Past
ON my seventeenth birthday, Aunt Constance gives me an eReader, while Blythe sends me a lingerie set that’s so revealing I’m actually embarrassed to look at it. 'For when you get lucky’ the accompanying note says. Ever since she started sleeping with Carter, she’s been very outspoken on the joys of sex, and impatient for me to join her in what she calls the ‘club of lovers’ so we can have real adult conversations. I wish. I’ve barely seen Jackson since the day at the orchard. Last year he gave me a camera to replace my old one, this year, he hasn’t even called or texted to say happy birthday, talk less of sending me a present.
Mrs. Shannon bakes me a delicious chocolate cake. Aunt Constance is in New York for the day, but she insists that I should have some friends over and have a party in the garden or by the pool. I don’t have many friends. There’s May, of course, and Chace, a bookish guy who became my friend after we shared a table in biology lab. He’s as studious and nerdy as May is outgoing and bubbly. As soon as I tell her about the party, she takes over the planning, and by evening, we’re having a very cool party by the pool.
“I heard some guy tried to sneak booze into your party and Mrs. Shannon caught him.” I’m on the phone with Blythe, the day after my birthday.
“Yeah,” I laugh. “She got the door, and somehow she knew, so she bumped into him and the bottle fell out of his jacket."
Blythe snorts with laughter.
“And then she caught it, it was like something out of Mr. and Mrs. Smith.”
“I’ve always suspected she was ex-KGB,” Blythe says, giggling, “or at least a vampire, only she doesn’t glitter in the sun.”
“A lot of vampires don’t glitter in the sun,” I laugh, “it totally depends on the type of moisturizer they use.”
After a few more minutes spent laughing at vampire jokes, she has to go. It’s hard, but I resist the temptation to ask her about Jackson in the hope that she would know why he has totally ignored my birthday.
I’m about to go back to enhancing a picture on my computer when, in the silence of the practically empty house, I hear the purr of a car engine coming up the drive. Aunt Constance is attending a dinner party at the Gorman’s, and she won't be back until about midnight. I find myself hoping that it’s Jackson on one of his unannounced visits to the house. I try to contain myself as I go downstairs, trying not to run down the stairs in my eagerness to see him. When the door opens and Jackson lets himself in, I’m already in the foyer, almost out of my mind with joy at the sight of him.
It never gets old, seeing him. The older we get, the more handsome, and irresistible he seems to become. Looking at him is as much agony as it is pleasure, but I can’t tear my eyes away. He’s like the sun, and I’m a helpless planet, revolving around him.
“Olivia.”
I love that he still calls me that, ever since that first time when he defied my mother’s warning. Now it’s like an intimate secret between us that he’s the only person in the world who still calls me Olivia, It makes me feel so much closer to him.
“Hi Jackson,” I say, doing my best to keep the breathless joy I’ve feeling out of my voice. “I didn’t know you were coming home.”
He frowns. “I… Yes… I was just in the area.”
“Oh…” He probably came down with Lindsay to attend her parents party. I decide, swallowing the feeling of disappointment. What did I expect? That he was here to see me?
He starts to walk towards me, and I forget my disappointment as I admire easy gracefulness with which he moves. He’s perfect, and more than anything, I want to close the distance between us. I want to go to him, to put my arms around his waist, run my fingers through his hair…
“What are you still doing up?” he asks, when he reaches where I’m standing on the bottom stair.
I snap out of my less than innocent thoughts, and shrug, the careless movement belying the exquisite tension I’m feeling from standing so close to him. “I was working on a picture,” I say, “and then I heard the car.”
“Okay, picture-nerd.” He laughs and put an arm around me, and I look up at him, blissful and wondering at the contact. He’s looking down at me, his face so close to mine, that I’m sure he can feel the heat as my face flushes.
I freeze, my heart thumping in my chest, and my mouth suddenly dry. He doesn’t move either. Our faces are so close that suddenly, I’m filled with a crazy hope that he would just lean further down, and kiss me.
Instead, his hand leaves my shoulder, and he moves away, going up the stairs and leaving me with no choice but to follow him. We’re both silent, me torturing myself with wondering what he’s thinking, and trying to understand the moment we had just had. At the top of the stairs, where the house split into the family wing and the guest wing, which is rarely used, he suddenly stops and turns around.
I stop too, hoping that he would say something to me, something to validate the wild hope in my chest that the moment we had at the bottom of the stairs, means something, not just to me, but also to him.
“Happy Birthday,” He says, smiling apologetically, “I’m sorry I didn't call yesterday, but I got you something.” He retrieves a box from his pocket.
I take it from him, hands shaking as I open it to reveal a fine platinum chain with a heart shaped pendant. I reach for the pendant with trembling fingers, feeling the stones set in the metal, and the engraving of my name in flowing script.
“It’s beautiful.” I sigh, looking up at him. “Thank you Jackson."
He looks pleased that I like it. “You’re welcome.”
I don’t know what comes over me at that moment, but when I smile at him, it’s the most provocative and teasing smile I can manage. “Aren't you going to help me put it on?” I ask, taking my cue from all the movies and romance novels I’ve read over the years.
He gives me a quizzical look. “Okay.” he says, after only a second’s pause. He lifts the necklace out of the box, and I turn around, my body quivering as his fingers brush my neck.