THE FIRST TIME
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO - HIT THE ROAD JACK
"Hit the road, Jack
And don't you come back
No more, no more, no more, no more
Hit the road, Jack
And don't you come back no more!"
RAY CHARLES (Single from 1961)
Jack's life had become about one thing and one thing only, ever since he'd helped his dad with moving the last of their things, that hadn't either been sold or driven off to the junkyard, from Providence to Capeside, marking an end to the many and mostly joyous years, their family had lived there. Going back that one last time however, had been a sobering experience and saying goodbye to the house, where he'd grown up, was an experience that he didn't feel like thinking back to, more than he was forced to. Even if part of him still missed it from time to time, he also knew deep down that if they'd tried to continue living there, then it would have been like Tim's ghost was following him, everywhere he went.
In any case, the end result of his dad not being able to find a new job in Providence or the surrounding area, now was that for the first time in over half a year, their entire family was gathered under one roof again and for Jack, this also meant having many uncomfortable silences with his dad, where none of them knew what to say. He couldn't explain to anyone exactly why there was this huge gap between himself and his dad, only that it had seemingly been there almost since he was born and that it didn't look like it would ever go away. It wasn't like they hated each other either (although Jack had to admit to still feeling some resentment towards his dad, for how he wasn't there for his family after Tim's far too untimely death), there was just something in their relationship that wasn't working and it wasn't just that Jack had a sneaking suspicion that his dad was a bit of a homophobe, from some of the things he'd heard him say in the past.
All of these were things that Jack was trying not to think about, while he was catching some rays with Abby down at park. Why the park and why Abby, you might ask? Because the heatwave, they were having and the hundreds, if not thousands, of tourists that had come to town, meant that beach was so thick with people, that you could barely find a couple of free square feet to spread out your towel on and Abby had her one day a week off, that Joey had practically had to force her to take.
"It feels like I'm wasting my time here, when I could be at work and working towards my goals" Abby remarked, while she was applying another layer of much-needed sunblock onto her arms and legs, seeing as the summer sun was beating down hard and relentlessly on them.
"It sounds like someone has been hit by the greedy bug!" Jack quipped in return. "What are your goals, if you don't mind me asking?"
"To earn enough money there, that I can send myself off to college, when high school comes to an end. Let's face it, there's no other way for me to pay for it, with what little money there was in my college fund having long ago been eaten up by my mom's legal bills and my dad having a new girlfriend that he cares ten times more about, than he does about me!" Abby sighed.
"At least, you have a plan. Most of the time, it feels like I'm just making things up, as I go along" he admitted to her.
"I know how you feel. Honestly, if my mom hadn't practically forced me to, I probably would have still been the same girl, I was a year ago and right now, most likely sitting at home and sulking over how I didn't have any friends, I could hang out with. Trust me, Jack. Sometimes, being forced by circumstances to grow up a little isn't the worst thing in the world".
"I guess not. Does that in your case also include having to pretend that everything is all peachy, when it clearly isn't?"
"I guess, I do that sometimes. Things aren't all rosy and sunshiny at home?"
"When it was just my mom, Andie and myself living together, it sort of worked. Not in way that you could call great by any means, but it wasn't like I ever didn't feel like coming home to them. Now, where my dad is living with us ..."
"You try to stay out, all that you can?" Abby finished his sentence for him. "I know what that's like, as much as anyone does around here, believe me!"
"Because your mom is an alcoholic?" he cautiously asked and got a small nod in return.
"Don't get me wrong, she still had her good days, where it almost felt like I had my old mom back again. On those bad days, though ... let's just say that the way she treated me on those dark and best forgotten days, I wouldn't wish happening to my worst enemy, or anyone for that matter".
"But you still love her, don't you?"
"Of course, I do. She's still my mom, when push comes to shove, and I only want the best for her. It's just sad that right now, the best thing that could have happened to her, is what is happening to her, that she's locked up in a place where she can't get her hands on anything, that could get her drunk. Call me crazy, but I'm still hoping desperately inside that we can rebuild our mother/daughter relationship, after she gets released".
"Even in spite of everything, she did to you?" he had to ask, since he wasn't sure that he would ever be able to entirely forgive his own old man and that what he did can't have been any worse (or even in the same category), than what Abby's mom had put her poor daughter through.
"What it did to me was make me realize that parents, in spite of how we're raised to see them as our all-knowing window to the rest of the world, are just regular people who don't always deal with situations, the way that your own sense of logic tells you that they should. And sometimes, they end up making the wrong decisions, only they can't see that they're wrong. That's where we, as their offspring, have to either try to change them, or learn to live with them, the way they are. In my mom's case, I had to make the tough call that I couldn't live with her anymore, which is why fate has brought me to where I am now, living with Jen and her sweet, old grandmother" Abby explained to him. "The question is, can you live with your dad or not, or is it time that you began looking into "Alternative Living Arrangements" too?"
Was Jack ready to take it that far? Probably not and it would also mean that he wouldn't be there to keep a keen eye on Andie and his mom, not to mention whether either of them was showing any signs of mental deterioration or not. So, for the time being at least, all he could do was try to get through the days as they came, with as little drama in his life as possible and if he was really lucky, maybe find a potential boyfriend for himself. Although, even Jack himself would have called that last part a long shot, at best.
Pacey's summer was so far going splendidly, or at least in his own eyes, it was. While the video store getting bought by new investors and still being closed for renovations had at first put a small dent in his plans, it was surprisingly turning out to be a blessing in disguise for him. Not only did it mean that he was forced to find himself a new job, where he could find the challenges that he'd been lacking sorely at "Screen Time" towards the end of his employment there, it also meant that he wouldn't have to spent most of his summer being bored inside of a video store, while his friends were out enjoying the sunny weather and being young, while they could. The summer from a year before, when he'd just started working there, it had been the one thing that had annoyed him by far the most about the job and by the time he had to go back to school, he'd had more than his fill of hearing stories about all of the interesting things that his schoolmates had been up to, while he'd been stuck inside of a humid room, with Dawson as his only company for most of his waking hours, and making a measly five bucks flat per (very long feeling) hour in doing so.
Of course, he did have to attend summer school, but it was only for a few hours at a time and only three days a week, plus he always had the breaks in between classes to look forward to, where himself and Joey would sneak off to the janitor's closet (the boiler room was sadly locked off for the summer) for a quick and very steamy make out session, that afterwards would see them through those hours of slight boredom that followed, like it was a mere breeze.
In short, this summer had already turned out to be the opposite of last year's and it wasn't only because he now had "contacts" in the restaurant business, who could hire him for what had so far been a rather well-paying job, waiting tables at the Ice House. Not that it was a job that he could picture himself doing for the rest of his life, mind you, but the great thing about having his girlfriend as his immediate superior (until Bessie came back to work, at least) was that he was allowed to more or less only work the shifts, that he wanted to and could use the rest of his time to either take his boat out for a spin on the creek, or play the world's best younger brother to his almost four-month-pregnant older sister Gretchen. Something, she was clearly relishing, for all it was worth! If he wasn't doing a combination of the two, like he was on this day, sometime around noon.
"There you go, Mademoiselle! Your half of the delicious five-star-dinner treat, known as mom's leftover lasagna from yesterday!" he joked smilingly to his sister, before he handed her a plate filled with steaming hot lasagna (heated up on the battery powered hot plate, that he'd bought for this very possible situation), plus a knife and a fork.
"Thanks, Pacey. You didn't have to do all this though, if it was only to cheer me up. You're doing plenty of that already, just by being you" Gretchen sweetly answered him and while he couldn't deny that part of it was for her sake, it was also for his own, since taking care of both her and Joey and making sure that everything was as easy for his two favorite girls as possible, had quickly turned into his number one pastime.
"Don't mention it! Can't a little brother spoil his older sister, just because he feels like it and without having any ulterior motives?"
"I just feel like I need to do something in return, with how adorable and attentive you've been towards me, ever since I came home" Gretchen replied, before taking a bite of her lasagna and letting out a small sigh of satisfaction. "You and mom between you are making it extremely hard for me to want to leave again, I can tell you that much!"
"As if that's a bad thing?" he asked her with a gleam in his eyes. Her smile in return couldn't hide either, how much she was enjoying their pampering of her.
"I never said that it was, did I? Come on, Pacey, there has to be something that I help you with!"
"Like what?"
"I don't know ... I could help you with your girl troubles, perhaps?" Gretchen asked him leadingly.
"What do you mean "Girl Troubles"? I have Joey back here with me now, so how could things be better for me?"
"Then why do you take all of those "Long Bathroom Breaks" during the day, if it isn't because she's not giving you something, you want from her, huh? It can't be thanks to mom's cooking, because in spite of this lasagna being nothing short of excellent, we both know that most of her cooking isn't this great!" Gretchen cheekily asked him and in such a way, that it almost made him choke of the bite of lasagna, he was chewing down on, when she said it.
"You notice stuff like that?" he had to ask, since honestly speaking, he'd been keeping his fingers crossed, that she hadn't!
"You're a teenage boy, who's beginning to hit your sexual peak, Pacey! I'd be far more worried about you, if you weren't jacking it at least once or twice a day!" Gretchen, in a way that was far too carefree for his own liking, when it came to this particular subject, answered him.
"Can you from now on, if you're ever going to use the words "Jacking" or "It" in front of me, make sure that there are a minimum of three words separating them?"
"Would you rather that I called it "Spanking Your Monkey", or "Stroking Your Wookie", like a couple of my ex-boyfriends liked to call it? It's nothing to be ashamed of and believe me, when I tell you that at least nine out of ten of the girls you go to school with, do something similar to themselves!"
"More than ninety percent of them? Really?"
"Almost none of the girls that I was friends with weren't regularly pleasing themselves, by the time they got to be your age now and the few, who weren't, were already getting what they wanted from their boyfriends. Which again leads me to believe that something is missing in yours and Joey's relationship, you're just afraid to tell me what it is. You can trust me not to tell Joey anything, that you don't want her to know, you know that".
"Well ..." Pacey began, as he tried to think of the right way to formulate his thoughts into the correct words. "Can I ask you something very personal, that I'm not entirely sure that I want to hear all of the details about?"
"Whatever it is, I'll try to keep my answer PG, I promise!" Gretchen jokingly reassured him.
"The thing is that Joey and I have almost gone all the way. Only almost, though! Let me stress that part!"
"And how many times has this happened so far?"
"Twice, with a third time, where we got interrupted, that sort of counts for half a time! Anyway, I guess what I'm asking, is that since it's kind of in the air that soon will be the time when we ..."
"Join together in the biblical sense?" Gretchen finished his sentence for him and by doing so, got him out of having to say the word "Sex" out loud in front of her.
"Something like that. It's just such a huge step to take, you know?"
"Yeah, I do. What's your question, then?"
"When you had to ... take that step, were you worried at all?"
"You mean about pregnancy and STD's and stuff like that?"
"Not so much that as the emotional part. I'm worried that it could be too much for both of us, if we take things too far and it's too soon for us".
"I can understand that, easily. Are you sure that Joey is the one?"
"I think so. It's almost funny in a tragic sort of way, because before we became a couple, my mind was all over the place when it came to girls and which ones, I'd have a fling with or a crush on from one week to the next. Then, I kissed her, she kissed me back and ever since, the only girl that I can see myself being with and loving with all of my heart is her".
"Why is that tragic? Most people would give an arm or a leg to experience a romance like that!"
"Because I have no idea what I would do with myself, if she one day woke up and decided with herself, that it was time to move on from me" he answered his sister as truthfully, as he could. "It's one thing to know that I probably won't be able to give her everything, that she deserves out of life, but if I can just give her a first time that she can look back on and smile, when she gets older, then I've given her something worth holding onto, when it comes to me, at least. Do you understand why I'm so worried that I'll mess our first time up now?"
"Have you said these things to her?" Gretchen, after a few seconds of thinking over her answer, asked back.
"Do you think that I should?"
"Pacey, if any guy, who wasn't my close relative, said those same beautiful things to me, that you've just said, I would have had to fight every inner instinct in my body, not to want to kiss him immediately! Look, I know that I'm no Freud or any of the other famous thinkers, when it comes to the study of the human mind and our behavior, but I know both you and Joey, like I know my own back pocket, and as long as you two keep communicating your innermost feelings to each other, you'll be perfectly fine! As for the whole sex thing, all you have to do is be open with Joey and I'm a hundred percent certain that you'll find out, that she has those exact same fears too, that you've been running around with".
Pacey spent the next several minutes wondering to himself, if it really was that simple, as they enjoyed the rest of their lunch together, before it was time to sail back and him to get ready for working the dinner shift at the Ice House.
After having more or less wasted his day away with Abby (although, he wouldn't have called it a complete waste, since he'd gotten to know her much better than he did, when his day began), they'd capped it off by going to the movies to see "Notting Hill", the latest flick in the long line of them, where Julia Roberts plays a lovable single girl, who's desperate to find love and finds it in the most unlikely places, in this case a small English bookshop. A tried-and-true formula at this time and if you substituted Julia Roberts for Meg Ryan, you'd have most of her filmography from the 90's summed up perfectly too!
"I'm just a girl, standing in front of a boy and asking him to love me!" Abby comically overacted out one of the corniest scenes from the movie, that they'd just seen and (to their collective joy) had more than its share of them!
"Is that the lamest line in movie history? I mean, it has to be up there!" Jack laughingly asked her back, as they made their way out of the cinema with the rest of the movie goers and onto the streets of Capeside, that were still bustling with activity compared to only a few weeks earlier, thanks to the huge influx of tourists coming up by the hundreds and the most welcome amounts of money, they'd brought with them.
"I don't know! There's sure to be some real stinkers, if we get into some of the passion projects of years past, where someone said, "I'm paying for this, so no one's allowed to disagree with me" and simply allowed their ego's to run wild!"
"It sounds like you're describing "The Room" to a T! Have you seen it?"
"I don't think that I've heard about it, sorry".
"That's probably because far too few people have! The guy who wrote it and stars in it is the unopposed king, when it comes to writing horrible dialogue, believe me!"
"It sounds like a movie, we'll have to watch together sometime" Abby smilingly answered him, before it had finally become time for them to call an end to their rather fun day of hanging out together. "I'm not doing anything this time next week, if you want to repeat today's success story. It's kind of nice to be around a boy, where I know for sure that he isn't mentally undressing me, you know?"
"I can say the same for you. We'll see, okay? I don't know what my dad could have planned, and he hasn't told me about yet" he answered Abby, although what he had wanted to do was say yes, without there being any reservations over it.
"When you find out, you know where to find me. See you tomorrow, Jackie-Boy!" Abby cheerily bade him goodnight and headed in the direction of Jen's grandmother's house.
He kept up a brisk pace on his walk home, that when you knew the various shortcuts that Pacey had shown him, could be cut down to a little over two miles and he was far off in his own thoughts about whether the Patriots should stick with Drew Bledsoe at QB, or it was time to bring in someone younger to take over his spot, when he saw something that he hadn't expected to see. Andie sitting by herself, down at the end of their street, with her hands covering her face and wearing far too little clothing, for what had become a rather chilly evening, considering that it had apparently been one of the hottest days in Capeside in several years.
"What are you doing, sitting here by yourself?" he asked her quietly and when she looked up at him and he could see that she'd been crying, it was like his heart sank for her.
"Everything was driving me crazy back at the house, Jack! It's like we're not supposed to mention that anything is wrong with mom, or that it's weird having dad living with us again and it's just all driving me crazy!" Andie weepingly replied and like the good twin brother that he was, he pulled her in for a long and comforting hug. The way that she shivered to his embrace told him as well, that she probably needed it.
"I know, Andie" he comforted her. "Tomorrow, we'll think of something fun and carefree to do together, just us two, okay?"
"Okay. I'm sorry that you had to see me like this again" Andie got out, through crying a well of tears into his t-shirt.
"You don't ever have to be sorry for anything, Andie. None of what happened, whether it's with me, dad, mom, Tim or anyone else, could ever be your fault. I love you more than life itself, I hope that you know that".
"I love you too, Jack. Can you walk me home and help me to sneak upstairs, so mom and dad won't know that I've been gone?" Andie barely audibly asked him, as she wiped what was hopefully the last tears of that day, away from her eyes.
"They don't know that you're not at home right now, do they?"
"I snuck out through the basement window, while they were in the living room watching TV. Things will get back to normal soon, right? I mean, they have to at some point, don't they?"
"I hope so too, but first things first. How do you plan on sneaking in, without them noticing you?"
"That part is easy! All I have to do is sneak back in, the way I came out, while you talk to mom and dad and create a distraction for me. Can you do that for me, pretty please with sugar on top?" Andie pleaded with him, as if it had been necessary for her to do so, to get him to help his beloved sister out of a tiny pickle, like this one was.
After all, as Jack saw it, his primary job in life would always be to look out for her and if that meant trying to please his dad, by keeping his mouth shut when it was taking everything in him to, then it would simply be the yoke, he would have to carry.
Pacey had quickly learned how a dinner shift at the Ice House during the summer usually went. He checked in at five o'clock and for the first hour, they would only have a manageable number of customers and it would be like a quiet before the storm, that began almost exactly when six o'clock hit them. For those next three and a half hours, they would serve and have literally hundreds of customers, some coming to dine and others just to enjoy a cool drink or a snack there, before they were on their way to do other things. In any case, they were hours that felt like they flew by in an instant and compared to sitting in the video store and being bored out of his skull most of the time, it felt like a step in the right direction. Financially too, seeing as he'd already made more in tips alone in a week and a half, than he would have at "Screen Time" in a month. When you added his hourly pay on top of that, he could for once say that he wasn't feeling underpaid!
This evening had been no different and in spite of them at one point having had a line, that stretched a few dozen yards down the street, they'd managed to keep all of their customers satisfied, or so it seemed to him, at least. He was in the middle of counting up the day's take, when a very pretty mid to late teen girl with short, blonde hair and carrying a large backpack on her back, came into the restaurant and walked up to the counter, where she dropped her load of luggage onto the floor.
"Is it too late for me to buy a beer?" the girl asked, before sitting down on one of the stools.
"It isn't, if you can show me some ID" he answered her, although it didn't seem like the answer, she was looking for.
"Can't you cut me some slack? I've had a day from hell and now, I don't have a clue where I'm spending the night!" the girl pleaded her case.
"Sorry, I don't make the rules. I can fill up your soda to the rim and still get away with it, but that's the best, I can do for you" he answered, and it seemed to calm her down.
"It's better than nothing, I guess. A medium Sprite and don't think that I won't hold you to your word!"
"I take it then, that you're not from around here?"
"Is it that obvious?"
"The backpack sort of gives you away" he told her, before serving her the beverage of her choice.
"Plus, I pretty much had already told you, hadn't I? That's just so me, a typical scatterbrain! I'm Eve, by the way" the girl, who he now knew as Eve, introduced herself.
"It's nice to meet you, Eve. I'm Pacey and welcome to Capeside, I guess. How long are you here for?"
"I'm not really sure. My plan was to come up here and work for the summer, but I've just found out that on top of the job not existing, I also don't have anywhere to live, so I'll probably have to re-think it. Unless you can tell me where I can find a well-paying job and a place to live, that isn't too expensive for a girl like me?" Eve (sort of flirtingly) asked, before taking a sip from her soda.
"There's a motel on the outskirts of town, that isn't too expensive, from what I've heard. You'll most likely have to share your room with a family of decades old spiders, but it beats sleeping on the streets, right?" he answered Eve, who smiled back at him.
"I can tell already that I've lucked into finding the right guy to help me! That takes care of where to stay, what about a job?" Eve asked and he quickly got an idea.
"Hey, Jen!" he called out to Jen, who as she so often did, had come down to the restaurant to help with closing down, so she could hang out with Joey and/or Abby after work.
"Yes, Pacey?" Jen answered, as she came over to them.
"This is Eve and she's looking for a job. Didn't you say that they were hiring down where you work and that you really wished, you had another girl working there with you to, as you so eloquently put it, even out the stench of testosterone at your workplace?" he asked Jen, who only now noticed Eve and the two girls quickly smiled at one another.
"Hi, Eve. I'm Jen. Let's talk work, shall we?" Jen introduced herself and sat down on the stool next to Eve's, whom she chatted with until it was closing time.
And, as he continued on with this last part of his job for the day, something occurred to Pacey: Some guys want everything out of life and won't settle for less. Pacey was a different breed from them, satisfied just from seeing his friends doing well and knowing, that his life could certainly have been a lot worse, than it was.
END OF CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
