Beautiful Mistakes

When weekend came she had to work at her second job—the one she was liking less and less with every party she had to work—and she wondered if she should tell Jim that she was pregnant. Her body hadn't changed yet, but she knew she wouldn't be fitting in that pirate costume forever.

Aaron had not seemed enthusiastic about her opting to work that weekend. He didn't come out and say anything about it, but she could tell he disapproved by the look he gave her when she told him she was going to work.

But she had to go. She needed the money, plus she had to stop and ship out her Juicy Couture purse to some person named Jan in Idaho—$76 for her unwanted handbag, and apparently Jan was the type of person who liked purses with straps that looked like charm bracelets, so she assumed Jan and the purse would be very happy together, while she would be very happy putting that money away to buy a book for school.

Everybody won.

Except maybe Matt, since she was no longer returning any of his phone calls.

And maybe Emma, who apparently footed the bill for the purse.

Oh well.

When she got done with the last party of the day and was ready to head home, she saw that she had missed another phone call—why wasn't she feeling it vibrate?—and she had a voice mail. As she waited for her car to warm up, she called her voice mail box and heard Matt's voice on the other end.

"Why are you ignoring me?" he asked without preamble. "I have called you on your cell phone to be considerate, and you're not answering or calling me back. I'm going to start calling you on the house phone and asking my damn brother to talk to you. Did I do something? Are you pissed about the Shannon thing? Because I tried to explain that to you, you wouldn't listen. Give me a call when you get this, I need to talk to you."

Grimacing, she made a mental note to call him back before he did start calling the apartment, because she didn't want Aaron to have to talk to him.

She still always felt like their friendship—was that the right word?—was one Matt-sighting away from being over.

Her priorities seemed to have shifted, because she realized that Matt still called or texted every once in a while, but she had stopped responding. Her side was the only one that changed, but quite simply she would rather have Aaron's pleasant company than talk to Matt. Sure, if she had nothing better—like when she had been with Jack—maybe talking to Matt wouldn't seem like such a waste of her life, but being around Aaron just caused her to compare the two—and Aaron was definitely the better brother. When it came down to it, if she was forced to choose between the two, she didn't even have to pause to consider—Aaron just felt like the natural choice.

Strange, since he wasn't the one whose child she was having…

Unfortunately…

She was honest enough to admit if she was going to accidentally get knocked up by any guy that she knew, she would probably have preferred it to be Aaron.

Of course that would have required them having sex, but… well, that didn't seem like such an awful proposition.

She conveniently blamed her hormones for thoughts like that.

When Julie got home Aaron was gone, of course, so she beat around the bush a little bit, taking a shower and having a bowl of cereal before she finally returned Matt's call.

When she finally did call him back, he didn't even answer.

Rolling her eyes, she couldn't believe she had wasted so much of her day putting off calling him and he hadn't even bothered to answer.

She kind of expected him to call back later when he saw the missed call, but as the minutes and then hours ticked away there was no sign of him.

Aaron stopped home early in the evening and he brought in the mail. He was preoccupied with scowling at whatever he was reading.

"Jury duty?" she guessed with a smile.

Glancing up, he said. "Worse." Then he read from the card, "Mr. and Mrs. Joshua Lee Turner request the honor of your presence at the marriage of their daughter, Rebecca Nicole to Adam Fergus Donovan…" Sighing, he said, "I forgot my sister was getting married."

Raising her eyebrows, she said, "That's kind of a big thing to forget."

"Fuck," he muttered, sitting down on the couch with her.

"When is it?" she asked.

"Next weekend."

Raising her eyebrows, she said, "One week notice?"

He nodded. "She sent an e-mail around to let everyone know a while ago, but I complet