What Connects Us: Jessica and Jeremy

Fragment Thirteen

One day left. One day left. One day left...

            One day left. Jessica bit her nails anxiously as she gazed blankly at the TV. She was supposed to be watching her favorite show, but she was nowhere near excited about it. One day left...she reminded herself, as if the past 120 reminders weren't enough. She was more worried about her surprising state of content at the relatively unexpected business leave. Maybe that's what happened with Jeremy... she thought again, but even so, he had fairly enough time to inform her.

           The woman turned the volume up to distract herself from the chapter she kept ending up at. With the distraction, thankfully, she revisited her list of personal belongings she must take along with her to Arkansas, and crossed out everything she'd packed earlier mentally for the umpteenth time.

            A knock on her door startled her, causing her to nearly throw her phone on the glass coffee table. She slid from the couch in full reluctance, and the extra length of her sweatpants swept the marble floor with each glide she took. This time she made sure she was dressed more appropriately for unexpected visitors, especially if it happened to be her ex-husband/boss. Her content towards the unexpected business leave sunk below her feet as her two ex-sisters in law stood in front of her.

              "Hey," Holly said with a contrite smile and a shrug.

              "Hi," Jessica replied flatly.

              Rachel exchanged dubious glances between the two girls before giving Jessica a hug.

               "Please, come in," Jessica said as she opened the door for them.

                "So, are you excited?" Rachel asked as she sat on the couch, she brushed her dirty blonde hair away from her face as she straightened herself on the couch.

                "Well to be honest, I don't really think I am. It feels like it won't really happen, you know?" Jessica said as she took a seat in front of her.

              "Well that's an odd way of dealing with it," Rachel said with a laugh. "But although I've never exactly been in that kind of situation, I can understand. Ready to say goodbye to the City?" 

               Jessica sighed as reality was beginning to get back on track. "I don't know, from skyscrapers to a lowland? That's quite a shift, but I guess I need that," she said with a nod of approval at her own answer.

                  The young woman stood up to fetch drinks for two of her closest friends, adding three bottles of water and three soda cans on a tray.

                "Oh, and just so Ricky won't scold me for forgetting to ask you this; what are you planning to do with the apartment?" Rachel asked again in surprise.

          Jessica looked around her apartment and shrugged. "Too late to offer it for rental, you guys can crash in here whenever you want to. Plus I need it cleaned at least four times a week," she hinted. A second knock startled Jessica again as she nearly toppled over the tray. She quickly placed it on the coffee table and glided again to the door.

             "Surprise!" she heard Richard, Rachel's husband say as he wrapped her in a friendly embrace while placing two pizza boxes on the floor. She smiled and blushed at her rather casual attire, and the gesture her "family" had done for her. She grinned ever so widely as Charles appeared before her, hugging her and patting her back at the same moment. She held the door for the two men and placed the pizza boxes on the electric warming tray.

              "Guys you should've given me a head's up or something!" Jessica said, waving her hand at her outfit embarrassingly. 

                "Well I did keep insisting on going out for dinner together, and then we'd surprise you but you insisted on staying at home, so we brought the surprise to you!" Rachel stated with an arm around her husband. Jessica rolled her eyes. "Guys, you shouldn't have done this, really," Jessica said with a laugh. Although she was joking, there was a pinch of truth behind it, and they added salt to an open wound.

              "Is Jeremy coming?" Charles asked as soon as they'd settled down in the living room. Jessica bit her lip anxiously. "No, I don't think so. I asked him to come over, but you know how he is," Rachel replied with a shrug. Jessica breathed out a sigh of relief while drinking a bottle of water. 

               "What time did you say your flight was tomorrow?" Ricky asked Jessica as he took a bite of cheesy pizza. 

                "Oh, it's at eleven at night."

                "Ah, prepare for the worst," he joked with a swig of his Coke bottle. She smiled and felt a nudge on her shoulder. "Hey, so can we talk?" Holly said with a low voice, Jessica nodded and guided her outside to the balcony overlooking a breath-taking view of Manhattan. Skyscrapers pierced the dark of the night, and the insomniac city was illuminated by its architecture, mingled with the twinkling stars overhead. 

                   Jessica glanced at her three guests inside who were busy changing channels on the TV. "Look, I wanted to apologize for my behavior," Holly began, staring out into the city. "You're right, it wasn't right of me to make decisions for you, and I really am sorry. I-I just," she wiped the ends of her eyes, smudging a bit of her mascara. 

            "I just hate thinking that if I had changed my mind about telling you about him that it might've mended things between the two of you, and," Holly broke, as she wiped her eyes again, ignoring the runny mascara. 

              Jessica sighed and hugged her best friend. "No, Holls, please. Everything just happens for a reason, do I wish things were back to how they were? Yes, but who knows what would've happened?" she said, trying slide the guilt away from beneath her friend's feet. She sighed again as she realized that she inadvertently repeated what Jeremy had told her in her office, "what's done is done.".

           "I hate myself for this, you know that?" Holly said in a mocking tone, this time. Jessica chuckled, and steered Holly back inside with an arm over her shoulder. Jessica's jaw dropped as she burst into fits of laughter.

           "Come on, guys!" she said, as Charles lighted the candles on her cake with Good Luck Jessi at the center with a picture of Arkansas landscape as a background for the cake. 

            "So what exactly do we sing?" Richard asked as he raked a hand in his dark brown hair. 

             "I don't think we can sing anything, it's not like we want to get rid of her," Holly joked. Rachel sidetracked the predicament by raising her glass of soda as she cleared her throat.

              "Ahem, I'd like to propose a toast to our one and only Jessica," she began, as Jessica buried her face in her hands in embarrassment as she bit her nails, eying Rachel admirably. "Jessica, even though your boss is with us in your vicinity, I'd like to wish you a safe and enjoyable experience miles away from us. Yes, we might be hanging out in your apartment while your away for cleaning purposes only," she said to Holly. "We're going to miss having you around, Jess," Rachel concluded.

            Jessica was already immersed in her own feelings as she succumbed to reality. She wanted that feeling of content to return, and she realized she wasn't ready for tomorrow. She wasn't ready at all.