Total pages in book: 104
Estimated words: 98134 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 491(@200wpm)___ 393(@250wpm)___ 327(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98134 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 491(@200wpm)___ 393(@250wpm)___ 327(@300wpm)
I hesitate. She’s probably just guessing, but her suggestion makes my heart pound. Stupidly, of course. After what we did last night it shouldn’t come as some kind of revelation that he might “like” me. He certainly liked touching me, at least. I guess I just want more than that. Shocker. “What happened with Sarah? He has hardly said anything to me about it.”
“You only got here what, like a week or two ago? The fact that he has said anything at all is impressive.”
Now it’s my turn to try the silent treatment.
“I don’t really know anything about why it ended,” she says as she scribbles something on her clipboard. “I do know they dated off and on since he was in college. Sometimes, they had fights about him traveling for hockey. More than once, they took breaks apart and I know she fooled around with other guys, but I’m pretty sure Jesse didn’t get with other girls during the breaks. He always took her pretty seriously.”
I listen quietly and try not to let this information sting. It’s stupid to let any of this bother me. Jesse had a life before me. He has been very careful to make sure I know he’s also going to have a life after me, too. We’re not even supposed to officially like each other, anyway. The idea that he took this girl so seriously shouldn’t bother me, especially considering I was about to get freaking married right before I met him.
It shouldn’t bother me, but it does. It makes me wonder if the reason he’s keeping me at an emotional arm’s length is because he’s waiting for this girl to come back–that he’s fighting his urge to be with me because he knows he’d drop me in a heartbeat if Sarah was back in the picture.
“And one day they just broke up for good?” I ask.
“Not just that. One day they were living together at that cabin. The next, she had already flown back to Connecticut to live with her parents before anybody knew they had split up.”
“And nobody knows what happened?”
“Jesse won’t talk about it and Sarah has ghosted everybody from town, not that she was much of an open book before that, anyway.”
I lean on my palms, thoughts racing. I’m about to ask more when Caroline’s friend, Mia, appears. She has ice skates slung over her shoulder and her red hair pulled up in a ponytail. “Hey,” she says. “I was going to go down to the harbor and skate some. Do either of you want to join me?”
I think about the movie Jake said the guys are watching back at the cabin. Something about curling up on the couch in Jesse’s cabin while a fire roars and snow drifts down outside sounds amazing. That, and the feeling I’ve already come to love of being part of the team with the banter of the guys in the background and the feeling of camaraderie when they’re all together. I’ve had Nolan’s popcorn, too, and it’s almost enough to make me want to ask Caroline for a ride up to the cabin. But, then I think about the awkwardness between me and Jesse. Where would I sit for the movie? What would I say to him?
I make up my mind.
“Sure,” I say. “Do you happen to have any skates I can borrow, though?”
“They have a rental place down by the harbor. My feet are huge, so I doubt you’d want to use a pair of mine.”
“I’ll pass. I want to finish cleaning up here,” Caroline says.
“Oh,” I say, feeling suddenly like an asshole. Caroline is paying me after all. “I’ll finish helping you first. I just meant–”
“Go,” she says, smiling. “Have fun. It’s okay.”
I pump a fist in the air. “Whoo! I haven’t skated in so long.”
I follow after Mia, who leads the way down the hill. “Caroline told me you’re a really good skater,” I say.
She scrunches her nose and shakes her head. “I’m a has-been. But, I still love something about it. Just being on the ice is my place of peace, I guess.”
I nod. Don’t be nosy. Don’t be nosy. “So, what’s up with you and Nolan?” I ask.
Mia swallows suddenly. Then smiles. “He’s a really cool guy. Isn’t he?”
“Yep,” I say, my smile a little too big.
Mia looks at me and laughs. “I don’t know,” she finally says. There’s something reserved in her tone that tells me it would be rude to push more.
“Guys are confusing,” I say, offering her a chance to drop the topic.
“Did you skate?” she asks after a few moments.
“When I was younger. My brother was always at the ice rink and my parents were always driving us around. If I didn’t learn to skate, I would’ve been bored out of my mind. Eventually, my parents decided to get me lessons.”