My Heart Skips a Beat (completed)

Chapter 13: The Story Behind The Story

After dinner, Jackie and Mr. Burroughs went into their room, which was just through the doors of Jonathan’s guest bedroom. Skip rummaged through an old closet of games and toys from his childhood and finally managed to find an old Monopoly game, much to Jonathan’s delight. We sat on the floor in Jonathan’s room playing for at least two hours when Maggie came upstairs. Ellen was nice to me. She seemed a little uneasy around Skip, and from the resemblance between them, they had to be twins.

“Skip? Claire? Jonathan? Ellen?” she called to us from the stairs.

“Yes?”

Then Maggie came into Jonathan’s room. “It will be dusk in about thirty minutes. Skip, Ellen, would you like to take your guests on a tour of the property?” she asked us.

Our eyes zoomed from each other in our little triangle. Jonathan held the dice in his hands as he glanced at Skip and me. “You two can go along. I’ll stay back and entertain myself,” he said.

“Yeah, I don’t wanna be the third wheel between you two,” Ellen joked.

“Well, Jonathan, I was just getting ready to start watching It’s a Wonderful Life downstairs on the television. A network is showing broadcasting it for the holiday. You are welcome to join me if you please,” chimed in Maggie.

“Don’t mind if I do.” Jonathan stood up and grinned as he made his way to the stairs. “Have fun, you two.” He winked at Skip and went downstairs. Ellen walked into a room on the opposite side of Jonathan’s quarters.

“Well, I guess that just leaves the two of us,” said Skip, scooting closer to me and kissing my cheek.

“I guess it does. So, how about that tour?”

“Do you want to go on it?” Skip asked me.

“Only if you do. If you don’t want to go and you want to stay back here, we can,” I said.

“Well, I do adore the film It’s a Wonderful Life more than the average seventeen year old boy should, but I would like to go on a walk with you. But we’ll have to have the condensed version. They sky is getting darker by the second, Claire.”

“You are absolutely right about that one, Skip,” I agreed. “So. How come you didn’t tell me about Ellen? You said you were your parent’s only kid.”

“She’s my twin.”

Just as I presumed.

“Well, I’ll explain everything to you on our little walk. Is there anything here in particular you would like to see? It’s snowing, of course, so you’re options are slightly limited.” He frowned. “Really, we just have the pool house and the stables.”

I smiled into our kiss, and I could feel Skip grinning too. “Sounds great, Skip. Let’s go!”