This
is supposed to be Nick and Jude bonding time. Somehow it got waylayed
by basketball which kind of freaked me out because I know nothing
about it. Random. Anyway, please comment. I need to start
writing again if I'm going to keep up with regular updates; the next
chapter is only half done. I'll try to make it a bit longer since
these last ones have been really short.
Part
24
"I
want to hear you laugh like you really mean
it."
Jude sat on a stack of old tires, swinging her legs forward and bouncing the back of her feet against the rubber surface as she watched Nick jog around the Warehouse, dribbling a basketball in front of him. Since they returned from the library an agreement had been met to put aside the plan, their worries and everything else for a few hours to just relax.
They'd congregated to the first floor of the Warehouse. Nick had found an old basketball under a work bench, along with a makeshift hoop an old employee had made, six feet from the floor in the corner of the room. Tommy was sitting on the stairs, scribbling in his notebook and Jude was bored.
"Want to play?" Nick called to her, holding the ball up questioningly.
Tommy's eyes lifted from his notebook as he watched her shake her head. "Not a good idea. I'm so bad with organized sports I'm almost lethal."
Nick's head tilted to the side adorably. He grinned and let the ball drop to the floor, without even looking he caught it as it bounced back up. "Come on. No one is that bad."
She shook her head. "No, really. I put my best friend Jamie in the hospital with concussion after a tennis game when I was eight."
"So you've got a strong arm. That's good."
"He didn't think so."
Without warning he tossed the ball at her. She caught in and stared at him questioningly.
"Good reflexes too. You're a natural; you just don't know it yet." He motioned for her to come over and sighing dramatically, she hopped down off the tires.
"The key to Sport and being good at Sport is to enjoy it," Nick explained. He motioned for her to toss him the ball and she did so with so little enthusiasm it barely reached him. She glanced over her shoulder at Tommy, raising her eyebrows as if to say 'you buying this?' and he shrugged in response, smiling slightly.
"Take a shot," Nick urged, tossing the ball back at her. She wasn't so quick catching it this time and it connected with her gut, eliciting a loud 'oof' from her lips. Nick cringed.
Making a face, Jude turned to the hoop and tossed the ball. It arced through the air then began to fall, finally hitting the wall three feet below the hoop.
"Okay, not the strongest first effort," Nick conceded as he jogged over to retrieve the ball.
"You're crazy," she remarked with a shake of her head.
"So," she gripped the ball in her hands, running her hands over the grooves in the plastic. "What do you do Nick? I mean, when you're not helping rock stars and fugitive boy banders."
He grinned, "I'm in college, majoring in journalism."
She nodded, "Very Clark Kent, ties in well with your heroic acts of late." She tossed the ball to him and being distracted by the conversations he failed to notice her hoop evasions.
"My Dad wasn't too pleased. Not enough wealth and power in it for his liking." He noticed her eyes fall to the floor and the disapproving look Tommy cast him over her shoulder. "Sorry, not small talk material."
She shook her head. "It's fine. He's your Dad. Of course he'll come up in conversation." She cringed as the ball flew back her way and fumbled to catch it. "I take it you're not close now but were you ever?"
"When I was a kid he was little more then the man that paid the Nanny. In my teens he was around more, trying to craft me into some close of his own career glory, like I was his new project. I had to go to the right schools, network with the right people, avoid the wrong, learn to be ruthless. All that crap."
"I'm sorry."
He shrugged, "it was different when my mother was alive. I only have a couple of memories of her but they were good ones. Things would have been different if she'd survived."
Jude glanced up from her attempt at dribbling to see him staring at her. She blushed, assuming it was down to her poor athletic skills. "How did she die?"
He glanced at her briefly and she caught the glimmer of tears in his eyes before he looked away. "Ugh, this isn't really small talk material either." He shook his head, "Tommy says you have a sister. What's she like?"
She smiled. "She's great. You'd like her, the boys always do." She rolled her eyes over her should at Tommy. "Just ask him."
Tommy made a face at her in response.
- -
"Sunday morning rain is falling and I'm calling out to you…"
Tommy was standing by an open second floor window, eating an apple. It was early the following morning and neither he nor Jude had broken the tense atmosphere around them by speaking. Things were easier when Nick was around, his laid back nature easily overcoming their own uptight tendencies.
Jude had been reading a newspaper in the corner when she spoke up suddenly. "What would you say to seeing Richard Furlow in person?"
He turned away from the window to face her. "What?"
She was sitting on the mattress, a blanket wrapped loosely around her shoulders and her hair spilling around her shoulders. Early mornig light spilled through the window, falling on her like a spotlight, far superior to any that had ever illuminated her on stage. He paused for a second to inhale slowly.
She held the paper out to him then shook it impatiently when he failed to take it. "On the top right hand side; he's appearing at a charity ball tonight. Nick could probably get us in. You said you've only spoken with him on the phone or via his henchmen. I'd like to see what we're dealing with close up."
He scanned the article briefly, "You're crazy. What if he saw us?"
"There's going to be hundreds of people there. We'd keep a fair distance and you obviously didn't read the small print." She stood up, letting the blanket fall from her shoulders. "Right here," she jabbed at the end of the article, "Two words: Masquerade ball."
A grin slowly spread across his features as he stared at the words. He glanced at her to see she had one to match.
"I'd say I'm in."
Teasers
for Part 25
"Candle
lit small light inside your window that I see hoping that your light
still shines for me."
Frustrated, she turned around and opened the door behind her to let him in then returned to the mirror. She saw his eyes rove over her when he thought she wasn't looking and felt a familiar flutter in her stomach. Then, nonchalantly he ran a hand through his hair and leaned against the door frame.