Page 114 of Jake Forever
Embarrassingly, I knew exactly what he meant. In truth, I did hate my job. But the situation wasn't as simple as Jake made it sound. "I'm not planning on being a bartender forever," I said. "It's a big company, and now that I have my foot in the door…" I gave him a pleading look, hoping he'd let it drop already.
He didn't. Instead, he made a forwarding motion with his hand. "Go on."
Jeez, did I have to spell it out?
From the look on his face, apparently, I did.
"Well," I continued, "if I play my cards right, I could get into their hospitality department."
"And?"
"And, I'd be using my degree."
"To become?"
God, why was he playing dumb? He knew exactly what I'd been hoping for. We'd discussed it, several times, in fact.
Still, in the most reasonable tone I could muster, I said, "Well, for starters, I could become an event planner or something."
"Right."
I made a sound of impatience. "Why do you keep saying that?"
He looked at me for a long, silent moment. Finally, he said, "So let's recap. Your 'plan' is to work your way up to a job that I'm already offering you."
I glanced away. Technically, this was true. But things weren't quite that simple.
Jake continued, "So, I've gotta ask. Why?"
"You know why."
"Because you'd rather trust strangers than me?" Abruptly, he turned away. "Got it."
I watched, with a sick feeling, as he fired up the engine and pulled away from the curb. Suddenly, I felt like crying. But what would that accomplish? Nothing.
As he drove, I sat, sulking in the passenger's seat. Why couldn't he get it? If I took a job with him, I'd have literally all of my eggs in one basket – the Jake basket. Oh sure, that basket was beyond nice, but how sturdy was it?
Jake loved me. I knew that. And I loved him, too. But what would happen if our relationship ended? I'd have literally nothing – no money, no job, no future. Why couldn’t he see how risky that was?
But of course, Jake thrived on risk. He ate it up and went back for more. It was one of the things I loved about him. But unlike Jake, I didn't have gobs of money and hard assets that I could sell if I had to.
I didn't have fame. I didn't have fortune. All I had was him.
Of course, that, in itself, was a very big deal.
I was so damned crazy about him. But I couldn’t help but notice that in spite of some hints a few weeks earlier, he'd taken no concrete steps to make the relationship more permanent. I didn't want to rush him. Hell, I didn't want to rush us.
But if our relationship didn't survive, what then?
For the millionth time in the last month, I thought of Bianca. She'd worked for him, too. And now, she was a total basket case.
I sank lower in my seat. Funny, I was feeling like a basket case now.
Suddenly, I was so tired of being on defense all the time. We were now only a couple of blocks away from Jake's building, and I desperately wanted to resolve this before we got there.
I turned sideways in the passenger's seat and said, "Let me askyousomething. At the conference, center, why didn't you mention that Bianca was there?"
"I wasn't hiding it."
