Cheek to Cheek

Chapter 26

A/N: So I know lately I've been slow with the updates, and I apologize. Right now, this story isn't one of my top utmost important priorities, and it's difficult to find time for it. However with your amazing feedback, it pushes me to write and try to perfect the story as much as I can, so thank you.

Please keep the feedback coming. Share this story with your friends, discussions, clubs, and whatnot, so this perhaps would have a better shot in the Watty Awards? I love hearing from each and every single one of you, and thank you to those who have really stuck around with this story. I promise I will try to update quicker, especially if you guys remain as the amazing readers that you are.

On the other hand, this chapter was written much differently and is more of a personal assessment of Kat's feelings towards Jake and Jack. Don't hate me for it, just give it a chance. And don't assume too much by the ending. Thanks, guys!

I didn’t think I was prepared to go back to class the very next day. As the day before was ending, I realized how much I actually liked what happened. I had actually enjoyed the attention from the guys I had received the day before... and I really liked the kiss I had received.

It made me go home and think with Tabby about what to do.

I had been in love with Jack for six months. I had taken a different perspective on him since I met him a year ago, and we were friends for a short while. He showed me similar attention to what he had showed me the day before. A year before I hadn’t really received attention like that, so I enjoyed it. It lasted for a little over a month before we drifted, and I didn’t have much thought on it. People drift.

Six months ago, it happened. A little bit of the attention he had given me had come back. I was different then, and it reminded me of what had been or could have been. But I wasn’t the only who had changed.

If I said Jack was always like this, I’d be lying. He only became like this six months. I wasn’t there when it happened, but maybe if I was, I could have stopped it. I could have made him stay the way he was a year ago.

Instead, he came to me with the attention I remembered, but for a different purpose. He wanted to explore multiple people, but I think the reason was he just didn’t want to deal with love.

I never found out who was the girl that broke him.

He thought I could be the first of his victims, that he could take me so easily because I wasn’t used to the attention and really liked it. He was wrong; I really had changed. I never told anyone what really happened between us at some point, but I wanted it back.

I thought I could change him back to the way he had been once. I thought I could put the pieces back together again to form the old Jack where the attention he’d give would be special and not just a cheap trick to get between her legs.

I remembered the old spark that once had been and acknowledged it too late. Needless to say, I became obsessed with the idea of getting the old Jack back, of being the special one that brought him back.

I fell in love with the old Jack months after we stopped talking. Crazy, huh?

I fell in love with the idea of him returning.

Honestly, I have a pretty good shot with guys. I’m not that bad-looking, and let’s be honest, that’s what they most go for. Yet, I wanted him because he was different to an extent. I wanted to be the one that brought him back. I wanted to be the special one that got to date him rather than sleep with him.

To be a girl he slept with was a dime a dozen. But to be something more would be something else.

There was also the reason that he was the first boy to ever give me that kind of attention before I changed. It made me have a reason maybe not to change, that I was okay the way I was. I only realized that after we both did.

Then there’s Jake. Don’t get me wrong, there’s definitely an attraction there, and I can’t really lie about it anymore. The only thing missing is that special something between us, like what I think about when I think of Jack.

When I think of Jake, I push the idea of being a player on to him, when I really know he’s not. But when I lived with the image of Jake being a player for so long, it’s really difficult to think of anything else. It’s similar to why I can’t give up the idea of Jack being so wonderful because it’s the image I developed for him.

Jake is a wonderful guy, but I hadn’t known him long. I could say the same for Jack, yet there was still that one special truth behind it. What Jake and I have is really based on the humor of our history and that undeniable and unbreakable attraction between us. And there was more to him than meets the eye.

One might think it’s the typical bad-boy-and-good-girl thing or the falling-for-a-player, but it’s not. Jake is just little James trying to survive high school, and he’s on the same level as I. He just wears a disguise.

However, I’m even attracted to his disguise. That’s how deep he had gotten under my skin. I didn’t want to fight that attraction any longer, and I was prepared to give up on Jack. Sometimes, it’s too late to get people back.

So I went to class with my head held high, looking at Jake, even though Jack was creeping in on my sight. I remembered that typical fake smile plastered on his face, but for a split moment it softened and reminded me of a time a year ago, when a certain boy came up to me and started talking to my awkward self. He was my boy.

He changed me, too. He gave me confidence that I wasn’t as bad as I thought.

He changed me. I changed for him to get him to like me so I could get the chance to penetrate him and change him back. I dressed differently, walked differently, even talked differently, all for him to come back.

His smile hardened back to the same smile he always put on. But I hadn’t imagined it. That smile of his had been there a moment before. Could he possibly return?

I gazed at Jake, confused with what to do. I had already decided to give up, but now I had been given hope. Fate was messing with me again, taunting me this very second.

I didn’t look at Jack and tried to focus on Jake. He tried to tell me something, but I kept getting distracted by Jack who had sat beside me once the teacher was done with his lesson. Jack wouldn’t let Jake talk.

I tried to fight back the hope that was erupting in my chest at the sudden attention. I wanted Jake to win this one, so maybe I could just finally be happy.

Jack wouldn’t have it. Jake could never finish, and Jack would always have something to share. It was at first those flirty lines that he had tried yesterday, but hadn’t worked so well. Then came the quirky things, things he had once told me a year back.

Jake couldn’t get a word in.

I had to hear it to believe it that the quirkiness was coming back to him. Was he really changing? I couldn’t help but ignore Jake to listen and take in every word that dripped from his mouth into my ears to try to grasp it and believe it.

When the bell rang, I wished it hadn’t. I smiled at him as he was getting up and couldn’t help but notice Jake bolt out the door. He was jealous, and I knew it. In my heart, I suddenly regretted ignoring him and felt like I betrayed him.

Yet, there was a chance I could have gotten Jack back, and I had to take it.

I’m sorry, but I still have to try, one last time. It’s unfair, but I really can’t drop liking someone for so long just because someone asked. Have you ever tried it? Have you ever had someone tell you to stop liking someone one and your heart immediately follow?

I didn’t think so.

This wasn’t really that fun or funny to talk about. Then again, Jack was never a humorous part of my life.