Beautiful Disaster

I’m only moderately surprised to find Jazz working on his laptop when I get home – against all odds his new business venture seems to be bringing in some contracts already. He absentmindedly returns my greeting, then keeps typing when I don’t say anything else. I’m so used to either being alone or with Bella that sitting in the same room with him weirds me out after a while, and because the weather isn’t too bad I decide to go for a run.

Yet before I can get off the couch I hear Jazz’s chair scrape back.

"Hey, wanna go shoot some hoops? At least there’s a basketball court down at the park around the corner, and I’ve never seen anyone play during the day there."

I’m a little surprised by his offer, but after a moment of hesitation nod.

"Sure, I think we’ve still got the ball stored somewhere here."

Back when we’ve been living at the house together we used to play a lot –

or sometimes just shoot hoops while talking, or getting drunk – and like with so many things of late it takes me actually hunting down the ball to realize how much I’ve missed those old habits. Ten minutes later we’re at the court and find it deserted as expected. It’s cold enough outside that we actually run, dribble and jump for real to keep warm, but that doesn’t hamper our easy conversation.

After recounting pretty much every general sports event that I’ve missed during the last week for me Jazz seems to run out of topics, and when he scores five 3-pointers in a row I feel a little vindictive.

"I’ve run into Alice today."

He doesn’t even glance my way but his next shot barely even hits the hoop before it bounces back, and I catch him roll his shoulders in what I know is a defensive gesture for him from the corner of my eye.

"I hope she’s doing okay?"

He even sounds sincere, which makes me feel a little guilty for bringing up the topic, but when my next throw evens out the score I decide that it was worth it. And some time he’ll actually have to face that she’s still around.

"She seemed fine, if a little stressed. But I couldn’t really tell because she ran off within the minute I showed up at Rose’s."

"Always the little busy bee," he snorts, then does a slam-dunk by the book.

When he passes the ball back to me it hits my chest a little harder than necessary, but I ignore the silent challenge.

"Yeah, seems like she’s too busy to talk to me at all, compared to half the city, including Jessica Stanley."

"So you finally checked your facebook?"

"Don’t need to with people like Rose and you who can tell me any day what others post."

Jazz snorts, and accepts the ball back from me in momentary silence. I’m about to think he’s going to change the topic when he starts idly bouncing the ball without moving, but after a few seconds he turns back to me, the ball all but forgotten.

"I’ve tried calling her, four times, but she doesn’t pick up. Not that I’m surprised about that, but it’s still-," he trails off there, then throws the ball, not even checking if he scores or not. The pain so plain on his face makes my stomach clench in sympathy, and I feel like an ass for even having brought up the subject. Then the moment passes, and he visibly shakes himself as if the motion can clear his head of whatever is lodged there.

When he goes on his voice is flat, deliberately void of emotion. "You know her – she’ll move on, get over it, and in a few months from now it will be as if nothing ever happened. That’s Alice in a nutshell."

I want to protest, defend her, call him a liar – but the sad truth is, he’s right.

Jazz accepts my silent acknowledgement for what it is, then sighs.

"Maybe that’s exactly what I should be doing, too. Move on, I mean. But I still love her, and although I know that what we had is over, I don’t want to let go. And I have definitely seen too many chick flicks as my brain is able to spew out crap like that!"

Chuckling under my breath I accept the ball back from him.

"Obviously."

We both score a few points before Jazz speaks up again.

"Things seem to be pretty harmonic between you and Bells."

"As much as can be expected, yeah," I reply, then pointedly ignore the look he’s shooting me.

"And there I always thought the ‘as can be expected’ is people’s way of saying ‘like f**king crap, really’."

His remark makes me snort, and he shrugs when he sees me glance at him.

"Well, considering you’ve been staying over for what, nearly two weeks?

And we’ve only had sex once in the time because of my insane work schedule and Bella being all creeped out by you hanging out on our couch, I feel like saying ‘fucking crap’ anyway."

"Seriously?"

The open surprise on his face makes me crack up.

"Trust me, that’s one thing I wouldn’t lie about."

"Yeah, like you’re that great of a liar in the first place."

I don’t even pretend that I haven’t aimed the basketball to nearly hit his head for that, but Jazz takes it in stride with a grin. We keep up the light banter for a little while longer, before Jazz picks up the ball and turns to me.

"How about we hit one of the pubs around here? There must be a better place than freezing our balls off here in the cold."

"Sure, because a cold beer is the ideal thing to warm up with."

Ignoring my jibe, he throws the ball at me.

"You can drink it piss warm, too, if you want to."

"Like hell."

Ten minutes later we’ve found a bar that’s open and not crammed with after work business people, and we settle down. After emptying half of my bottle in one go I get out my phone and write Bella a short text where we are if she wants to join us once she gets home from work. When I put the phone away I see Jazz follow the motion with his eyes, and at my questioning look he shrugs.

"I was just wondering if she’ll show up or prefer to stay home, relishing not having me around."

"You’re not that much of a nuisance."

His snort is short of derisive, but when I don’t react he leans a little closer.

"Seriously, if my girl would cockblock me because of the guy crashing on the couch I would call him a lot more than that."

"Yeah, maybe I’m just gracious because I know that by the time you find your own place she’s going to be so frustrated that I wouldn’t be able to fend her off if I wanted to. Not that that’s ever gonna happen."

He shakes his head laughing before he takes another sip.

"If you need me to be gone for a certain time on a certain day, just say so, Bella is cranky enough as it is, can’t really justify being a real reason for that, too."

"Cranky?" I know that she’s still somewhat reserved towards him, but I wouldn’t have described her behavior like that.

"You know, terse, cool, takes most of what I say way too literal, stuff like that. Her way of expressing disapproval without even glaring for a second.

Although, come to think of it she does her share of glaring at me, too. But not the whole time, it comes and goes with her moods, and I have no idea what causes it."

At first I think he’s joking, but Jazz remains completely serious. Not being around much of late cuts back on my chance to observe any of that myself, but it sounds about right from what I should have expected.

"Be glad Alice didn’t break up with you a month ago, Bella wouldn’t have let you stay over for more than a day back then."

He doesn’t even look particularly baffled.

"I know, she’s been acting like that ever since Rose had the baby. But shit, I really have no clue what I’ve done to incur her wrath like that."

Despite the seriousness of the topic his words paint a grin onto my face, but my mirth is mostly superficial, and heavy on the scorn side. Of course he picks up on that but takes it in silence, and after a few moments I clear my throat.