“Just another week, honey.”
“Good, because I have a surpr-” She stopped herself and shook her head.
“What sort of surprise.”
“Nothing,” She shrugged, like it was nothing. “Nothing; it can wait.”
Chapter 21:
Chelsea
“Hey.”
Jake’s voice sounded distant on the phone; strained, and like he was distracted by something.
“Everything okay, Jake?”
He sighed in response. “Chelsea, about next weekend.” He paused again. “I can’t come.”
I felt my heart sink as the smile on my face from his call slowly faded. What?
“It’s a bad time, honey.” His voice sounded edged; sharp and truncated.
I could feel myself slumping into the chair, my hand pushing my hair back out of my face as I took a deep breath. “No, no, that’s okay, I understand.” I mean the man worked full-time for himself; I got that he had to push himself work-wise sometimes, right?
“Well, maybe next weekend?”
Jake sighed again. “It’s just bad timing is all.”
It still felt like he wasn’t saying everything, like he was holding something back or was distracted by something else.
“Oh, okay.” I tried to hide the disappointment in my voice, but I knew I was probably failing. “Well maybe we could video chat alter tonight-”
“I have to go, Chelsea.” He said quickly, his voice edged. “Look, I’m sorry. I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”
Um, okay.
*****
Except Jake didn’t call the next day, or the day after. And on the third day, when my phone still wasn’t ringing, and after I’d restarted it five hundred times to make sure it was actually working, the dark clouds closed in.
Somehow, something had gone wrong, and the worst part was I didn’t know what that was. I sulked in my room that whole third day after last talking to him, trying to puzzle things out in my head and see if I could see what I’d said or done. Had he pieced it together from my “I have something to tell you later” comment about what was up? Had he guessed what my not-so-little secret was and decided he wanted out? I mean, I still wasn’t totally sure what Jake and I were, even if I knew - or at least was pretty sure I knew - how I felt about him. But it wasn’t like I could hold him to me with a baby or something. That was something psycho girls did, I wouldn’t be that type.
But, I wanted him, and I wanted us to be an “us”.
I just hoped he did too.
*****
“Honey, whats wrong?”
I’d always thought that mothers had an intuition and a type of sixth sense that I would never understand. Of course, right then, I wondered if maybe I would someday in soon; say, in nine months. I smiled into the phone, sprawled out on my bed and watching the snow fall down on the city of Boston outside my dorm room window.
“It’s nothing, mom, just tired is all.”
“Classes? Oh, you’re not getting stressed about midterms already, are you?”
“No, mom, it’s really nothing.”