Page 24 of Room 908

“Oh shit, now you’ve done it,” Jasper’s brother Beck said, laughing.

“What? What did I—?” I began to ask, confused, before I heard the rumbling. It was the sound of a stampede coming up the stairs, feet stamping on wood, accompanied by whooping and hollering. I found it impossible to believe it was only a dozen ten-year-olds. They were hopped up on sugar and were somehow feeding off each other’s unlimited supply of energy. Beck grabbed me by the back of the shirt and pulled me out of the way before I could get bowled over as the kids thundered past to the dining room. “It’s like the entire defensive line coming at me at once!”

Beck patted me on the back. “Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it. Just in time for them to grow out of it.” I detected a hint of pity in his voice.

I’d been so distracted dealing with Jasper’s and my emotions about the whole surprise-kid scenario that I hadn’t really taken into account all the other people who’d been involved. Jasper hadn’t told his family who the father was either, and some of them had made it very clear to me that they had disagreed about his choice to keep the secret.

“I’m not mad at Jasper, you know,” I told Beck quietly as the kids descended on the pizza boxes laid out on the dining room table. “I don’t blame him for what he did.”

“Yeah, well… I do,” he said pointedly. “Things could’ve been better, easier. He could’ve been a doctor by now if he hadn’t been so damn stubborn.”

“Hush, Beck,” Isabelle scolded. “It wasn’t your decision to make.”

Beck gave his mother a look I couldn’t decipher, full of regret, but he didn’t argue. Instead, he said, “I’m gonna go grab a slice of pizza before the vultures pick it clean.”

Across the room, I saw Jasper had made himself at home in my kitchen, and my chest warmed. He was busy making sure every kid had the right drink. “He has the patience of a saint,” I told his mom.

“He does, doesn’t he?” We both watched him for a moment. I loved how he gave every kid his individual attention, even if it was only for a split second before they went back to eating or laughing with friends.

“How’s your dad?” she asked me carefully. “Any plans for him to meet his grandson?” It had never been a secret that my dad struggled to raise me on his own after my mom left. My dad did his best to hide his resentment, but the rift that formed between us was wide. Mr. and Mrs. Mayle invited me for family dinner often in the weeks leading up to graduation, when I was over to study with Jasper. Sitting around that dinner table was the first time I’d felt like part of a family, and I still held that feeling close to this day.

I shrugged. “I called to tell him, but he didn’t know how to take the news. We’re no closer than we were ten years ago, but you never know. Maybe he’ll come around.”

The din surged in volume when someone spilled their drink. No matter the ruckus, though, my mind kept coming back to what Beck had said. A new kind of regret was itching at me. “Hey, Mrs. Mayle, I’m really sorry for what I put you all through. I didn’t mean to hurt anyone. I just…” I sighed. “I just really loved your son.”

“I know you did, and I suspect you still do. It’s not your fault that his life took a different path. And he doesn’t regret Cam at all, not for one second. Even as a single parent, he still had plans to finish medical school, but then I got breast cancer a few years ago, and he dropped out to help take care of me. If it’s anyone’s fault he didn’t finish, it’s mine.”

“I’m sorry,” I said earnestly. “He’d mentioned you got sick, but he never said with what.”

“He has a hard time saying the C-word,” she said, smirking. “As if saying it out loud will give it power over us. I’m better now, but I feel like he’s still holding his breath.” She shook her head. “Hard to believe he wanted to be a doctor. He’s smart enough, and he had the drive, but his heart is too soft.”

I chuckled, thinking about how hard it had been for Jasper to see me get hurt on the field. But when I thought back to teenage Jasper and his single-minded focus on becoming a doctor, I wondered if there wasn’t another reason it was difficult for him to handle it. Maybe it wasn’t that his heart was too soft but that he felt helpless to stop it. With that degree, he might’ve had the ability to treat cancer or set broken bones. Without it, he was just a father and a son, and his love was all he had to offer.

I may not have known the part I’d played in changing his future, but maybe it wasn’t too late to give it back…

“If you’ll excuse me,” I said to Isabelle, and she waved me off with a knowing smile.

The chaos was still in full swing, but when I saw my opportunity, I grabbed it—or rather, I grabbed Jasper. “Come with me,” I whispered in his ear, hooking a finger around his pinky, aware of all the eyes on us.

“Right now? Can it wait?” he asked, half his attention still on the kids.

“I think it’s waited long enough,” I told him, and he must’ve heard something in my voice because he looked up at me, then nodded.

“Okay.” The kids had plenty of other adults in the room to chaperone, and Jasper let me lead him from the room.

We didn’t go far. I pulled him into the walk-in pantry off the kitchen and slid the pocket door closed behind us. It muffled the kids’ chatter to a dull roar. “Where’s the light switch?” Jasper asked, and I heard him sliding his hand over the wall, looking for it.

“Leave it off for a second,” I told him, drawing him into my arms. Even in the dark, I remembered his body. He hadn’t changed so much as he might’ve thought. He still fit perfectly against me. “It’ll be easier to have this conversation without overanalyzing each other’s expressions.”

“Um, okay… You’re kind of scaring me.”

“It’s nothing bad. In fact, it could be very good.” His body was tense, but as I nuzzled into his neck, he started to melt into me, his hands smoothing over my chest. It felt so right to hold him like this, and I knew I’d promised we were just getting to know each other again, but my body was ready to move on to the next step.

Instead of kissing him until he forgot his own name like I wanted to, I braced myself for the conversation I needed to have with him. “I want you to go back to school.”

He jerked, bunching my shirt in his fists. “What? No, I can’t—”

“Just hang on, let me finish what I have to say before you turn me down.” Even without being able to see his face, I knew he was probably chewing on his bottom lip, trying to stop himself from the barrage of excuses he’d practiced over the years. He couldn’t go to school because he was busy taking care of Cam, taking care of his mother, busy with work so he could pay the bills. But now that I was back in the picture, those barriers were no longer in his way.

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