Jane Lark - Just You

I hadn’t realized she was that bad. “I helped you get dressed and you were unsteady on your feet but you weren’t out of it. We came back on the subway, and I walked you to your door.”

“You did?” Her gaze was boring into mine, like she was looking for a lie.

“Yeah, I did.”

“Thank you.” Those words were reluctantly said, and she looked away, but as she spoke she reached out and picked a piece off the muffin I’d bought her.

“You’re welcome.”

She glanced up again.

I picked up my muffin and took a bite, watching her as she watched me. So what now? Did I want this to be something, or was it just a hook up.

I didn’t say anything, nor did she.

Then eventually, after she’d nibbled a couple more pieces of her muffin, I said, “Do you regret it?”

One of the staff set down my toasted pastrami thing.

Portia took a breath as they walked away.

She did regret it.

“I––“

“Forget it, Portia. We hooked up at a party, it’s nothing big, it probably happened a ton of times all over New York. Two people had too much to drink, end of, no headline.”

End of. Justin was right. I was embarrassed, and I felt awkward as hell, ‘cause I couldn’t remember exactly what we’d done, but I believed we hadn’t gone the whole way. I hadn’t had any flashbacks of that, and as soon as he’d said he took me home, I saw an image of him next to me in a subway car.

“Sorry.” Embarrassment led me to say it.

He shrugged. “So anyway; what the frick went down with Jason?” There was a sudden glint in his brown eyes.

Wicked and funny. That was Justin.

He always joined in with the gossip but we never knew if he was making fun of us when he did. Crystal’s theory was that he was a douchebag and he was joining in with the hope of getting lucky. Well if that was true, his moves had worked on me. I was staying sober from now on. Resolution.

“What the hell you gonna do, Portia? You won’t have pretty boy to stare at every day… Shame. You’ve got no chance of pulling him loose from his girl now…”

“I wasn’t trying to.”

He lifted his dark eyebrows. “Yeah, right. Whatever. You aren’t fooling me. If he’d have offered, like I did…”

Crap, he had to go and bring that back up. My skin heated. I was tired of blushing. I’d spent yesterday with my head under the pillow, too embarrassed to even face myself. “Don’t talk about it.”

“Was I that bad?” He was joking but he wasn’t joking. I’d kicked his ego in the balls.

I gave him a lopsided smile and narrowed my eyes, “Justin, I told you. I don’t even remember!”

His eyebrows lifted higher. “Great. That bad.” His wide lips tilted. He wasn’t unattractive. I’d never really looked at him like that before. But he was okay. I mean his eyes were nice, dark brown and glowing like treacle, with that wicked and humorous glint, and he had a wide smile that came in flashes. His short black hair, that he kept cut close to his head, suited him because he had a nice shaped head… That sounded stupid. But he did. I wanted to reach out and touch him, run my fingers up his cheek and then over his hair. Maybe that was how things had got started in the pool.

He was talking about Jason again. I wasn’t really listening.

“… so you girls are going to miss the eye candy.”

I smiled at him, and just nodded. I wasn’t going to lie. Jason was hot. I could just watch him for hours.

“We oughta get back.” He stood. “Otherwise we’ll be the next to be fired.”

I got up.

When we reached the office, he held the door open for me. Crystal was wrong. He wasn’t a sleaze. He was just a normal guy––girl hunting. He was nice in a way. He’d made this whole thing with me easier. He could have been really horrible.

He whispered in my ear, “We better go back separately, seeing as we’re incognito… You can go up first, I’ll hang back.”

I smiled at him, “Thanks,” then walked on ahead.

I glanced up when he walked into the office five minutes after me, and watched him take his black Parka coat off on the other side of the room. His body wasn’t that bad either, I remembered. He had abs. He’d looked pretty good in the pool.

Another blush raced over my skin and I looked down at my screen before he caught me watching. But ten minutes after he’d sat down I sent him an email, giving him my cell number, with a message saying… “Why don’t we be friends outside of work? If you want? What’s your number?”

A second later an email came back from him. It was just his number and nothing more.

I looked up and leaned ‘round my screen to see him, but he wasn’t looking at me. He was staring at his screen, like he was totally focused on work.

“Justin!” My kid brother, Dillon, hurtled out the school gate, right into my belly, with his backpack falling off his shoulder and smacking me in the thigh.

“Hey Dillon, woah. What’s up with you, kid?”

Having hugged me, he pulled away, laughing. “Nothin’.” His eyes were shining with a I-love-my-big-brother look of idolization. That look got me in the chest every time, with a sharp bite of affection.

“Did you have a good day?”

“Yeah.” He liked school but he hated the after club he had to go to when Mom was working and I had to pick him up.

“Dillon!” A pretty little girl with braids shouted over, taking her mom’s hand. She did a huge exaggerated wave, the way young kids did.

My already super cool and chilled little brother just lifted his hand. “Bye Miah.”

I laughed. He looked up at me, taking my hand. “Are you working on the ladies already little bro?”

He laughed. Then he said, “She does like me but it’s annoying. She hangs around all the time when I just wanna play.”

I gripped his hot, sticky hand tighter, looking up the street watching the traffic and getting ready to cross. “Well, one day, you are gonna be begging girls to just hang out with you.”

He made a disgusted sound, and I glanced down laughing at him. “Urrgh, no way. I don’t wanna play with girls … ”

For now. The day will come Dillon when you will love playing with girls … I didn’t say that. Just smiled at him, wishing I’d had a childhood like he did.

He may have to go into after-school club but he never had to comfort Mom like I did at his age, after her and Dad had fought, and he’d knocked her about, or after he’d had a run in with the cops and ended up in jail.

When we’d crossed the street, Dillon let go of my hand and started telling me about his day. Telling me all the eight-year-old-kid gossip from his school. I loved it when he did. He made me laugh the way he talked with a blazing fire of excitement, at a hundred miles an hour, and the flames of the excitment in his belly flickered over his facial expressions and in his eyes too.

Along the street I saw Jake, waiting on the corner of the sidewalk, where he always met us. He turned the corner and walked on as soon as he knew I’d seen him.

Met us––was a loose term. He never actually bothered waiting for us, or spoke to us, but walked two hundred yards ahead of us, pretending he didn’t have to walk back home with his fricking annoying older brother and the baby of the family.

Dillon chatted on. He didn’t care… Jake only stirred me up, no one else… and he knew it.

How the fuck had I ended up being treated like our frickin’ shit Dad? I didn’t know. But Jake treated me like I was his parent and not his big brother. He had an inbuilt button that said––do everything the opposite of what I said.