"Katie, what're you doing here?"
A long, awful silence stretched out as Katie dissected the scene in front of her and slowly drew her conclusions. A woman was in Tuck's t-shirt, at his house after clearly staying the night and (because as women we have a sixth sense about this) she was not wearing a bra. This didn't bode well. I had no doubt that when she saw I was the female in Tuck's home, she would be extremely pissed off. To try and look less guilty, I turned and gave Katie what I hoped was a neutral smile. Her eyebrows rose in poorly concealed shock but she managed to force a smile in return.
"Jessie, what a surprise to find you here." Not a good one if her tone was anything to go by. "What brought on this impromptu sleepover?"
"Nothing happened." Tuck ground out a bit too defensively. I shot his back a withering look and bit tongue so I wouldn't inform him that I was more than capable of answering for myself.
Katie pretended to look surprised and let out a laugh. "I didn't say anything did. How are you, Jessie?"
"I'm fine, thank you." Sound nicer, sound less guilty I though. "How're you and Joe?"
"We're fine." Katie's voice was clipped and she quickly found a reason to ignore me. "Tuck, honey, I was really hoping that we could grab breakfast and talk about yesterday. I really wanna put it behind us as soon as we can; for us and for Joe."
Everything about that sentence made me prickle: she'd never use terms of endearment like that with Tuck – "honey" was for my benefit to prove he was hers; she'd probably wanted another chance to fight her side but since I was there she could let this argument blow over and she sounded too sincere, too upset by it. But the thing that annoyed me the most was that she was right – Tuck was hers. He wasn't property but there were officially making another go of being a couple and I was seconds away from being one thing I'd never wanted to be – the "other woman". No matter what had happened a few minutes ago, no matter the feeling that was left in my chest and how painfully right it had felt, I had no right to kiss Tuck because he was dating the mother of his child. I sucked my bottom lip between my teeth and bit down hard.
"I'm sorry, I didn't realise-" "I was just going anyway." I interrupted Tuck. Even to my own ears my voice hard and Tuck turned towards me.
"Jess, you don't have to." he said.
His brow furrowed as he clearly tried to tell me something without saying the words. I pretended not to notice and began to edge my way to the spare room.
"It's fine, I have work to supervise at the house and then a backshift at the hospital anyway." I said truthfully.
I knew that Tuck couldn't protest anymore without risking Katie's wrath so I slipped out of the kitchen and walked towards to spare bedroom as casually as I could. I didn't look back at him. Damn him for putting me in that position! Damn me for letting him put me in that position! But, most of all, damn Katie for interrupting our position.
I made a quick escape after making the bed and fully dressing. Tuck rose from where he was sitting on the sofa – from a conversation that was straining to keep its volume down – but before he could get close enough to give me a hug, or say anything without being overheard, I said a hurried goodbye and left. I could count on one hand the number of times I had left without saying a proper goodbye to Tuck so I couldn't un-see the hurt that flashed across his face.
Past experience told me that Katie would want some form of retribution for what she's just walked in on and I would take it because it would be nothing compared to her reaction if she knew the danger Joe had been in. Walking down the stairs, I sent a silent thanks to the universe for Joe's thoughtfulness and insistence that we keep her in the dark about him being at my house on the night of the fire.
TmWtMwTmWtMw
Two hours later I was weeding my back garden in a vain attempt to feel useful while my builders hammered and sawed and scraped in an attempt to break my house down so they could fix it up again. The day had turned out to be a warm one; the sun causing sweat to run down my face and back. I had a feeling that the back of my neck would be quite burned when I finished.
A pair of expensive leather boots walked into my field of vision to startle me out of my single-minded concentration. I knew who they belonged to but even as I looked up to meet her expectant and condescending gaze, I prayed that it wouldn't be Katie standing in front of me. Why did her clothes always have to fit her perfectly and her hair never look windswept? Making slow work of taking off my gloves and standing up, I tried really hard not to feel inferior in my own back garden. With the melanin that my Scottish ancestry denied me, Katie's skin was bronzing in the sun, not burning.
"What can I do for you?" There was no point in trying to beat about the bush.
"It's quite simple Jessica – stay away from Tuck. We've had this discussion before and I won't have it again." she folder her arms over her chest and waited for me to deny her implications.
"I'll tell you the same thing I told you eight years ago – we're friends. We were friends before you even came into the picture and I will not back off from it because you feel threatened." Katie scoffed, just like she had done the first time she's warned me away from him. "He is my best friend; I won't let you come between us."
"God, you're the same naïve girl aren't you? Nearly a decade later and you're still trying to pretend you're not in love with him." She shook her head in disbelief. "When will you realise, Jessie? He won't ever feel that way about you. You were a child when you met and when he looks at you he sees his best friend's little sister. We were married for six years; don't you think I know how he feels about you? Maybe now he sees you as a friend in your own right now or as his own sister, who knows? But he'll never get past the fact that you're his best friend's sister. First impressions last. What can you give him that I can't? He gave his heart to me before and I'm going to take it back again."
I hated her. I hated the smug look on her face and that every word had felt like a physical blow – hitting home with such resounding truth that I felt the fight being knocked out of me and a tremendous urge to sit down. But I steeled my face, stiffened my spine and looked Katie dead in the eye.
"Are you done?"
"It's only a matter of time before Tuck and I are married again. Don't get in the way Jessica, you'll only get hurt. How many times has he broken your heart and not even noticed? Move on. Find another man because you can't have mine."
With that parting shot she turned on her heels and headed for her car. I calmly placed my gloves on the grass, took a deep breath and walked to the utility room that had been mostly untouched by the fire. Slowly and methodically, I washed my hands and arms then I looked into the small mirror above the sink. Wisps of hair had escaped the bun I had tried to control my long hair into so I pulled the hair tie out and let my dark brown hair tumble to my waist. It didn't frame my face like they say in books, it just looked a bit untidy. My usually pale skin was flushed and coated in a sheen of perspiration; my eyes still held smudges of the makeup I hadn't properly removed last night.
No wonder Tuck doesn't give me a second look I though bitterly.
Without meaning to I recalled what he's said to me that morning "You're unselfish, caring, smart, funny, beautiful…"
I sighed, utterly defeated, and let my head drop when holding it up seemed like too much of an effort. Tears gathered in my eyes again and I tried to remind myself that I was twenty-six, not six. Then something caught my eye. The blue handles had always fit so comfortably on my fingers, the blades reliably sharp whenever I needed them. I picked up the scissors and turned them over in my hands as thoughts churned in my head. I caught my own eye in the mirror and nodded once, my mind suddenly made up.
Sliding a lock of hair between my fingers, I cut before I could back out of my own deal. The piece that fell into the sink was over a foot long. I grabbed more hair and snipped. Each time I cut I told myself that this was the beginning of a change. I was going to stop loving Tuck Hansen. I was going to lift my head up high and move on. I'd dance in the rain and with strangers; I would get on a train with no idea where it would take me, just for a day; I would use the money that my parents had left, that Nanna had invested and grown into a not-so-small fortune, and I'd actually live.
Much love and thanks,
Liv.
