She slapped my ass and walked out of the room.
I sat there at my desk for several minutes trying to concentrate on the work that was before me, but everything else was pulling at me and my mind kept drifting off. Oddly enough, out of all the stressors pulling at me, Jessica’s last warning was the one that frightened me the most. I’d never seen her get actually angry with me. It appeared that she vehemently wanted to hurt me now.
But then again, what could she really do to me? It was possible that she could try to hurt my reputation, but to do so one’s reputation had to be in good enough standing that you could trash someone else’s legitimately. The entertainment world knew about Jessica’s issues, and until she cleaned herself up and showed that she was ready to be a working professional again, there really wasn’t much helping her.
Yet, the fire in her eyes seemed so certain. It kept nagging at me. Even as I watched the Uber pull up in front of Jessica’s car on the surveillance. She got into the car and they drove away. What was she planning? Was it really anything? Would she even remember any of this a few hours from now when she sobered up? Or was she even further gone than that? Maybe she was never sober nowadays.
It was heartbreaking to see. I remembered the talented, driven young woman Jessica was not that long ago, and to see how far she’d fallen so quickly really tugged at the heartstrings.
The idea that some of the guilt I felt about Jessica was related to my feelings with Gina and it was not lost on me. I kicked myself about it constantly wondering what I could have done differently, if I could have seen the signs that she was thinking about using again, if I’d let my work cloud my judgment and delude myself into thinking that everything was so much better than it was.
But eventually I came to the conclusion that it wasn’t my fault. It wasn’t her fault. There was really nothing I could have done in the end; the choice had been made by her. And she’d paid the ultimate price. And of course Toby and I had paid a price.
And all of that, no matter how dark it was, had brought us to here. All you could do was wait for the right opportunities to present themselves for you to hopefully do some good in the world and in your life. When you saw it you just had to go for it. That’s what I had always tried to do.
Libby was right; not even I could help everyone, especially if they didn’t want to be helped.
CHAPTER 24
Libby
Mason came into the kitchen as I was dumping several large scoops of double chocolate ice cream into a bowl. I’d been craving something sweet all day and I figured this might just be the thing.
“Want some?” I asked.
“Sure,” Mason replied. I never saw him eating junk food. I was even surprised that he had it in the house.
I grabbed another bowl from the cupboard and sat it down on the counter. Then I began to dip several large scoops into his bowl.
Mason grabbed some whipped cream from the fridge and appeared behind me.
“Read my mind,” I said as I took it from him. I drowned both servings of ice cream in whipped cream and we sat down at the table to indulge in it together. Toby should have been there, but he was playing with his toys in his room. I didn’t feel like disturbing him, and it was getting too late in the day for him to have sugar. He was very sensitive to its effects and he would be bouncing off the walls all night. At least, according to Mason. I had yet to witness it for myself.
“So, you got everything taken care of with Jessica?” I asked.
“Yeah. She is gone. I’m just glad she actually listened to me.”
“I heard her warning you. I wonder if she knew she was screaming that loudly?”
Mason laughed. “I doubt it. I guess I shouldn’t laugh. It’s actually pretty sad, when you think about it.”
“Yeah,” I said. I’d listened patiently as Mason explained everything to me about Jessica. He seemed a bit nervous about it, almost as if he thought I might not believe him. I trusted him whole heartedly; I hope he knew that he could trust me the same. Besides, I’d seen the condition that Jessica was in. She was definitely suffering from a big problem.
I decided to open up to Mason a bit as well while we were sitting there, enjoying our ice cream. “I dated a guy who is now in prison.”
Mason almost choked on his bite of ice cream. “Really? What happened there?”