Julia had been given a clean bill of health by the docs at Mav General. The second time was worse than the first as she couldn't regain her strength fast enough. She may have been hospitalized for four days unconscious and 3 additional days fully conscious. She finished up a week's course of round the clock antibiotics and then went home with more prescriptions, 2 different antibiotics to take for a month, which upset her stomach, so there was another pill for that. She was seen by her regular docs in the hospital, those that treated her for her previous stay. Julia complained that her nerve pain was constant and the numbness and tingling were an annoyance. Her neurologist prescribed her a new medication for the nerve pain in addition to increasing the dosage of her previous medication she'd been taking for the same pain. Julia suggested she continue to smoke weed and call it a day, the doc disagreed. Julia thought weed was cheaper, had less side effects and worked better. Julia saw herself as another source of money for big pharmacy, but accepted the prescriptions nonetheless. None of her meds mixed well with vodka. She was 100% sure of that.
No one would prescribe her what she really wanted, narcotics. Each doc she'd seen standing at her bedside with a stethoscope and a badge, Julia harassed for narcotics. None of them would prescribe them for her. The one surprise she got during her stay was the psychiatrist. Why did psychiatrists always appear like they were disheveled and unkempt? Did the crazy rub off on them? The shrink had been Cal's idea. This was a completely different shrink from her previous stay at Mav General. This was a woman in her 40's, appeared hurried and rushed. She had a list of various symptoms she fished around for and diagnosed her as clinically depressed. "Well, wouldn't you be?" Julia asked her. Despite Julia's positive attitude, she was depressed and she was prescribed one more medication she had no intention of taking.
The shrink left her card, informed her of her office hours and suggested making an appointment.
Having divulged the truth to her father improved their relationship. He seemed to understand her a little better, was a little more sympathetic to the entire situation. He was still figuring out in his head how to deal with the information she'd given him. He had many more questions, which she'd tried to answer for him. He was fishing for something she couldn't put her finger on yet. He looked worn out and tired, having divided his time between work and the hospital and sleep. He complained about bills and everything else. He complained about a house he couldn't even sell at a loss because of what had happened there.
"We could move back home." Julia suggested.
"How will you get in the house, out of the house, up the steps?"
"Um, there's a bedroom on the first floor. You can build a little ramp. I obviously cannot live in my basement room again, but I could live at home. It's ok to go back there."
"Too many memories there for you."
"More good memories than bad ones. You're the one that can't deal with it, not me."
"You don't know what it looked like."
"I've gone home. Tavin took me there. I've seen it."
"Why don't you ever tell me anything?" He yelled.
"I tell you, you only find out after the fact, like long after the fact."
"Why would you go there?"
"Curiosity. To get some of my stuff. And the cleaner didn't do the best job."
"Blood doesn't come out."
"But the carpet can."
"It would be a daily reminder."
Julia slid off the bed onto her wheelchair. "My chariot here is a daily reminder, so it doesn't matter where I live. Does it?"
Discharge papers signed and a car ride later, Julia was back in her apartment and laying down. Dad took the scripts to the pharmacy to fill and she was left alone for the first time in a week. Left to her own devices, the world at her fingertips, she went to lay down. She was exhausted because the infection the second time around was worse than the first. She swore it should be easier. The length of the true infection, the fight was less time consuming, but the tiredness was exacerbated. When her dad returned with the scripts, she was fast asleep on the sofa with a blanket over her.
Within a couple weeks, her father had come to the conclusion that returning home was their only course of financial action. The house obviously wasn't selling and they couldn't afford to live any longer in 2 places. One on paper and one physically. They for sale sign stayed firmly planted in the lawn, but by the end of June they'd be home again.
Julia spent her energy one morning at the AA meeting in Maverick across town. She decided she was going to see a friend. She sat by the door outside in the parking lot and watched as a variety of souls passed her. Young, old, any age in between in all styles of dress. She noticed him from a distance.
He approached her right away.
"There's a rear entrance for wheel chairs. You can't get in this way. I can show you."
"I don't want to go inside."
"No one wants to."
"I'm not a alcoholic." Julia told him. "I'm Julia." She said, extending her hand.
"Tom." He answered, shaking her hand.
"A friend of mine met you here a few months back. You are a builder and you were out of work."
"Yeah. I was. I am. I do work here and there. Whatever I can find."
"I have something for you. You'd have to work out the details with my dad, but I got a job for you."
"You do, huh."
"My house, we're moving soon and I need 2 ramps. One out front and one out the back. Nothing special, just something I can get up and down with my chariot here." Julia told him. She handed Tom a piece of paper with Cal's phone number on it.
"Who's your friend?"
"Anonymous, remember?"
"You ok? You look tired."
"I've been sick. Getting better though."
"Do I know you, Julia?"
"No, sir. You don't." Julia replied as she started to wheel herself away. "Call my dad."
Julia met with Tavin and the kids in the park. Kelly arrived with her brothers shortly after. It was a nice afternoon, not oppressively hot yet, just comfortable. A couple weeks had passed and school was out. The kids had unending energy. Alex and Frankie became fast friends. They had met numerous times before only they had never come face to face in Maverick. They had memories and history between them that only they knew. The things they'd seen together and they started talking about the twins. Tatia and Daniel played in the sand and ran all over the park together. They kids were accepting of both worlds and their memories didn't confuse them or weigh on them like they did the grown ups. Friends were friends. Tatia started asking about Hannah. "Where baby Hannah, mama?" Tatia asked, Julia, tugging on her arm.
"Um-I don't know." Is all Julia could think to say.
"She's in the suburban, Julia." Tavin told her. "Baby Hannah is a doll. I'll go get her."
"A doll. Thank God. I was worried."
"She's fine, Julia. It's only a doll."
"So I'm going to babysit?"
"You wanna see him or not? It's a valid excuse to see him and you make money. It'll all go through Sandy. Tavin will make that happen."
"I can be alone with him. I need, like really need, to be alone with him."
"You have to be smart about all of it. You can't put demands on him. You can't expect dates. It has to look like you are the sitter to everyone. Don't get my friend jammed up over you, Kelly."
"I won't. I don't want that for him."
"And no lies. We don't lie to each other. Ever. There's always a solution to whatever problem there is."
"Ok."
Tavin brought baby Hannah back and dropped the doll on the blanket with Tatia's blankie. "How did Jay do this? Cause this kid crap gets old."
"Jayson likes to play with them. He likes to run with them, play dolls and eat fake food they cook. That's just how he is."
"Thank God you got a sitter." Kelly smiled, reaching across the blanket to his hand. She started feeling like the third wheel. Tavin was correct as she felt pangs of jealousy creep up on her. She forced it away. She looked at her ring.
Kelly looked up at Julia in her chair. "How come you can have a 20 year old boyfriend and I can't? You're not worried about jamming up Dylan. Hey, how come you can have a boyfriend at all? Dylan's not your husband."
"Kelly, stop. You're being immature." Tavin scolded her.
"She's right, Tavin. She's absolutely right. We've blended these worlds. It was my idea."
Julia felt hurt. "I stopped seeing Dylan anyway." She sighed, thinking of weed and tacos and a guy that played guitar for her in his spare time.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean it to sound like it did. I know you miss Chess."
"It's ok, Kelly. I'm glad you said it." Julia told her. "We need a plan, Tavin. Have you thought of anything?"
"Let them rest in peace, Julia."
"You didn't read the book, did you?" She asked.
"I didn't. I'm sorry."
"I'm leaving." She said to them.
"Where are you going? I'm your ride."
"I have my ride, Tavin." She said defiantly as she unlocked her chair and swiveled around. She started the long roll away from them. She hated rolling over grass, too. It took so much out of her. She'd only been out of the hospital a couple weeks. She was not healthy enough. She felt short of breath. She had to stop.
"Are you alright, Julia?" Tavin called. She stopped, but didn't answer. "Julia, are you ok? Come back."
All she did was wave to him. She didn't want any attention brought to herself. Tavin got up and walked over to her. "Didn't get far."
"I. Can't. Breathe." She stammered. "Scared."
He crouched in front of her. "You're wheezing. Try to control it. Slow deep breaths, Julia. In through the nose and out through the mouth." He coached her, demonstrating how to breathe for her.
"I. Can't. Fucking. Breathe. Tavin."
Tavin pulled out a cell, "You thought you were mad before..." He laughed. "You're gonna be pissed now."
Cal got to the ER and found Julia with Tavin and the kids. She sat up on a stretcher with a mask on her face. He'd been to the hospital so much lately he felt as though he should have his own parking space. "What happened this time?"
"I over did it at the park." Julia said.
"The doc says it's most likely exercise induced asthma." Tavin added.
"Asthma?" Cal had a look of relief.
"I over did it pushing myself around on the grass, dad. That's all."
"So you can leave today." He said, leaning on the stretcher railing.
"Yes. I'm fine now."
"All she'll need is an inhaler. If it happens again, she can use the inhaler and it won't get out of hand."
Tavin explained. "Hey, I gotta get the baby out of here. I can't stand this anymore." Tavin announced, scooping Tatia up and keeping her out of the drawer she'd opened in the room.
"Ok, go."
Cal walked Tavin and the kids out. Cal had the gift of gab and had a 20 minute conversation with Tavin before coming back and having another 20 minute conversation with the ER doc. Cal got a crash course in asthmatic attacks such as Julia's and handed him a script for an inhaler, which she only had to use on an as needed basis. On the way home to the apartment, Cal filled another prescription and handed it over to her.
"I got a call from a guy named Tom, interested in building ramps at the house."
"Yeah, did you talk to him?"
"Where'd you meet this guy?"
"An AA meeting. He needs work and he's good. Give him the job."
"You going to meetings now?"
"No, Tavin met him at one. He told me about him."
"Maybe you should go to meetings?"
"I'm not an addict, dad."
"How about another support group or something online? When I went to the one when your mom was sick-"
"I know about your meetings." Julia cut him off. "Speaking of being sick, I would like you to let me go the next time I get sick. I mean if I ever wind up in a similar situation. Just like let me go."
"Uh, no. What if I had done that months ago?"
"Yeah, I question that decision. You can let me go. Not like we won't ever see each other again, right."
He parked the car at the curb and she waited for the chair. He opened it and set it beside the car door. "I question your decision making. And I think you need help."
"I know what I need. It's getting it that would take a miracle."
"You need a group. You can't do it alone."
'You need a group. You can't do it alone.' That thought churned through Julia's mind over the next week as she packed, as she surfed the internet, as she laid around watching TV. I need a group to go into the darkness with us. I can't do it alone. I need all of us. All of them. I need everyone involved. I need the angels. I need those fucking books.
Sandy had met Kelly and decided having Kelly as a sitter wasn't such a bad idea at all. Sandy even went as far as suggesting that once Tavin settled and made a home somewhere other than her own that he take the kids and be their guardian. Sandy could assist him, she said, but she was ready for someone else to take the responsibility. Once he had a fulltime job and had his school and work schedule planned out, she wanted him to consider it seriously.
Julia nearly called Tavin, but remembered it was Thursday. Book club night. Sandy met her girlfriends and had an evening all to themselves. They drank wine and discussed whichever book they were reading. Mostly they drank wine. It was the one evening out of the week that Kelly did care for the kids and Tavin's schedule was hit or miss with working as needed and picking up whatever shift he was offered. The two squeezed in the first book night as theirs, settling Tatia into bed and then leaving Alex on his PlayStation as a veritable distraction from whatever they had planned. Kelly told Julia they were going to make the magic happen. She decided to hold off on calling or texting till the next day.
Julia wrapped up with the packing and then turned in for the night. She had to take her time, still recovering from the infection. Any other time she'd have packed the entire apartment. Her dad kept bringing her boxes and she kept loading them up, but slowly. She had the motivation, but lacked the energy. Her dad still had reservations about moving back to the house, but financially they had no choice. He had already re-enrolled her in school for the fall, senior year, against her wishes. He informed her that she had to get her life in order. Once they moved, she would either have to see a counselor or find a meeting or group to join to work through her trauma. He'd been talking to people, which people he wouldn't specify, and these people suggested that she may have PTSD.
She thought he may have had a point and decided to research it before admitting to anything. Even if she didn't have it, not having been diagnosed by anyone. The professional that she'd seen in the hospital had diagnosed her with major depression, which Julia had researched.
She put on her headphones and she relaxed with the meditation Jay used to use to relax himself. Since the FBI had returned her own phone to her after having it for months. Once they'd inspected and picked apart every app, text, email, picture and video she'd ever taken, they handed it back to her in one piece.
She drifted off to sleep in a calm and relaxed state. Trying to give up weed and trying to live without her brain being clouded by substances, she sought the comfort of that stupid meditation. She swore by it, but Jay had always waited for results despite never giving up on it.
She felt herself being pulled home and let herself go. One or both had tried to pull her in, but she'd figured out how to avoid the pull. She couldn't recover and be drained by being there. This evening though she let herself go. She found herself in with Chess. It had been him.
"The phone only worked once." He told her. After the initial charge and the first call when he'd talked with his mother, the battery wouldn't hold the charge and he feared they fried the phone with their interspace phone call. The phone was dead to him, but he was glad he'd spoken to his mom. "I'll admit I was shocked when she answered. I didn't expect her voice." Julia lay still, listening to her Chess talk about feelings and closed her eyes, searching the darkness. She could feel she was at the right time and place and when she opened her eyes it was all a distant memory. She sat beside her mother as she lay unconscious in bed, Jayson sat on the floor to her right and held her hand as she and Jay waited. They looked at each other.
"Should we stay and start over?" Julia asked him.
"Can we?" Jay asked her. "Is that even possible?"
"It doesn't seem real. This was so long ago. What time is it?"
"Round 7." He answered looking to the clock above the door.
"She's still alive." Julia pointed out as Rose took a breath. "How long have we been together now? Since spring right? Like 4 months."
"About that." Jay nodded, studying Rose. "She looks like-"
"No, around 8." Julia corrected him.
"Why are we all the way back here?"
"Trying something. How far back can I go?"
"Why?"
"I was trying to get to the night, that night."
"What night?"
"The night. Then I wondered if I could stop it somehow? Can we change what happened? Can we go back, tweak something and change the past just slightly, alter it?"
She and Jay sat with Rose as she took her final breaths on earth all over again. The sad mood around them drummed up feelings she'd tucked away from that night. This memory she didn't wish to alter as she propped up her feet on the side of the bed all the while holding Jay's hand in hers as they waited out Rose's final minutes.
"Let's get Cammie and my dad. It's nearly 8."
She and Jay alerted Miss Cammie that Rose was close and let Cammie do her job and deal with Cal. Julia and Jay returned to the room with them and watched Rose die all over again. It hurt all the same.
"What do you feel comfortable erasing, Jayson? Let me know, please. I need help here. Tavin won't help me. I have asked him 10 times for some input. He's distracted. I'm still sick, the infection kicked my ass and I am tired." She commented as Jay held her close like he did on the original night her mom had died. "I figured out how to keep myself from being pulled in by you guys. And I also figured out how to leave of my own accord rather than having to be released."
"You did? So you never have to come back?"
"That's right. It might have to do with the infection? It might have to do with the meditation that you used to listen to. I don't sleep better or longer, but I do have control now."
"So don't come back, Julia. Just leave us." Jay suggested. "We will be ok."
"I have one idea and it's going to be a long shot. We need to have a meeting."
"For what?"
"I think we need to face Caleb Downing again." Julia told him, feeling herself tense up. "Can you face him and let him live, when we find him? I think he'll know we're coming this time. We have to go on the assumption he's as aware of this as we are. From Kelly's visions, he had his hands on us that day. We kept him alive the more we dwelled on him, the more we focused on him. All that negative energy, Jayson. He fed on it. It was his life blood after we killed him."
"So he'll be harder to kill the second time around?"
"We aren't killing him, remember? We have to keep him alive, do the right thing, but we have to face him. All of us together."
"But Hayley?"
"The Angels, Jayson. We need his angels. I need those books. I told you we all need to have a meeting. At the table."
They watched Cal breakdown when Cammie pronounced Rose. Julia pulled them away, moving slightly forward in time. She separated them quickly from Rose and Cal and Cammie . Like jumping out of the way of an oncoming car, they jumped together, moving fast. He had no idea where they were going as Julia had hold of him. All darkness, he couldn't see anything, but he could feel he still embraced her. They felt like they weren't moving at all. He wasn't carrying them, she was. Julia had learned to control whether she came or went, the point of origin and the destination, all the stops in between. When they reached the time she chose, they stood in front of Julia's house on Green Street. Snow had fallen on the ground. They stood by her gate and looked at snow angels in her yard. Her footsteps fresh on the steps from the door to the snow.
"Why can you stand?" He asked.
"I can control that too. It doesn't matter anymore. The condition is in my reality. This is not current, it's like 2 sides to a quarter. One side has been stamped with my life and its circumstances and the other has a completely different life and circumstances. Instead of a quarter that we can flip from one time to another, pretend it's the edge of the quarter with all those little ridges. Instead of flipping the quarter, you can ride along the side sliding in and out of each of those many ridges."
"Um, ok." Jay said, not understanding her completely.
"An elevator in a building with 100 floors. Pick a floor. The elevator is the darkness. Once you know what's on each floor, you can hop off and hop on as you choose."
"I see, but how come you can ride the elevator all the way, but I can only stay on the first floor?"
"Have you tried to ride to a different floor?" Julia asked, feeling his arms start to pull away from her waist. She stopped him. "No, hold on to me. I lead, you follow."
Jay's eyes scanned the street. The heaviness of Green Street felt suffocating to him again.
"You feel it too?" Julia sighed, pointing to the house at the end of the street that hadn't burned yet. "This is the night." Julia whispered, sensing movement near them. They viewed the shadow of a man emerging from the yard at the far end of the street. He started walking toward them.
"Julia, what's gonna happen?" He whispered.
"I don't know." Julia shrugged. "This is not how it happened, remember?" As he approached them wary and possibly with the same reservations, Julia and Jay held firm but scarily still. "I can jump, remember, just hold on. Relax, babe, just relax."
"I want to kill him all over again." Jayson whispered.
The closer he got, the more menacing he appeared. Her assailant, he seemed so small and so insignificant, but the aura surrounding him was dark. He oozed a confident evil. "It is a test, Jayson. Restrain yourself." She felt his arms releasing her again. "You leave go and I will have to face him alone, Jayson." She said, holding his arms firm around her.
"Jump, jump, jump." He urged under his breath, lowering his face into her hair.
"No." She stated nonchalantly.
He stood nearly 20 feet from them, slowly advancing. The physicality of Caleb Downing was becoming more visible. His facial features, his broad shoulders. She sensed he was deciding how to react or whether to react at all.
"Jay, focus on where you'd like to go. A safe place, a comfortable place. Find that floor and take us there." She said softly, nonurgent. "Where would you like to take me?"
"Home." He said.
Darkness.
Julia awoke and was completely startled. When Jay moved them, it was a rougher ride. Maybe she'd shoved him over the edge too fast? Presenting Jayson with the fear and the uncertainty had been a shock to his system. Home. Where was home exactly? She looked around the darkness of the room. She was home alright. Julia had taken Jayson back to Caleb Downing, had faced him and instead of killing him, let him live. Jayson brought her home.
She moved to the edge of the bed, dropping her legs over the side. She reached for her chair and it wasn't there. She allowed her eyes to adjust to the darkness and squinted to see her surroundings.
"Where's my fucking chair?" She mumbled. "Where the fuck am I?"
"I brought you home, Julia." Jayson answered. "We are home." He said nervously.
Julia got her bearings and settled her butt back on the bed a little. "I'm awake, Jay."
"So am I." He replied. He slipped past her on the bed. "I'll get the light."
The lamp switched on. They were in her room.
"I'm awake, Jayson." Julia said again, looking around her bedroom. It was dull. Half her stuff was gone. There were no sheets on the bed and there was blood on the carpet across from her in front of the dresser. Jay took in the sight of her bedroom all over again. He hadn't expected the room to look like this. He hadn't seen it up close, only in the photos from Tavin's phone.
He said in awe. "We're all over this fucking room." His head and body turned as he took in all the blood stains.
"I am not home, Jayson. I live in an apartment. My chair..." She said, trailing off into thought.
"Your chair."
"My chair." She repeated. "Is next to my bed at home, Jay. Fuck."
"Well, where do you wanna go? I'll..."
"Where are you taking me? What can you possibly do here?" She asked annoyed. "We need to call your brother."
Jayson jogged upstairs for the cordless phone and brought it back to Julia. She dialed Tavin's number.
She dialed and redialed till he answered. Book night or not, this dilemma came first. He was annoyed when he finally answered. "Julia, what?" He groaned.
"We have a problem." She said quickly.
"Julia, dammit, it's book night. I'm in the middle of something." He complained.
Julia passed the phone to Jay. "Tavin, we have a problem." Jay said to him. He listened to Tavin a few minutes, then told him they were at the house. Jay clicked off the phone. "He said it's book night and he'll be here when Sandy gets home."
"Lovely." Julia said, tossing the phone behind her on the bed. "What's your plan, Jay? You got one?" She asked as she scooted back and stretched out on the bed.
"You said jump so I jumped."
"Not here. Not now. You are not supposed to be here. Can you get back?"
"I'm not going back."
"Jay, you don't belong here. All we did was move you from one place to another."
"Why are you so mad?"
"Cause Chess is still fucking there, Jay."
"We'll go get him too. If I can-"
"You don't get it. You aren't alive here. Where will we keep you? You cant just resume life, pick up where you left off. It'll be worse than what you already got."
"I'm not going back. No." Jay refused.
Tavin dropped Kelly off at home and arrived around 1030pm to Julia's. He came in the back door completely confused as to how his brother had arrived in the wrong place at the wrong time. He had no idea that was even possible and neither did they. Tavin sat in the chair next to the bed and watched Julia and Jayson bicker back and forth amidst the ruins of their bodies and souls. He listened to Jay's side of the story, listened to hers and then came to the same conclusion that Julia had. He needed to jump home where he belonged.
"How is any of this possible?"
"It's what I have been working on. I have learned to control it and I think I pushed him too hard. Obviously."
"You've been working on this in your spare time?"
"If you had read the book I gave you instead of jerking off with the fucking kid." She yelled at Tavin.
"This is about the book?"
"Yeah. I asked you for help. All the ideas...Tavin. I been doing it alone. You wouldn't help me so I went to someone that fucking would."
"And look where it got you." Tavin responded.
"I told you we had work to do. That we could come up with a plan."
"We can get Chess." Jay said.
"And do what with him? You people are dead and gone. This is what I have been trying to explain to you. You don't think people will notice-"
"I don't care." Jay said firmly, shaking his head.
"Julia, take him back."
"She can't just take me back cause she showed me the way to not go back."
"We can fix everything that went wrong that night, Jayson Keller. If you'd just trust me, us and let me do it. I am still fucking sick. I am so fucking exhausted."
"What's your plan, then, Julia?"
"Go back!" She screamed at him. "The plan is not for you to stay holed up in my basement. You'd live an anonymous life here. You'd never be able to be Jayson Keller again."
"We let him live." Jay said.
"But we ran away. We need to right the wrong, extinguish the evil that he is. Keep him alive, turn him in and reset the whole thing. I am telling you it has to do with that night."
"You can't know that."
"It all goes back to him and that night. If you would have read the book, you'd know that." Julia yelled at Tavin. "I can't do it alone. It'll take a group of specific people to-"
"But Hayley is gone."
"No, she's not. She's there with the rest of you and them."
"Them who?"
"The angels, Jayson."
"Angels?"
"Tavin, you didn't read those books either? Caleb's diaries? Where'd you put them, when you got rid of them for me?" Julia asked.
"No. You told me to get rid of them. You told me you never wanted to see them again. Julia,"
"You didn't destroy them did you? I didn't say destroy them."
"No, they're in a safe place."
Julia turned her attention back to Jayson. "We can do this. Jay, you're going to have to trust me." Jay hesitated. He was realizing that Julia may be right. "I'm going to need the dead on one side and the living on the other. I have a plan, I think."
"Please, Jules, let's just go get Chess and we can leave and start over. We have started over before." Jay suggested.
"Jay, you can't beg me for a life you took from us. You never did trust me. You always doubt me."
"You really amaze me. Why would we have trust issues?" Jay sighed, pacing the floor where he had paced the day he shot her. He was thinking and thinking hard.
"I understand why you'd say that. I'll admit it, but when it comes to trusting me with your life-" Julia paused and shifted herself on the bed. "I want my life back too."
"Jules, I wanna stay."
"Tavin, I wanna go home." Julia said.
"No, you can't leave me here."
"Jay, if my dad gets home from work and I am not there, what's he gonna think?"
"I'll come back, Jay. You won't be alone." Tavin said.
Tavin piggybacked her to the car and set her inside the passenger seat. The drive home was tense as Julia realized she'd fucked up taking a chance with Jay. She sat in the seat, crying quietly on the way home. Julia stressed to Tavin the importance of sending Jay back. It was up to him to make him accept that. "How we getting in?" Tavin asked as he carried her out of the car to the building.
"Patio door." Julia replied, resting her head on his back. He slid over the railing to the patio and he took her inside the apartment through the sliding glass door. He took her in her room and set her in her chair. "I'm sorry we ruined book night."
"You didn't, Red. She couldn't do it. She's into signs now. You calling us was a sign, a big fat stop sign. To any normal person, it would be an interruption. To her it was a sign."
"Wrong time?"
"Wrong time, wrong place. Wrong everything." He shrugged. "All this, too, the extra we have her doing and the places we've had her going, she just said stop. Then got mad cause I didn't push her, the little weirdo. Then got mad I took her home, like I had a choice-she's a hot mess."
"You can pick em', can't you?" Julia laughed.
"Know who she reminds me of, and this is gonna sound funny, but she reminds me of you."
Julia wheeled away from him. "Tavin, go to Jay and convince him I am right as usual. If it's even possible. Make it so he understands." Julia called, slamming the bathroom door behind her.
Jayson waited at the house for Tavin. When he saw the car lights in the driveway, he left, got in the car with his brother. "Jayson, what do you plan on doing?" Tavin asked.
Jay put on his seatbelt and simply said, "Drive."
Tavin put the car in drive and pressed the gas. He parked down the block from Sandy's and Tavin went off to Sandy's to pack him a bag. Jay sat in the car, looking around the dark block that was semi lit by the street lights. He looked at Jess's house, her light was on. He grabbed the cell from the car charger and nearly dialed Jesslyn's number. Instead he got out of the car. Jay jogged quietly from the car to Jesslyn's back yard. He stood on the deck by the pool. The filter hummed. The heat made him wanna jump in the pool. He hadn't been swimming in so long. He tried the door, which slid open, allowing him to enter the kitchen. The living room was clear, and as he ascended the steps, he saw Jess's mom sleeping in bed. He tip toed past mom and knocked on Jess's door as quiet as possible.
"Jesslyn." Jay whispered to her. He turned the knob, whispering her name so she wouldn't get scared.
"Jayson?" She gasped, looking over her lap top. He slipped inside her room and shut the door behind him. "Jay, how are you here?" She whispered.
"It's a long story." He hesitated, decided to take a chance. "Wanna ditch this place?"
Jess closed her lap top as she rose from bed and hugged him. "Hell yeah, Jay. Where we going?"
"I don't know." He answered honestly.
She kissed him quickly. "Awe and you came for me, Jay?"
"Get a bag, quick. Pack light. Leave the phone."
Jess threw a bag together fast, a few summer outfits, some toiletries. She stuck her feet in flip flops. "Ready." She smiled, reaching for her phone.
"No, leave it." He ordered.
Tavin didn't mind taking Jesslyn along for the ride. He felt assured he'd return her home safely with him when he got back.
"Here. Stop at that motel. It's yellow. See it."
"Yeah. I do. Kinda hard to miss."
Tavin pulled over to the side of the road. Jay and Jess got out of the car. "This junk ass motel, Jay?" Tavin asked.
"Not for long. Just for the night. It's cash only and no cameras." Jay said. "I been here before."
"When?"
"Thanks for the ride." Jay said. Tavin handed off the rest of the money that he'd taken from Julia's when she was in the hospital. He never spent more than she'd asked him to spend on the Christmas list when she was at the farmhouse last time. He hadn't intended on keeping it, he just hadn't returned it. In fact he'd forgotten all about it.
"Jess comes back with me." Tavin stated.
"No. She's not. Drive away, Tav. Just drive away." Jay said firmly. "I'll be in touch."
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