Jessica's Fate

Chapter 61

Friday was a horrible crappy day.

Nothing was going right, other than the fact that I did manage to overcome the uprising my equipment was using to protest the fact that we were tackling a wedding on Sunday. I did manage to get everything done that I needed to get done.

I glared at the trays of desserts that I put into the walk in at the diner. "Bane of my existence today." I grumbled, sounding and looking a lot like North. "Stay here and think about what you did." I slammed the walk-in door and walked away from it.

"Bad day?" Luke asked, poking his head out of the office, eyes widening as he saw what I looked like.

"Yes." I grumbled. "I have to go. No sneaking treats out of the walk in." I smiled at him.

"No, ma'am." He nodded solemnly.

"Good. See you tomorrow. I'm dashing off to the house to change in the hopes that Tony's free tonight like he thought he would be."

"Sounds like a good time." Luke tilted his head to look at me. "Why haven't you brought him around here, Jess?"

The question caught me off guard and I stared at him.

"I mean, I get it if Uncle and I embarrass you or something. It's not a problem. I just thought it's strange I haven't met him." Luke's eyes softened into almost puppy dog eyes as he gazed at me and I felt super bad for ever making my favorite brother from another mother think that I was embarrassed by him or uncle or the diner.

"Oh, no, Luke..." I shook my head. "it's not like that at all." My shoulders slumped and I ran my hands over my face before shoving them through my hair.

"Then what is it?" He asked, reaching out and snagging a clean dishtowel from the stack by the office door and handed it to me. "You've got a little something..." He motioned at his face in general.

I felt my cheeks flush with color and I rubbed the towel over my face, making a face at the towel when I saw how much cocoa powder was on the towel. "Well..." I shrugged. "I don't know how to explain it but it feels like the diner was Zack's place. I don't want to bring Tony here because I feel like the first time I do that, I'm going to make him compete with all the memories of Zack that are here." I frowned. "Does that make sense?"

He studied me. "Yeah, it makes sense." He said softly, taking the towel from me and swiping at my cheeks again with the towel. "You sprung a leak." He said.

I couldn't help the laugh that bubbled out of me as I raised my hands and carefully wiped under my eyes to catch the tears I hadn't expected. I sighed heavily and leaned against him, my head resting on his shoulder as he patted my back gently. "I'm over him, I am." I said, words muffled by his shirt. "I hardly ever think of him but I'm just scared that ... I dunno, that I'll relapse or something by inviting memories of him in. So, it's easier to just keep Tony away from here. I'm not ashamed or embarrassed about anything here at the diner."

Luke tilted my head back up from his shoulder. "A family BBQ at Chez Lee is probably out of the question too, right? No need to risk it." He said sadly.

"I thought about that but yes, you're right. I don't want to risk it in case Kota has just as bad of a reaction to Tony like he did to Zack." I said. "But Tony's got an advantage of knowing North." I said.

"True." Luke nodded again.

"I don't know. I'll think about it?" I said. He reluctantly nodded a final time and let go of me. "I just really have to run or Tony and I will never go out tonight. We tend to fall asleep on each other if we're kept waiting too long."