One Day His (The Someday Series Book 2)

by Shawn, Melanie

  “Thanks, Rachel,” I responded warmly as I lifted the steaming coffee to my lips.

  Honestly, I could see why Cat viewed Don and Rachel as her only island of sanity in the craziness she experienced growing up. They were kind and stable, and every moment I spent with them made me more grateful that they had been there for Cat to turn to when she was a kid.

  “Anything for you, Jace. You just keep putting a smile on my girl’s face and we’ll call it even.”

  “Deal.”

  “Oh, well, speak of the devil and the devil appears,” Rachel said lightly as a sleep-disheveled Cat stepped into the kitchen, yawning and ruffling her fingers through her hair.

  She looked adorable in a tank top and plaid pajama bottoms, and I had the urge to grab her around the waist, throw her over my shoulder, and take her right back up to where she had come from—her bedroom.

  “Coffee…” Cat mumbled groggily as she collapsed into the kitchen chair next to mine and laid her head in her arms.

  I planted a kiss on her hair, silky even in its sleep-tousled mess, and teased, “Good morning, sleepyhead.” I got nothing but a grunt in response.

  The mug of coffee Rachel sat down in front of Cat got a nominally more enthusiastic response in that Cat did raise her head slightly and groan in appreciation as she took a sip.

  Rachel smiled knowingly at the two of us. “Had a late night, did we?”

  Cat’s cheeks colored slightly. “We, um…we went to hear some writers speak. And then we went out to eat. We were out kind of late, I guess.”

  Rachel’s wise smile broadened a little in response, and with a wink, she said, “Is that what happened? Hmmm. Sounds like fun.”

  Cat’s face deepened into an even darker shade of red.

  Rachel’s light chuckle filled the large kitchen. “Ah, to be young, beautiful, and in love.”

  Don entered the kitchen just then with his customary, “Hey, hey, hey there. How are my ladies this morning?”

  Cat smiled. “Morning, Don.”

  Don ruffled Cat’s hair affectionately and then walked over to Rachel, wrapping his arms around her waist from behind as she stirred the eggs that were in a skillet on the stove. “Now what’s this I heard about someone being young, beautiful, and in love? Were you talkin’ about yourself, darlin’ girl?”

  Rachel laughed, and now her cheeks were the same deep shade of red as Cat’s. “Don, you stop,” she scolded. “Not in front of the kids. Also, I do notice that your drawl gets thicker when you’re laying on the malarkey.”

  Don laughed at this and swatted her backside with a wink, making her jump and laugh.

  Flustered, Rachel said, “Now, Don, don’t you be distracting me. I’ve gotta get these kids fed and on their way. They have a busy day planned!”

  Cat looked at me, puzzled. “Busy day?”

  I nodded. “Yep. I figured that, since you’re actually pretty unfamiliar with your own city, it’s sort of like you’re a tourist in your own hometown. It’s like seeing everything for the first time, even though you live here. So after you fell asleep, I did some research and looked up the top tourist destinations to see here in LA. I have a whole day planned.”

  The last thing I wanted was a repeat of yesterday. I’d overheard Jerry in the green room yesterday say that Angelica was going to be having a spa day today to recover from her press day, so I took a chance that Cat’s schedule would be clear, too.

  Cat’s jaw dropped. “You planned an entire day for us?”

  I nodded. “Oh, yeah. We’re gonna be like senior citizens on a bus trip. We have a schedule to keep if we’re going to make it on time to the very special surprise we’ll be ending the day with.”

  “What is it?” she squealed.

  “Oh, Cat,” I said, affecting a tone of disappointment. “Don’t tell me you’re as unfamiliar with the concept of surprises as you were with the concept of fun?”

  She chuckled. “Well, I’m becoming more familiar with the concept of smartass every single day.”

  This drew a laugh from Don and Rachel as well.

  Playfully, I said, “Hey, I thought you two were on my side.”

  “Well, son, we were—until that ‘senior citizens on the bus’ comment,” Don quipped.

  “Oh, now, Don. Leave the boy alone,” Rachel said with a sparkle in her eye as she set our plates in front of us.

  Cat sat up straighter and inhaled deeply. “Oh my God, Rachel. This smells fantastic!”

  Rachel beamed. “I put some dill in the eggs just like you like it, little lamb.”

  Cat rubbed her hands together and then grabbed her fork and dug in. When she moaned with pleasure, I had to remind myself that this was neither the time nor the place to pop wood. Damn, though—her moans were sexy. It was difficult to control myself around her.

  I didn’t realize I was staring until she turned to me, a twinkle in her eye and said, “You better start eating. We have a schedule to keep, remember?”

  Chapter 18

  Cat

  “God, this feels strange,” I commented to Jace in wonder, looking around as we walked up Hollywood Blvd together.

  “Does it?”

  “Yeah. I mean, I’ve been on this street a hundred times in my life. I would have sworn I knew all about it. But I’m just now realizing…I’ve never gotten out of the car here. I’ve never actually walked here. All the experience I have when it comes to the city of Hollywood is through the glass of a car window.”

  “It feels different, then?”

  I grabbed Jace’s hand. “Oh, man, it’s like a whole different experience. It’s like it’s not even the same street. I recognize landmarks, like signs or stores I’ve seen before, but now I’m actually in it. It’s like I’d only ever seen it in a movie before, and now, I’m really here. It’s kind of surreal, actually.”

  Jace shook his head. “Yeah, I can imagine. Hey, there’s the Chinese theater. Do you want to get someone to take our picture?”

  I agreed enthusiastically. I had decided at the beginning of the day that I was really going to embrace the whole ‘tourist in my own city’ thing and throw myself into it wholeheartedly. Pics. Souvenir T-shirts. Oh yeah. All of that and more would be happening today.

  We continued up to the front of the Chinese Theater and I gamely let Jace snap my picture with my hands in the impressions left by Myrna Loy, Mary Pickford, Marilyn Monroe…and even a bunch of actresses whose names didn’t start with M.

  We walked up and down Hollywood Blvd and Sunset, shopping in the interesting shops along the way and stopping in for junk food snacks at every single pizza place, ice cream parlor, and burger joint we saw. It was shaping up to be one of the more fun days in recent memory. I even went all-in and bought an “I <3 LA” T-shirt with Betty Boop giving a little bootie bump to the cartoon heart on the front and a plain, black T-shirt with the Hollywood sign letters across the chest in white.

  When we got to the ArcLight Theater on Sunset, Jace bought us tickets to see a movie at the famous CineDome. While he was pushing the buttons on the self-serve ticket dispenser and swiping his credit card, he said, “Look, I realize that you’ve been around the movie industry your whole life. I mean, you probably know half of the people in this movie. I don’t know. But I thought this would be a fun. We’re just a normal couple, doing a normal couple thing, catching a movie. We’re also just normal tourists checking out the CineDome. It’s a ‘two birds, one stone’ kind of thing.”

  “I love that idea. I think it’s a great plan. And, since the movie doesn’t start for a half an hour, we can grab a bite at VeggieGrill.”

  Jace groaned. “God, you’re really into vegetables now, huh?”

  I laughed. “Again, it’s good, I promise you. Get the fake chicken sandwich. I swear to God, you won’t know it’s fake.”

  Jace smiled. “Well, if you’re trying new things, so can I. Let’s go eat vegetables and watch a movie.”

  Chapter 19

  Jace

  Midway do
wn Wilshire Blvd, the GPS told us that we had arrived at the next destination, so I found a parking space and we got out of the car. I took Cat’s hand as we started to walk and said, “Okay, so, since Bigfoot Days was such a panty dropper, I figured this would be right up your alley.”

  She smiled broadly, and my heart hitched. I loved her smile.

  “So, what is it?” she asked, and I heard the excitement tingeing her voice.

  As much fun as I was having seeing all of the iconic sights of Hollywood and Los Angeles for the first time, I was having even more fun seeing the sparkle in Cat’s eyes as she took it all in. She seemed completely lost in the experience, which was exactly what I had hoped would happen. I wanted to give her something memorable, something fun, something that would take her entirely outside of the other experiences she was having on the trip.

  In fact, I hoped that, when she remembered this trip in the future, it would be our sightseeing that her mind would jump to and not the drama created by her mom and Jerry. I hoped that the fun we were having would carve a more lasting impression into her brain than the damage those fucking terrible people were doing. I didn’t know how realistic that hope was, but seeing the way her face and eyes lit up at every new thing she noticed and pointed out to me, I thought it was at least a possibility.

  “The La Brea tar pits,” I said with a smile.

  I knew she was going to be excited. She loved history, and she loved museums, and she loved… Well, basically anything that most people thought was boring, she loved. It was one of the things I thought was coolest about her. Girls her age were usually so much more interested in social media or their clothes, but not my brown-eyed girl. She was smart. She loved to learn. Getting to know Cat had helped me better understand a lot of the things that I was bored by before. It’s not because the thing itself was boring. It’s that I hadn’t been looking closely enough to see how cool it really was and how many fascinating things there were to learn about it.

  I was hoping that this would be the case at the tar pits today, because frankly—on the surface? They sounded a little boring to me. To be perfectly honest, I had only put them on the itinerary because this day wasn’t about me. It was about Cat, and when I had seen the tar pits on various lists of the top things to do in Los Angeles—and especially when I had seen that they had a whole museum that went with them and they were right next door to an art museum—I had known beyond a shadow of a doubt that they absolutely belonged on our itinerary. Cat’s reaction now told me I had made the right decision.

  The other nice thing about going to the tar pits after having spent the morning wandering up and down the streets of Hollywood was that, while Hollywood was definitely something I had wanted to see with Cat, the vibe was definitely very crowded and urban. Now, wandering between the tar pits and looking at the statues of the prehistoric animals rising up out of the tar, we could slow down a little bit. The crowds were much thinner and much more casually chill. The pace itself was slower. There were green spaces and trees, and we could appreciate the beauty of nature as we walked.

  Another thing that I liked—although I admit that this was purely on my end—was that the sunshine was so bright and pure coming down on Cat, that she looked like an angel. The rays shining through the strands of her hair made her look like a halo was around her head. I pestered her again and again to stop and take photos until she finally laughingly told me, “Okay, seriously, Jace—this is the last one. No more pictures until we’re at the next stop. Promise?”

  I had to reluctantly agree because, after all, this was her day—but I wasn’t happy about it. If it were up to me, I would capture hundreds of pictures of Cat a day. She was just that beautiful.

  When we had seen everything there was to see outside, we went inside the museum and toured all of the exhibits. Cat was so absorbed in learning every little piece of information that she didn’t even notice if I was paying attention to the exhibits or not. And that was a good thing, because I sure as hell wasn’t.

  I mean, sure, finding out all of the details about some prehistoric animals and landmasses and evolution and all of that can be pretty interesting if you’re in the right frame of mind—but it didn’t stand a chance of measuring up to watching Cat’s beautiful face as she took it all in. In fact, I couldn’t think of anything that would ever be as interesting as watching that beautiful sight.

  So, even though we’d wandered around the museum for an hour listening to presentations and reading plaques, I walked out just as ignorant as I had been when I’d walked in on the subject of prehistoric animals and their history with the La Brea tar pits. But that didn’t matter. I had spent that hour with my eyes fixed on my girlfriend’s gorgeous face and that was always—always—time well spent.

  When we walked back into the bright sunshine and Cat looked up at me, her whole face was alive with anticipation. I loved that. That was how I wanted her to look all the time, every moment she was with me.

  “So, what’s up next?’ she asked.

  “We’re headed right across the park to the art museum.”

  “Yay! Another museum! God, I love museums!”

  I grinned and took her hand as we strolled over the grass. “I know, babe. And this one is—brace yourself—slightly more expansive than the Bigfoot museum.”

  “Awww…the Bigfoot museum! That’s one of my favorite memories, babe.”

  “Because of the exhibits or the company?”

  She made a big show of acting as if she was giving this serious consideration and really couldn’t decide.

  I slapped her on the butt and grinned. “Smartass.”

  She laughed. “Okay, okay, you got me. It was the company. I mean, don’t get me wrong. Those Bigfoot exhibits were informative. But when you come right down to it, no—they couldn’t compare to the company.”

  Just before we walked into LACMA, the LA County Art Museum, Cat stopped me and turned to face me.

  “Alright, I’m gonna tell you something serious, okay?”

  I nodded, wondering what confession or heartfelt words she might have had for me.

  “You have to actually look at the art in here, okay? You can’t just stare at me like a creeper the way you did the whole time we were in the tar pits museum. I want you to see these amazing pieces of art. Got it?”

  I laughed, completely surprised by her words.

  “Yeah,” she continued. “Didn’t think I noticed that, did ya? Well, let me tell ya something, mister…I see all.”

  I leaned down and kissed her. “I don’t doubt it. And yes, fine, I promise to look at all the art inside the museum. Although, I will tell you right up front that I’m not going to see anything in there on the wall that I’m going to think is more beautiful than what I’m looking at right now in front of me.”

  Cat flushed, and I could tell that she liked my answer. She smiled and gave me a kiss back. “You’re smooth. I’ll give you that,” she said and led us inside.

  For the next hour, we wandered the halls, and I have to say that I was glad Cat had told me to really look at the art in the museum. A lot of it was really stunning, and most of the pieces had really interesting histories behind them, too. I felt like I had accomplished something by the time we left, that I had really picked up information and made memories that would stay with me for a long time. This must be the way Cat felt when she learned something new. I could see why she found it addictive.

  But even though I liked what I saw on the walls, there was absolutely nothing I saw inside that museum that even came close to comparing to the beauty and the splendor that was Cat.

  Chapter 20

  Cat

  Headphone life

  Whole

  Music filling

  All

  Complete existence

  Brings me joy, brings me bliss, brings me light

  Again

  And again. Yet again

  Over and over

  Comforting

  Exhilarating

  Gives
my life meaning and soul peace

  When nothing else will do either one

  Cat Nichols, Age 14

  This day had already been more wonderful than I could have imagined. It was just one more fantasy that Jace had made a reality. It had been chock-full of fun and interesting activities, and the memories Jace had given me were among the most precious that I would carry with me for a lifetime.

  That was why it was such a surprise when the car reached Sunset and Jace turned east instead of west. I looked at him, puzzled. “Aren’t we going home now?”

  “Not yet,” he answered with a very satisfied smile on his face. “We just have one more item on the agenda, and I saved the best for last.”

  “Seriously? Do you know it’s almost seven o’clock though?”

  He gave me a mysterious look. “I’m well aware of the time.”

  “Okay, Captain Mysterious. No more questions. But I will just say this—I hope there is food there, wherever it is that we’re going. I’m starving. Like, super starving.”

  He smiled. “Nice try. There’s food there. I’ll tell you that. But that’s all you’re getting out of me. Now just relax and enjoy the surprise.”

  I smiled and leaned back in the car seat. I was enjoying the surprise—that was the thing. I had enjoyed all of the surprises today. The truth was that I had never really had anyone plan a surprise for me, let alone a whole day full of them, before Jace. First of all, there had never been anyone in my life who’d cared about me enough or thought about me often enough to bother planning a whole surprise except for Don and Rachel, and they never would have for a couple of reasons. For one, they worked pretty much all the time, so they never had time for frivolous and fun things like surprises. Secondly, my mother would not have liked it if they would’ve done anything nice for me other than just being nice. Any big gifts they would have given me or any outings they ever would’ve taken me on would not have gone over well with my mother. Not at all. It would’ve been the end of them working there, which would’ve meant the end of them having the opportunity to keep an eye on me—and they would never have risked that. I knew that.