Flutter

“I can’t live with Peter anymore, and I don’t think you should either,” Jack said. “And I don’t really want to be around Mae.”

I chewed my lip and looked up at him. He’d just come back, and I really didn’t want to lose him again, but I wasn’t ready to sacrifice everything else just to be with him.

“Okay,” he said. “How about this? I keep working with Ezra, and we start looking for a place of our own in the Cities, with room enough for Milo and Bobby to stay with us as often as they want. We’ll still be close to everybody, and Milo can go back and forth if he wants, but me and you will finally have some privacy.”

“Okay,” I nodded, but the idea made me nervous.

After seeing what Milo did to Bobby and Jonathan did to Jane, I wasn’t so keen on the idea of privacy with Jack. Yes, I really, really, really wanted to do things with him, but I loved him too much to kill him.

“I have barely slept in three days,” Jack yawned. “And it’s not even noon yet. What do you say we get some sleep?”

“Sounds good,” I smiled and gave him a kiss on the lips.

He pulled off his tee shirt and shorts, opting to sleep in his boxers, which was fine by me. Few people in the world looked as amazing in their underwear as Jack did. I crawled into bed, and he climbed in after me. He lay on his back so I could curl up in his arms, resting my head on his chest.

“I missed you so much,” he said, running his fingers through my hair.

“Me too.” I squeezed him tightly, then thought of something. “Where did you sleep for the past three days?”

“Hotel,” Jack chuckled a little. “I just got a room at a hotel downtown, and I didn’t leave until an hour ago. I couldn’t take being away from you anymore, so I came home.”

“You should’ve came home the first day.”

“I know, but I had some thinking to do,” he sighed. “And it worked out okay. I mean, I’m here with you now, aren’t I?”

“That you are.” I kissed his chest, then lay my head back down.

Jack must not have been kidding about not getting any sleep, because within seconds, he was sound asleep. I stayed awake longer than him, thinking about all the things he said, and trying to come up with a solution.

I promised him that I would never hurt him again and living with Peter might be too great a temptation for me. I couldn’t explain it, but that made it all the more dangerous. If Jack thought it was best to leave, it might actually be. And even if it wasn’t, it was what he wanted, and after everything I’ve put him through, didn’t I owe him that much?

Nobody seemed that surprised to see Jack when we got up. Unlike me, they had all known he was coming back. Jane greeted Jack with a shocking amount of indifference, and that’s the same way Jack treated Mae. Mae rushed over to apologize, and he all but pushed her back. Her face crumbled afterwards, but I couldn’t really encourage him to forgive her. He had to do it in his own time.

Peter had stepped out for the evening, but nobody really knew where. I suspected that he had known Jack was around and disappeared before things got ugly.

Jack took Ezra back to the den so they could “discuss” things in a very mysterious fashion. It was probably business talk and about moving out, but apparently, Jack didn’t want everybody else to know of his intentions yet.

Mae got over being snubbed by Jack because she had Jane to distract her. In the dining room, she had thrown down a giant towel on the floor and set up an impromptu hair salon. Mae always cut everyone’s hair.

Jane sat in a chair with foil and dye in her hair, and she languidly flipped through an issue of Cosmo. While waiting for Jane’s hair to set, Mae cut Milo’s hair. For the first time in weeks, Mae seemed to brighten up. A discussion about lip-gloss had done what the rest of us couldn’t.

“Would you like a haircut too, love?” Mae smiled up at me over the top of Milo’s head. Her own hair was clean and pulled back neatly. Jane made some comment about shoes, and Mae laughed, her eyes sparkling. “What do you say, Alice?”

“Um… no, I’m good,” I said.

“Girls’ shoes are so much better than boys’ shoes,” Milo lamented. He lifted his head to steal a glance at Jane’s magazine, but Mae gently pushed his head back down so she could trim his hair.

“At least you don’t have to wear heals,” Jane said.  “I mean, they may look fantastic, but they kill to walk in. They’re like little feet torture chambers.” Mae laughed again, the second time in two minutes.

Taking in the scene in front of me, it finally occurred to me what was happening. Mae had a daughter, and a granddaughter, and a sick great-granddaughter, but all she ever took care of were boys. Peter and Ezra needed nothing from her at all.

When I came around, she had been so thrilled because she thought she’d finally have a girl to pal around with, but I spent most days lounging around in jeans. Jack was back, so I tried to look extra pretty today, and I had still gone for jeans with a fancy green top.

Maybe that was why Mae had bonded so much more with Milo than she did with me. He was probably more feminine, and in a weird way, needier than me, even though he was also far more self-sufficient.

Enter Jane, the walking Barbie doll. All clothes, boys, fashion, and a constant need for attention, the exact thing Mae needed. I’m not sure if this solved Mae’s crisis over what to do about her terminal great-granddaughter, but it lifted her spirits for a while.