Chapter 8 yo. Thank you to the wonderful Ztofan! And thank you to everyone who reviewed chapter 7, I'm sorry I didn't get a chance to reply but I'm SO so grateful for all of you! :)
Alone: Chapter 8
Jess buried her head in the pillow, her fingers skirting over the material as she opened her eyes. She was greeted with the sight of the empty condom wrapper, and groaned as she turned over, placing her face in her hands. She had been awake for 20 minutes now, refusing to drag herself out of bed and greet the day.
She couldn't think of a single reason why Nick had left, other than to go and see his new girlfriend. The thought made her feel physically ill, and she was painfully aware that it was because she wanted him, for more than just sex. It had taken her a while, but she knew now. She wanted to be his girlfriend.
She thought back to all the times they had shared a look that said are you thinking what I'm thinking? All the jokes, playful nudges, exchanged words before they fell asleep still lost in each other. How small her hand felt in his. The way his face lit up whenever he saw her.
She had blown it, that was for sure. Last night had been special, something Jess would carry with her forever, but she wasn't sure it had been an indication of his desire to stay. She was almost certain now, as she lay tangled and naked in the sheets, that he was still going ahead with his decision to end things. She swallowed the lump in her throat – she had been so, so stupid, so determined to prove her best friend wrong that she had pushed away the best thing to come along in a very long time.
Sitting up abruptly and swinging her legs out of the bed, Jess decided that lying miserable in her room wasn't going to solve anything. She had kids to teach, lessons to plan and a promotion to work towards. She would go and see Nick after school, tell him how she felt. Even if he said no, that he would rather be with the other woman in his life, at least she tried. At least she gave it her all before accepting defeat. One thing was for sure – she wasn't going to let Nick get away with disappearing on her like that. Not without a serious explanation as to why he wanted to leave after making such passionate love to her.
She managed to force herself into the shower and some fresh clothes, slapping herself lightly in the face with her fingers as she stared at her reflection in the mirror. She had to prepare herself for the worst, but she couldn't help the seed of hope that was growing in her stomach whenever she thought back to the way he held and kissed her. That hadn't been her imagination, and she knew that it was now up to her to march over there and convince him that she was better for him than Miss No Face. No matter how besotted he might be with her, Jess wasn't sure it could compete with whatever had happened between them last night.
She was distracted as she drove to the school, but even under extreme stress Jessica Day was a damn fine driver. Although she nearly hit a very alarmed fourth grader when she got to work, everything seemed to go quite smoothly. She could have done with a little more lipstick perhaps, and maybe a hairbrush, but nobody noticed in their pre-coffee stupor. It wasn't like they hadn't all turned up hung over at work, at least once anyway.
When lunchtime came round Jess was edgy, leaning against the wall and paying no attention to the students as she checked her phone every two minutes. She was supposed to be on lunch duty, but her mind was elsewhere. She was torn between refreshing her signal to see if maybe his text had gotten lost somewhere, and just texting him herself, probably something along the lines of seriously?!
This feeling was strange and new to Jess. She had never cared this much about anyone – she could count the sexual partners she'd had on one hand, and Spencer sure as hell never made her body convulse with waves of pleasure. In fact, since she and Nick had made their arrangement an actual thing, Jess hadn't really thought about Spencer at all. She thought that she would know when she was over him, that it would be a defining moment of her female independence, but it wasn't. It turned out, she just…woke up one day and he didn't matter to her any more. She didn't want him back. She might have felt liberated, if it wasn't for the small fact that the guy who solved all her problems promptly decided he wanted to be with someone else, and all her shiny new ideas of happiness turned to shit when she rolled over in bed and he was gone.
Her last couple of lessons served as a welcome distraction, but all too soon the bell was ringing and it was time to go home, the kids conjuring up a miraculous amount of energy once they realized the school day was over. Jess was shuffling papers and trying to quell the butterflies in her stomach. She was nervous about going to see him, but was surprised to find out that excitement was churning in her belly too. What she was doing felt good, it felt invigorating. Nick was kind and honest, and that was what she needed after Spencer. She was prepared to put up a fight if it was necessary.
The drive to his apartment was a slow one, her fingertips drumming impatiently on the wheel as she crawled through traffic. "Come on," she muttered under her breath. She wasn't one for road rage, ever, but tonight she could feel herself getting agitated.
Once she was in front of his door, she hesitated. She had never done anything like this before, but she was here now, and seriously, what was the worst that could happen? He would say no, and she would be crushed, but at least he hadn't cheated on her. After all, they were never in a relationship in the first place.
She knocked once, twice, three times, biting her lip. The door swung open.
"Oh, hi. Jess is it?" the man in front of her most certainly was not Nick. She recognized him from the couple of times she'd been caught sneaking out of the apartment, but couldn't quite place his name.
"Yeah, hi…"
"Winston." He smiled at her. "If you've come to find Nick, he's not here. He's at work."
Her stomach dropped, but she had come this far and she wasn't giving up. "Do you know what time he finishes?" she asked, biting her lip, hoping Winston didn't think she was desperate. She knew he knew their arrangement. She didn't want him to think she was some kind of sex-starved hussy.
Winston checked the watch on his wrist. "An hour or two maybe? He's on a split shift today, I think he has to be back there at 9." He glanced at her, his eyebrows furrowing. "You wanna come in and wait for him?"
Jess breathed a sigh of relief. "Yeah, thanks."
She entered the apartment, scanning the room. "Schmidt's at work. I work nights, so it's just me here a lot of the time," Winston said, making his way to the kitchen. "Tea? Coffee?"
"Tea thanks," Jess answered with a small smile. "I'm sorry if I woke you up."
"Nah, it's cool," he replied, banging cupboards and clinking mugs. "Saturday is my day for sleeping."
She giggled as he handed her the mug of tea, wrapping her fingers around it in an attempt to warm up. Winston watched her intently over the rim of his coffee, until she was squirming under his gaze.
"So…" she started, unsure of what to say under his scrutiny. "Does Nick work nearby?"
"You don't know where he works?"
She shrugged, feeling embarrassed. "We never…y'know. Talked about it." She cringed.
Winston chuckled. "Yeah, he works over at Clyde's, it's not far from here. You ever been?" Jess shook her head. "He makes a mean raspberry margarita."
Jess tilted her head to the side. Huh. So Nick was a bartender, like JPEPPERWOOD. She sipped thoughtfully on her drink, wondering why she seemed to be attracted to the same kind of man all of a sudden. Maybe it was because she knew she wanted whatever the complete opposite of Spencer was – a little rough around the edges, attentive, real.
She drank some more of her tea as Winston took a seat at the kitchen island. "Thank you," she said with a shy smile. "Do you mind if I…" she gestured towards Nick's room, blushing.
"Sure, I'm going back to bed in a couple minutes anyway. Go wait for him in there, help yourself to a little light reading." He laughed to himself. "He's written enough to keep you entertained."
Jess felt her brain starting to shut down as she stared at Winston. "What?" she asked, her voice coming out blunt. There was no way he had just said that. "What?" she asked again, setting her mug down on the table before her with a loud bang.
Winston gave her a funny look. "I said you could go read some of his writing if you wanted. It's all over his bed at the minute, I sneaked a peek earlier. Usually he doesn't like people reading it, but…" he shrugged. "Maybe he wouldn't mind you taking a look."
Jess felt her breathing coming in little short bursts, and she turned on her heel and marched to Nick's room without uttering another word, leaving Winston to wonder what he had said. She pushed the door open and was met with a sight that took her breath away.
A full blown novel was strewn all over Nick's sheets, a mixture of scrawling cursive and neatly typed pages. There were pencils and pens, the ends chewed almost completely off, and little yellow post-its plastered here and there with notes scribbled on them. Sitting at the edge of the bed, Jess picked up a piece of paper and read it.
The low lighting cast shadows over the walls of Julius' basement as he paced in front of her lifeless body, trying not to let his mind wander and failing miserably. He threw himself into the chair in front of her, driving the heels of his palms into his eyes. The guilt was tearing him apart inside. He never should have dragged her into this.
The restraints clinked as she moved, finally waking, and Julius held his breath. This was the moment of truth – he was about to find out if Jessica was coming back good or bad. He pressed his clenched fists to his knees, his knuckles white. She had been out for a day, longer than it usually took to turn, and that worried him. He thought of her, fighting so hard in her own head to battle the disease, succumbing to it only when her last ounce of strength was gone. She was stubborn like that.
Her eyes opened, and he immediately saw the absence of color in them, her usual shocking blue replaced with a washed out grey, her pupils faded and barely visible. He swallowed. They weren't her eyes. Jessica had beautiful eyes, the kind you could get lost in for hours. The kind Julius had wanted to get lost in from the moment he met her.
She stirred, trying to sit up, but the straps and buckles prevented it. Then she looked at him, for the first time, the veins prominent in her face as she turned it towards him, slowly.
"Knight," he said, his voice cracking. "It's me, Pepperwood. Your boss." He waited for her to speak. If she spoke, there was hope. The bad ones never had enough brain activity to form words. They were mindless killing machines. "Come on, please talk to me Jessica. I can't finish this case on my own." He placed his head on his folded hands, breathing deeply, willing himself to hold it together.
"Boss."
His head shot up and he stared at her, stunned. She smiled slowly, bringing her deathly white hand to her mouth, apparently just as pleasantly surprised as he was that she could talk. Julius couldn't help but let out a breathy laugh. "Yeah, it's me. Oh my God Knight, I was worried sick, I haven't slept all night and-"
"You're my boss?" she asked, and he stopped, frowning.
"Yeah, I'm Julius Pepperwood." He straightened up in his seat, puffing his chest out a little. "Zombie detective. Best in town."
She tilted her head to the side, staring at him, and he was reminded of her old self, when she used to give him that look as he explained his latest theory to her, before immediately shutting him down with her know-it-all comments on why it didn't make any sense. "I don't know who you are. I've never met you."
"Yes, you have," Julius shot back, panic starting to spread through his body. "You came to my office, you made me hire you. You wanted to end this epidemic." His eyes frantically searched hers for some sign of recognition. "Don't you remember any of it?"
Her eyes showed nothing but confusion, and a hint of the same unease he was radiating himself. "The last thing I remember is…" she looked at the ceiling, deep in thought, "saying goodbye to my sister. We lost her." She cast her eyes to the floor. "Then I woke up here. Am I sick? Why am I strapped down?" She glanced down at herself, her yellow sundress caked with dirt. "Gosh, I'm so pale, I must have lost a lot of blood. Was I in an accident?"
Julius just stared at her as she looked at him, wide eyes demanding answers. She looked as innocent and naïve as ever. "Jessica…" he said, struggling to get the words out. "You're dead."
Jess slammed the piece of paper back on to the bed, closing her eyes. Her hands were shaking.
Nick was JPEPPERWOOD. The facial hair, the apartment near Chinatown, the bartending job, the fucking writing. All of it had been him, the whole time. And he had known about it.
She was so, so, unbelievably stupid. The back of her throat burned as she swept her eyes over the story on Nick's bed. The story about her. She wondered if the sex scene she had read online was in there, and it made her flush with hot embarrassment.
She was fucking furious. Standing abruptly, she leaned over the bed, ready to sweep everything to the floor, but something stopped her. Instead, she straightened up, smoothing her hands over her skirt as she took deep, heaving breaths. After a couple of minutes, she was considerably calm, the anger reduced to a simmer below the surface that she could control. She didn't need to be the angry psycho-bitch, she was better than that. She left his room, forcing a smile to Winston, who was still sitting at the kitchen island reading a newspaper.
"Hey," she said, her voice surprisingly even. "I've just remembered I have to be somewhere. I'm gonna go."
Winston nodded. "D'you want me to tell Nick you were here?"
Jess shook her head, fighting back tears. "No, it's fine. I'll catch him tomorrow."
She said her goodbyes and left the loft, biting hard on her lip to stop herself from crying. A lot of the anger had dissipated now, and was replaced with a raw sadness that was threatening to spill over. Once in the elevator, Jess pulled out her phone and tapped out a text, blinking through her blurred vision.
Hey. I just wanna say thanks for last night, it was great to have one last fling before we went our separate ways. Hope everything goes well with your girlfriend, I'm glad you found someone who is willing to do the 'relationship thing'. You guys deserve each other! x
She pressed send and clutched the phone to her chest, leaning her head back against the cool metal. Exiting the building and crossing quickly to the parking lot, she yanked her car door open and threw herself inside, grateful for the silence once she had closed it behind her.
Then she let her head fall forward on to the steering wheel and cried, sobs wracking her body as she squeezed her eyes shut, tears dripping into her lap.
Even when her head throbbed and her throat ached, she didn't stop. She gripped the steering wheel, feeling it digging into her forehead as she let the realization wash over her that everything she had thought she wanted had turned out to be a complete lie.
Jess felt utterly betrayed, devastated that Nick would do this to her. Was he going to let her fall in love with him, this mysterious idea of a man who listened to her and accepted her, all while he was fucking her against her bathroom wall? She felt sick thinking about it, and had to sit up to stop herself from dry heaving. He had written about her, about their time together, and posted it online for everyone to see. Their encounter, the one that Jess had thought of as amazing and perfect and just what she had needed, was the same one she had got herself off to a couple of days later. She wanted to scream. How dare he humiliate her like that?
She wondered if she was the only girl he had done that to. She couldn't picture Nick as a player, he couldn't possibly be that awful, but after everything she had just seen, she wasn't really sure who Nick was at all. One thing she knew for sure – he was a goddamn two-faced bastard, and she never wanted to see him again.
When she didn't have any tears left in her, she started the car and drove home. Cece was in the apartment when she opened the door, nibbling on a cracker and watching reruns of My Super Sweet Sixteen. She shot up as soon as she caught sight of Jess' tear-streaked face.
"What the hell happened?" she asked, her arms enveloping Jess as soon as she reached her. "Where have you been?"
She relaxed into her best friend's embrace, burying her head in her shoulder. "It's Nick," she said, her voice muffled against Cece's sweater. "He's…" she hiccoughed, feeling Cece pull her tighter. "He's been playing me this whole time."
"I will kill him Jess, I swear, I will kill him. I wasn't kidding about those people in my phone."
They stayed that way for a while, Cece stroking Jess' hair as she rested her chin on her best friend's shoulder, explaining everything in a quiet murmur. She felt like even more of a complete idiot hearing the full story from her own mouth. How had she not clicked? She had been so completely and utterly trusting of him that it had never even crossed her mind.
"We made love last night," she choked out, releasing Cece to pull back and look at her, sniffling. "At least, I thought we did. Now I'm not sure. He probably went home and wrote a freaking story about it." She buried her head in her hands. "Oh my God, I thought we were gonna go somewhere, Ceec. I thought he was my guy. I thought he was what I needed after Spencer, someone honest and caring. He's a liar, just like him."
"Babe, I'm so sorry," Cece said, her voice pained. "I don't know what to say."
A stray tear rolled down Jess' cheek, and she brushed it away angrily. "I need to be alone, is that okay? I need to go to my room."
"Of course. I'll make you something to eat, you're pale as a ghost."
Jess went to her bedroom, perching at the end of her bed. She didn't want to lie down, she knew she would only cry again. She had shed enough tears now, and it was time to sort herself out. She couldn't let anyone get under her skin like Spencer had, and even though every part of her hurt, she wasn't going to let it get to her. She'd had enough.
She didn't want to look at her phone for fear of seeing a reply from Nick, but when she pulled it out of her pocket the screen was empty. Jess breathed a sigh of relief, unlocking it and scrolling through her contacts. She had gotten an idea when she was in the elevator at Nick's, and right now it was the only thing that made sense to her. Pressing down on the contact, she put the phone to her ear, waiting as it rang on the other end.
"Hello?"
Jess let herself smile at the familiar warmth in the sound of her voice. "Hi Mom."
"Jess! Honey, how are you? Why are you calling me? You never call. Not that I'm complaining!"
Jess sighed, feeling exhausted. "I'm fine, I'm fine Mom, a little tired. I'm calling to say, well…" she took a deep breath. "I think I want to come home."