Page 81 of Full Tilt
A short silence descended in which I heard only my own heartbeat, thudding hard against my chest. I reached again and pried his hand from the wheel. His medic alert bracelet glinted in the streetlight.
“You don’t have to be sorry. Don’t apologize. That kiss wasbeautiful. Didn’t you feel it? It feltrightand perfect, and it means something. Jonah…”
“God, Kace,” he whispered, his voice breaking. “You should go. Please. Just go.”
“I don’t want to,” I said, my own voice cracking. “I don’t want to waste another minute. I was away from you for twelve days when I quit the band.Twelvedays I’ll never get back.” Tears streamed down my cheeks freely now. “Listen to me. I’m more afraid of not being with you than I am of being with you. Or of what might happen four months from now.”
Jonah’s hand gripped mine tight, and his own eyes shone.
“Four months,” he said, shaking his head. “Do you know why I keep my damn schedule? Why I keep my head down and work every day to get the installation ready for the opening? It’s not just to finish the work. It’s because when I do only that, I keep time as an abstract idea. Instead of a linear stretch of days it’s…a sphere. A glass sphere in which I work, visit my family, have drinks with friends, over and over, round and round. Each week no different from the next. That’s how I hold time still.”
Tears splattered my skirt. “And now I’ve messed it all up?”
He shook his head, his eyes brimming, his voice hoarse and tremulous at the edges. “No. You’ve been a brilliant light in my drab, dark world. But if you let me kiss you again… If we start something right now, time won’t stand still. The end,myend, won’t be some nebulous thing off in the distance. It’ll race toward me, because…”
His voice choked off, and I held his hand tighter, our tears falling together.
“Because why?” I whispered.
“Because, Kace, the days will count down until there’s only one left,” he said through gritted teeth. “The one where I have to say goodbye to you.”
The words pummeled my heart, cracked and broke it.
It’s real. Like Lola said. I can’t pretend this away.
Jonah heaved a breath and turned away, wiping his cheek onthe sleeve of his shirt. “It’ll be hard enough as friends,” he said, his voice full of gravel. “It’ll be so much worse if we try to have more. If we make love. If we fall…” He shook his head, frustration coloring his agonized expression now.
“Jonah…”
“It’s late. I have a lot of work to do tomorrow.”
I couldn’t take the cold finality in his tone. I nodded mutely and reached for the door. “All right. Thanks for dinner and my first time in a casino…”
And my first kiss.
Jonah reached across the seat to take my hand again. He held it tightly, pressed my fingers to his lips, and then let me go.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-SIX
In the early morning hours on the Friday of Oscar’s camping trip, my phone chirped with a text from Kacey.
Yesterday @ lunch, Tania told me she found a $250 bonus in her paycheck.
Who said nickel slots don’t pay?I typed back.
Wasn’t me.Smartass. :P
I eased a sigh of relief. Things hadn’t been tense between Kacey and me that last week, but they weren’t 100% back to normal either. She was as sweet as ever, still bringing Tania and me lunch at the hot shop or sending me random, funny texts like this one. She was doing what I’d asked her to do: she was being my friend. Upholding her end of the bargain, while I had been the selfish bastard who kissed her and nearly fucked everything up between us.
None of us—Oscar, Theo, or myself—had a car or truck big enough to hold six passengers and our camping gear, so we each drove up in pairs. The drive to Great Basin National Park was a four-and-a-half-hour drive. I thought for sure Kacey and I would spend the entire time in an awkward silence, the kiss and everything after hanging between us.
But long silences and Kacey Dawsondidn’t mix. She was allsmiles when I picked her up at her complex, and chatted nonstop about various topics, and camping itself.
“I never spent a night outdoors,” she said. “Will we see stars?”
“You’ll see so many stars, it’ll look unreal,” I told her.
