Always Him (Always #1)

Chapter Three

"Before we go to the apartment, I'm not done talking to you, Jas." We had reached his car; he leaned against the hood, smirking. He wasn't surprised by my telling him that.

"Should've known." He murmured.

"Yep," I replied, reaching for his arm; he let me tug at him and joined me at my side. I turned us away from the cars, away from the park. "We still have a couple of hours before the sun sets." I also wasn't ready to go back to the apartment; I wanted to stay in this moment, the feeling of having Jasper around, going back to the apartment was the real world, going back to the reality of Jasper living with me. He was really going to live with me! On the outside, to the public, I was a calm and cool young woman taking a stroll in the park with a handsome man. On the inside, I was a screaming teenage girl walking with the captain of the football team. For a moment, it felt like things had never changed.

Only for a moment.

Jasper noticed where I was directing us. "The river trail behind the high school? You still come back there?"

"Yeah. It's where I go when I want peace and quiet. Only now, it'll be used to reminisce with an old friend."

He put a hand over his heart, feigning offense. "Old friend? Damn, Sadie! Only a year older than you, and you believe I'm an old grandpa."

I let out a laugh before pinching my fingers close in front of him. "Just a little."

We walked around the high school to the trail behind it. Jasper inhaled deeply before we got onto the trail. I gave him a quizzical look. He shrugged in response. "Just seeing if it smells the same. River and geraniums. Hasn't changed."

Nothing much ever changed in Rosenwood. Not the flowers, not the community, not the buildings. People occasionally came and went, but nothing more than that. No one ever had a bad experience in Rosenwood. The only complaint which wasn't much of a complaint was how small of a town we were. We didn't have major retail stores, no mall. Our schools were all on the same road, only a few buildings.

We all liked our small town. It had what we needed. With the river trail behind the high school, most of us thought we were spoiled. Some of us wanted more and got more, like Jasper, others were content here even though we wanted more, we didn't want to leave, like me.

"You make it sound like you expected everything to be different when you came back. Did you expect for a tornado to come down and rearrange everything?"

Jasper let me walk ahead of him on the trail a bit. He wasn't far behind, though.

"It's weird going from a big city like Houston to a small town like Rosenwood, Sades. I may have only been there for a year and a half, but it's so different from here, I was thrown off a bit. Have to refamiliarize myself with it all."

Even though I'd never left the state, I understood. When I went to the next city over, Elming, I always thought of the differences between Elming and Rosenwood. And for Jasper to go to a massive city like Houston? I can only imagine the adjusting that took and then to come back and readjust again. I didn't want to do that.

We walked in silence for a while. Occasionally Jasper would help me as I tripped over a fallen tree branch. It was a comfortable silence though, I thought I'd be talking his ear off once he came back; I was enjoying the feel of having him around too much to interrupt the peaceful silence we'd become accustomed to.

When we were younger, we'd do these kinds of walks all the time; the three of us would after we got permission from our parents or Carly, whoever was watching us at the time. No one would talk; we'd only walk. Sometimes we'd dip our feet into the water on the warmer days; during the colder days, we'd all bundle up and skip rocks along the frozen river. We didn't have to talk to enjoy the trail.

It was nice that now, after a while of not being able to come here with him, Jasper didn't force conversation on the trail. Perhaps the silence was nice for him too, let him do some thinking; I was doing plenty of thinking.

"It may smell the same, but it feels different," Jasper stated a few minutes later. He'd sat on a rock, looking out at the river.

I sat on a tree branch next to him. It didn't take a genius to understand what he meant by that. The last time he'd been on the trail, Blaine had been with us. This was the first time we'd been on the trail, just the two of us.

"Is it a bad kind of different?"

He kicked a rock, watching as it skidded twice on the river top before plunging under. "No."

The branch was cold under me. I began to kick my legs to bring some warmth into them. I placed my hand on it, giving me balance before leaning down closer to Jasper. From where I was, he wasn't far below due to his height. If I kicked my leg far enough, I'd clip him on the shoulder.

Jasper hadn't elaborated on what he said. I wasn't going to push him on it.

Scooting down from the cold branch, I nudged Jasper gently with my hip. He slid over, making room for me to sit down next to him. I rested my head on his shoulder, something I'd always done, and yet, it felt different this time—a good different. Jasper relaxed.

"I think I know what you mean," I said after a moment. "The first time I came here after losing Blaine, just after you left," my fingers were cold; I put them under my legs to warm them. "I almost didn't make it to the trail. I'd sat at the beginning for over an hour, telling myself I could do this, that I needed to do it. It was still the same trail; the only thing that had changed was I was by myself."

The sun was close to setting, the temperature had dropped. The fall weather was coming fast.

"I only made it about halfway the first time I walked the trail." Jasper stopped looking at the ground; his eyes met mine. "It took me three times before I could do the entire thing without turning back."

Jasper said nothing as he put an arm around me; the heat from his body had me almost letting loose a moan.

"I'm proud of you."

I couldn't help the surprised look on my face.

He laughed. "Truly, Sades. We left you alone, and yet you conquered obstacles like this that surely weren't easy. I didn't know if I could do this at first. Think it was easier cause you were here. You didn't have either of us; you did it by yourself."

"You made it further than I did my first time."

He looked around. "We're near the end of it."

"Still further than I got." I reminded him. "Let's get to the apartment." My stomach had growled, prompting me to change the subject before either of us got too emotional. It wasn't the time or place for that. "Get you settled in and get some warm food in us."

"Sounds great." He stood, helping me up with him. He led us towards the end of the trail. "I think I need to hear more about these firefighter visits you've had."

I laughed. "Let's get back to the apartment. Each visit has its own story, and I don't want to freeze before I finish telling you about the first one."

...

Before heading to the apartment, I dug out the journal from the car's center console and wrote. It was only one sentence, but I wrote.

Journal 8

Jasper came back to me.

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