Miss Adventure Page 13

  I let out a wail. “In the morning?”

  Jack doesn’t even turn his head as he lopes down the porch steps. “Just be ready.”

  * * * * *

  “Do you know what you have to do?”

  I turn to look at Jack, but don’t say anything. I just breathe. In and out. In and out. But for how much longer?

  “Lisa?”

  “I pull the Goddamned parachute cord when the altimeter reads 4,000 feet.”

  That’s right. He’s making me jump out of a plane. Bad enough that he made me get on the plane in the first place. Now he’s making me jump out.

  JUMP OUT!

  Of a PLANE. That’s FLYING!

  “Or?”

  “When you tell me to.”

  “Then?”

  “Jack!” My bark is sharp enough to make the pilot glance back. “You made me get up at no-o’clock in the morning just so I could listen to EIGHT HOURS of instruction. I passed all the stupid tests. Now just let me jump in peace.”

  “Answer my questions, or you’re not jumping anywhere.”

  “Is that supposed to be a threat?”

  Jack pulls in a deep breath. I see his nostrils flare when he does it. He looks at me then, and even through his goggles, his stare makes my skin go cold.

  “What do you do next?”

  “Steer myself. With the toggle. Follow you. When I see the big X, head towards it. As I get closer to the big X, I use the cords to help steer.”

  “Remember, I’ll be holding on to your harness the whole time. And you have the reserve chute.”

  “I know. I know. It’s going to be fine. So, just leave me alone.”

  Jack reaches out and grabs me by the lapels of my jumpsuit. “No, Lisa,” he says sternly. “It’s not going to be fine.” But then his face breaks into a smile. “It’s going to be awesome.”

  Some guy called Mattie gets out of his seat next to the pilot and steps into the back of the plane. “Ready?” he bellows.

  I suck in my breath as he rolls open the door to the sky. At least Jack promised to take care of the animals if anything happens to me.

  Jack takes my hand.

  “Let’s go,” I say, trying to pretend none of it is real.

  He leads me to the gaping door of the plane. We wedge ourselves into the opening. He lets go of my hand and I feel him grab hold of the harness on my back. “One, two—”

  “Three!” I shout.

  Together, we jump.

  “AAAAAAAAAAHHH—”

  The air catches me. The falling sensation disappears. I’m floating. Flying. Flying! Flying! FLYING!

  My body stretches out. I spread my arms wide.

  “Wooooooooh-aaaaaah!”

  Jack has spiraled away from me, but we’re still connected. He mimics looking at his wrist. I look at my altimeter. 8,000 feet. I give Jack a thumbs up. Our eyes catch for a sec, and we smile.

  “Wooooooooh-aaaaaaah!” I scream again, looking at the world all around me.

  ALL AROUND ME! All around me. All around me.

  I check the altimeter again, and release the chute.

  I spin far away from Jack, the air jerking me up. I look across the sky. His chute opens.

  I grasp onto the toggle, twist around to float in Jack’s wake, take it all in. All of it. All of it. EVERYTHING.

  The ground below comes into focus as more than a beige-on-beige patchwork quilt. I see the big white X. I’ve drifted out of Jack’s wake, but I can see the X. That’s all that matters.

  Suddenly, the ground is coming up fast. Faster and faster.

  “Jaaaack!” I twist around and see him off to my left, but he doesn’t seem at all concerned that I'm barreling toward earth with the velocity of a meteor.

  Jack is landing. He’s landing. He’s touching dow—

  “Hwaah-“ My feet touch earth. I run to keep up with myself and fall right on my face into the dirt.

  I’m on the ground. The ground. I did it.

  Rolling over, I press my back against every scrap of earth my body can cover. I take off my helmet, so even my scalp can press into the glorious ground. I fling off my goggles to better see the amazing sky which is now safely above me.

  Arms flung wide, I curl my fingers into the grass, gripping on with all my might. I’m down. I’m safe. My body is held together in one wonderful, miraculous piece!

  I DID IT.

  “Lisa?” I can hear Jack call from some short distance.

  But I’m too psyched about breathing in and out, in and out. Oh, the wonder of it!

  “Lisa? Lisa!”

  He runs to me, and stops just before trampling my invincible body. “Lisa?”

  I look up at him and notice he’s flung off his goggles and helmet too, leaving his hair messed. And he looks so concerned. About me. Damn, that Jack is a sexy guy.

  He throws himself onto his knees right next to me, leans over me. “Lisa?!” He puts his hands near my face as if he wants to grab my jaw and shake it, but he doesn’t touch me.

  It occurs to me that maybe he thinks I’ve broken my back. Or my neck.

  “Lisa, are you okay? Answer me!”

  “I’m wonderful!” I shout on a geyser of laughter erupting from my way-alive body.

  Jack exhales, smiles, relaxes.

  I grab him. With both hands, I take fistfuls of the front of his suit. I yank him down onto me and kiss the daylights out of him.

  Man, it feels good! I’m just so alive that I want to suck every drop of life out of him. He gets on top of me, mauling me right back. Next thing I know, he’s peeled my suit, leggings, and panties down to my ankles and—

  Now he’s—

  WOW! We get enough clothes off to slam into each other so hard my pelvic bone throbs. Wow wow wow! I just want more and more and harder and harder and faster and faster and FASTER. Yes, yes, yes, YES!!!!

  CHAPTER 13

  When I can breathe again, I try to move, but Jack’s body on top of me keeps me down. I shift around beneath him. I even say, “C’mon,” trying to get him off me. Seriously, I want to get up and run a marathon or ski down a mountain or go out for a Hail Mary on fourth and long. I’m THAT pumped. “Fuckin' A, man, get off me.”

  Using his arms, he levers his torso off me and looks at me. “You curse a lot.”

  “So?” I say, trying to get up for real this time, but he’s still pinning my thighs, immobilizing my strongest asset.

  “It's lazy to curse all the time. Can't you think of anything smarter to say? And a better way to say it?”

  “Hey,” I retort. “I was on the speech and debate team in college. I even took first place in my very first competition.”

  “So, I’m right. It is just laziness.” He pulls himself off me.

  “I guess it is lazy,” I concede, pulling up my panties and leggings. “But I like to spend my energy on other things.”

  Jack zips himself up. “I thought you didn’t want to be average anymore.”

  My head whips up as I’m fumbling with the jumpsuit around my ankles. I just alluded to what we—and he said—

  “Average?” I choke out.

  “Anyone can curse.”

  Average? AVERAGE?

  We just HAD SEX and he called me average. I’m going to…going to…die, I think. But not in front of him. “That’s what makes this country great,” I note as I straighten up, zipping myself back together again. “Anyone can curse however much they want. Fuckin' liberty.”

  Jack turns away from me. Without another word, he goes over to gather his parachute.

  I bend down to gather up mine. “Why do you even care about my freaking language?”

  “It’s just another thing about you that annoys the hell out of me.”

  “Dude, you came to me with the offer, even after you knew I annoyed you, so suck it up.” I walk toward him, feeling buffered by the mess of parachute in my arms. “What were we testing today, anyway?”

  “A camera in my helmet. A lot of consumers complain that helmet
cameras wobble, so we’ve been working on stabilizing—”

  “You fuckhead! That’s not beginner gear! You made me jump just so you could laugh at me! You are SUCH A DICK!”

  “And you’re a bitch.” He folds his parachute with flag-like precision. “But I guess you think that’s okay now that you have all that money.”

  “What? How am I a bitch?”

  “For one, you just called me a fuckhead. And a dick. All for giving you what you wanted.”

  “Giving me what I wanted?”

  “You said you wanted to do scary stuff!”

  Good God, he's already completely forgotten that we just had sex. Really average, forgettable sex.

  Jack comes at me and tries to take my chute from me, but I yank it back.

  “What the fuck?” he demands, trying to take the parachute off me.

  I shove the whole mess at him. “Why do you have to be so mean?”

  He doesn’t answer as he untangles the carnation and magenta mass of material.

  I tighten my jaw. “You are such—”

  “Who paid your hospital bills?” he asks, cutting me off.

  This question throws me, so I answer it. “They did. Burger Barn.”

  “Other than the however many millions of dollars they settled on you?”

  I refuse to feel shame or embarrassment over my settlement. “Yes.” I barely open my mouth to grind out the word.

  “What else did they give you? Pay your living expenses while you were in the coma? Your parents’? Keith’s?”

  “Yes!” I shout. “Their restaurant fell on my car! With me in it! Don’t you get it?”

  “What I get is that they paid for their mistake, long before they even made the settlement.”

  “Mistake? Is that what you call it?”

  “That’s what it was. What do your millions have to do with what happened?”

  I grab one end of the parachute to help him straighten it out. I’ll be damned if I’m going to let this jerk take care of me. “How is this even your business?” I ask. “And anyway, does it really matter who has the evil money, me or them?”

  He just looks at me a few seconds. “I think it does.”

  “Why?”

  He walks toward me, then takes the ends of the chute I’m holding.

  “Why did they even have that much money lying around to give you?” Jack demands. “Why don’t they use their billions to pay their workers a decent wage? There’s so much money in the world and it’s in all the wrong places. In the hands of the wrong people.”

  “But my hands are good hands.” I actually look down at my splayed palms. “I’m going to do something good with that money. Something that counts.”

  “That’s why you’re working at HEYA?”

  “It’s a start.”

  “I don’t suppose you’re doing that because you feel guilty for having the money in the first place?”

  “No.”

  He picks up both chutes, barely acknowledging me.

  “Don’t you get it?” I demand. “You’ve talked to me. You’ve seen how I live, heard how I used to live. How can you not understand that I’m trying to fix my life?”

  He still says nothing, acknowledges nothing.

  “Jack—”

  “Here comes the jeep.”

  I look toward the horizon and see a yellow range rover. I turn back to Jack but he looks so... flinty, like anything I say will just spark right off him and ricochet back to burn me in the eye. I can tell he doesn’t think my piddly life is worthy of so much money.

  “Besides,” I blurt, “what’s wrong with doing things out of guilt?”

  He looks up at me. “I can’t believe you just asked me that.”

  “I’m serious.”

  He turns around and walks toward the approaching truck, as if he’s going to meet it half way. “I know.”

  I talk to his back. “I mean it. What’s wrong with trying to do good things because you feel guilty? If you’ve messed up, and you can never fix what you screwed up in the first place, why not do good things and live a better life because you’re sorry and you don’t want to mess up again?”

  He turns to me, his stare boring into me like that earbug in Wrath of Khan. “Money can’t fix things like that. It can cause pain, but it can’t take it away like a goddamn Swiffer.”

  “A. Money can fix a lot of things. B. How do you know what a Swiffer is?”

  “I own a house,” he says. “And I clean it when it gets dirty.”

  My forehead bunches up. “You don’t have a maid? I thought everyone in L.A.—”

  “I’m only one guy and I can clean up after myself,” he says. “And guess what else? I do my own laundry.”

  I know I should try to come up with some witty retort, but I’m so befuddled at the thought of Jack measuring out fabric softener that I honestly can’t speak.

  * * * * *

  When Jack drops me back at my place less than an hour later, I’m starving. I figure he must be, too. “How ‘bout something to eat?” I can tell he’s going to say No. Maybe No Way. “I’ve got some fried chicken that Dolly brought over last night.”

  Jack opens his mouth as if he’s about to diss me. Then he looks at me. “Wait. I thought you were a vegetarian.”

  “I’m trying,” I tell him. “But it’s fried chicken, made by a woman who grew up in Alabama. And besides, she gave it to me as a present, and I don’t want to be rude.”

  Jack juts his jaw, thinking. “Genuine Southern Fried Chicken?” He says it with such reverence.

  “Mmm-hmm.”

  “Fair enough. I’m in.”

  We both race out of the truck then charge through the front door. But on the way to the kitchen, I stop. The answering machine is blinking at me.

  Weird.

  Very few people have my number. Pretty much just Jack. And Jack is right here.

  Jack sees me walk cautiously up to the machine. “It’s a pretty new, untested invention,” he says, “but I’m almost positive it won’t bite you.”

  I just stare down at the blinking light. “You’re here,” I say, trying to explain my confusion. “No one else has my number. I mean, I put it on the paperwork at HEYA, but...”

  Jack comes up to me. “Do you think they’ve found you?” There’s such concern in his voice, concern that the big, bad media might be out to take embarrassing pictures of me again, that I feel like a wimp.

  I tear my eyes from the hypnotic light and look at him. “I doubt anyone’s even looking,” I say on a laugh. “I guess I’ve just gotten used to my little cocoon.”

  “Lisa, you just jumped out of a plane. You can push the button.”

  “Of course I can,” I chirp back quickly. “It’s probably just Lupe.” I keep smiling at him and nodding, until I realize I actually have to push the damn thing.

  So I put my finger on the button, close my eyes, and press.

  Beeeeep.

  “Hi,” Manny’s voice greets. Wasn’t that nice of him to agree to do this for me? “Leave a message. Ruff ruff! Arf!” I like that I was even able to get Aaron and Christian to harmonize at the end of the greeting. It makes the message really say, “I’m a tough guy with big dogs, so back off!”

  The message begins. “Cripes, Lisa.”

  Good God, it’s Maggot-Face. Her voice is in my house. Yuuuuck.

  “Are you trying to sound like Tattoo from Fantasy Island? Because I can tell it’s you. That’s really lame. Anyway, after Paris, Rick and I got married in Italy, so I just wanted to let you know. We’re registered at Pottery Barn, Brookstone and Nordstrom, plus you can find a list of our favorite boutiques at maggieandrickinsomuchlove.com. Bye.” Beeeep.

  When the message ends, my breathing pumps so hard it makes this echoey, raspy sound. I’m pretty sure there’s also fire coming out of my ears.

  “Your sister, I take it?”

  “I HATE KEITH!”

  “Lisa.” Jack’s voice is quiet, so I ignore him.

  Huff,
heeee, huff, heeee-

  “Lisa,” he says again.

  Huff, huff, huff, huff-

  “Lisa?”

  I turn to look at him, so mad that I don’t even care that tears gush down my face.

  Jack lifts his hands and allows them to hover, one above each of my shoulders for a few seconds, before he sighs, and lowers them so he’s touching me. “You know, Lisa, marriage isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”

  I fling his hands from my shoulders. “I know that! Is that what you think? That I’m mad at Keith because he didn’t marry me? Well, seeing that he didn’t even love me I’d say it’s a pretty good thing that he didn’t marry me!”

  “Lisa….”

  “That bastard is giving out my phone number!”

  Jack snaps out of shoulder-to-lean-on mode. “What?”

  I stride across the living room, kicking empty moving boxes. “When I first moved in, I called Keith.” I turn back to Jack. “It was stupid, I know. I was lonely and depressed and I had a box of his stuff . What a lame excuse! Like what? He’s going to want his Deep Blue Something CD back? I wasn’t even thinking about caller ID. Then he called me a few days later to tell me to trash the stuff. That's when I realized he had my number.”

  “Maybe he won’t—”

  “Don’t you get it?” I throw myself down on the couch and look up at him. “My family called Keith, and he gave them my number. None of them were supposed to have it. This is my castle. My island. My Helena.” I sit panting.

  “Helena?” Jack echoes.

  “The island. Napoléon?”

  “You mean Saint Helena?”

  “I don’t care. Whatever. I don’t want my family here. They’re talking behind my back to work their way in.”

  Jack sits next to me as I slump against the back of the couch.

  “They don’t even like me,” I say, “but they won’t leave me alone. Why can’t they just leave me alone?”

  “Because you’re the runt.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Everyone has a role in a family.” His hand moves toward my head, lingers, then musses my hair like I’m a kid. “Regardless of who you become or how you grow, your family sees you in your role. You’re the runt, the one everyone else gangs up on. That’s not going to change just because you’ve become a millionaire.” He pauses. “And made them all millionaires, too.”