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I can visualize Olivia as a girl, bouncing up and down with excitement.
“It was a Saturday and the day started out well. Our tiny house was filled with the scent of yeast and flour and sweets. Mom was baking. Hope flared in my chest. Marcus and I sat in the living room and exchanged hopeful glances. Maybe we were finally going to be a normal family.”
My stomach clenches in anticipation.
“Normalcy didn’t last. I’d invited five friends from school, girls from dysfunctional families like mine. Mom came carrying the cake but from the moment she appeared in the doorway, I could tell that something was terribly wrong. Her legs grew wobbly by the second and she has this weird expression like she was trying to smile but her lips were refusing to cooperate.” Olivia’s voice chokes.
“What happened?”
“She fell flat on her face, with the cake stuck between her body and the floor. At first, I thought she’d had a heart attack but on moving closer, I could smell the alcohol on her. She’d been drinking while cooking.”
I’m horrified and angry. “That’s messed up. She couldn’t not drink for the period it took her to bake a cake?” It’s not fair to judge but when it's children, it pisses the fuck out of me. Why do people bring children into the world and then make them suffer? Drugs, alcohol, abuse… those things make me so angry.
Olivia shakes her head. “I used to ask myself that all the time. Then I went for therapy. An addiction is a disease that needs treatment.” She looks so sad.
I tighten my fists, frustration welling up for the child that Olivia had been. “Did she get treatment?”
“Yes, but it never worked. She always went back to her alcohol, then later it became drugs.” Olivia smiles brightly, all traces of sadness leaving her face. “That’s how Marcus and I stopped celebrating birthdays. He and Charlotte will send me a birthday message in the morning but that’s it.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know.” I remember the surprise and the joy on Olivia’s face in the morning when I brought her coffee and then the flowers later. She might have started out as not wanting to celebrate her birthday as a form of protection but this is a different Olivia. “I’m no therapist but I do know that I want you to have different memories for your birthday starting from now.”
She smiles and dabs at her eyes with her napkin. “Thank you and it’s already working. I had a wonderful day and I felt special.”
“You are special.”
The waiter brings our food. It doesn’t disappoint.
“It smells so good,” Olivia says. It’s nice to see her getting excited over food as she never does. Hopefully, we can change that and make her start to enjoy food for the pleasure it brings.
We move on to lighter topics. Olivia tells me that she invited her brother, sister-in-law, and best friend for dinner at her place.
“Finally you’ll get to meet the people I’m always talking about,” she says, her eyes twinkling.
I refrain from pointing out that she doesn’t really talk about her family. “I can’t wait. Thank you for arranging it. Do you need help cooking?”
She raises an amused eyebrow. “Are you offering to help?”
“Yeah. By sending a chef I know.”
Olivia laughs. “I’ll be fine. Thank you for the offer though.”
We are starting to feel like a real couple, not just two people who have insane chemistry and like to act on it. I take a bite of my food, while I try to remember something I wanted to ask Olivia. It dances out of reach and just as I’m about to give up, it comes to mind.
“What are your plans when you finish working for me?” I ask her.
She’s quiet for a moment and her gaze is on her food, so I can’t really see her expression. She takes a bite of her food and chews before answering. “I haven’t decided yet. Maybe I’ll take another temp job.”
I don’t understand Olivia. I have so much I want to say but I need to sift through it and not hurt her feelings. There’s nothing wrong with temp jobs but they have no future. No opportunities for growth. “What’s wrong with a full-time job? If you like I can look around and see if there’s something available?”
“I don’t need you to get me a job.”
Chapter 22: Olivia
Fear makes me say things I don’t mean. Mean things. Like that last thing I just said. Silence descends on the table. I see the hurt on Jace’s face. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. I didn’t mean it in that way.” I’m taking out my frustrations on someone who means the world to me.
Jace is right to be concerned about my future work prospects. It doesn’t look good from where he’s standing. I’m a temp who doesn’t seem to have plans for the future. I hadn’t thought about this. How could I when I couldn’t have predicted that Jace and I would become so close so fast?
“Maybe I’ll go back to college,” I say softly.
