Something's Up

I managed to make it to my car without exploding. It was a good thing Jordan wasn’t near me at the time because I would’ve bitten his head off and probably stomped away from him. I was looking forward to the weekend. I wanted to get out of town and get away from everyone. But most importantly, I wanted to spend a whole two days wrapped up with him.

Resisting the urge to scream, I jabbed my key into the door lock and opened my door. “It’s ok,” I told myself. “It’s not like there isn’t something for me to do this weekend.” I sighed. I was putting it off. I knew I was putting it off but who could really blame me?

When Cassie came to me a couple days before with an idea for a fundraiser at her school, I was impressed that she was getting involved and helping out. I felt like I had an influence on that. And then she told me what she wanted. “I need a parent volunteer Anna.”

“I’m not your parent,” I replied.

She rolled her eyes at me. “They say ‘parent’ but you know that it doesn’t have to be a parent Aunt Anna! It just has to be a responsible adult.”

I laughed.

“Aunt Anna! Be serious! I need you to supervise and help out with the show. Dad can’t do it because he’s working like crazy now. Mom isn’t feeling that great, she’s in the bathroom getting sick most of the time. You are the only one I can ask, and we need volunteers otherwise we are going to have to do something boring to fundraise.” Her face screwed up as if she had just smelt something horrible. “We want to do a talent show.”

“Fine.” I figured it wouldn’t be too difficult to help out with the show, they were high school kids, and they didn’t need to be supervised every second.

“Good,” she jumped up off my bed where she has plopped when she started telling me the idea. As she ran out the door, she yelled over her shoulder. “You have to meet with Coach Baker Monday after school!”

“Get back here!” I ran after her. I chased her up the stairs, around the living room and up to her bedroom before she finally stopped running. “Why do I have to meet with Josh?”

“Don’t hate me,” she pleaded. “But he’s the teacher assigned to the show.”

“And you couldn’t tell me that before you talked me into helping out?”

“What’s the problem?” She looked confused. “You are happy with Uncle Jordy and you said that one day you would probably be friends with Coach Baker. Why would this be a problem?”

“Well…”

She gasped, her hand clamping on my arm. “OhmyGod! Do you think Uncle Jordy would have a problem with you working with Coach Baker?” She pulled her arm away and tapped her bottom lip with her finger. “I never thought about that.” With a sigh, she told me that it would be ok if I couldn’t help her out.

Even though I wasn’t one hundred percent sure, I told her it would be ok. I mean, sooner or later, I would see him around and have to talk to him. It wasn’t that either one of us did anything wrong, we just didn’t work out.

I had told Cassie I would give Josh a call after work, before I went out of town with Jordan. Now that Jordan had made plans with his brothers, I figured that there was nothing stopping me from meeting up with Josh and the kids over the weekend to work on the show. They were supposed to be meeting at the school both Saturday and Sunday afternoon.

I sat in my car, staring at my phone, for the longest time. I didn’t know what to say to him.

While I was debating the best way to start a conversation with Josh – ‘hey Cassie roped me into working this show, what do I do?’ or ‘hey josh, how’s it going?’ Both sucked, to be honest. One was too harsh and the other almost too friendly.

Ring.

“Oh shit!” I jumped in my seat – almost dropping my phone.

Ring. Ring.

I didn’t have time to check the caller id before it would go to voice mail. “Hello?”

“Hey Babe, whatcha doing?” I forgot all about Cassie, Josh and the play the moment I heard Jordan’s voice.

Trying not to let my previous pissy mood sound through in my voice, I told him I was sitting in my car. “What are you doing? Slow day at work?”

“Nah Babe, I’m not at work.” He lowered his voice and jokingly said. “I’m playing hooky. Wanna come play with me?”

I closed my eyes and squeezed them tight. It was difficult to resist him when he used that sexy voice on me. “I don’t know,” I chewed on my bottom lip. “I still have to contact the teacher for Cassie’s talent show production.”

“Baby come on,” he groaned. “I haven’t seen you in forever and it doesn’t feel right. I miss you Anna.”

“I didn’t go anywhere.”

He didn’t say anything for a moment. I wished that I knew what he was thinking but, of course, I wouldn’t ask.

“Will you come over? We could go out for dinner and have a relaxing evening together. What do you say?”

Despite how upset I was that our weekend wasn’t happening, I couldn’t say no. I wanted to see him. I hated not seeing him for days at a time, it wasn’t how we did things – except for the one month that I was stupid and stopped talking to him.

When I pulled into his driveway ten minutes after I hung up with him, he was standing by his truck, waiting for me. “Hey baby,” he greeted me when I got out of my car. I didn’t even get a word out before his arms wrapped around me and he held me tight.

“Everything ok Jordy?” My hands trailed over his back as I pulled back to look at him. He met my eyes and held them. For the longest time, he just stared into my eyes without saying anything.

“What?” I chuckled nervously.

“Nothing.” He motioned towards the passenger door of his truck. “Are you hungry?”

When I nodded, he opened the door for me and helped me in. Just before he closed the door, he leaned in, gave me a kiss and then hurried around to his door. Once he climbed up into the driver’s seat, he leaned over again and kissed my cheek.

“Are you ok?” I was starting to get suspicious – but about what? There was something up, I could feel it.

“Yes, I’m wonderful.” He gave me a kiss again. As he settled back into his seat, he suggested that I get comfortable. “We aren’t eating in town tonight Babe. I’m taking you somewhere special.”