talk to me if you want to. But I just thought I’d let you know that I’m going to go hang out with Jack. But you can call me if you want to. Okay?” He still didn’t answer, but I waited a minute just to be sure. Then since I’d already spent too much time getting ready, I hurried out to meet Jack.
I stepped outside, feeling like the worst sister in the world, just in time to see Jack pull up. I trudged over to the red Lamborghini and fell into the seat heavily. The Ramones were blaring out the speakers, and he turned them down quickly, looking at me with an excited, mischievous grin. Even though my sour mood had to be obvious, he was oblivious to it, so it soon faded away.
“What?” I asked curiously. He bit his lip, as if he couldn’t decide whether to tell me or not. “What’s going on?”
“I think that its time you met my family.” He sounded wildly excited by the idea, but also a tad nervous. Whatever made him nervous tended to terrify me, so I gulped. “No, it’s a good thing. Yeah.” Then he nodded, more to himself than me. “Yeah. It’s good.”
“Why?”
He had already thrown the car into gear and we were flying down the street and turning on the highway before I could even really protest, not that I would’ve anyway. Meeting families was usually my least favorite thing in the world, but a family that spawned Jack intrigued me. Especially considering how happy it made Jack.
“After what happened last night, I think its time,” Jack explained, but I had no idea what his family could possibly have to do with a rabid dog. Unless his family were dog breeders or something.
Then I remembered what happened and looked over at Jack’s arm, which was bare thanks to his return to his tee shit uniform. (He wore one today that read “Frankie Says Relax.”) I leaned in closer to inspect both his arms, thinking I must’ve looked at the wrong one. But neither one of them had a scratch or a mark or even a scar. He noticed me looking and immediately chastised me. “No.
Don’t even think about it.”
“What?” I leaned back in my seat, still staring at his arms. “You mean asking how you magically got rid any trace of the dog bite so quickly?”
“Precisely,” Jack warned. “Don’t ask any questions about anything like that, not about me, not about anyone else.”
“They’re like you, aren’t they?” By now, nothing should come as a shock, but I still looked at him in disbelief. Every time I thought things couldn’t get any weirder, they did.
“I want you to meet them, but you can’t be like this. You have to act completely oblivious.” His tone was light, but he was being firm. If I said anything wrong, he’d probably drag me out of the house and forbid me from ever talking to him again. My heart ached just at the thought of it, so I groaned compliance. “I mean it, Alice. My family. My rules.”
“Yeah, yeah, I get it.” I rolled my eyes, and turned my attention to the world speeding past us out the window. “Where do you live anyway?”
“In St. Louis Park, by a lake,” Jack said casually. I didn’t know tons about that area, but what I had heard is that there were lots of really nice, really expensive homes. So it would make sense that Jack lived there, since we were cruising down the highway in a bright red Lamborghini Gallardo. “It’s not that far.”
“I’m sure it’s not, with the way you drive,” I commented.
“Don’t worry,” Jack attempted to reassure me. “They’ll like you. I think.
Well, Ezra isn’t there. So it’s just Mae and Peter. That should make it easier.”
“Where’s Ezra?” For some reason, knowing one of his brothers would be gone made me more nervous. Maybe Jack knew he wouldn’t like me, and that’s why he was bringing me over when he wasn’t around.
“Business thing,” Jack shrugged. “He’s gone a lot with stuff.”
“Well, the Lamborghini doesn’t pay for itself,” I supposed.
“Yeah, I guess that’s true.” He looked over at me, and then laughed at my nervous fidgeting. I had started chewing on my nails, which was an awful habit that I kept vowing to quit. “Seriously, you’ll be fine. They’ll like you. I mean, I like you so… they’ll like you.”
“Yeah, cause everything in life is really that simple,” I sighed.
“This one thing might actually be,” Jack smiled confidently.
“Wait.” Something new and mildly terrifying occurred to me. It wasn’t really that scary, it just might turn out to be embarrassing. “Are they all like you? I mean like… are they… will I be super attracted to them?” I flushed at the thought of fawning all over anyone the way Jane and my mother did to him, especially in front of him. I would die.
“I don’t think so,” Jack furrowed his brow. “I don’t know, though.”
“Oh, good.” I sunk lower in my seat, thinking about how this was a really terrible idea.
“I met your family and that wasn’t so bad,” Jack pointed out.
“That was different!” I groaned, and that had been really disturbing for me anyway.
“This will be fine,” he promised.
I could tell by the way he was driving that we were getting closer, and my heart thudded painfully. When he pulled up to his house, I cringed. It was incredibly beautiful and massive. It was more of a mansion or a castle than a house. There was a five stall garage (I didn’t even know they made such a thing) at the end of a short, winding driveway. The whole thing had been done in some kind of pale sandstone. The front door entered right into a rounded tower. There was a large rectangular window above it, covered in rod-iron bars.
The tower flowed into what would otherwise be a rather conventional square house, if not for the gorgeous black iron balcony coming out of a second story window underneath a weeping willow.
“Oh my gosh,” I gasped as we pulled into the garage. “You live here?”
“Yeah.” He heard the awed tone in my voice and chuckled. “It’s just a house.”
“Nothing is ‘just’ anything with you,” I mumbled.
He laughed harder and started getting out of the car, and I followed suit, but much slower. I had never felt so intimidated in my entire life. Everything about me suddenly seemed plain and dreary, and I felt totally ashamed that I had let him see the inside of my disgustingly tiny apartment.
“You know I didn’t buy this, right?” Jack turned to look back at me as we walked past the four other vehicles in the garage (Mae’s black Jetta, a green Jeep Wrangler with a canvas top, a black Lexus LS, and a shiny silver Audi TT Roadster). Then he gestured to the impressive collection of cars. “I didn’t buy any of this. None of it’s really mine.”
“Then who did buy it?”
“Ezra, mostly. And Peter.” We had reached the huge wooden door that presumably led into the house, and he turned back to grin at me. “Mae and I are just eye candy.”
“I see.” There was something comforting in that. If that were true, then maybe his brothers weren’t as attractive as him, and I wouldn’t have to worry about making a fool of myself over them.
Jack threw open the door, shouting hello. I had barely crept in the house behind him when a giant mass of white fur flung itself at him. It caused a mild flashback to the night before and I almost yelped, but Jack was scratching the dog and telling her how pretty she was, and I realized that it was just his gigantic Great Pyrenees.
“Matilda!” A warm voice with a soft, British accent filtered through the house, and then I saw her rushing in to greet us. She was beautiful, probably in an unconventional sense, but that almost made her more stunning. Her long, light brown waves of hair had been clipped back to keep it out of her honey colored eyes. Her skin looked like white porcelain, but there was a warmth coming off her in comforting waves. She went over to the dog, pushing her down off of Jack with ease, and in a slightly scolding tone, she said, “Oh, Matilda, do be a good girl. Please.”
“Ah, she’s alright.” Jack crouched down to continue scratching the dog’s head. Watching him play with her, I realized for the first time how hard it must’ve been for him last night to kill that dog. It had never really occurred to me that he had been hurt too when he was forced to protect me.
“I’m so sorry,” she apologized breathlessly, putting her hand over her heart to show how sincere she was. She looked at me for the first time and smiled at me. “Matilda’s still a puppy.”
“Mattie’s always a good girl, aren’t you?” Jack’s voice was verging on baby-talk, and Matilda licked his face appreciatively.
“Well, look at you!” She exclaimed, and her smile grew broader and warmer. “You’re lovely!”
“Thanks,” I mumbled, feeling my cheeks burn with embarrassment. She was far more beautiful than I could
