* * *
“Can we have that table in the corner?” Jackie asks the hostess and then gives me a triumphant look when she starts to lead us that way.
It’s lunchtime at a restaurant a block away from work and it’s the first day Jackie has been back. The lucky bitch’s honeymoon stretched on for almost two weeks before her and Will had to return with matching tans and big smiles. She only works part-time at Mad Men so she can spare it, and Will, well Will only has to answer to Ted and we all know how Ted feels about it. I think he’s just glad they came back at all.
While I’ve talked to her every other day while she was in Mexico, I still haven’t been able to get down to the nitty gritty with her. Not that I particularly feel like it today. After the boating trip, my head has been all over the place and I’m really not sure what to feel anymore.
“I think Tiffany was a little upset that she wasn’t invited,” I tell Jackie after we order drinks, a Caesar for me and a virgin one for her.
“Hey,” she says to me, giving me a steady look. “Remember when you needed to talk to me about Will, back when we were secretly dating, and you said she couldn’t come? Just doing the same favor. We both love her to bits but you know she can’t keep her mouth shut, try as she might. If word gets out about the truth about you and Emmett, it could ruin everything. The press would be so quick to jump all over that.” She pauses. “Speaking of press, have you been keeping up with yourself?”
She takes out her phone and waves it at me. “I pretty much spent the whole honeymoon reading all the gossip sites. I think I learned more from them than I did from you. Alyssa, these people are fucking everywhere following you around. This must be driving you crazy.”
I shrug. “To be honest, I’m getting used to it.” I gesture around the restaurant. “And no one ever looks my way unless I’m with him. In a way, it’s the perfect blend of fame and anonymity. With Emmett I know people will take pictures and we’ll turn heads, I mean that’s why I’m here. And when he’s not here, well I’m just myself.”
“So you’re not yourself with him?”
Her question makes me pause. Am I myself with him? Or am I putting on some persona? I dismiss the question with my hand. “It doesn’t matter. The real question is, why were you looking at pictures of me on your honeymoon and not having sex with your new husband?”
“This isn’t about me,” Jackie says. “Don’t even try to change the subject. We have our whole lives to talk about the baby and the honeymoon and how the husband is doing. What I want to know is every single detail about you two.”
“Well what do you want to know?”
“Alyssa,” she says sternly. “You’re dating Emmett Hill. Do you know what they call you? The Bruiser and The Blondie.”
I stare at her, slack-jawed. Seriously? Was that Carla’s doing?
“Well it’s highly unfair to call him a bruiser,” I say. “That’s just the media running with it because it rhymes with Cruiser. He’s only gotten in like a handful of public fights.”
“And your whole relationship is fake,” she goes on, ignoring that. “So of course I want to know what the hell is going on. I mean, this is the most exciting thing to ever happen since…”
“Since you found out you were having a baby and getting married?”
She looks sheepish. “Well yeah. So are you sleeping with him?”
That’s the one thing I haven’t been forthcoming about in our texts. All the times I’ve slept with Emmett, which is technically three if you count the beginning, I haven’t mentioned to anyone. I don’t know why, I’m not usually one to shy away from sharing the details. I guess it’s just the one thing we do together that’s nobody’s business but ours.
And it’s something that won’t continue, I remind myself. Though I’m starting to take these declarations less and less seriously. Kind of like when you promise you’ll start your diet tomorrow and you never ever do.
“You are sleeping with him,” she exclaims softly. “Holy shit.”
“It’s nothing. It’s not a habit.”
“Pretty nice habit if it was.”
“He’s good at what he does,” I admit.
“You’re selling him short.”
I press my lips together trying to supress a smile. Am I ever. Emmett is not just good at what he does, he fucks like champ. He’s in it to win and nothing less than a million mind-blowing orgasms will do.
Crap. I know I have that sick dreamy look on my face and Jackie is delighting in every minute of it.
“But it doesn’t matter,” I go on, making my features blank, “because he annoys the living shit out of me.”
“Oh, he does not.”
“He’s a cad, Jackie. A prick. An asshole. A player. A downright scoundrel.”
“And that’s a problem for you?”
I give her a loaded look.
“Can’t you just enjoy the wining and dining then?” she asks, desperate to find some sort of romance between us. “I mean, that’s what helped Will win me over. That and the gifts.”
“Yeah. And that’s the huge difference here. For one, no one is winning anyone over. Except for us, together, winning over the general public. For second, you actually liked Will.”
“I still don’t believe you don’t like Emmett, even a little.” I stare blankly at her. She shrugs with one shoulder. “Okay, so then at least you like his dick.”
“I do. And I can like a dick without liking what it’s attached to.” I pause. “Though I must say, his tongue and his hands are pretty fantastic too. Wouldn’t be fair to leave them out. So I guess if there was some version of Emmett out there that was just tongue, dick and hands, I’d venture to say then that, yes, I like him.”
A silence falls over us as we ponder this interesting phallic creation.
“You know what, I know you,” she says with a patient smile. “I know you and I know you say you hate him but you don’t. Not even a bit. In fact, the only thing you hate is the fact that you like him. I’d go on to say that you probably like him a lot.”
I scoff and busy myself with the napkin. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh, but I do. I do. All that time pretending I wasn’t in love with Will was absolutely futile.”
I glance at her in annoyance. “I’m not in love with Emmett.”
“I’m not saying you are. But you like him and you’re pretending you don’t.”
I swallow that down. “So?” I ask cagily.
“Love is a cliff. You’re just steps from the edge. The fall is inevitable.”
I let out a huff of air, blowing a strand of hair off my face. “You can like someone and not fall in love with them. It happens all the time. It’s why so many people break up. They have the like. They want the love. And they expect the love. But sometimes that love doesn’t show up. So you have to end it.” I can’t help but think about Emmett as I’m saying this, the way he was with his ex-fiancée.
“You’re so cynical.”
“I’ve been around the block a lot,” I remind her. “And I’m not cynical, I’m a realist. I know what to expect, I know how it all works. The fact of the matter is the majority of relationships downright fail before they even get to the ‘I love you stage’, let alone after. And when it comes to Emmett and me, our relationship is one hundred per cent fake.”
“I bet the orgasms are real,” she says under her breath.
“And they are. I like Emmett. Okay? And I like having sex with him. No, I love having sex with him. But that’s the extent of what we are and who we are to each other. It will never go beyond that. It’s not in the contract. There are no cliffs of love for us to leap off of here. Just one big wall, signed with ink.”
Jackie studies me for a moment before shaking her head and taking a sip of her drink. “You’re a dream crusher, you know that? What the hell are you doing reading all those romance novels anyway? Don’t you believe in the happily ever after? Don’t you want that?”