Time of My Life_ A Novel - Allison Winn Scotch [94]
Later, he insists on walking me home. We trudge through the piles of snow and beyond revelers who, in spite of the storm, seem to crowd the streets in drunken packs, and my face nearly freezes from the chill. But after he’s deposited me safely, and I rush inside toward the warmth of my lobby, I realize that while my cheeks have gone numb, there, that spot where he kissed, seems to burn hot enough to warm me from the inside out.
WHEN I WAKE the next morning, there is a message from Jack. He’ll be home in two days, and Happy New Year, where are you?
I wrap myself under my covers until it seems too gluttonous to stay in bed any longer. I peer out my window, and the sun has risen, strong and bright, and already, the snow is dissolving into streaky drops on the glass, into flooding puddles on the street.
I walk to my closet and pull open my sock drawer and tug out Izzy’s New Year’s card. I rattle around in the kitchen drawer until I find some tape, and then I paste it up on the refrigerator, a daily reminder of a nine-year-old who hadn’t yet found a way to conceal her true colors.
I sink onto the kitchen floor and gaze up at her card, with its lopsided snowflakes and piles of glitter. That is how life should be, I think. Shiny and imperfect but, despite the flaws, still full of promise for the year to come. How did I miss that in the first place?
Chapter Twenty-six
But why can’t you just go along with it?” Jack is saying, as he steps out of the shower and wraps a towel around his tanned, lean waist. “I mean, she wants to throw us a party, and she’s already started making the calls and doing the planning, so come on, Jill . . .” He trails off and moves closer, kissing me on the neck, as if that will convince me.
“I just . . . don’t,” I say, pushing him away. His face clouds into a bruise. “Besides, the wedding is in three months; do we really need an engagement party now?”
I’d read enough bridal magazines to know that, in fact, engagement parties were thrown for an engagement, not because the mother of the groom was once again looking to insert herself into a relationship and had grown bored at the lull in the planning.
“How’s the writing going?” I ask, hoping to divert his attention, hoping to hear that perhaps Jack’s New Year’s resolution was to finally, finally find something, anything, writing or otherwise, that ignites his fire. Life with Jack has started to feel like we’re playing on a loop: circling everything, going nowhere, and it’s hard not to acknowledge that his lack of direction, his total complacency with his lot, is part of the problem.
But he ignores me.
“It will be small, tasteful,” he insists, wandering into the living room to retrieve his dry cleaning from the front hall closet.
“It’s not an issue of size,” I say, following him in. I spy the time on the cable box. “Shit. I have to run.”
“So we’ll talk about this later?” he says.
“Why? You heard me,” I answer, stabbing my arms through the sleeves of my coat and throwing open the door. I knew it was a small thing, even a petty thing, to refuse this engagement party, but it seemed like a good place to start—to start saying no, to start crafting a better version of myself, rather than an echo of the old one.
“Come on, Jill,” he weaves his arms around my waist and kisses me fully on the mouth. “Just think about it.”
“Really, Jack, there’s nothing to think about,” I say flatly. “I just have too much on my plate, with your mom’s nonstop wedding plans and craziness at work,