Hold My Hand || J.Seresin

Chapter 13

It had taken about 20 minutes for the awkwardness to dissipate in the car. Mostly because Jake had pulled over for one of the roadside fruit stands. After buying a few baskets of strawberries, we continued on. The food settled things in the car and we started talking. Mostly Jake wanted to know about my relationship with Bradley. After years of not sharing, I opened up and it just spilled out of me.

The day had been great - we'd started out at a small boardwalk. It wasn't a huge tourist spot, like Santa Monica, but there was still a big crowd of people. I'd snuck off while Jake was talking with one of the beach vendors haggling over the price of a souvenir sweatshirt to the nearby corner store. The shop was clearly intended for tourists, but they had disposable cameras and I thought it would be fun for the rest of our day trip. Jake was holding up the sweatshirt, waving it like a flag as I approached. I wound the camera until it clicked and snapped a picture of him.

Our next stop was a mini golf course. We decided to keep score since we were pretty competitive. Just like when we were at Top Gun, we kept fighting for the top spot, or in this case, the least amount of points. Jake and I had always loved being competitive with one another and as we got to the last hole, the game was tied. Jake had gone first and royally messed up his shot. When I lined up mine, I knew I had this. And unlike my Top Gun year, I finished all the holes and won.
"Don't worry, Bagman, I won't tell anyone that you tanked on the final hole." I joked.
"Yeah, yeah." He responded. His left arm slung around my shoulder, pulling me towards him and kissing me. My hands came to rest against his abdomen, and I tried not to let out a sigh. We didn't kiss in public often, but I didn't care if anyone was staring or waiting for us to move; I just got caught up in the moment. Jake's arm tightened around my shoulders and his other hand came to rest on my cheek, deepening the kiss. He pulled away sooner than I would have liked,
"Good day so far?" He asked. I nodded, smiling before kissing him again and taking his hand to leave the course.

But I knew the best was saved for last when Jake opened the back door of his truck, revealing both our pairs of cowboy boots and a cowboy hat. Jake turned to look at me,
"What do you have planned?" I asked.
"I wanted to show you a place I used to frequent a lot in Texas, or a similar venue to the one back home." He stared at me expectantly, as if waiting for an answer. I racked my brain, thinking about what I knew about Jake's past.
"Oh my god. No way." I gasped out, excitedly. My eyes darted back and forth between the boots in the backseat and Jake's face, "We're going to a country bar?!" He nodded, his face lighting up with a smile. I practically jumped on him, wrapping my arms around his neck for a hug. He let out a small laugh, but kept his footing.

The country bar parking lot was already busy when we arrived. We slipped on our boots and I grabbed Jake's cowboy hat, placing it on his head. My eyes scanned over him, liking what I saw.
"You look good, cowboy." I told him, leaning up to kiss him. We followed after a group of people and entered the bar. There was loud country music playing and people on the dance floor.
"You want a drink?" Jake asked, looking across the room.
"Yeah, I'll come with you." We started walking across the room, dodging groups of people. Jake's hand slipped to the small of my back, keeping us together and silently leading me forward. While I was of average height, I was slender and had always been good at navigating through crowds to get near the front or just to pass people who were walking slower. I maneuvered my way through the crowd until I was at the bar. I hadn't looked back, but I knew Jake was behind me.

His arm was around me, his hand resting on the bar, so I was partially trapped in his space, not that I minded. One of the bartenders approached us and Jake ordered a beer. The bartender looked at me,
"Make that two." I told him. I turned around, my back facing the bar and looked at Jake. He had the cowboy hat dipped down slightly, blocking his eyes. My hand reached out and tilted it up slightly, his eyes meeting mine. Before he could stop me, I unhooked the disposable camera from my belt loop and snapped a photo of Jake in the cowboy hat. He was scowling in the picture most likely, but I didn't care. The camera had a wrist strap and I'd been using that attached to my belt loop to keep my hands free since I didn't have pockets or a bag.