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Chapter 8: Of Sane Conversations that Reveal the Truth . . . Or Some of It
~Jemma~
I honestly didn’t know what to think when Jacob came strolling up my driveway. My first thought was, how does he remember where I live? My second thought was, he probably has no idea I’m up here.
I watched him from my vantage point in the tree, eyes glued to him as he sauntered up my driveway to the cabin. He stopped in front of the front door and raised his hand to knock. A moment later Aunt Clara opened it up. She looked surprised and full of questions. It’s not every day some hot seventeen-year-old guy shows up on your doorstep, and he just happens to know your loser of a niece-turned-daughter.
I couldn’t hear what words were exchanged between the two, but I saw him wave good-bye and Aunt Clara shut the door. Good. I just had to be absolutely still until he was gone so he wouldn’t notice me and he didn’t have to . . .
Oh . . .
Oh shit.
Don’t sneeze, don’t sneeze, don’t sneeze. Of course I’d have to sneeze right now. Not ten minutes before this, or even five minutes after this. Right now. As in, this moment. And it was gonna be a doozy.
Before I could even begin to stop myself I emitted the loudest sneeze I’d ever produced in my life. The action caused the tree to shake and I clutched the branches and the trunk to keep from falling off. Jacob swung around, looking in all directions, and then he finally looked up. “Jemma?” he enquired in wonderment.
I closed my eyes and turned my face to the sky, mouthing why? Then I leaned over the side and gave a half-hearted wave. “Hiya.”
“What are you doing up there?”
“Thinking.”
“Do you mind if I join you?”
“Kind of.”
He folded his arms. “So you’re going to be stubborn again?”
“I’m always stubborn.”
He laughed. “Got that right. Is this your special tree or something? Is that why I’m not allowed on it?”
I rolled my eyes. “Exactly. Don’t go near it. Don’t even touch it.”
Jacob stepped forward and tauntingly reached out a hand. “I’m going to touch it.”
“Don’t you dare.”
He leaned forward and pressed his hand against the bark, smilingly smugly up at me. “I’m coming up,” he declared without further argument to back it up. He began grabbing limbs and loose edges to pull himself to me. I willed myself to teleport from my spot all the way back to the ground the whole time he was climing. It didn’t work. Curse my lack of magical powers.
He sat across from me on the thick branch, half-supported by another tree near mine. He got himself comfortable and looked at me.
“So, you’re up here. What do you want?”
“If you don’t mind me asking . . .”
“Which I probably will.”
He licked his lips. “Why did you suddenly . . . start crying after the movie?”
I sat back. I would feign ignorance. If it didn’t work it would at least drive him crazy to the point where he gave up. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You can’t avoid this. I know you know exactly what I’m talking about.”
“Prove it.”
“I don’t need to prove it.”
I met his eyes intensely, and the blue pierced right through me, maybe to my soul. I felt a little violated then, because I sincerely wondered if he was reading my soul. “If I tell you,” I said softly, “will you let it go?”
He hesitated for a moment, and then nodded.
I took a deep breath, sliding down on the branch, finding anywhere to look but at him. “I don’t have a mother,” I whispered, swallowing hard. I had the sensation of glue in my throat. I clenched and unclenched my hands to relieve some of the tension, feeling more tears prick my eyes. I didn’t let them through.
“A week before I started at Heart my mom . . . my mom . . .” No. I couldn’t do it. The tears fell and my body shook and I just couldn’t do it.
“Jemma?” Jacob whispered. I didn’t try to look up and see him through my blurry eyes. I just shook my head.
“I just don’t have a mom, okay? Is that good enough for you?” Before he could answer I slipped from my place on the branch and climbed half-way down, jumping the rest of the way. Man, if I just kept running away like this, nothing would ever get accomplished. But it was me and it was just the way I handled things. It was the only way I could. The truth was too hard for me to admit and it was the only thing people wanted from me. I heard Jacob rushing after me into the cabin, and Aunt Clara gasped when we burst through her front door. I ran straight up to my room and closed my door, leaning my back against it, bawling my eyes out.
*****
~Jacob~
I chased her up her stairs until she slammed the door in my face. I tried the knob and banged on the door, but she wouldn’t open up. I could hear her crying on the other side and I just wanted to get in there and find out what the hell was wrong with her.
“Jemma!” I yelled through the thick door. “Let me in!”
“No!” I heard through a sob. “Go away!”
“What’s going on up here?” Jemma’s aunt suddenly emerged from the stairway, arms folded across her chest. She had her eyebrows raised at me and was tapping her foot. “Why is my niece crying?”
“I don’t know!” I cried, exasperated. “She just burst into tears!”
“Really?”
“Yes! I was hoping maybe someone would tell me what’s going on?”
Her aunt bit her lower lip, then reached over and grabbed my arm, pulling me down the stairs and into the kitchen. She sat me in a chair and put a plate of fresh sugar cookies out. They weren’t chocolate chip, but hey. They were cookies. I took one and started chewing on it. Jemma’s aunt took a seat across from me and started tapping her nails against the table, making a clicking sound that gave me chills.
“So, what’s her problem?” I asked after devouring my third cookie.
“What did you say to her?” She asked abruptly.
I stared at her. “Um . . . I just asked her why she kept crying all of a sudden, and she said something about not having a mom . . .”
Jemma’s aunt---I thought her name was Clara---leaned back in her chair and covered her face with a hand. “Oh, god. That girl is going to kill herself one day.”
“Excuse me?” I asked, totally in the dark.
“So, it’s been established that she has no mother, right?” Clara leaned forward, looking me hard in the eyes. I nodded. She ran a hand through her hair and shook her head.
“No . . . I can’t be the one to tell you this. Okay, listen.” She dabbed at a few crumbs on the table. “Jemma has a lot of . . . hurt in her soul. Yeah, that sounds good. She hasn’t really known a lot of goodness her whole life, and she’s just afraid. Afraid something will happen. That she’ll hurt someone or lose someone, and worst of all, that it’ll be her fault.”
“But why would she---”
“Don’t ask me, I’m not Jemma!” Clara exclaimed, then took a deep breath when she realized she had raised her voice. “I’m sorry. Jemma will have to tell you. When she’s ready, and the pain is no longer so unbearable. Please, don’t press her. She’s having a hard enough time coping as it is.”
My hand was hovering over the plate of cookies, but I restrained, suddenly not hungry. What would make Jemma so sad and scarred that she . . .
“I guess I’ll go, then,” I said awkwardly, rising from the kitchen chair and walking to the front door. “When Jemma comes out tell her I’m sorry and we’ll continue this another time, I suppose.” I stepped out onto their walkway. “Good-bye, Clara.”
“Bye, Jacob.”
I felt her eyes on me the whole way down the driveway---and their driveway is long, let me tell you---but when I got to the end, I turned around, and it wasn’t Clara staring at me but a figure in an upstairs window. I squinted and was able to make out flashes of Jemma staring down at me. I sighed heavily, making my shoulders rise and fall dramatically, and turned around to start on my way back home.