A Cruel Kind of Beautiful (Sex, Love, and Rock & Roll Series Book 1)

by Michelle Hazen

  She buries her face in Jacob’s neck. Wait, was that study about newborns or toddlers? Because even to my untrained ear, I sound like a crazy person.

  “Say hi, Maya.” He jiggles her slightly to get her attention.

  No response.

  “Maya...” he prods, dropping his voice.

  “Hi,” Maya says to Jacob’s neck.

  She hates me. Awesome.

  “This is my friend Jera,” he says. “We’re going to play with her today, okay?”

  My heart drops so fast it gets stuck somewhere around my stomach. I was supposed to meet Maya as his girlfriend to show I could deal with commitment but apparently I’ve been demoted to trial run status. Jacob goes around and unlocks the trunk, using one hand to pull out a stroller.

  Is this even worth it, when he’s apparently already written me off?

  I close the car door and hurry back to pitch in, even though it takes me a couple of tries to figure out how to unfold the stroller. Today is all about showing him I have faith in myself, and in his feelings for me. Of course, it would be nice if he still seemed to have any feelings for me. Or if, I don’t know, maybe I didn’t make his sister cry within seconds of meeting her.

  The trunk shuts with a slam and Jacob opens the front of the car again, pulling out a plain navy messenger bag.

  “Nice diaper bag,” I say, trying to lighten the mood. “What, flowers and elephants weren’t manly enough for your taste?”

  “Ben won’t carry it if it has cartoons on it.”

  I want to slap myself. Right. With biceps like his, it’s not like Jacob needs to spend much time worrying about proving his manhood.

  “So...how have you been?”

  Jacob pauses in getting Maya settled in the stroller, and just stares at me. I shift my weight. I mean, it wasn’t the world’s worst question, right?

  When he doesn’t answer, I squat down next to the stroller and wiggle Maya’s tiny foot. She’s wearing adorable little buckled shoes with glittering daisies on them. “What’s your favorite animal, sweetie?”

  She frowns at me.

  “At home, her favorite is elephants, but the last couple of times we’ve been here, I don’t think she really made the connection between her stuffed animals and the real thing. The size differential, I think.” Jacob shrugs.

  I stand up. “You guys have already been here?” Crap, of course they have. Everybody takes kids to the zoo—I was just trying to pick something really fun for her, and I wasn’t sure what else a two-year-old might like.

  “It’s okay, she loves animals.” He starts pushing her stroller toward the entrance, and I hurry along in his wake so I don’t get left behind.

  By the third exhibit, I’m not sure if I should be bummed because Maya is the only child on earth who hates animals, or happy because Jacob obviously lied to make me feel better. So far, she hasn’t glanced at a single exhibit. She has, however, tried to climb into the bushes, banged her head on a drinking fountain, and shoplifted a stuffed elephant from the front display table of the gift shop when I wasn’t looking.

  Getting his baby sister taken away in handcuffs is totally going to make Jacob fall in love with me.

  “Maybe we should go to the farm section,” I suggest. “They’re supposed to have stuff for kids.” I gesture at the glass wall separating us from the swimming penguins. “More hands-on, you know?”

  Jacob glances at me. Why does he look worried about the petting zoo? I resist the urge to open a browser window on my phone to double-check. They definitely said the petting zoo was for all ages.

  He squats down to Maya’s level. “You want to see the bunnies?”

  “Bunny?” she asks.

  He takes the blanket out of her stroller and tickles her neck with its fuzzy edge. “Remember the bunnies? They were soft.”

  She giggles and grabs the blanket. He plays a gentle tug-of-war with her for a second before she throws the blanket on the ground and runs off toward another stroller. I go after her and grab her hand while Jacob gathers the blanket. Her hand is unbelievably tiny in mine, and something twinges in my chest. Before I have a chance to sort out what it was, she yanks her hand away and sprints back toward Jacob.

  I straighten my shoulders and check the signs that lead the way toward the petting zoo. It’s no big deal. She’s two, and I’m a freaking adult. I’m not going to get all teary over being rejected by a toddler.

  “Bunny hop hop,” Maya says, skipping her way into the farmyard. “Hop hop hop.” She tugs at Jacob’s hand, and I take the stroller from him, parking it outside the fence. “Hop,” she demands, and he takes a couple of little jumps with her, careful to keep his big sneakers away from her feet when he lands. A smile tugs at my lips. God, they’re cute together. Taking both her hands, he lifts her up with every step like she’s walking on the gravity of the moon.

  “Hop hop hop,” he says, and Maya giggles.

  The gate squeaks as Jacob opens it, then shuts with a slam behind us. As soon as Maya sees the goats, she stops laughing.

  I grin and squat down next to her. “Have you seen goats before, Maya?” They are super weird looking, every different size and texture, with their crazy little goat eyes and stubby horns. Wait, horns? Who let horned goats in with the kids? The horns are like, right at eye level.

  Maya must have the same idea, because she shrinks back against Jacob’s legs, then starts whimpering as she turns and tries to scale his jeans. “Up up up up up!” she screams as one of the goats comes trotting over and pokes his nose toward her hand, looking for food. I push him away while Jacob pats Maya’s back and tries to coax her into turning around.

  “They’re just like bunnies, sweetie, just bigger. You can pet them. Look, Jera’s petting them. She’s not scared.”

  I reach out, nabbing the retreating goat by the collar and hauling him back toward us, petting his hard little goat head with one hand while I paste on a big grin. “See? They’re nice goats.”

  Please, please don’t let the zoo staff bust me for manhandling their goats. Rough, oily goat hair slithers beneath my palm, but I make oohing sounds like he’s as soft as a cloud. He cranes his head around, licking at my wrist, and I try not to gag at the scent of his breath.

  Still holding Jacob’s leg with one arm, Maya reaches out a hand, her brown eyes wide. Both my hands are busy, but with a knee, I nudge the goat a little closer, keeping a sharp eye out for disapproving zoo staff. Maya’s fingers just barely brush the edge of one ear and she gasps.

  I smile. “See? The goat is nice.”

  The goat gives up on my hand and cranes his head toward Maya, licking her fingers. She shrieks and burrows in between Jacob’s knees, escaping out behind him. Sweet Jesus, now she’s going to have a goat phobia. In twenty years, she’ll be telling her therapist how I forced a vicious, hand-eating goat on her and she had to run for her life.

  With a laugh, Jacob turns and sweeps her up. “Did that goat kiss you, Maya?”

  “Yessss!” she wails.

  Jacob frowns. “Did it feel like...this?” He nuzzles his head into her neck and blows a noisy raspberry. In an instant, Maya goes from horrified to laughing and swatting at her big brother with goat-slimed hands while he tickles her waist. When he tries to set her back down on the ground though, she clings to his neck, starting to cry all over again. “We might have had enough zoo for one day,” he says to me. “She wouldn’t go down for her nap this afternoon, so I was worried it wasn’t going to work out so well.”

  “We could have rescheduled,” I say, even though it feels like my lungs are wilting inside my chest, and he just shakes his head.

  They’re going home. Of course they are: Maya cried like a hundred times and hit her head twice, and neither of them will so much as look at me.

  That was it. This was my audition and I just blew it.

  Chapter 28: Ballast

  The walk back to the car takes forever, and not nearly long enough. I can’t cry when I say goodbye to Jacob, not with Maya
here. I’m wrangling with my tear ducts over this issue when Jacob glances over at me. His shoulders sag a little.

  “Hey,” he says. “You got an extra minute, or do you have to get going?”

  “No, I have—” I clear my throat, trying to control my voice. “I’ve got plenty of time.” Actually, I have a metric shit-ton of finals to study for, but my participation grade is already in the toilet thanks to last week’s truancy spree, and I’m not even sure I can focus enough to fake literacy at the moment, so studying’s already a lost cause.

  “Okay.” Jacob pushes Maya’s stroller past the car and toward the other side of the parking lot.

  A sign for the Portland Children’s Museum sits on the other side of the road. Of course. Jacob’s dad was a professor, and if Maya inherited any of the same brainy genes as her brother, it makes perfect sense that she’d like a museum more than a zoo. I dip a furtive hand into my purse, trying to determine if I have enough money for another set of admission fees today, but Jacob just keeps right on going past the entrance and toward a trail winding through the woods, browning lawn spreading out between the trees. Maya starts to squirm, and he barely gets her unbuckled from the stroller before she wriggles out. She drops her hands to the ground, nearly somersaulting with the momentum of the abrupt stop.

  We both watch her as she pats at the winter-dry blades of grass, examining them as they spring back into place, then pushing them down again, holding longer this time before she lets them go. For the first time today, she doesn’t run or squeal, or look off to the next thing. She just brushes her hand back and forth over the strands, fascinated.

  Jacob slides his hands into his jeans pockets. “Loves grass. Has like two roomfuls of toys, and all she wants to do is sit on the lawn and smack the grass around. She’s a pretty weird kid.”

  My laugh catches in my throat, and I shake my head. “No, look at her. She’s experimenting. She’s trying to figure out how long she has to smash it before it stays smashed.” I dare a glance up at Jacob. “I’m afraid you’ve got a future engineering major on your hands.”

  The hint of a smile touches his lips. “I’m going to try to forget you said that.” A puff of wind blows through the trees, ruffling his hair.

  Heartened by his reaction, I take a couple of steps, then sit down next to Maya. Not looking at her, I pat the grass, too.

  She drops to her bottom, curling her fists in the grass as she rips out a handful of blades, then arranges them on the leg of my jeans. I pull up some grass—Sorry, Portland Parks Department—and return the favor, making sure to evenly cover her whole leg in green, leafy shrapnel. Maya giggles.

  My skin tingles at the sound.

  The little girl reaches over and pats my knee. Or maybe the grass on my knee. Either way, I don’t care because I’m not breathing and I might start crying all over again because she’s the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.

  Before I can decide how to respond, Maya crawls up to her feet and runs away, pelting toward a little boy who is kicking a ball around closer to the trail. I look back at Jacob, but he’s already searched out the mother of the little boy and they’re making parental eye contact while she gives him the “totally fine” nod. Her gaze flicks to me, and she smiles. That too-quick, overly polite one like, “I was just checking out your husband and I super hope you didn’t notice.”

  I attempt to smile back, but it’s a little weak. That woman has no idea how much I wish this was my family. Which it’s never going to be if I don’t grow some courage.

  I pull myself up to standing and return to Jacob’s side.

  “Maya, no,” he calls and I whirl around. It’s been like one-twentieth of a second, what did I miss?

  A stick trails grungy looking moss toward the ground as Maya lifts it and tastes the other end. She ignores Jacob, licking it again, and he changes tack.

  “I threw it on the ground,” he sings in a familiar tune, miming throwing a stick down. Maya’s face breaks out into a grin and she hurls her stick, laughing.

  “Oh, no you didn’t!” I burst out laughing, my hand coming up to cover my mouth. “You trained your sister not to eat trash using a freaking viral YouTube video from The Lonely Island?”

  “I taught her the song with the video on mute,” he says defensively. “There is a ton of swearing in that thing.” I’m still smiling, and a bit of red starts to flush across his cheekbones. “Hey, nothing else worked. And she loves that video. Granted, she’s thrown a lot of food on the ground since then to watch it explode, but better a few hot dogs wasted than have her eat a used syringe or something, you know?”

  I try not to laugh, I really do, but it’s pretty hard, especially when Maya picks up the stick again and flings it to the ground, giggling to herself.

  “Good girl!” he calls. Maya’s new friend picks up a stick, and he throws it too. “Kid’s mom’s going to think I’m a freak,” Jacob mutters.

  It looks to me like that little boy’s mom is squinting herself into early wrinkles, trying to see from across the lawn if Jacob is wearing a ring. I edge a little closer to him.

  “So look, obviously the first test was an epic fail, but do I at least qualify for a makeup exam?” I dodge a look up at him through my eyelashes. Please say yes.

  Jacob stiffens. “No.”

  I reel a little, then plant my feet wider to combat the dizziness. He can’t mean that. He said he loved me, and now he’s kicking me out the door after my first hour-long attempt at parenting. Can’t I get an internship here?

  “It was never a test!” he snaps. Maya looks over our way and he waves at her, pasting on a smile, then lowers his voice. “The point wasn’t that I expected you to be a pro at babysitting. Come on, do you think I knew what I was doing when my parents died? I’d been busy in college since she was born—I’d never even been alone with Maya before the accident.” He crosses his arms. “I wanted us to be in this together, Jera. In our relationship, as role models for Maya, in whatever. You don’t go through life knowing what you’re supposed to do, but if you’re lucky, you have someone to figure it out with. You can’t do that if one of you is going to give up on the whole thing the first time you screw up.”

  My stomach drops. He’s absolutely right, and yet after everything we’ve been through, my first instinct was to try even harder to prove myself to him instead of trusting that he didn’t need me to.

  “You know that game where you’re supposed to fall and catch each other?” Jacob sounds past annoyed now, and well into upset. “You’d never fall for me. I’d be standing there, mats laid out, hands extended, muscles braced. And instead, you’d fall on Danny.” He shakes his head. “He probably wouldn’t be paying any attention, you’d both end up on the ground, and you’d laugh like crazy and it wouldn’t matter.”

  This time when I see his jaw flex, I want to wrap him in a legs-and-all koala hug. “Wait, are you jealous now?” I poke him in the ribs, starting to smile. “I thought Jacob Tate was way too selfless and mature to ever be jealous.”

  He scowls. “I’m not jealous that you love him, I’m jealous that you trust him.”

  My eyes widen. “Hey.” I lay a hand on his arm, but he keeps going because now that he’s started, he obviously has some things to get off his chest.

  “Did you know the professors gave me a key to the art building? I’m not even an art major. Moms from Maya’s daycare practically throw their children at me. When I don’t have time to babysit for them, or even go for a play date, they ask my advice. Mine.” He frowns down at me. “I’m not even old enough to buy my own beer, Jera. People give me their cars even though I don’t have a license, I didn’t go to school for that, and they have no recourse if I screw it up. One loose bolt, one forgetful moment, and their car could fail when they’re on the freeway and kill thirty other people. Everyone trusts me but you, Jera.” His jaw twitches as he looks out at Maya. “So yeah, maybe I’m still a little pissed about that.”

  I squeeze his arm, his PU hoodie soft against my p
alm even though his bicep is clenched underneath. “For the record, it’s not that Danny’s more trustworthy than you. It’s that he has lower standards. I don’t exactly have to worry about impressing a guy whose roommate lit his toothbrush on fire trying voodoo spells on a goldfish.”

  Jacob does not laugh.

  I turn so I’m standing right in front of him. “Hey,” I say softly. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  He scowls. “That just makes it worse.” He sits down, dropping his arms over his knees and grabbing his wrist with the opposite hand so hard that I wince. “Give me a problem I can fix already.”

  I sit down next to him. “I can’t. Because you’re not the problem. I am.” There has never been a man more worthy of trust than Jacob Tate. That’s not news. But what’s giving me hope right now is that he’s mad because he cares what I think. He wants me to trust him, to rely on him. I already do, more than he realizes. I’m just trying to be someone he can rely on, too.

  “There’s nothing—” He stops himself, swallows.

  “There’s nothing wrong with me? That’s what you were going to say, isn’t it?”

  He doesn’t answer.

  It’s not that this is going anything like I planned, or even that it’s going particularly well. But for a second there, I saw the crack in his defenses. He cares about me, and as long as I’ve still got that, I can deal with the rest. Besides, I’ve got a feeling I know why he’s still holding back.

  I glance over to check on Maya. She’s ignoring the little boy now, pushing his soccer ball around while he breaks the sticks she had into pieces.

  I hug my knees into my chest. “There’s plenty wrong with me, Jacob. It’s just mostly in my head.” I grimace. “Which doesn’t sound so bad, until you realize that’s the most dangerous place it could be.” After last year, when I exhausted myself trying to please everyone, I thought the only safe thing to do was to stop trying: to have a relationship, to be a better person, to make my parents proud. I got it half right, because that helped me figure out what I really wanted. But the answer wasn’t to give up, it was to find a man who would love me even when I wasn’t perfect. The way my parents do. The way Danny does. The way Granna did.