Page 38 of King of Jokers

“Anyway. Given you helped me so much in making sure my novel was perfect, I knew I had to read it to you. So here’sa little ditty ’bout Jackson and Summer…” She didn’t sing the lyrics, but I heard the tune all the same. It was our song after all.

I watched her, not wanting to interrupt in case she stopped, ran away or disappeared before my very eyes. Lifting the paper in front of her, she flashed me the smallest smile before she began to read.

Summer was frozen. Everything she thought she knew about the man before her, long forgotten. Her earlier assumptions challenged when he stood before her, declaring his love in an act she never could have envisioned.

The rain had splattered his skin, the backdrop of a tumultuous sea spread out behind him as he told her what she had always hoped, but never thought she would hear.

He loved her.

Jackson loved Summer.

“You’re my North Star,” he’d said. The intensity of the memory alone reigniting a spark deep in her belly.

“I love you,” he’d admitted.

And she’d stood there. Feeling every single thing he was brave enough to admit, but caged by insecurity and fear which prevented the same words leaving her own mouth.

Because more than anything, Summer was terrified of the unknown.

She paused to look up into my eyes as she dropped the papers and spoke from memory or heart or both.

And admitting she loved him too – and she did love him – scared her. Leaving everything she had ever known was near debilitating because Summer knew nothing if not predictability.

But what scared her more than that, was losing Jack.

“I’m sorry,” she said to him now as tears filled her eyes and her hand wiped across her face to catch them. Hoping the words, coming two days later, weren’t too late.

Winter mimicked Summer’s actions, wiping her own tears and I bit my lip to avoid correcting her calling him Jack.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you I loved you too. Because I do. I always have. I thought I couldn’t ever leave Willow Bay. I thought I would miss the beauty of the sunrises over the beach where we spent so many mornings searching for shells. I thought I would miss the grassy roads which led into town – the same path we rode our bikes to and from school hundreds of times. I thought I would miss the nights spent searching for stars, our laughter so deep it ended with a stitch in my side. I thought I would miss the sounds of the cicadas at the beginning of November each year because it meant you were coming home. But it was none of those things I would miss. It was you, Jack.

“You are in the concrete of every single one of my memories. It wasn’t Willow Bay that made me comfortable. It was you. And I will find those things wherever you are because I love you.”

She paused, a small smile on her face which was now covered with tears.

She was here. Regardless of all of the fear it would have evoked, she came.

Because she loved me too.

I stepped towards her, using the pads of my thumbs to swipe her cheeks clear of her emotions.

“I didn’t know Jackson and Summer lived in Willow Bay?” I said and she huffed a small laugh.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you every time I thought about it but Iwilltell you everyday for the rest of my life. If you’ll have me.”

My hands framed her face, lifting her chin slightly so I could stare into those gorgeous brown eyes.The same brown eyes I’d dreamed about for longer than I could remember.

“You came here. For me,” I whispered and she nodded. “Thank fucking god,” I added before taking her mouth with my own. She melted against me, her hands wrapping around my back tightly. And having her, like this, felt like finally coming home.

It wasn’t until the cheering of the boys got louder that I pulled my mouth from her own.

“Why do you taste like that lethal orange poison?”

“I needed some liquid courage,” she winced and I laughed to the sounds of more hollering. We turned to see the team all lined along the sideline, not having followed the orders of their captain, who was also watching with a troupe of females who I also recognised.

Oh for fuck sake.Did every person I’d ever met need to be here?

“Oh my god,” Winter said as Arna, Marlee, Eva and Felicity came walking towards us.

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