One Week - By Nikki Van De Car Page 0,24
my head. He had seemed so engrossed in his book, I didn't think he'd noticed. And it was either read over his shoulder or claw my eyes out. Not that his book was much better. A biography of some dead jazz musician? People read those?
I give the newsstand selection a quick glance and sigh. We've got bodice-rippers, really cheesy-sounding P. I. mysteries, Dan Brown, and Harry Potter. I grab one of each. I also snag a deck of cards and a couple of bags of Skittles. Maybe I can talk Jess into playing Skittle poker at some point.
I walk out of the newsstand and look around until I spot Jess. He's on the payphone again. Hasn't the man ever heard of cell phones? He doesn't look too pleased with the conversation, and I figure it's his mom again. Though why he would call her just to get yelled at is beyond me. Masochist. If there's one thing about payphones, it's that nobody can call you on them—you initiate all contact. So why would Jess be putting himself through this, again and again?
The guy needs to be rescued from himself. I walk around behind him and tap him on the shoulder. He turns around and mouths “What?”
“The train's leaving,” I say.
Jess frowns and looks over at the board. “No, it isn't,” he says. “We've got another half an hour. Give me a sec.” He turns back to the phone. “Uh huh,” he mumbles. “I know.”
I roll my eyes. Most people, given an out like that, would take it in a heartbeat. Leave it to Jess to be either too self-sacrificing or too stupid to figure it out.
“No, Jess,” I say loudly. “It's leaving right now. We have to go.”
Jess whips his head around and glares at me. “I'm sorry, hold on for just a moment,” he says into the phone, then covers the mouthpiece with his hand.“What?” he says, exasperated. “Will you give me a minute? We have plenty of time!”
“Yeah, I know,” I huff. “I'm just trying to help you out here—you're on the phone with your mom again, aren't you?”
“So what?”
“So why are you bothering if you're just going to get yelled at? Most people who are old enough to get kicked out of college on a drug bust don't report their every move to their mother, you know. Call her when you get to New York if you have to, but in the meantime, chill out, would you?”
Jess grips the phone with one hand and runs his other hand through his hair, making it even more unruly than it already is. “Look, Bee,” he says tightly. “I get that you and your father have issues, and so you ran away. That's your business. But see, most of the rest of us in the world are not heiresses that can just run away from our problems. We have responsibilities. When you get to New York, you can do whatever the hell you want. When I get to New York, I have to figure out how to pick up my life again, because my life affects the lives of the people that depend on me and have sacrificed for me. So yeah, I am calling to check in with my mother, and I am being yelled at, and I'm just going to suck it up. Okay?”
“Who is that? Who has run away?” I hear the voice on the other end of the line squawking. “Jess?”
Jess looks at me for a long moment before answering. “It's nobody, Mom,” Jess says into the phone, and then turns away from me. I stand there staring at the back of his neck, feeling the blood rush up to my face.
After last night, I thought…I don't know what I thought. Is that how Jess sees me?
And worse—is that how I really am?
I try to shake myself out of it. Who cares what he thinks, anyway? Obviously whatever connection we had last night was something so flimsy it can't last in the light of day. I walk away, and wander around aimlessly, and then decide to just get on the train.
I show my rail pass to the train attendant, and am delighted to discover that it does in fact entitle me to a sleeping cabin. Or “roomette,” as they're calling it. It's about the size of a closet. Not my closet—mine is pretty big, come to think of it. But someone's closet.
Anyway. Like most closets, including mine, it doesn't have a toilet or a shower or