Every single step was rhythmic. Left, right, left, right, a steady beat that was perfectly in time. It was very easy to concentrate on it to the exclusion of all else. It was a beautiful day. The sun was shining but a nice breeze took the edge off the heat and left the temperature warm yet still agreeable. Only a light sheen of perspiration resulted. The trail was well beaten and picturesque, the dogs were trotting happily along with only the occasional pause for a sniff and examination of the surrounding plants. Despite all the lovely scenery, however, Justin concentrated on that steady walk.
Left, right, left, right.
The truth was that he could concentrate on it all he liked; it wasn’t doing its usual trick and it wasn’t going to. Normally he took this path because it was so familiar and comforting that it could drive all other thoughts from his head. It did wonders for clearing his mind and reinvigorating him – maybe because it was all so familiar that he barely had to think. It was enough exercise to perk you up but not enough to wear you out, it was pretty, and it got the dog walking chore out of the way. All in all he should have been having a very pleasant stroll but for once it had failed to shut his brain up.
Justin really would have appreciated it if it had. He’d had to escape the house after walking in on his mom and Trace’s having yet another conversation about the upcoming nuptials and what they were wearing. He was sick to death of hearing about that Godforsaken wedding but it was all the town residents ever talked about. If anybody had expected people to shut up about it in the ex-fiancé’s presence (‘anybody’ namely being him) then they were very wrong. People seemed to have taken the opposite view, thinking it was more conspicuous if they avoided the topic.
He kicked a stray stone off the park, narrowly missing Brennan which made him wince at his aim. Maybe Trace had been right, although the thought would never be aired within audible range of him. Perhaps coming home while all this was going on had been a bad plan. What exactly was he trying to prove, and to whom? Sometimes he thought that he was trying to show everybody that it didn’t bother him. On other occasions he’d considered that maybe he was trying to demonstrate to Reese that it didn’t bother him, although he was willing to bet she thought he was here to screw with her.
And then, sometimes, he thought he was trying to prove to himself that it could really be happening and it wasn’t some Twilight Zone he’d dropped into.
Other people’s opinions seemed to fall into two categories. Some thought the timing was a coincidence and he had simply been overdue a trip home. That wasn’t unreasonable; he hadn’t been back since before the golden couple thing had exploded in his face. Given that he regularly returned to Tennessee his continued absence would have been stranger, so went the logic. Others thought the timing was anything but coincidental and that he had specifically returned home for the wedding. Reese had been fool enough to include him on the engagement party invitation even if she had excluded him from the wedding and people gossiped that with their history he couldn’t possibly resist appearing.
As usual, for all the speculation surrounding Justin Timberlake few had got it right. He had long since needed to go home but the desire to hide from his ex-fiancée kept him away. When his mother mentioned that the invitations for the engagement party and wedding had dropped through her door it had galvanised him into action. Reese was clearly determined to settle in Shelby Forest and he couldn’t avoid the place forever – didn’t see why he should when it was his home too. The jolt had been what he needed to man up and face his fears… though he couldn’t deny that curiosity had got the best of him and he’d wanted to check out the competition.
It didn’t take a master detective to work out that he’d really fucked up and that he’d fucked up Reese because of it. The complete and uncharacteristic 180 degree spin she’d done immediately after their break up was proof enough of that. Even so, he found it hard to believe she’d not only got another boyfriend so quickly but she’d got engaged again within months. It had taken an incredibly long time before she’d even consider marrying Justin, a guy she’d known most of her life, because she was career oriented and determined not to get lost in the shadow of a husband. Now by all accounts she was ready to hang up her suits completely to become a veritable Mrs Brady, and so very quickly. You didn’t have to know her well to know that such a sudden and drastic turn around was not the result of healthy change and growth.
“Ahh,” he grunted quietly to himself as he continued walking (or more like stomping) along.
What he didn’t understand was why she was doing it. Drake from what he could gather was exactly the same kind of guy they’d grown up with, the kind Reese had never really been interested in. The type wasn’t a bad guy – though it pained Justin to admit it – but never likely to amount to much or leave the town, something Reese had always previously insisted on. She’d been thrilled when Justin had finally come around to the idea that they were serious enough to be living together and he’d installed her in his L.A. house. Her ambitions had always been bigger than a Tennessee backwater, even if it was a Tennessee backwater she was fond of. Okay, he had deeply hurt her and he knew it, but how could that suddenly alter her entire life’s course?
He’d expected that she would quickly move out. What he hadn’t expected was that it was to go straight home and turn herself into somebody he barely recognised. Maybe he had little right to be at all bothered, after how things had ended. Still it hurt that after so many years together (and a good deal more of both longing from afar but being too nervous of the friendship to do anything about it) she had done this. In such a short space of time she’d rejected not only him but the entire person she’d been while with him.
“I don’t see the problem.”
“The problem is that what you won’t see is your husband,” Justin joked, trying to bring some levity.
Reese frowned back at him. Even as they walked together down the trail looking like love’s young dream the tension was obvious. “It’s not funny.”
“I’m not saying it is…” he groaned. “I’m just saying that I’ve been in this industry and I know what happens when you never see each other. I want you to have the high flying career peanut, but not at the expense of our marriage. When we finally get around to having one of those.”
“Is that what this is about? The date setting thing?”
When would he learn that he was never going to win any disagreement with the woman? His grandfather had warned him to learn the art of ‘yes dear’ and he was starting to think it was good advice. They’d had a separate clash about her reluctance to set a date but he wasn’t the type to drag up every previous fight when they disagreed.
“No. I think it’s probably a good idea for us to have agreed on jobs and kids and all that stuff before we make anything official anyway. It’s not that it’s the schedules, you know? I don’t want to be one of those guys who never see their wives; they all end up divorced.”
“But come on, babe, do you really want me being Ms Sit At Home? You know that’s not me.” Reese tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, gazing down at the floor self consciously. His hand was in hers, very warm and solid and there, but she felt a million miles away from him right that second. She knew he was trying to understand her point of view but he wasn’t getting it. In his head he had the perfect solution and he couldn’t see why she didn’t feel the same.
“No, that’s not what I’m saying either. I know you got things you want to do and I don’t want to stop you doing them, but I don’t think it’s a good idea for both of us to have jobs which keep us away all the time.”
“So automatically it’s you who keeps yours?”
“Not automatically, it just makes sense that I can’t slide so easily into another job and I at least get to set some of my own schedule,” he pointed out. “You’d be at the whim of some ass twenty four seven when there are a million people I could hit up to give you the same job but that would keep us more in sync.” God, that phrase had been ruined for him for life.
“I do not need my boyfriend to fix my life for me.”
“No you don’t, which is what I love about you,” he kissed her head as punctuation, “but I wouldn’t be doing that. Only giving you some more options so you can still have what you want but maybe we can balance it more with our other shit. You know I wouldn’t try and make you take some job you hated or tell you not to go a certain way. I just think there’s more of a compromise we could have here. And I gotta be honest, I don’t understand the resistance.”
“Ugh.” Reese’s lower lip stuck out in a fierce pout. Justin was very difficult to argue with. He always managed to make her sound like she was being unreasonable or irrational even without trying to. Somehow she could never articulate her side as well as he could and she wound up losing the debate by default because of it. “I get enough shit with people telling me I’m riding on your coat tails; I think it’s asking for it if I use you to get me a job.”
“I wouldn’t get you the job though peanut, I’d just put out some feelers and find out who’s hiring and would be a little more personal life friendly. Jacob Winchester is like the legal version of Miranda Priestley, he burns through assistants at the speed of sound.”
“I knew you were paying attention to that movie. Liar.”
He nudged her softly with his shoulder. “Now who’s making jokes?”
“It’s just important to me that I’m not dependent on you and I make my own way.”
“It’s important to me too. I want you to have what you want, but I think there are ways to get that for you which selfishly benefit the two of us more.”
“So you admit this isn’t entirely altruistic and all that ‘I’m just worried he’ll overwork you’ stuff you said earlier was a fib?”
“No, that’s true, never said it was my only reason though. It is hard to get laid when your wife’s never home. Oww!”
Reese had elbowed him sharply, though with a big smile and a chuckle. The tension at least was broken even if the issue wasn’t resolved. “You earned it. Can’t believe I’m marrying such a pig.”
Justin released her hand to wrap his arm around her shoulders and hug her to him as they walked. “Come on, Mrs Pig. Dinner’s in about twenty minutes and you know Mom complains if we’re late.”
