SKIPPING TIME

Chapter 22.5

The next three days seemed like the longest of Jess's life. Not only did Cacee refuse to even look at him, but her eyes were always puffy and bloodshot, as if she spent most of her time crying. If someone would have told him three days ago that he was capable of breaking Cacee's heart, he would have laughed. He'd never once considered that she might be so hurt by their split that he would lose even her friendship.

In fact, although he'd done his best for the one day they "dated" to convince himself that Cace really wanted to be with him, in his heart of hearts he'd known they were only together because  Cacee's whole world had become unknown. Except for him.  He was safe and comforting and, therefore, datable.

At least until they returned home and she returned to her senses.

Deep down, that was what he believed until she started screaming at him.  At that point it finally sank in that she'd genuinely  wanted to be his girlfriend--enough that she may have actually stuck around until he came back. And knowing that made everything even worse.

Jess sighed and, despite the pain in his head and stomach, set the treadmill to a higher speed and made his legs to move faster. He knew it wouldn't be long before Ray came to his door and forced him out of his room for a few hours. He wanted to be good and exhausted before then.  

Exhaustion made it easier to "relax" on the twin bed in the corner of the big room, surreptitiously following every move Cacee made, while simultaneously feigning complete disinterest in her. Of course, watching her just intensified his guilt, but it didn't matter because he couldn't seem to help himself.  He grimaced as pain throbbed in his temples, but pushed his legs to keep moving.

When Ray was around, she seemed a little better. The two of them spent hours talking, and Cacee didn't get shy around Ray, like she did around everyone else. In school she always looked like she wanted to disappear. She got nervous talking to teachers, or even the librarian. In fact, he'd never seen Cacee act completely comfortable with anyone but him. Until Ray. He now despised Ray with the same burning passion he once reserved for Chloe.

He wished the asshole would at least stop taking away his only friggin' privacy. But every day Ray made him leave the back room for hours. Jess didn't know what the fuckwad did back here. Probably jerked off. It would make sense. After all, Ray seemed more dejected every time he left this room. No doubt the sight of his tiny pencil-dick depressed him.

Jess snickered but, since he was having a hard time breathing, quickly stopped.  He actually wished he could figure out the real cause of Ray's depression. If he knew, there might be a way to make it worse. The ever-increasing slump in Ray's shoulders was the one bright spot in his days.

Well that, and the steady malfunctioning of everything in the warehouse. Light bulbs exploded on a regular basis, the fan blew wildly, the faucet decided it wouldn't turn off for a few hours, pictures fell off the walls, the electrical outlets spurted red and yellow sparks...

In truth, living in the funhouse of doom kind of sucked. But he loved watching Ray squirm in front of Cacee. Every time something else broke Ray looked more baffled, but Jess didn't buy it. Ray kept pretending surprise because he didn't want to look like an idiot. Still, given the condition of the room, he couldn't avoid it. At this point it was glaringly obvious that good ole' dipshit Ray had obviously wired this entire place wrong.

Cacee, however, took the defective set-up of the room with stoic disregard, helping Ray clean up and assuring him repeatedly that she didn't mind.

But Jess figured all the cleaning must be getting to her, especially with how sick she looked.  The next time something broke he planned to stop being a chickenshit and offer to help Cacee clean it. If he spoke first, it might lead to them somehow making up. Not that he expected that to happen, but he needed to at least try.