Dropping Gloves

by Catherine Gayle

  “Jamie…”

  “Come inside,” I repeated, glancing over my shoulder to find her exactly as I’d left her. “Please.”

  She looked back at the house she was buying, but then her feet fell into motion, and she followed behind me, a frown creasing her forehead.

  It was only once she came into my kitchen that I realized I was doing exactly what I couldn’t afford to do—I was letting Katie back into my life, welcoming her in with open arms, and inviting her to beat my heart to a bloody pulp.

  Normally, I didn’t have a tentative bone in my body. Yeah, I got stage fright, but that was a different sort of beast. It had never kept me from getting up on the stage and doing my thing. It was just that adrenaline coursed through me in those moments, and the sensation just made everything different in some way, more than anything. I knew that about myself, and I could recognize it for what it was, and so I just powered through whenever stage fright hit me. But right now, following Jamie into his house, my feet were as heavy as those Acme anvils that were always dropping on Looney Tunes characters.

  Ever since Jamie had pulled up with his brother and I’d realized I was buying the house next door to his, I’d been in a state of intense emotional turmoil. It was like having vertigo; I couldn’t figure out which way was up, and everything was spinning, and I had no sense of my bearings. He kept looking at me the way a man looks at a woman he wants, but the only thing Jamie wanted from me was to get out of his life.

  Supposedly.

  I was pretty sure we both knew there was still more there, but it was buried underneath a lot of hurt, and I wasn’t sure he was willing to let me unearth it.

  Yet here I was, walking into his kitchen while he brought his new kitten home.

  He shut the door behind me, and I set my purse on the counter and took a glance around. It was a state-of-the-art kitchen, very similar to the one in the house next door. Jamie’s counters were covered with a few small appliances that were surprising, at least if you knew much about him.

  “Don’t tell me you can use more than a coffeepot and a toaster now,” I teased. It wasn’t all that long ago that he couldn’t do more than make a peanut butter sandwich, at least without running the risk of needing assistance from the nearest fire department.

  “Maybe a bit. Zee always told me a guy has to be able to feed himself. I guess I finally listened.” Jamie bent over and set the kitten down on the floor, not that it did any good. He’d barely let the kitten go when it let out a pathetic meow and raced back up to his shoulder, causing Jamie to hiss in a breath with his eyes pinched closed. “Those claws are intense,” he said when he looked at me again.

  “I think he feels safe with you.” When I’d held the kitten outside, it had been shaking, and I wasn’t convinced that it was just because of the cold. Now he was in a big new house where nothing was familiar. Nothing but Jamie.

  “I guess he’s going to be my parrot, then.”

  “You should name him Blackbeard.”

  “Better him than me.” Jamie laughed, and warmth bubbled up inside me. At least I could still make him laugh. “You’re sticking around for a while, then?” he asked. He took a couple of glasses out of a cabinet next to the refrigerator and filled them with water before offering me one.

  “For a while.” I took a sip and eased onto one of his barstools. “Probably for a lot longer than a while.”

  He nodded. “Because of your treatments.”

  “Because I think I’m done with Hollywood,” I corrected. “At least done with everything I’ve tried so far.” Not that I was ready to go into the particulars. Some things, I wasn’t sure he ever needed to know—the things I’d been keeping buried so no one would realize just how badly I’d fucked everything up. They were all disappointed in me enough without knowing the full truth.

  Jamie shook his head. “It’s what you’ve always wanted. What you were born to do. You can’t just give that up.”

  “Already have. Derek’s not my agent anymore. I don’t have anything in the works, and I have no desire to be on a new show or audition for a film. I thought it was for me, but I was wrong.”

  He bent over the island between us, resting his weight on his forearms. The kitten apparently didn’t like that angle, so he hopped down onto the granite countertop, dashing over to attack my fingertips again. Jamie wasn’t watching the kitten, though; he was staring at me. Through me. “You come alive when you sing, though.”

  “Well, maybe I can figure out a way to sing but do it from here. I don’t know. I was thinking that I could use the office in that house for a studio, maybe write some songs.” I fluttered my fingers, and the kitten leaped for them, sinking a claw into one momentarily. I probably shouldn’t be teaching him that fingers were toys, but I didn’t have anything better on hand. “Something like that, anyway. Whatever I end up doing, I’m done with LA.” The finality of it, of saying it that way, felt good. It felt comfortable, and there wasn’t a whole hell of a lot that had given me a sense of serenity in the last few days. Nothing but putting an end to my career in Hollywood and settling on buying that house. It could only mean I was making the right decision.

  “So you’re staying in Portland?”

  I could tell he was trying to make it sound casual, but it came across as anything but. I looked up and held his gaze. “Yeah. I’m staying.”

  While I wasn’t watching him, the kitten made a flying leap for some of my hair that was apparently swinging and looking like prey.

  “Not so fast, little guy.” Jamie caught him midair just before he latched on to my face with all those razor-sharp claws, and the kitten squeaked in indignation. “I should probably bring in the box of things they sent home with me for him. Food, toys, all that stuff.”

  “Tell you what,” I said. “You keep him in here and figure out something you can make me with one of your fancy new appliances, and I’ll go bring it all in so we can get him set up.”

  “Yeah?” He smiled—a true smile, one of the ones that made his dimples pop out. It gave me hope that maybe—possibly—he would give me a chance to prove I wasn’t going anywhere this time.

  Now that I had that tiny glimmer of hope, I knew there was nowhere I wanted to be and nothing I wanted to do unless he was there. I’d hurt him a lot, though. I knew it, and there was no easy way around it. I was going to have to fight and claw my way back into his life if I was going to have any chance at getting what I wanted. But at least now, I knew what it was.

  I didn’t want fame and fortune.

  I didn’t want Hollywood—the long hours, the intense scrutiny, the sense of never being able to be enough.

  I didn’t want to live my life under a microscope and have every mistake I made blasted out to the world even before I could recognize the implications of what I’d done.

  I didn’t want guys like Jesse Carmichael, who was more into the high-rolling life that fame could grant him than he was into me. I didn’t want guys like Beau Brunetti, who only cared how I looked on his arm when we were in public and who did things I would never be able to speak of when we were in private.

  I didn’t want a life that would force me to be apart from my family, my friends, the people and life that I’d always known and loved.

  I didn’t want any of that.

  I wanted Jamie Babcock.

  “Yeah,” I said, trying to impart with that single word all the things I was only starting to understand myself.

  “All right, then.” Jamie put the kitten back up on his shoulder and headed back toward the fridge. “The box is on the backseat. Blackbeard and I have work to do.” When he turned around, he had his arms full with more ingredients than I would have ever imagined he could name, let alone use.

  I bit my lower lip, a renewed energy making it next to impossible to keep from grinning. “Be right back.”

  One thing life had taught me was that a person only had so many opportunities to get the things they really wanted. I didn’t yet know how I would do it, but
there wasn’t a chance in hell I would let this one pass me by.

  While I set up Blackbeard’s food, water, and litter box—all the while thinking he would have to have a different name, even though I’d been the one to suggest it, because Blackbeard was no better than Spanky—and played with him to keep him out of the way, Jamie made us a complete meal using nothing but a waffle iron and a toaster oven. I kept stealing glances at him and what he was doing while he worked, and in all honesty, I was both intrigued and impressed. He was actually cooking! Not only that, but there were enticing smells filtering through the air, and it didn’t seem as though the smoke detector was in danger of going off.

  After about twenty minutes, he carried two plates to the dining room table. “Ready to eat?” he asked.

  I unhinged the kitten’s claws from the front of my shirt, set him down on the floor, and joined Jamie. I couldn’t hide my shock when I saw what he’d made: ham-and-veggie omelets done in the waffle maker, waffled hash browns, and a cucumber and bell pepper salad. I looked across at him, wide-eyed and slack-jawed.

  He gave me a sheepish grin, one that revealed a hint of pride. “I thought breakfast for dinner sounded good. Hope it’s all right.”

  I sunk down onto a chair and put a napkin on my lap. “It looks really good, Jamie.” It looked absolutely fantastic, actually, and smelled ten times better than it looked now that it was right under my nose. It might as well have been a full gourmet meal, considering only a few years ago he couldn’t make coffee without potentially burning down the building or causing a monumental flood.

  Jamie had barely taken his seat when the kitten climbed up first his pant leg, then his shirt, and took up his favorite position. Blackbeard perched himself sitting upright on Jamie’s shoulder, staring down at the plate with blue-gray eyes almost as big as his head.

  “I think he wants some,” I said.

  “Not sure if I should give him any. Shouldn’t he stick to kitten food?” Jamie craned his head around to look at the kitten, who mimicked his action in reverse. In a flash, Blackbeard nipped the end of Jamie’s nose, growling something fierce and pulling back, like he was trying to rip the nose free from Jamie’s face.

  I cracked up into uncontrollable laughter.

  “Oh, you think that’s funny?” Jamie rubbed a hand over his nose and looked down at his fingers, as if searching for blood.

  “Yes, actually. Hilarious.”

  He was obviously fighting to hold back his own laughter, pinching his lips into a thin line, but his dimples were peeking out at me. Eventually, he gave in and chuckled, too, trying to re-situate the kitten so it wasn’t quite so close to his face. Every time he moved Blackbeard a few inches, though, the kitten just edged closer and dug in harder. There wasn’t a chance Jamie would win this battle of wills.

  “You might as well just give up and try to eat,” I said. “He’s not budging.”

  Jamie let out a beleaguered sigh and, with a final narrowed-eyed glance at his new companion, picked up his fork. “This should be interesting.”

  It was, at least for me. I couldn’t stop myself from watching the show. Blackbeard focused in on Jamie’s plate, his nose working overtime as the smells wafted up to meet him. Each time Jamie moved his fork up to his mouth, Blackbeard’s head moved right along with it, his neck straining forward in a comical attempt to steal a bite.

  Jamie didn’t seem inclined to talk, so I followed his lead, paying more attention to my food and watching the kitten’s antics. By the time we were about halfway done with our meal, the excitement of the day seemed to catch up with Blackbeard. He ended up lying down across Jamie’s shoulder, paws hanging down in the front and back, and his head dangling down Jamie’s chest.

  “I think he’s going to sleep like that,” I said.

  Jamie twisted his head around and snorted in laughter. That wasn’t enough to bother the kitten. Blackbeard’s ears twitched, but that was the only sign he wasn’t completely lost to the world. “I don’t know what it is about my shoulders.”

  I knew exactly what it was about Jamie’s shoulders. They were broad and strong enough to carry more than just his own burdens. They were a safe place to lay your head. They were home. But that wasn’t something he would want to hear, at least not from me, so I ducked my head down and took another bite, trying to smother my smile so he wouldn’t ask me about it.

  “Why are you buying a house?” he asked after a minute.

  “Is it such a strange thing? You bought a house. It’s what people do.”

  “That’s not what I mean. Why aren’t you staying with your parents while…” He let his voice trail off, apparently not wanting to speak the words aloud.

  “While I go through whatever treatment I have in store?” I finished for him. There wasn’t any point in avoiding the issue. Whether either of us was prepared to deal with it or not, cancer was very much back in my life. I flickered my eyes up to find him staring through me again. He’d always had a way of making me feel as if he could see all of me, right down to the thoughts running through my mind so fast that I couldn’t catch them and make sense of them. “You remember how Mom was last time. I just need some room to breathe.”

  “She’s just like that because she loves you. Like—” He cut himself off and shook his head. That jostled Blackbeard enough that he slid forward. Jamie didn’t reach out to grab him in time, so the kitten tried to slow his fall in the only logical manner—he dug his claws in to Jamie’s chest, eliciting a stream of curses and a thin streak of red blood staining his butter-yellow T-shirt.

  Jamie went to the sink to clean himself up, leaving the kitten on the table. Blackbeard immediately went for the plate, so I scooped him up, Jamie’s words echoing in my head. She’s just like that because she loves you. Like—like what? Like your father does? Or had he been about to say, Like I do?

  “I’d better put some Neosporin on this or something,” Jamie said.

  I’d been paying attention to keeping the kitten out of our food, but I looked up when Jamie spoke. He had taken off his shirt to rinse the blood and clean the cut, and was standing there in nothing but his pants. I couldn’t make myself look anywhere but at his chest. I’d known it was muscled and defined, but there was no comparison to actually seeing it in person. I wanted to lick it, but I sincerely doubted he would let something like that happen, so I forced myself to look away. That didn’t do anything to slow my pulse or stop heat from flooding through my body.

  “Probably a good idea,” I murmured. I hugged Blackbeard to my face so I could nuzzle my nose in his fur, hoping that would keep Jamie from discovering where my thoughts had gone.

  “Careful,” Jamie said, winking when I allowed myself to look at him again. “He’s vicious. He might bite your nose off.” He flicked a finger over the end of his own. Then he disappeared down the hall, leaving me and his kitten to entertain each other.

  Blackbeard didn’t bite my nose, though. He just purred and closed his eyes, getting comfortable to continue the much-needed nap that had been interrupted.

  Jamie had a clean shirt on when he returned, much to my disappointment. He sat down and started eating again. “You can put him down, you know,” he said after a couple of minutes.

  “I know.” I just didn’t want to. Blackbeard had fallen asleep in my arms. I carefully lowered him to my lap, keeping one hand around his back to support him so he wouldn’t slide. No point in both me and Jamie ending up bloody today. Then I finished my meal, eating with just one hand.

  He didn’t say anything else for a long time, so I didn’t either. He kept staring at me in the way he had that drove me crazy, and I kept staring down at my plate and trying to figure out how I was going to convince him to give me another chance.

  “I’m glad you’re not leaving,” he said quietly.

  I lifted my gaze. His eyes were as warm and intense and perfectly serious as ever. “Are you?”

  He chewed a bite and swallowed, taking his time. “I am. You should be with your famil
y. You should be with people who love you at a time like this.” He set down his fork.

  “People like you?” I asked before I could stop myself.

  He didn’t answer. He just kept staring into my eyes so long that I got self-conscious and had to look away. After a few moments, he picked up his fork again and resumed his meal.

  What was I thinking, asking him outright like that? I was still shocked that he was speaking to me and letting me into his house, allowing me to play with his kitten. I might not have a full plan in place for how I was going to earn that chance with him, but I was pretty sure I’d just skipped over steps two through seven hundred forty-three.

  When he was done, Jamie got up and cleared away the dishes. “In the mood for dessert?” I couldn’t discern anything in his tone, couldn’t read anything in his expression. It wasn’t like him to put on a mask like that. Or at least it wasn’t like how he used to be. I’d changed a lot over the last several years, and Lord knew he had to have changed, as well. He was still Jamie, but there were so many things about him I didn’t know now. Things I didn’t understand and wasn’t sure I ever would.

  “Don’t tell me you have that in your arsenal, too,” I said, trying but failing to keep my tone light and teasing. Instead, my voice cracked with emotion.

  He didn’t let that faze him, quirking up a grin. “No one makes a microwaveable chocolate mug cake quite like mine.” At least that was still the same Jamie I remembered. Nothing ever threw him.

  I did my best to return his smile. “Now this I have to see.”

  He set to work, taking out flour, sugar, cocoa powder, and a half dozen other ingredients. He measured things out in two coffee cups, stirred it all up, tossed in a few chocolate chips, and set the mugs in the microwave. While they cooked, he took some fresh raspberries and a can of whipped cream out of the fridge. He rinsed and dried the berries, put them on top of the chocolate cakes when they came out of the microwave. A shot of whipped cream later, they were ready.