All our lives

Chapter 28

After he closed the door in the boys' wake, he quickly went upstairs and resumed his investigation. He couldn't find a birth certificate for Thea, only the ones for the boys along with adoption papers. So they were Richie's - which he could have told just by looking at their pictures - and they had used a surrogate. Jon googled her name but it was too common to find any information and except for those papers there was no other evidence of her existence in their lives. By all means, the boys' birth had been simply a matter of business for her.

Jon knew there was nothing useful anymore to be discovered there - nor in the house, nor in that circle - but that didn't stop him from meticulously packing his and Richie's baggage and calling a lift for the airport. He could have slipped into his past at any moment and yet he hadn't done it. Not on the way to the airport and not in the stampede at the security check that totally took him by surprise.

He was so used to airports - those and hotels were practically his second home - and yet he didn't know how airports looked and felt like for common people. And he hadn't set foot in a commercial aircraft in decades. He didn't even know seats that couldn't be reclined existed.

There had been a short moment, when he had met Dot and Bobby, when he had been close to bringing that almost empty rope to life - seeing them together reminded him once again that he didn't belong there - but then Richie had joined them and the thought of escaping that circle vanished like it had never crossed his mind.

The flight was almost five hours long and, with the time difference, they were supposed to land in the dead of the night. Richie declared himself unfit for a sleepless night and encouraged Jon to change seats with Bobby or Dot if he didn't feel like sleeping. Bobby quickly adhered to Richie's plan for the flight, so Jon found himself cramped between Dot and a massive guy who seized most of Jon's personal space and, in addition, started snoring minutes before take-off.

Jon turned to Dot with the intention of bitching about his luck just to see her letting her bag drop and kicking it under the seat in front of her with an irritated huff.

"You're still mad at me," he said, smiling lovingly.

"Huh?" Dot eyed him inquiringly.

"You're still mad at me," he repeated, amused. "You can't pretend it isn't so. I know you," he said, keeping his smile on his lips.

She narrowed her eyes and scrunched her nose, looking dangerously pissed off. The sense of familiarity in her reaction was equally comforting and unsettling. These were gestures and grimaces he knew and expected. And missed. God, how he missed them.

"Shouldn't I be?" she asked, annoyed by the fact her displeasure amused him. When he remained quiet, she turned her eyes and attention to the window and for a while, he kept looking at her profile. He felt the urge to caress her hair or her face, but a strange thought - that he had no right to do that - stopped him. He didn't know how to do that as a simple friend. This Jon might have known it, but he didn't.

"I didn't mean to hurt you," he finally said. He had a hunch that this Jon's selection of photos had really upset her, but he carefully chose his words so they could match a broader spectrum of mistakes. Firstly because a man could never be too sure of what had made a woman angry, and secondly because that was true. He had never meant to hurt her and yet, in every circle, he had done exactly that in some way.

"I know," she sighed. "But it was hard to see myself erased from my best friends' lives..."

"No, no, no!" he interrupted her and vehemently shook his head. "I can't even remember what I wanted to achieve with that photo album, but erasing you was definitely not my goal!" he assured her.