Caged

[Twenty Two]

I had never thought that I would miss having a normal life. Between keeping up with my lies to Jace, to fighting with Jax and keeping secrets from him, my life had gotten pretty hectic. Everything was back to normal now. If being kissed in shadows and hidden around corners was normal.

It was hard to concentrate at work when Jace was around me. It's not that I was so captivated by his dreamy personality and wishing I could feel his lips on mine again. No. I'm not some teenage girl from a cliche romance novel who was obsessed with a boy.

It was hard to concentrate because I had to pretend like nothing was going on between us. Like we don't travel to the next town over to go on dates. Like he doesn't drop me off at home some days and kisses me at the door before he leaves.

It was incredibly hard to pretend not to notice the guy you liked and were dating. We could still be friendly, but we couldn't give each other those 'special' smiles. He couldn't hold my hand for no reason at all. I couldn't give him a peck on the cheek. I already found relationships difficult and I was barely in one.

Of course we could do all of those things around Jax. Everything was back to normal with him too. We were back to having our movie nights. I was back to texting him to come over when my mum's parties got a little out of hand, and he was back to being the greatest best friend ever.

"Thinking of me again, baby girl?" Jax asked, snapping me right out of my thoughts. "You have that look on your face." When I just looked at him in question, he said, "that look that everyone gets when they're thinking about someone gorgeous and amazing like me."

I rolled my eyes but gave him a wink. "I'm always thinking about you, baby." I put my hand to my heart dramatically. "It's so hard to keep you out of my mind."

"Well I'm sorry," he replied, placing a sarcastically sympathetic hand on my shoulder. "You're just going to have to try harder. It's very distracting seeing that look on your face, and I'm afraid nothing could ever happen between us."

I walked off, pretending to sob. When I got to the registers, I turned to face him and started laughing. He just shook his head and chuckled, putting the new releases on the shelves. 

"Ashlyn?" Jace called from the doorway of the staff room. "I need to see you in my office for a second please."

Worried that I had done something wrong, I quickly asked someone to cover my register and followed him into his office. "What's wrong? What did I do?"

When he chuckled at me, I let out a breath that I didn't even know I was holding. "You haven't done anything wrong. I wanted to talk to you normally, instead of trying to pretend that I don't kiss you when no one is watching."

"We can't kiss right now Jace!" I listened carefully to make sure no one had heard my little outburst before continuing. "There are cameras everywhere, including your office."

"As much as I want to, I didn't call you in here to kiss you." He perched himself on the edge of the desk. "I wanted to ask if you wanted to come to my place this afternoon. We don't really get to hang out after work, seeing as you don't want me coming in your house."

Go to his house? That would mean possibly meeting his parents. I don't think I was ready for that just yet. I only met his brother a week ago, and he was really cool, but this was different. Parents are always the hardest people to meet when you're in a relationship, well from what I've heard anyway. 

"Um, can I think about it for a bit and let you know later?" I asked, my thumbs twiddling nervously. "I just don't know if I'm ready to meet your parents yet. I mean I'm sure they're very lovely, but I've never been in a relationship before so everything is new to me and -"