My phone vibrated in my pocket, and I pulled it out and tossed my plate onto my bed.
Who was that girl? Are you hooking up with someone else?
I ignored her text. Lex needed a Xanax—or seven. It seemed like the wrong people cared about me, the ones who deserved to be shuttled on a one-way trip to a deserted island.
I just had to go and screw things up with Jules and tell her I didn’t know what we were. I took one bite of pepperoni and trashed the rest. Sitting back on my bed, I put my hands behind my head and caught a flash of green in my vision. I looked down, green paint still smeared on the inside of my arm. A nice reminder of how bad I messed up.
Uncle Gary was sitting at the dining room table when I when I came downstairs in the morning. His brown eyes lit up when I walked into the room.
“The man of the hour. How’s it going, RJ?” He clapped a hand on my back, knocking the breath out of my closed-up throat. What was he doing here? He hadn’t said anything about visiting when I talked to him the other week.
“Hey, Gary. Didn’t know you were coming to town.” I looked to Dad, who was oddly quiet. Was that why he’d gotten the pizza? Because he knew shit was about to go down? He white-knuckled the counter top and stared off into the corner of the room. Ever since I could remember, my dad and Uncle Gary never got along, always competing against each other. I was just another peg in their achievement ladder.
“Decided to visit. See how your dad was doing and your grandmother. And you, of course.”
I nodded and poured a glass of orange juice from the jug in the middle of the table.
“We’ve been talking, Ry.”
Yep. Pizza definitely counted as pity tactics. I looked up from my pouring, and orange juice splashed onto my hand. “Yeah?” Wiping off my fingers, I glanced from Dad to Uncle Gary. From the frowns on both their faces, talking wasn’t meant as a good thing.
“We know you’re taking the summer to figure out career goals, but there’s an opening in the academy that starts a month earlier.”
“You mean next week?”
He nodded. “Yeah. I think it might be good for you to start as soon as possible, get you up and running again. What do ya say?”
I looked at both of them, their expectant gazes boring into me. Next week? That cut dream-job searching down by three weeks. Summer would be gone. Jules and I would be…done. “I don’t know.” My fucking broken record response for everything these days.
The more I thought about it, the more I dreaded the start date of the academy. Sure, chicks dug the uniform, but this wasn’t my calling. Same with business. I needed to come up with a plan C, quick.
“It’s just an option.” Gary slid out from the chair and clapped a hand on Dad’s back. “Summer with this guy must be a drag.”
Dad shook his head. “Or take the month and stay here. Office Jax needs you.”
Fuck me.
I turned to my uncle. “Thanks, Gary. I’ll let you know.”
He wiped off his hands on his jeans and smacked them down on the kitchen table. “Well, I’d better get over to see your grandmother. Gotta demolish some chocolate chip cookies.” He winked and let himself out. Dad hunched over the counter, his back to me. Even though he faced the wall, I knew the vein in the middle of his forehead bulged against his reddened skin. He and Gary had this weird competitive relationship and, since Gary didn’t have any kids, he tried to be parent of the year with me.
As soon as the front door shut, Dad said, “You don’t have to go.”
“I know.” But what else would I do? Being a police officer sure as hell beat spending my life surrounded by office supplies.
“We just want what’s best for you.”
“Doesn’t my opinion count?”
He turned, his face a deep red, the vein throbbing double-time compared to my pulse. “Don’t get that attitude with me, son. You shitted away three years of your life at that school. College is out of the equation. This is the bed you’ve made, now lie in it.”
Damn. It was an honest question. Guess our truce had an expiration. It was nice while it lasted.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. No use arguing with him. I pushed away from the table, my chair screeching across the wood. Grabbing a croissant, I shoved half of it in my mouth, said something that Dad would construe as a sounds good, and went to my room.
After a few minutes, the garage door opened, and I heard Dad’s car pull out of the driveway. I spent the remainder of the day scouring those stupid career books, my final lifeline. Maybe there was an option C I just hadn’t come across yet.