Page 12 of Jake and Conner
Wonderful.
"If you don't open the door I'll let myself in," I announced. At least I was pretty sure that he still kept the spare key in the same location he always did. As it turned out, though, it wasn't necessary for me to go get it.
The door wasn't locked.
Bracing myself, I stepped inside. The front half of the house was dark, but that didn't stop me from seeing the large furry creature that came bounding toward me. "Bailey!" I greeted the gentle Labrador-Bulldog mix. One of the sweetest dogs in all of Oceanport. "Wanna tell me where your daddy is?" I asked Bailey as I scratched her neck.
Bailey barked and ran back the way she'd come. There was a sliver of light spilling into the hallways from the door that led to the living room. Bailey disappeared into the room and slowly, I followed her.
The light was on low in the living room.
Jake lay sprawled out on the couch, one of his hands dangling off the side. Bailey nudged it with her nose, but her owner didn't wake. Taking stock of the room, I had a pretty good idea why. Jake's state probably had something to do with the empty liquor bottles that lined the edge of the couch.
"Seriously?" I muttered under my breath. Here I was worrying about Jake and what was he doing? Having a party by himself. At this point, I should have just left.
But there was something about this scene that just didn't feel right.
Jake had never been a heavy drinker--which was probably why he was passed out on the couch right now--but I'd never known him to go overboard like this. He knew when to stop; he'd learned that the hard way when we were teens. The first time he'd tried to impress me by trying to sneak a case of beer from his dad he'd ended up violently sick after.
He wasn't the type to get drunk by himself in his living room.
Besides, I noticed something else too. There was a gift box on the coffee table, and it had my name on it.
So he hadn't forgotten my birthday.
Momentarily mollified, I decided not to walk out. Sure, Jake was acting like an idiot, but he was a redeemable idiot. A cute one too.
God, had I really just looked at a drunk person in his passed out state and thought he was kind of cute like that?
Maybe Jake wasn't the only idiot in the room.
I stepped up to the couch, wrinkled my nose against the sharp smell of the liquor and nudged Jake's shoulder. "Jake? You okay?"
He grunted and rolled over. Only there was no space on the couch for him to roll, so he landed on the carpet floor. Bailey yipped as she jumped out of the way and then barked at her owner as if to ask what was going on.
I laughed. At least Jake was waking up now. He snapped his eyes open and waved his arms as if lost at sea--which resulted in him knocking over one of the liquor bottles on the floor. It wasn't completely empty either.
"Fuck," he cursed as amber-colored liquid spilled over him and seeped into his carpet. He sat up and righted the bottle in a hurry. Then his gaze finally darted to me. "Conner?" He rubbed his eyes as if he couldn't believe what he was seeing. His speech was slurred, which made me think he hadn't been asleep for too long when I came in.
"I thought I'd come check on you," I said.
"Why?" Jake asked. Meanwhile, Bailey started licking his cheek and Jake turned to bury his face in her fur. I hoped he wasn't going to be sick.
"You didn't respond to my message."
"Oh." Jake shot me a frown. "You do that to me lots of times. I don't walk into your house."
"Do you want me to leave?"
Jake's response was immediate. "No." Slowly, he stood from the floor but swayed on his feet.
"Maybe you should sit," I suggested. "Why were you drinking?"
Jake gave me a half-hearted shrug. "Cause why not?" He laughed. I had no idea what was so funny. "You should try it sometime," he said. "But you can't. You don't have time. You don't have time foranything." He spread his arms wide and then let himself flop back on the couch.
"I do have time," I protested, though I wasn't sure why I bothered. We'd had this stupid argument so many times there was something almost nostalgic about it. I knew exactly how Jake was going to respond. He was going to complain that I had time forotherthings, just not for him. Which had never been true.
Or at least, I liked to think that it wasn't.
