Nate steps into the living room, the sight of him literally taking my breath away. Lorelei follows close behind and looks from him, to me, then shrugs.
“I need to talk to you, Jessie,” he says. “Please.”
I look from Lorelei back to Nate, then back to Lorelei, my mind doing flips. Too many emotions and thoughts flooding through me for me to act on any of them. Nobody tells you about the calm that comes when you reach critical mass, nobody tells you about the zen you get when you feel like it can’t get any worse. I place my coffee cup slowly down on the table and, still looking at it, say, “It’s okay, Lorelei. He’s right. We should talk.”
21
Jessie
Nate stands in the middle of the room, his eyes focused on me. I glance up at him, but it’s like looking at the sun – almost painful – and I quickly look down again at the spot where my coffee is.
“Um…” Lorelei mumbles awkwardly. “I’ll…I should go do a thing…that I have to do. I’ll leave you two alone.”
She leaves without either of us acknowledging her, and I keep my stare fixed on the coffee table. “So I guess you’re still mad at me,” Nate says, moving to the center of the room.
I raise my eyes to his, almost in a challenge.
“Give me a reason I shouldn’t be.”
Nate smiles.
“How about because I’m here to say I’m sorry.”
I shake my head, almost amazed at how easy Nate thinks this is.
“Sorries don’t change the past, Nate,” I say, standing abruptly and moving toward the window. “And they don’t change who we are.”
I turn back to find him staring at me with a frown on his face.
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
“It means there’s nothing to be sorry about. It means that I’m not angry, not confused, not frustrated. Not anymore. I’m just disappointed.”
Nate clenches his jaw before talking.
“Jessie, I came to try and fix things between us. To admit that I fucked up. To tell you that I know I was wrong and that I—”
“To ‘confess’?” I interrupt, studying Nate’s face for his reaction. When he barely flinches at the word, I smile – he’s one hell of a poker player. “About being a ‘bad boy’?” I say, driving the point home.
This time I watch the tiny changes in his expression, so subtle even I wouldn’t spot them if I hadn’t spent so much time looking into those eyes. I can almost see his thoughts play out, the instinctual desire to call my bluff, to try and talk his way out of it, the realization that it’s hopeless, the calculation of his best defense. It only takes a few seconds, but I see everything that’s there, and at the end of it all Nate laughs gently and looks at the floor like a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
“So?” Nate says, his eyes unrepentant. “I make videos. That part of my life doesn’t have anything to do with this – with us. I don’t see the problem.”
“Fucking hell, Nate,” I say, with as much awe as frustration, starting to pace in front of the window. “You really don’t get it.”
“Get what? That you want me to feel ashamed? That you keep trying to fit me into some perfect little boyfriend role? That you don’t like the life I led before we got together? You know exactly who I am, Jessie, who I was.”
“I do, that’s the problem. Regardless of the videos you make, and whether or not you chose to hide them from me, I know that you’re never going to be the guy I need you to be.”
He flinches back as if I’ve struck him. “And who exactly is ‘that guy’? The guy who cheated on you? The guy whose car you wrecked? Or is it the one who bailed you out of jail at a moment’s notice? The one you’ve known since you were a little girl? The one who fucks you the way you want? Which guy do you really need?”
“Ugh,” I groan. “It’s always about sex with you.”
“What else is there?” Nate shouts, raising his arms wide as if imploring some third party. “We fuck well, and we’re good friends. This could work as a relationship, it doesn’t have to get more complicated than that. What else do you even want?”
I feel the pain and humiliation and anger rising in my chest, and I narrow my eyes and try to keep from yelling in his face. “A little fucking honesty, for a start.”
Nate sighs, laughs, and puts his hands on his head. “Shit, Jessie. If that’s what this is all about, those fucking videos, I can just stop making them. You don’t have to be this fucking melodramatic.”
I stop and stare at him, half-shocked, half-insulted.
“You think I’m being melodramatic?”
“Yeah. And I’m a talent agent, so you know that means something.”