Page 59 of Houston, We Have a Problem
“How are you like this?” I ask without meaning to. You’d think, for how long we’ve known each other, I would have asked something like this before, but I’ve always kept a decent distance between me and, well, anyone. All of this time I’ve been spending with Tamlin and Darcy has apparently made me go soft.
I’m trying to see that as a good thing.
Jordan does an impressive jumping twirl before landing in the Heisman pose with an invisible football. The combination ofthat with his fluffy tutu looks ridiculous, and he clearly doesn’t care. “Like what?”
“How do you make it look so easy to not care what people think of you?”
He stands up straight again, eyebrows low. “I care what people think of me.”
Gesturing to his leotard, I raise an eyebrow.
“One,” he says, “I have never looked better. And two, I absolutely wouldn’t wear something like this if you and Brooklyn weren’t wearing it too. And three, I only care about the people that matter. If you were to tell me I was acting stupid, you would probably mean it, so I’d listen. Just like when Brooklyn says I need to stop working and relax, I know she’s not saying it to make me feel bad, so I should do what she says.”
I narrow my eyes at him. We haven’t talked much about his relationship with Brook outside of that short conversation when he admitted to being in love with her the day after trivia. That means I haven’t sufficiently warned him not to break her heart. Now probably isn’t the time, but I still say, “You’d better listen to her.”
He smirks. “I do.”
“Good.”
He studies me for a moment, fully serious now that he’s probably picked up on my own sobriety. “This is bigger than a tutu, isn’t it?”
“That’s a sentence I never thought you’d say to me,” I mutter and then head down to the living room to flop onto the couch. I’ve still got a few minutes to kill before Darcy’s expecting me, and it might be nice to talk out some of the stuff that has been bubbling up since my date with Tamlin today.
Once Jordan has settled on the other end of the couch—our tutus bunch between us awkwardly—he bites his tongue and waits for me to initiate this conversation. I’m glad he can beserious when he needs to be, and I can sense Brook’s influence. He usually can’t shut up, and Iknowhe has things he wants to say.
I appreciate his uncommon willingness to let me take this at my own pace.
It’s still weird to think that he and my sister are in love, but from the sound of things, they’ve been good for each other. That’s what a relationship should look like, but I’m not sure I have that with either Darcy or Tamlin. Has either been good for me? Have I been good forthem? The instant I suspected Darcy of lying to me, I basically ignored her for days. I don’t think that would make anyone feel good.
“Do you think I have trust issues?” I ask without context.
He lets out a little laugh, as if he has no idea what to do with that question. “I’m guessing you’ve given this some thought?” he says slowly.
Not really, but it has probably been festering inside me for a while. Definitely since I made the connection—or lack of—between Darcy’s family and Jesse, but I think this is a deeper problem. There has to be a reason I’ve never been very open in my relationships over the years. One that goes deeper than the fact that I’ve always been busy with baseball. That never stopped me from constantly having someone to call mine.
Have I been overcomplicating things, like Bonnie said? She told me I don’t like to be alone, but that doesn’t mean I’ve ever let someone else in. I’m pretty sure I’ve been alone my entire life.
“It’s a more recent thing that’s come up,” I say, shrugging. “And I know you trust pretty much everyone, so it’s okay if you don’t underst—”
“I love how you have all these ideas about me that aren’t true.” Jordan shakes his head and grins like he’s never met anyone more ridiculous. “I know you and I don’t see each otheras much as we used to, but you clearly need to work on your friendship skills. Who says I trust easily? I have thehardesttime trusting people.”
“Says the guy who fell in love with someone after a week.” Whatever happened between them over the last couple of weeks, they both seem really happy to have found each other, so it must be real.
He rolls his eyes. “First of all, I’m pretty sure it’s impossible to distrust Brooklyn Briggs. Second, I’ve technically known Brooklyn as long as I’ve known you. I may not have been crushing on her back in the day—too busy driving her crazy for that—but I knew her. I knew exactly who she was and what she could do to me if I let her in. Love means vulnerability, which means the risk of getting hurt orcausinghurt, which means my instinct is to run far away because I can’t give up control. But we’re not talking about me.” He nudges my arm. “Why are you wondering if you have trust issues?”
“I don’t know. There’s the whole thing with Tamlin Park—I thought for sure she was out to get me, but I’ve come to respect her and how she does her job after getting to know her. And then there’s Darcy’s brother…”
“That guy terrifies me,” Jordan says with a nervous chuckle. “He was heading out to his car when I got here and wouldn’t stop glaring at me.”
Sounds about right. “Thing is,” I continue, “I talked to Darcy about her family quite a bit last week, and she said she only has a sister. So she’s probably lying about Jesse being related.”
Jordan doesn’t reply, like he’s waiting for me to finish my explanation.
“That’s it,” I say.
“Okay, so you don’t trust Darcy because she’s not related to the guy who’s twice her size and a completely different ethnicity from her?”
“She introduced him as her brother when they first moved in.”
