by Jessica Kate
“Oh no, you’re not my son—I mean he. He’s not my son.” The horn of an oncoming train filled her mind, and it said one word: IDIOT! “He—I—Jem’s an old friend, and I nanny his kid.” Her tongue fell limp.
“Well, that sounds . . . interesting.” Sam indicated the semicircle of women seated to their right. “Are you ready to face the wolves?”
Natalie peeked over at her waiting victims. Several cardigan-clad matrons sipped their tea, seated and waiting. One young mother—whom she suspected wasn’t wearing a bra under her hoodie—had fallen asleep in the corner. An older kid, looking bored, bounced a soccer ball off the wall. Cackles of laughter echoed on the far side of the room where a gaggle of women mobbed Jem and Olly.
Natalie straightened her shoulders. “Let’s do this.”
* * *
She should be the president’s speech writer.
Natalie barely kept a triumphant grin from her face as she delivered the final lines of her talk, the women staring at her with an intensity usually reserved for chocolate cheesecake. Not even the constant thump-thump from Soccer Ball Kid could throw off her rhythm.
Natalie, 1. Irrational fear of public speaking, 0.
“So the next time you feel discouraged as a mother, remember the story of Aunt Esmeralda, the penguin, and the fire extinguisher.”
A smattering of applause sounded across the room—a little unenthusiastic, but applause nonetheless. Jem, standing beside a perky blonde woman with a baby girl, let loose a long whistle. The dozing woman in the corner jerked awake and swiped a palm across the drool patch on her neck.
Natalie thanked her audience and stepped away from the podium. She’d done it. And, apart from Jem’s whistle, she’d done it with a semblance of dignity.
She floated down the stairs, and Sam approached to take the microphone.
He helped her down the final step, then bounded up the stairs two at a time. “Well, folks, it wasn’t quite what we expected, but let’s give Natalie one last round of applause.”
Wasn’t what we expected? Did he mean in a good way? Or—
“Natalie, come over here.” Steph took her elbow and pulled her a few steps away from the base of the stage.
“So, what did you think?” Surely she’d done enough to get this internship. Everyone had looked at her with such fascination.
“You had something in your teeth the whole time.”
Natalie chuckled, but Steph’s mouth stayed flat.
Her chuckle died away. “Seriously?” She swiped a finger across her teeth and dislodged a poppy seed from this morning’s breakfast bagel.
“And did you read the attachment on the email I sent you?”
Her soaring spirit—as yet undisturbed by her bloated abdomen and the incessant thumping of that soccer ball—smashed into the ground. “What attachment?”
A giggle sounded behind her, and she glanced back. Jem and that trim-yet-curvy mother again. Was she laughing at the poppy seed?
“It explained the theme for today’s meeting.” Steph drew Natalie’s attention back with a hand on her forearm. “Dealing with family illness and loss. You know, because of your dad.”
“So that joke about the sick penguin was . . .”
“Wildly inappropriate, yes.”
“Oh no.” The blood drained from her head. “I need to sit down.” She landed on the bottom step of the stage with a thump and rested her forehead on her knees.
Steph lowered herself to sit beside her, no mean feat in a pencil skirt and heels.
“I don’t remember an attachment.” Natalie scoured her memory and shook her head, forehead brushing her kneecaps. Her temples pounded with the beat of that child’s soccer ball. “So they weren’t paying attention because my wisdom was inspiring. They were watching a car wreck with morbid curiosity.”
Steph shrugged one shoulder.
Ouch. She hadn’t even tried to deny it.
As Steph spoke, a young woman approached. She smiled at Natalie.
Natalie looked at Steph.
“Natalie, you should meet Kimberly.” Steph beckoned the girl forward.
Kimberly wore peep-toe heels, and the air around her seemed to bounce with energy. Natalie had found her first gray hair that morning and been too tired to contemplate a shoe more complicated than slip-on.
Steph smiled at the two of them. “Kimberly’s just signed up as our newest intern.”
Natalie blinked. What? They were taking on more than one intern? Or had she lost her spot already?
The woman stepped forward and thrust out a hand. “Great to meet you. We might end up workmates—and competitors.” She winked with the last word.
“Nice to meet you.” Natalie’s words came out with the enthusiasm of a robot.
Kimberly sashayed away, and Natalie whirled to Steph. “What’s going on?”
“The board wanted us to take on more than one intern. She applied weeks ago. Your application just got in under the wire.”
Natalie swallowed. So even if she got the internship, she’d be competing against someone else for the permanent job.
A young, enthusiastic someone else.
“Great.”
Steph stood and tugged her hand. “Come on, let’s get the morning tea ready.”
Natalie let herself be pulled up and tried to focus on the positive aspect of the morning. “I guess my talk wasn’t a total loss. Had it been in the right context, it wouldn’t have been so ba—”
Something hard smacked her face. Pain exploded across her right cheekbone and nose. A curse word flew from her lips. Loudly.
A soccer ball bounced away toward the semicircle of fifty women. One hundred eyes lasered in on her as waves of white-hot agony rolled across her skull and she doubled over, face in her hands.
“Nat, come on.” Steph sounded mortified as she pulled at her elbow.
Natalie eased one hand away from her face. Blood would pour all over Mom’s blouse, but that couldn’t be helped. She squeezed one eye open, then stared at her hand. No blood?
The pain reduced to a dull pounding. Maybe nothing had been seriously damaged. She stumbled along behind Steph into the kitchen.
Steph hefted open a chest freezer. “Aha.” She pulled out a bag of carrots and slapped them against Natalie’s cheek.
Natalie jerked away. “Ow!”
“It’ll teach you to watch your language,” Steph retorted. “Did you see Mrs. Parrish’s face? My goodness, Nat. I really don’t know about this.”
Natalie pulled the carrots from her head, chest tightening, panic rising. “What do you mean, you don’t know?” Her throat closed at the look on Steph’s face. Pursed lips, two fine lines on her otherwise wrinkle-free forehead. Mad. Definitely mad.
Outside, Sam officially closed the event and the room swelled with chatter.
Steph picked up a tray of cookies and took two steps toward the door. “I have to do some damage control. I’ll call you later this week.”
“Wait—” Natalie fell silent as Steph strode away. She let her hand with the carrots stay limp by her side. Her face deserved to hurt. She’d just blown her chance.
Seven years ago, her life had derailed in a little town called Missing Out On Everything. The ache now attacking her chest confirmed that no matter how hard she tried, she was never getting out.
Jem strolled over, Olly bouncing against his shoulder. “Hey, there, sailor.” His smug smile stung like sandpaper to the eyeball. “I always knew you had a potty mouth.”
Her mind filled with the buzz of a million angry bees. Her dream was over. And he thought it was funny.
“Shut up.” She shoved the carrots in his chest and stomped away.
11
“Stop being stubborn, Natalie. Just get in the car.”
Jem’s voice called out to her from behind, but Natalie ignored it. Her stomach had declared mutiny. Her head pounded with every step she took on the footpath outside the church. The fabric of Mom’s shirt clung to her still-sticky chest. A
nd her emotions had time-traveled back to nineteen-year-old Natalie, who tried so hard to make something work and was still blindsided when it didn’t.
She pretended the old Camry creeping along the road wasn’t there.
“Natalie.”
“I really need some alone time here, Jem.”
Understatement of the century, but she managed to keep her voice calm. Well, relatively.
She threw a cursory glance at Jem’s vehicle. “How’d you even get the car? I had the keys. And how did you get here?”
“You left the keys in the church when you stormed out, and I hitched a ride with a workmate and planned to ride home for lunch with you.” The Camry kept rolling along beside her, Jem leaning to talk to her out the window. “C’mon, Nat. I’m sorry I laughed at you.”
She kept her eyes forward. “It’s not about that.”
“I’m not letting you walk home alone with that face. You’ll scare small children.”
It took every fiber of her self-control not to kick a dent in his door. “I’m not bleeding, so I’ll take that as a reflection on my looks.” She stormed over to the car and dropped into the passenger seat. A squeak sounded from under her backside.
Jem smirked.
She dug a plastic Nemo from the cushion and threw it on the floorboard. “I’m in. Happy?”
“Your eye is purple and green.”
“Fabulous.”
“I don’t know why you’re so upset. The soccer ball was bad—I didn’t realize how hard it hit you at first—but the rest of the morning wasn’t so awful.” Jem accelerated into traffic. Yawned. “Even if you don’t get this internship, just go try something else.”
Steam built up between her ears. “Opportunities like this don’t exactly come knocking on my door.”
“So go out and make them happen.”
Like she hadn’t tried. Maybe if he’d stuck around seven years ago, they could’ve shared the burden of Dad’s sickness together, and she wouldn’t have had to leave college. She clenched her hands. “I can’t.”
“Give me one good reason why not.”
“Responsibility!” The word spewed forth, seething with seven years of hurt. “I have people depending on me. I can’t just run off and do whatever I want.”
Oliver jolted at her sudden rise in volume and cried.
Jem’s jaw clenched and he slowed the car a little. “Like I did, you mean.”
A quiet voice rapped its knuckles on her skull and told her to quit while she could. She told it to shut up. “We don’t all have that luxury, Jem.”
“Luxury?” Jem jammed on the brakes for a red light, much like she’d done to him a few weeks ago. Natalie’s body lurched forward, but the seat belt held tight. Her head banged against the headrest as the car screeched to a halt.
Jem twisted in his seat to face her, his expression thunderous. “You think my leaving was a luxury?”
“What would you call it?”
“I’d call it the worst day in my entire life. And that’s including the day my mother died. For Pete’s sake, Nat, I—” He bit back what she assumed were some pretty choice words.
Heat swept through her, along with a wave of indignant rage. Her muscles quivered.
The day he’d left hadn’t been the worst of her life. No, hers was the day Steph sat at Mom and Dad’s old dining table, six weeks after Jem left, and told her that Mike had shipped the last box that morning.
He wasn’t coming back, and that date marked with love hearts on her calendar wouldn’t be her wedding day after all.
Her jaw tightened, and her voice came out as a growl. “Don’t you dare play the sympathy card.”
He barked a humorless laugh. “Yeah, I left. And that makes me the bad guy.”
She gaped. Was he serious? “You bet it does.” Did he have any comprehension of what he’d put her through? The crippling insecurity as she grappled with what she’d done to make him leave? The humiliation?
He pulled a hand down his cheeks. “Unbelievable.”
Heat rushed into Natalie’s face and her voice turned into a screech. “‘Unbelievable’? What do you mean, ‘unbelievable’? You ran out on me months before our wedding! You—”
A car horn blared. A flash of color caught her eye. “Green light.”
“What?”
“Green light!”
He hit the gas and took off.
Shudders rippled through Natalie’s body, but she held her breath to prevent a single sob. She pressed her lips together. If she spoke, she’d shout, so she said nothing at all. Olly’s screams turned into whimpers, and she twisted in her seat to slip his pacifier into his mouth.
“Don’t touch him.” Jem’s voice cracked.
“What?” Her gaze flew to his face. The granite expression he wore was reminiscent of John.
“If you hate me this much, you don’t have to stay. I’ll find you another job, and you can go do what you want.” He pulled the car into its parking spot at the apartment block and yanked the keys from the ignition.
She fumbled to release her seat belt as he pulled Olly from the car. It gave way and she scrambled out, looked at him over the hood. “Are you firing me?” She’d only worked for him for four days. That had to be some kind of record.
He swung Olly up into his arms and didn’t meet her eye. “I’m pretty sure you just quit.”
She stomped her foot. “Fine, run away again.”
Jem slammed the car door shut and speared her with his gaze. “Let’s get one thing straight. You can remember whatever twisted version you want, but I did not run away.”
Twisted version? Twisted version? She remembered, all right. The strange distance between them for a couple of weeks. Then his incoherent break-up speech on Mom and Dad’s porch. Her frantic, unanswered voice messages in the days after. And the unending silence, which made one thing clear: whatever he’d babbled on the porch that night, the simple truth was that he hadn’t wanted her anymore.
A passing jogger glanced at them, and Jem turned toward the apartment building. “If you want to yell at me some more, come inside. Unless you want someone to call the police and my dad to join this little party.” He walked away.
Nuh-uh. He wasn’t walking away from her again. She’d have the last word, and then she’d walk away from him.
Jem didn’t slow, and the stairs were horrendous to climb in her light-headed state. She caught him as he unlocked the apartment’s front door.
“You want a pity party, Jem? Fine, let’s go there.”
He spread his free arm in a bring-it-on gesture.
She followed him into the living room, riding the momentum of her righteous anger. “Let’s bring up the night I had to explain to my mother that she wasn’t going to be mother of the bride in ten weeks’ time. The day I had to explain to my friends why my fiancé would leave me. How about the day I returned my unworn wedding dress?” She folded her arms. What comeback could he possibly have to that?
Jem plopped a now calm Olly in his playpen and faced her. “I left because that was best for you, for both of us.”
She stared. In his warped mind, the months—years—of heartbreak she’d endured were “for her own good”? While he moved on with college, a career, and obviously another woman?
She pointed a finger at him and enunciated each word with precision. “Don’t you ever say that to me again.” Her voice shook with fury.
While he’d received his education, dream career, and a son, she’d had to drop out of school. Work jobs that turned her brain to oatmeal. Watch Dad shrink into a hundred-and-fifty-pound shell of a human being. And she’d had to do it alone.
To justify his selfish decision with this kind of lie was nothing short of delusion.
Jem closed his mouth, but nothing in his clenched-jaw expression looked like he was backing down.
She lowered her finger and folded her arms tight against her chest. “I’m not only mad that you left. I’m mad that you’re the one who did the wrong thing an
d it was my life that derailed.”
Jem threw his hands up. “You think I’m not derailed? You think I planned to move back within shouting distance of Dad? To practically get fired? Be a single dad?”
She barked a mirthless ha. “You know what people say when they look at you? ‘There’s Jem. Did you know he was a reporter in Chicago? It’s so sweet he came back to his hometown. And he’s so good with his little boy.’” She ran a hand through her hair, fingers snagging on each split end. “You know what they say about me? ‘Poor Nat. Do you know she was engaged once? And do you know who her father is? Everyone used to think she’d follow in his footsteps. Funny how things turn out.’” She spat the last word out with seven years of bitterness.
The moment stretched, Jem’s gaze unreadable.
Natalie swallowed, cheeks burning. What had she done? At least before she could pretend Jem hadn’t had the power over her that he did. Now she’d given up the one thing she had left: her dignity.
She pulled her jacket tight around herself and swiveled to leave. It was over. There was nothing left to salvage here.
“I’m sorry.”
His quiet words halted her trudge to the door. That was the first sign she’d ever seen that he regretted any part of how things ended between them.
“It’s not like I enjoy hating you.” Why were these words even coming out of her mouth? But still, she turned to face him, hands jammed into her jacket pockets. “Every day I walk up those stairs and tell myself, ‘Unforgiveness only hurts me. God forgave me, so I extend the same to you.’” She shook her head. “And every day it lasts for three seconds before I hate you again.”
Jem stared at his toe, expression thoughtful. After a long moment, he met her eyes. “But you try the next day?”
She swallowed. “I do.” Not because he deserved it. Not because there could ever be anything between them again.
But because it had been done for her.
Jem shifted on his feet. “Thank you.”
Her “You’re welcome” stuck in her throat.
“I can’t fix the past.” Jem pulled his notebook out of his pocket. “But I can help you get this internship.”
She sniffed, brain struggling to catch up. “What?”
