As she walked through the entryway with me, she mumbled, “Since they’re going to be girls, I say go with pink. Case closed.”
I twisted my face into a grimace and rolled my eyes. “Just come on.”
Lying on my side across Jordan’s bed, I listened as she explained her breakup with Gage and tried to figure out what had happened to something that had started out so great. Every word was laced with the familiar insecurity every female of dating age experienced, some more than others, when a relationship broke up and there wasn’t a shred of closure to be found.
“I thought we were good together, Nina. I mean, I never gave him a hassle about being out in LA, even though I missed him a ton. I may have felt insecure because of all those stunning women out there, but I didn’t think I was screaming “I’m needy” all over the place.” Jordan turned her head and stared out the window. Lowering her voice, she said quietly, “Maybe I was and I just didn’t know it.”
Reaching out, I squeezed her arm. “Don’t do this, Jordan. Of all the people I know, you are the least needy.”
She turned back to face me wearing an expression filled with pain. “Then maybe that’s it. Maybe I didn’t need him enough. Was I supposed to tell him I missed him and couldn’t wait until he came back all the time? That’s just not me. I missed him and told him that, but I wanted him to know he had space to do what he needed to.”
“What did he say when you talked to him the last time?”
“He was acting weird. I heard it in his voice. He sounded distant, but I didn’t want to think it was anything. I knew something was wrong when he picked a fight with me. All I did was ask how things were going and when filming would be done, and he blew up at me.”
“What did he say?”
“He said, ‘I can’t say, Jordan. Maybe we should just play it by ear, and when I get back to New York, we can get together and talk. I don’t really have time for this right now.’ You know me. I wasn’t going to let it go at that. I said that I thought we were more than just phone pals who may or may not talk when he returned, and then it just escalated from there.”
That Gage would say he didn’t have time for her didn’t sound like him at all. What the hell was going on with him? I didn’t want to say it, but my mind immediately went to the idea of him getting together with his ex-girlfriend and then feeling guilty. Trying to sound sympathetic, I said, “It doesn’t sound like it’s totally over, though. Maybe he was just having a bad day.”
She shook her head and frowned. “No. When I told him that I thought he was acting strangely, that all of this seemed so sudden, he accused me of not trusting him. Before I could say anything, he said this wasn’t working for him and hung up.”
“Oh.” That definitely didn’t sound like the Gage I knew. And it didn’t sound good.
“Yeah, oh. So your single friend Jordan continues to be single. Forever, it seems.”
I sat up and shook my head. “That’s nonsense. If you want to not be single, there are millions of men who would bow down at your feet to help you with that. Don’t let this one get to you.”
Jordan nodded her agreement, but I knew she didn’t think that way. Love just always seemed to elude her, even though I couldn’t imagine another person deserving it more.
“I just don’t know, Nina. I thought Gage could have been the one. We had a good time once we finally got to know one another. It felt right. He wasn’t some asshole who expected me to play dumb to make him feel like a man or some guy who just played around. I just don’t know what happened. That’s the worst part. One day we were okay, and then the next day we’re done.”
“I know it’s hard to believe now, but he’s not the only guy out there. You’re the greatest person I know, Jordan. I mean that. You’re smart and funny, and you have a heart like no one else.”
Wiping a tear from her eye, she said quietly, “Then why is it everyone else has found someone but me? You know what I want? I want what you have. Not the money or all that, but someone like Tristan. He’s so crazy in love with you. I want that. I want a guy who calls my friends like he did when he called me that night you left for Italy. I heard something in his voice then that I’ve never heard in any man I’ve ever been with.”
I tried to lighten the mood a little. “It was probably utter frustration with me. I was such a fool for doing that.”
“No, it wasn’t that. It was…” She stopped and thought for a moment, and then she got an intense look in her eyes like she was searching for something. “You should have heard him, Nina. It was like he’d lost part of himself, like he’d lost something so dear to him he couldn’t go on unless he found it. I want that.”
Instantly, I missed Tristan more than I had since Jordan came to visit. He’d be home in a little over a day, but at that moment, I wanted to feel his arms around me as we lay in bed and I talked his ear off about something or another while he just smiled at me, all the time quietly listening.
“You’re lucky, Nina. Tristan would protect you with his life. You mean as much to him as he means to you. That’s the real thing. I want that.”
“You’ll get that. You will. Just because it wasn’t Gage doesn’t mean it’s not out there for you, but I’m not convinced it’s totally over with him either.”
Sadly, she said, “I wish it wasn’t.”
I took her hand in mine. “Remember what you always say—good things happen to good people.”
“I want to believe that. I do believe that. I just don’t know why when everyone else around me is finding love, I’m still the same old single Jordan.”
“When it happens, you’ll see that it couldn’t have happened at any other time. Then it will be everything you deserve.”
As the tears rolled down her cheeks, Jordan smiled. “Is this what happens with pregnancy? You get all philosophical?”
I stuck my pregnant belly out and with a chuckle said, “I’m doing my best mom work here. How’s it sound?”
Jordan wiped her eyes and sniffled. “It sounds like my nieces are going to have a great mom.”
“Speaking of the babies, you need to help me figure out something other than ducks to decorate the nursery. It has to be unisex, so any ideas?”
“Why unisex? Aren’t you finding out the sex of the babies before they’re born?”