Avoiding Commitment (Avoiding #1)(56)
Author: K.A. Linde

"So," he began averting his gaze to the sleek marble floor.

"So," she agreed not letting her eyes drift from his face.

He cleared his throat uncomfortably. She held his gaze, waiting.

"Lex, I…" he glanced up into her brown eyes and then quickly back down at the floor.

"Yes?" she prodded.

"I’m sorry about last night," he mumbled, but something about the way he said it didn’t sound sincere.

"Jack, why don’t you cut the bullshit, and tell me what you’re actually thinking?" she asked him easily annoyed.

"Ok ok. I never could get anything past you, could I?"

Lexi shook her head not wanting to take that comment head-on. She could remember a time when he was able to hide many things from her.

He slumped into himself at her reaction. She waited, allowing him to collect his thoughts before speaking again. He straightened up taller than before and met her gaze. "You’re right. I’m not sorry for last night. I meant everything I said, and I don’t know if you are with someone or not, but I guess…I still wanted you to know."

Lexi blushed at his words. She had been piecing the previous night together in her mind, and could vaguely remember what had happened before she had blacked out. Jack had been there, waiting for her. She remembered his lips against her skin and his voice whispering in her ear. Her heart sped up at the recollection of those three small words they had uttered to each other, and a smile crept to her face.

"You love me," she whispered. She felt something wet on her cheek. When she reached up to brush it off, she was surprised to see that it was her own tears. She chuckled to herself at the absurdity of what was happening. Jack was here, in New York with her.

"You’re crying!" he exclaimed his face showing blatant shock. "Did I do something?"

"Yes," she said laughing a little harder.

"Something wrong?"

She shook her head no and threw her arms around him and he seemed to relax. "Well yes," she amended pulling back to look at him, "you left without saying good-bye and left me a note apologizing."

"I thought it was in your best interest."

She adjusted her body so that she could get a better look at him. "Did you honestly think I’d ignore your cryptic message?"

He smiled despite himself. "A part of me hoped you wouldn’t."

"A part of you knew I wouldn’t."

He nodded agreeing with her. "Well then I’m sorry for the message, but I did have to leave and you were still passed out. How much had you had to drink?"

She looked down at her hands twisting in her lap sheepishly.

"That’s what I thought," he said running his fingers through his perfectly kept hair. Lexi watched as the pieces fell back into place neatly, only a few stray strands obscured the view of his eyes.

"So are you…are you with someone?" he asked taking her hands into his own, his voice ringing with a note of hope.

Lexi hesitated watching his concerned face before answering him. "No there’s no one."

He breathed out the breath he’d been holding and smiled up at her in relief. "That’s good." He paused nibbling on his bottom lip as if deliberating his next move. "I never asked over the summer while we were still talking, but what happened with Clark?"

She cursed under her breath extracting her hands from his. She pushed her hair behind her ears several times anxiously. This had been the question she had been avoiding from the time he had begun to talk to her again. He could tell she was nervous and didn’t want to answer the question, but he didn’t stray from the subject. He waited giving her time to decide how she wanted to answer.

"Do we have to talk about Clark?" she whispered.

"We don’t have to, but you know my end of the story. You were the only one I saw when I closed my eyes," he said bringing his hand up to her chin and tilting her head up to look into his crystal clear blue eyes.

"Then why wasn’t I enough when they were open?" she asked another tear welling in her eyes.

"Please don’t cry," he muttered wiping away the tear that had fallen down her cheek. "I know I screwed up. We both screwed up, but I’m here now."

As if that solved everything.

She sat up straighter not wanting to let her emotions take over. She had been down that road before and it was a slippery slope. "Clark and I broke up the day you told me you loved me."

"What?" Jack cried a little too loud for their environment. He drew eyes from the surrounding pedestrians congregated in the hallway to escape the cold. "Why didn’t you tell me?"

"Jack, lower your voice," she demanded glancing around at the nosey onlookers.

"No, Lexi explain," he yelled out his eyes blazing.

Deep down she wished she could have lied to him right then and there. What made him special anyway? She lied to everyone else. She wished that she didn’t have to explain why she had done what she did. She had been avoiding the truth for so long. She didn’t feel prepared to divulge her actions, but she couldn’t lie to Jack. They had decided a long time ago never to do that to each other. Her heart told her that the truth would only hurt him further. That he should leave after everything they had been through. That she should run tail-end in the opposite direction, but she couldn’t and he obviously wasn’t going to either.

"I couldn’t tell you, but I couldn’t be with him either."

"Why didn’t you come to me?" he pleaded with her trying to comprehend what she had done.

"He made me…hurt you Jack," she finally stammered out. "What I felt for Clark…what Clark thought he felt for me would never be the same after all that. I’d gone ahead with his plan out of fear. And for what?" she muttered angrily. "For what? Fear of losing him? No, I’d never feared that, but I didn’t see that until it was too late. I was afraid of losing you. For what I had with you was more than anything Clark gave me."

"Then why didn’t you come to me?" he repeated interrupting her stream of conscious. "Why didn’t you tell me?"

"Can’t you see? I did it because I loved you and though you said the words first, I didn’t believe you," she told him breathlessly her face paling after finally telling him everything she had been holding in.

His features morphed at the shock of her words. She could tell he wasn’t pleased with what she had said. "You think I’d tell you I love you if it wasn’t true?" he growled.

"Your girlfriend had just told me you had held out on sex with her for over a year and a half because she was a virgin. You obviously respected her. You couldn’t even wait two days at a beach house while our significants were a couple hundred yards away. What does that tell you?" she asked her face regaining a little bit of color with the vehemence in her voice.

He leaned back hard against the bench and ran his hands through his thick hair again. Lexi’s eyes were drawn to the movement, and she wished he would stop doing that. It kept making her heart flutter. "Yeah I really respected Kate by not sleeping with her," he stated sarcastically shaking his head. "Is that what you think?"

Lexi looked at him helplessly. It had been what she thought at the time, what she had thought for a long time, but now staring into his defeated face, she was beginning to second guess herself.

"It was the opposite," he told her taking her hand out of her lap once again as he regained composure. "I didn’t respect her at all, because I slept with you. She was easy to handle and convenient. Nothing more to me than that. I cared for her, but when you walked away from me that day our relationship turned hostile and almost pathetic. I stayed with her more out of boredom. And to find out you weren’t with Clark after all that, I just…I don’t know what to say…" he trailed off.

They sat in silence both milling over the new found information that miscommunication had deprived them of so long ago. Lexi sighed heavily itching to find out what this meant for them in the present time.

"I guess we both thought we were doing what was in the other’s best interest," Jack told her.

"So where do we go from here?" Lexi asked tentatively looking up into his blue eyes. What she saw gave her more hope than she thought she deserved. His eyes were lit up and the smile that crossed his face took her breath away.

"Well I have a thought," he began leaning forward and pressing a kiss to her cheek. She giggled reflexively unable to believe he had just kissed her after all that.

"What’s that?" she asked nudging him along.

He scooted closer on the bench so that there wasn’t any room left between them. "I’m going to be in New York for a little while so why don’t we try this out?"

"You mean date?" she asked in disbelief.

He scrunched up his face. "You think that we can really be normal enough to date?" he asked sarcastically.

"Oh shush," she said smacking him playfully, "I just mean that we’re a little bit past that point and we’re not actually normal."

He nodded agreeing with her. "Okay so we don’t date. Let’s not be a couple since we’re pretty good at that at least."

"Then what are we?"

"We’re working on making this right," he said bringing his lips to hers gently.

"I like the sound of that," she said against his soft lips her breath quickening instantly.

He drew back from her a cocky smirk played across his features. "I forgot how much I love your reactions to everything."

She blushed as he trailed a hand down the side of her face and on to her neck. "Jack, we’re in public," she reminded him. He retracted his hand seeming to realize that they were in a crowded place for one of the first times. Lexi glanced around at their surroundings just to make sure that they hadn’t drawn any unnecessary attention towards themselves. When she was satisfied, she turned back to Jack taking in his beautiful features and feeling giddy and light-headed all at once.

For the first time, she was hearing the words she had always dreamed of hearing. Maybe not in the exact way she had expected, but it was improvement. So they weren’t a couple, but since when was that new? They had never been a couple. They had never had that kind of relationship. This was probably the best thing for them anyway. She couldn’t imagine them as a serious couple. Every other person they had dated that way had ended in disaster. She didn’t want them to end up like that. She wanted what she had always envisioned with Jack.

"So where are you staying in New York?" she asked not so subtly. She bit her bottom lip and stared up at him under her long black lashes.

"I’m guessing your dorm room only has a twin," he said smirking as he stood hauling her up off the bench and leading her out of the building. "You know I had planned on taking you through the museum."

She smiled up at him as they entered the cold afternoon air. "I’m going to assume there will be time for that later."

Jack laced his fingers with Lexi as they trotted down the stairs together. He hailed a cab that drove them across town away from Central Park, Washington Square, and Park Avenue where she typically frequented, to a rundown building with dilapidated paneling and a slew of broken windows. Lexi cringed at the sight unfamiliar with the more unpleasant side of town. She followed him up the four flights of stairs and stood before a door with three layers of off-white paint chipping from the frame.