as close as she’d ever come, anyway—and I didn’t want her to throw Alex on the funeral pyre.
But I wasn’t completely sure why. Did I want Alex? The guy who’d hardly spoken to me the last time I saw him and hadn’t shown up since?
I glanced at Jane, who was busy sucking on the end of her spoon, her eyes closed in ecstasy. “But you’re not getting married today or tomorrow, are you?”
A slight shake of Jane’s head. “This isn’t The Book, Liz, despite what Mom thinks. We spent all those months apart just because we were both stupid. I don’t want to get married yet, anyway, but I definitely won’t do it until I know we won’t have any more misunderstandings.”
I shook my head. “Is there actually such a point in any relationship? When there are no misunderstandings?”
Jane waved her spoon at me. “There will be with us. I’ll accept nothing less.” She closed her eyes again, swaying from side to side as if dancing an imaginary waltz with Prince Charming. “Oh, Liz. I’m just so happy! I wish you could be like this. Then everything would be perfect.”
I bit my lip, wishing the same thing. Well, not quite. “But I’m not like you. I’m snarky and pigheaded and tend to call an asshole an asshole. No, I’m fine as is. With any luck, another Wild Bill Cooper will ride up on a horse some day.”
Jane scrunched her nose. “And you’ll lasso him?”
“When hell freezes over.”
We both squealed, but I thought of a very different guy I wouldn’t mind seeing ride up in a certain black Lamborghini or maybe even a restored green GTO. The problem was, he’d show up the same day.
When hell freezes over.
Chapter 23
“My affections and wishes are unchanged, but one word from you will silence me on this subject forever.”
— Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, Volume III, Chapter Sixteen
Another week plodded by, and Jane and Charlie still looked as deliriously happy as ever. At least, considering that Jane lives at home, which tends to cramp a girl’s style.
Unbelievably enough, Mom kept trying to bust them up. She wouldn’t let them hang out in our room, which was fine by me, and she made Cat or Mary join them in the basement rec room if they tried to escape Mom’s eagle eye downstairs. So the happy couple took a lot of long walks, from which Jane kept coming home covered with grass stains.
Not that I noticed.
Sunday morning, Jane’s alarm went off at six a.m.—her new habit since Charlie hit the scene—to give herself time to shower and make herself glam in case Charlie showed up early. I knew she wanted Charlie to think she’s an even more natural beauty than she is, but I couldn’t imagine why she bothered. I mean, the guy was whipped.
By seven-thirty, Jane had been up and dressed for an hour when I came out of the shower, hair still wet, and threw on black gym shorts and a black Gap camisole. I’d been letting the whole Alex thing consume me, and I couldn’t afford to be consumed. I decided to drive to the college library. And study.
So much for good intentions.
I was lacing my running shoes on the bottom step when Jane threw open the front door.
Alex stood there, staring at me. Charlie, next to him, spotted my running shoes and said “Great idea!” and immediately suggested we take a walk together. The four of us.
Or, actually, two and two. Jane and Charlie shot ahead of Alex and me. My jaw dropped; I’d never seen Jane walk so fast in her life. I figured Charlie must’ve spotted some bushes and wanted to lure Jane into them. Based on Jane’s grass stains, it wouldn’t be the first time.
But I didn’t mind. As soon as the happy couple raced out of sight, I glanced sideways at Alex. “Hey,
um, thanks for what you did for Lydia.” Even though I wasn’t quite sure exactly what he’d done. Or why.
Alex kept walking, staring straight ahead and looking a bit pissed. Finally, he turned to me and laughed. “Remind me not to try to keep secrets from you.”
Not to keep secrets from me? Everything about him was a mystery. His personality. Where he’d been the last couple of weeks.
Whether he ever wanted to kiss me again.
I shrugged. “Lydia can’t exactly keep a secret. So let me thank you, okay? For whatever you did.”
We kept walking, silent, since Alex never says much and I couldn’t think of anything to say that wouldn’t come out stupid or stammering. Finally, Alex broke the silence.
“I was in Milwaukee anyway, on an acquisition. I helped with a few things, but no big deal. I didn’t do it to get you to go out with me. But—”
Was he really going to ask?
“—would you maybe consider it? Like, a date?”
I laughed as a flood of emotions rushed through me. “You’re not satisfied with long walks at dawn?”
His eyebrows danced. “I’d rather go for long walks at midnight, but I have a feeling they might not go over so well at your parents’ house.”
No kidding. I’d watched Jane and Charlie work around the hassle of pursuing a romance under my mom’s nose, but the problem finally hit me square in the face.
He grabbed my hand and started playing with my fingers. In a cute way. “You haven’t said you’ll go out with me. I swore I wouldn’t ask again, but I changed my mind.”
I wasn’t going to make him ask three times. “Yes!”
We swung our locked hands between us as we wandered around the neighborhood, trying to steer clear of the houses where I knew one of Mom’s spies might be peeking out the front window, even at this hour.
I turned to Alex, nervous laughter bubbling up in my throat. “I just don’t know why you’d want to go out with me.”
“It’s not the rock-band T-shirts, although they’re cute.” Grinning, he tapped me on my nose. “I’ve never met another girl like you. You say what you think, you look great but don’t give a rip, and you’re able to talk about a GTO without sounding bored.” He tilted his head, studying me. “Unless you were faking it on the GTO.”
