Double The Alpha: A Paranormal Menage Romance Page 29

  “Well, what is it? How is jugball played?”

  “Well, there’s still pitchers, right, like in baseball, and in fact, pitchers pretty much are the whole team. Then there’s runners, but runners are just pitchers who aren’t currently pitching at the moment.”

  “Well, then, who bats?”

  “No one does. See, the object of the game isn’t for someone to hit a ball with a bat; it’s for the pitchers to hit a jug with a ball. Specifically, it’s a thick plastic, five-gallon water jug to be exact, and there are all sorts of rules and regulations as to the precise dimensions and all that, but the point is for a pitcher to knock it over from a great distance with a rubber ball kind of resembling a baseball. Then, when a pitcher does knock it over, the runners on base have to try to reach home before players from the opposing team can get to the jug and get it upright again.

  In case of a tie at the end of the four quarters, the winning team is determined by who can kick the jug the farthest across the field. And kicking a jug all the way into the stands is an automatic win by that team for not only that game, but the next game they have scheduled. So, sometimes a team wins without the other team ever having had a chance to play. And in that event, the team who lost via never getting to play has to wear purple bandanas until the next time there’s a tie and one of their players kicks the jug into the stands. Sometimes teams have to wear the purple bandanas for years. It’s honestly... Well, the whole thing is honestly pretty weird.”

  Jugball sounded horrible. I just wanted American baseball again, just wanted to watch the Tigers play in the city that had my heart. Even while at the same time, I wanted to remain in the city run by the man who was slowly claiming my heart.

  Gaze on Celeste, I began sliding the baseball cards back in the envelope. “I need to talk to you.”

  It had just dawned on me that I only had one more day to make my decision and tell Jackson.

  With the bag of food from the cafe, Celeste gestured to my apartment door. “I need to talk to you, too. So, how about we head inside and have some Sunday brunch? I need some bacon.”

  It turned out that we both needed some bacon. We didn’t really even start talking until we’d each polished off two crispy slices, but then, we hardly stopped for breath. Celeste told me about the “hell” she’d experienced while in the hospital, with Irene fretting and fussing the entire time, driving her “insane,” and then she abruptly switched gears, asking if I knew that my trip to the mall was the talk of D.C.

  “You’re really like a celebrity now. A lot of women and teen girls have even started wearing their hair how you had yours. Long, straight ponytail, bangs side-swept and tucked behind one ear. A lot of naturally blonde women are even getting their hair colored brown to match your exact same shade. Word is that the salons are already running out of chestnut hair color.”

  I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. I’d really spent about thirty seconds doing my hair before my trip to the mall, spending even far less time deciding to just put it in a ponytail.

  I told Celeste all about my mall experience, from how funny it had made me feel to simply charge things to Jackson, to the preteen girl who’d asked if I were pregnant with his baby yet. But then I steered the conversation back around to Celeste, feeling like we needed to talk more about what had happened to her. Feeling like maybe she needed to talk about it more, even if she didn’t exactly want to. Digging into a fresh fruit bowl overflowing with halved strawberries and chunks of cantaloupe, I asked her to tell me exactly what had happened out on the balcony with Drago.

  Gazing on her plate, she briefly picked at an omelet stuffed with red and green bell peppers, mushrooms, and cheese before responding. “Well, it’s really not that long of a story; I just choked. Just like a jugball player not ready to pitch with the big boys in the finals. I didn’t even get a single arrow off. I just got out on the balcony, and then Drago seemed to spot me and started flying toward me, and then I just...” Celeste shrugged, setting her fork down, then lifted her gaze to my face. “I’m not who I’ve always thought I was, Vivian. I’m just a coward. Just a weakling. I realized that when Drago was flying toward me and I couldn’t move.

  I now knew that everything everyone has always told me has been right. Women shouldn’t fight dragons. We’re just not equipped to. I should probably stop spending so much time practicing archery and more time... Well, what do normal women spend eight hours a day doing? I really don’t even know. What’s a normal, female job I could do? Everyone always says I’m so graceful; maybe I should take up ballet.

  Unlike baseball, that’s still endured, and we have three major ballet companies right here in D.C. I know at twenty-three, I’d be starting way late, but maybe after a few years, I could dance in the corps, at least. Maybe if I really worked my tail off, anyway. I think my grandma would finally be proud.”

  Swallowing a bite of strawberry, I set my fork down and looked Celeste right in the eyes. “Do you really like ballet? Have you ever really felt drawn to it before?”

  I was pretty sure I knew the answers to both those questions.

  Confirming my suspicions, Celeste shrugged and didn’t answer. Instead, she picked up her fork and began picking at her omelet again. “To my complete, utter and total, life-threatening mortification, Jason came to see me while I was in the hospital.”

  She’d been interested in Jason for quite some time, though she’d been sure he didn’t feel the same.

  “He actually said I was brave. Can you believe that? After what happened with Drago, I was so terrified and horrified that I couldn’t stop screaming, to the point that I had to be sedated. And yet, Jason said I was brave. I told him he should probably have his head examined while he was at the hospital.”

  “He’s right, though. You were brave. You think going out there on the balcony when Gorgolians were attacking the city, and then hanging on to the railing to save your own life while Drago Stone tried to pull you to your death, you think those things didn’t take guts?”

  Looking down at her plate, Celeste scoffed. “Exactly what Jason said. Almost word-for-word. But, no... No, I don’t think I had guts. Not guts in the way I wanted to have them. Not by taking out a Gorgolian, or at least helping to take one out. You had the real guts, and I’m so grateful to you for that. For not only saving my life, but also for keeping my whole worldview from shattering completely.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, at least by your brave actions, I can still let myself believe that women can be brave and powerful. Fierce, just like how you were against Drago with the arrow. Without what you did, I might be tempted to think that all women are unheroic and weak. Like me.”

  Now it was my turn to scoff, and I did, heartily. “Oh, come on. You’re not—”

  “Jason says I just need another chance. He says I just need to be a little more careful this time so I don’t get hurt. He says I just need some kind of backup, or a safety net or something. He’s going to talk to Jackson about it all, apparently about me getting some kind of a second chance at some point in the future. I think he’s absolutely insane, and I told him that, right to his face. I think anyone who has even the slightest bit of faith left me in me after what happened is absolutely insane, and I guess I just don’t want to talk about this anymore, if you don’t mind, Viv.”

  A sudden shimmering of tears in Celeste’s big blue down-turned eyes told me that she really didn’t.

  “Okay. We don’t have to talk about it anymore right now. But just so you know, whenever you do want to—”

  “I know, and thanks. But right now, let’s just move on. Let’s talk some more about you. Tell me something to completely take my mind off me.”

  “Well, I guess just for starters, I’ve come to remember that Drago Stone is actually my ex-boyfriend.”

  Celeste, who’d been taking a sip of orange juice, now sprayed it all over the side of the marble-topped island in my kitchen, where we were eating. “Um... What?”

&n
bsp; I filled her in about everything, ending by telling her how Jackson had assured me that if I did decide to go back home to Detroit, he’d have the scientists send me back to a parallel where Drago Stone wouldn’t be present. And also where the nuclear blast that had created shifters and had nearly destroyed the entire would never occur.

  “So, basically, I’d get to go back to the home I remember and love, with none of the bad things. My mom would still be alive, and so would the rest of my family. Drago wouldn’t exist, and I won’t even remember him or his abuse, because I’ll only have memories of being in that parallel. I’m still a little fuzzy on the mechanics of it all myself, but Jackson says I won’t remember anything. Not Drago, not being frozen, not anything that’s happened here, and, well, I won’t remember him.”

  I shifted on my bar stool, hand going up to massage a high point on my chest, just below my throat, where I’d developed a faint ache.

  Celeste speared a piece of omelet, frowning. “You won’t remember me, either. Not to mention that I’ll never see you again, and not to be totally selfish, but you’re the best friend I’ve had in my adult life, by far, and I’m so not cool with that. Also not to mention, totally non-selfishly, the more I hear about you and Jackson, and the more I see different little looks on your face when you talk about him, and the more little artifacts and things I see that he’s given you, the more I think you should stay here.

  And I’m not even saying that you have to have his baby, at least not right away. I’m just saying that you should stay here and see what happens with him, because all baby-making aside, I definitely think it’s possible that the two of you could have a real future together as a couple... maybe even as a married couple. And maybe you could be unbelievably happy with him some day. And don’t you think that’s what your mom and your family would want, more than any other thing? For you to be truly happy?

  Even though I want you to stay here for my own selfish reasons, I truly just want you to be happy. So, I think your family would feel the same. And, anyway, from the way you explain it, it’s not like you’ll be killing them if you don’t go back home. The way you explain it, it seemed like they’ll all still go on living in the however many various parallel Detroit, just one of those parallels wouldn’t have you in it, not that your family would even be aware of that. So...don’t you think you should take a chance of happiness here? Don’t you think you should stay and see where things with Jackson lead?”

  I heaved a sigh, setting my juice glass down. “I don’t know. So, say I stay here, and Jackson and I don’t grow and evolve, and we don’t full-tilt fall in love, and we don’t ever have a baby, and everyone hates me, and Jackson’s disappointed, and I’m miserable. What then? Or, say we do have a baby, but we never quite make it to the commitment stage as a couple. What then? I have to live my life possibly seeing my child’s father, who I definitely already have feelings for, possibly dating other women? After having quickly moved on after I’ve given him an heir?”

  But what if things don’t work out like that? What if you and Jackson do fall ‘full-tilt’ in love? Are you ready to never find out?”

  Thinking about the question, I stared at drops of condensation sliding down the side of my juice glass. “I don’t know. I just feel like I’m not getting something from Jackson. Something that... Something I really can’t even put my finger on.”

  “Well, do you want him to try to sway your decision? Or, do you want him to demand that you stay here?”

  “No.”

  “Well, then, what—?”

  “I don’t know. And I don’t have a ton of time to figure things out. I have to tell Jackson my decision by tomorrow.”

  Celeste just looked at me for a long moment or two before speaking again. “Finish your omelet or whatever else you want to finish, then put your shoes back on. We’re going for a drive. And by the end of it, you’ll have made up your mind.”

  *

  A short while later, Celeste and I were in the subterranean parking garage below The Arch, taking her car out. While we both buckled our seat belts, I asked her for the second time just how exactly how a car ride was supposed to help me make a decision.

  And for the second time, she gave me an exasperated sort of look, like one a person might give to a small child. “Like I said before, you almost shouldn’t even need to ask this question. Car rides clear minds. Everyone knows this. Car rides clear minds and help people come to fast, sudden decisions about things. Especially car rides with the top down.”

  I wasn’t so sure. But at the same time, I supposed it was worth a try. It wasn’t like I knew how else I was going to make a decision.

  With the top of Celeste’s shiny red sports car down, we were soon zipping through the streets of downtown D.C., or at least zipping as fast as we could, periodically, considering the traffic, which was still pretty heavy, despite the fact that it was a Sunday.

  While she cut around a large, lumbering sedan, cutting it off, really, Celeste glanced over at me. “A lot of other people needing to make decisions today, apparently!”

  The spring day could only be described as glorious. The sun shone down on all the tall buildings, making them glint, and the sky was a perfect, pure robin’s egg blue, completely cloudless. The air was balmy, feeling like a gentle caress against my skin. While my hair, which I’d left down, whipped out behind me, I began to think that maybe there was something to a drive helping a person to come to a decision. I wasn’t anywhere close to being there yet, but I had to admit, my mind was feeling clearer than it had in days.

  Hovering a few feet above the road, like all other vehicles, we drove around the city for at least an hour, and I took in all the sights of a typical Sunday afternoon in D.C. On one downtown street corner by a movie theater, a man and a woman in matching black pants and white shirts sold bunches of bright spring flowers for moviegoers to give their sweethearts. From what Celeste told me, the man and woman were kind of a spring and summer fixture in D.C., moving from theater to theater with their cart of bouquets, seven days a week. If they were there when a couple went to the movies and a man did not buy his date a bouquet, he was seen as kind of a jerk.

  The smiling flower vendors seemed especially friendly, and while Celeste and I were stopped at a stoplight, they waved to us. I waved back, smiling, though my smile faded a bit when I spotted the movie theater marquee near them. In tall white lettering on black, it announced one of the day’s features to be Jugball Nation: Rise of the Chicago Vipers.

  Celeste seemed to notice my noticing of the marquee, and she laughed. “See a movie you want to watch? That one’s kind of a biopic about last year’s CFS champions. They do a different Jugball Nation movie every year. Wanna pop in and see it? We can, you know.”

  I turned my face from the marquee and stared straight ahead as the stoplight turned green. “Keep driving, please.”

  A few blocks down, we passed a few food trucks, and we did stop then, Celeste actually reversing around another car to pull into a parking spot, making the driver of the other car honk. While he passed us, scowling, Celeste shrugged.

  “What? We saw food trucks!” After shutting off the car, she began taking off her seat belt, glancing at me in a grin. “Now, I know you haven’t had fried dragon tail yet, because it’s kind of a summer thing here, and I kind of can’t believe they have a truck out already.”

  I froze with my hand on the door handle. “‘Fried dragon tail?’ I’m not too sure if I—”

  “Oh, yes you are. It’s delicious. And by the way, it’s actually not real dragon tail. It’s like dough mixed up with pieces of fruit, and then the dough is cut and shaped in the shape of dragon’s tails, and then it’s fried and covered in powdered sugar that’s sprinkled over a specially-patterned doily-type thing to give the tails a design so that they actually look ‘scaly,’ and they’re heavenly. Dragon tails are a D.C. warm-weather thing, and I’m not going to let you miss out.”

  I was glad she didn’t. The peach dragon tai
l Celeste ordered me was heavenly, as was her cherry one, which she had me take a bite of. Dense and doughy, but crispy on the outside, dragon tails reminded me of what people in my time and place probably would have called fritters, except maybe a little fruitier, and with a faint, pleasant tartness that Celeste told me came from lemon juice. While we ate, she told me all about the history of the dragon tails, and all about the city-wide dragon tail fry-off contest that took place every July fifteenth, on Confederation of Free States Day, a nationwide holiday.

  “And just think... You could still be here then, to take part in the celebration. Just imagine you and Jackson, strolling through the city arm-in-arm during the fry-off, when all the streets are shut down and the sidewalks are filled with different patriotic art exhibits for people to look at while they sample all the different kinds of dragon tails. Just imagine the two of you taking in the annual CFS Day jugball game, from the commander-in-chief’s special sky box, also arm-in-arm.

  Or, well... Maybe jugball wasn’t the best thing for me to just mention, but, well, imagine you and Jackson watching the CFS Day fireworks together in the park that night. The two of you on a blanket under the stars, with the fireworks bursting in light. A ring of guards around the two of you will keep people away and give you some privacy. Just think about all that.”

  I did think about all that, though I didn’t say anything. Not knowing what to say, I just busied myself nibbling my peach dragon tail.

  Despite the tails being fairly big, and despite the fact that Celeste and I had just had brunch not an hour earlier, we both managed to finish every bite of our tails while sitting on a metal bench by the food trucks, just watching traffic hover by.