Jake Undone

  Damn.

  When the door slammed shut, I closed my eyes and sighed.

  Oh yeah, I was in deep doo doo…in more ways than one.

  From the street, I could hear Jake in the distance. “Fuck you too, Mrs. Ballsworthy!”

  I covered my mouth in laughter. My new home was a bizarre place, but there was nowhere else I wanted to be at that moment.

  Then, I looked down at my phone and noticed he had changed the wallpaper on the screen. It was one of those “Keep Calm and Carry On” sayings that pretty much summed up my day, in honor of my encounter with our lovely neighbor:

  Keep Calm and Go Fuck Yourself.

  CHAPTER 5

  Tuesday was my day off from classes, and I spent the day doing laundry and nervously anticipating my tutoring session with Jake that night. I was 22-years old, but the level of obsession I was experiencing made me feel like I was sixteen.

  I still could not believe I had agreed to the terms of his bet. Truthfully, I knew I wasn’t going to get A’s on my tests no matter how hard I studied, so I could pretty much start mentally preparing myself for the worst. Even though what Jake proposed terrified me, I really didn’t ever consider telling him no.

  He was like no other guy I had ever known. It wasn’t just that he looked different (in a very good way). He had a self-assurance and commanding way about him that was hard to resist, but that oddly, also made me feel safe.

  Growing up in my small town, the guys I had met from the time I was a teenager up until I moved here were cookie cutter. I had yet to meet someone like Jake: dark and dangerous on the outside but smart and clever on the inside; someone who owned a room the second he stepped into it.

  My last serious boyfriend, Spencer, could not have been more different from Jake. He was a clean-cut, church-going kind of guy, who my parents and everyone else just loved. He was a few years older and sold insurance for a living, but looking back, if you ask me, the only thing he was ever really good at selling was a false impression of himself. What my family didn’t realize was that behind that squeaky-clean exterior, was a man that constantly tried to berate me with critiques and put-downs. And ultimately, he cheated on me. I felt like I wasted three years and got nothing out of it, except a certificate of completion in Asshole 101. He was the only guy I ever slept with. What a waste.

  I shook my head to rid my mind from thoughts of Spencer as I continued to fold shirts in the basement laundry room. Then, my cell phone rang, and I saw it was my father.

  “Hey, Dad.”

  “Hi, sweetie. I am just checking in. How are things going at the new place?”

  I can’t stop obsessing over my roommate.

  “Pretty good so far.”

  “How’s Ryan?”

  Who?

  “He’s great. Turns out he’s actually dating my other roommate, Tarah.”

  “Really? Good for him. Nice girl?” he asked.

  “Yes, very.”

  “Well, you know Ryan is like family to us. So, I couldn’t be happier that he is there to look out for you.”

  Actually, Ryan’s head is so far up Tarah’s ass, I am lucky if he even realizes I still live here.

  “Me too,” I said.

  My father sighed. “What about the other roommate? A guy, right?”

  Yes, a really hot guy, with tattoos and piercings on his face…and tongue…and God knows where else…and I sometimes want to lick him.

  “Jake…his name is Jake. Good guy, kind of quiet…an engineer.”

  “Ah, good, he must be nice and nerdy. I won’t have to worry.” He laughed.

  Dad, you should be so worried.

  “That’s exactly right. He is a bit of a nerd.”

  “How are classes so far?”

  I am going to fail math.

  “So far so good. Math is going to be a challenge.”

  “Well, I have confidence in you, honey. You made this big move to the city, and I know you won’t let yourself fail.”

  I just wish I had confidence in myself.

  “Thanks, Dad. I better get back to folding laundry. Tell Mom I love her.”

  “Ok, sweetie. Love you. Bye bye.”

  ***

  It was 4:30 in the afternoon, and since I had been up tossing and turning the previous night, I decided to try to take a nap since Jake wouldn’t be home until after six o’clock.

  I had set my alarm—or so I thought—for 5:30. So, you could imagine my surprise when I woke up and saw that it was 7:45. My heart was pounding, and I was beyond agitated when I realized I had overslept.

  I got up and scratched my head, lifting the alarm clock and noticing that, while yes, I had set the alarm for 5:30, it was for am not pm, which did me absolutely no good.

  Shit!

  I rubbed my eyes and matted my hair down, unsure of what I would be met with when I emerged from the bedroom.

  To make matters worse, I looked over at my nightstand and my pulse quickened as I discovered evidence that Jake had been in my room while I was asleep. There, next to my tissue box was another black origami bat. I shook my head in disbelief and began to unfold it.

  Did you know that you drool?

  That’s so not cool.

  Showing up is my number one rule.

  Now, get up, fool. You’re late for school.

  Mortified did not even begin to describe how I felt. Even though I would have rather stayed put at that point, I knew I needed to go out and face the music. I took a stick of gum from my purse to mask my sleep breath and quickly inspected myself in the mirror. I grabbed my math books and syllabus and headed down the hall.

  When I got to Jake’s room, his door was cracked open, and I could see that he was sitting up in bed wearing headphones and writing on a laptop. He hadn’t noticed me, so I stood there for a minute taking him in.

  His hair was flattened, like he had just taken a shower, and there was a loose piece hanging over his forehead. He had beautiful, shiny dark hair that looked jet-black when it was wet. He was wearing black cargo pants and a navy blue t-shirt that hugged his muscles and showed off his tattooed arms. The room smelled like cinnamon candle, musk and cigarettes, even though I had yet to see him smoking in the house. His long legs were stretched out to the end of the length of the bed. He was tapping his foot fast and nervously as he typed, bobbing his head to the beat of the music.

  I clutched my textbook and was nervous just looking at him, while anticipating the grief he was going to give me for sleeping through our tutoring session.

  I finally coughed to let him know I was standing at the doorway.

  Jake looked up and slowly removed his headphones. “Well, well, well, look who finally decided to wake up.”

  I stayed at the threshold. Waving the paper bat he made me, I said, “I am sorry, Jake, I really am. I set the alarm for am instead of pm.”

  He closed his laptop and sat up into a sitting position at the edge of the bed. He wasn’t smiling. “You should be apologizing to yourself. You’re the one who’s gonna fail.”

  Okay, hard-ass.

  “Why didn’t you just wake me up?”

  “I tried to nudge you, but you didn’t even move. I had to check your pulse to make sure you were still alive. Then, you farted, so I figured all was well.”

  “I did not!” I laughed, but was dying inside.

  “I’m kidding. Relax.”

  Dear God, thank you.

  “When is your first exam?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  He shook his head and sighed. “Tomorrow…” Rolling his eyes, he ran his hands through his hair in frustration.

  “Yes. Professor Hernandez doesn’t waste any time.”

  “Well, then, it’s a good thing you napped because I hope you’re ready to be up all night.”

  Shit. He was serious about this. There was no joking around in his tone, making this situation all the more intimidating.

  I looked down at my feet and then back up at him. “I am really sorry.”

 
Jake’s green eyes seared into mine for a few seconds. “I don’t bite, you know,” he said in a low voice.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Why are you still standing in the doorway, using your textbook as a shield?”

  I laughed nervously as I entered the room. He was right. I was hesitating. But it wasn’t for the reason he probably thought.

  I wished…he would bite…and that’s what scared me.

  Control yourself, Nina.

  “Should we study in here or in the living room?” I asked.

  “That’s your decision. You’re the one that needs to focus,” he said.

  “Okay. Here is fine. Tarah and Ryan will probably come home and want the living room.”

  Bad choice. Being in his bedroom was by far the most distracting place.

  “Let’s get started then.” Jake reached out his hand. “Show me the assignment.”

  I handed him the book and syllabus, as he pulled up a wooden chair and sat down, kicking his legs up onto the foot of the bed. I sat on the ground with my legs crossed.

  “You don’t have to sit on the floor. I sat here, so you could have the bed.”

  “Okay, thanks,” I said as I got up and planted myself on his bed. The mattress was firm and it was like lying in a sea of his masculine scent. The black comforter was surprisingly soft, and I ran the tips of my fingers across it as I watched him look over my syllabus.

  “Okay, this shit isn’t going to be easy for you,” he said.

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence. That is certainly an understatement.”

  He looked up at me. “Let’s start with the linear programming problem.”

  I scratched my head and leaned in. “Okay.”

  “You have to create a problem like the one listed here, using the same model but your own variables, and then you need to solve it.” He grinned. “We can make this interesting if we want.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes. All it says is that it has to involve transportation.”

  “Yes.” I nodded.

  I had no idea what he was talking about.

  “Okay, so the example in the book uses a lumber dealer transporting wood to warehouses.”

  “Yes.”

  “So, you could use, for example…a pimp transporting whores across the country.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “We need to keep you awake, so let’s go with that. The problem is to find the most economical way to transport the prostitutes to various cities.”

  I rubbed my temples and chuckled. “Oh my God. Okay.”

  “First, you have to determine your variables. There are two variables, x and y. If x represents the number of whores to be driven from New York to L.A., then since L.A. needs 25 whores, the number of whores to be shipped from Philadelphia to L.A. is 25 minus x.

  He looked up to see if I was paying attention and continued. “And if y represents the number of whores to be driven from New York to Las Vegas, then since Las Vegas needs 30 whores, the number of whores to be shipped from Philadelphia to Las Vegas is 30 minus y.”

  He then built a cost table showing the transportation routes, number of whores and various costs of each route. Eventually, he came up with a formula and made me run through the entire problem until I understood it. Even though it took over an hour, I finally did get it. I was amazed at how capable I could be when interested enough to apply myself.

  And I was definitely interested.

  There was also a nutrition problem where the object was to design a low-cost recipe that provided required levels of proteins, calories and vitamin B12. We had to choose variables again and assign different costs. Jake substituted the samples used in the book for things that would make me laugh. In this case, the recipe was for Mrs. Ballsworthy’s “shit cake,” and the ingredients were chocolate, shit and whole-wheat flour. Again, he built a table to organize the data, and after another hour, I was finally able to run through the formula myself.

  He was so animated and never seemed to tire when I couldn’t grasp what he was teaching. Instead, he would just find a new way of explaining the problem to me, like he enjoyed the challenge. His tables and graphs made things easy to understand, and after running through those two examples repeatedly, I was starting to think that maybe I could pass the exam tomorrow. If only I could just remember Jake’s methodology and apply it to whatever problem Professor Hernandez came up with.

  By the end of the night, we were both sitting on the floor, stretched out with white papers everywhere. I was so tired, but I wasn’t ready for the study session to end.

  I started to yawn. Jake bonked me on the forehead with a rolled up piece of paper. “What do you say…one more practice problem?”

  I yawned again and nodded. “Sure, one more.”

  “No falling asleep on me,” he said.

  I wish I were falling asleep on you.

  “Okay…let’s try this,” he said as he began writing out a new chart with different variables.

  Sitting on the floor with my legs crossed next to him, I stared at his intense expression as he wrote in bold, hard strokes. He was so focused and was one of the smartest people I had ever met. His intelligence made him even sexier in my mind and made me feel even more inadequate. He was a badass.

  My eyes were glued to the way his tongue moved back and forth over the bottom of his mouth as he concentrated, his tongue ring clanking against the metal of the ring on his lip. It was so erotic, and I was so out of line for thinking like that while he was trying to help me. As my gaze meandered down to his tattooed arms, I also concluded that his masculine scent mixed with cigarette smoke was just about the most arousing smell I had ever known.

  His eyes suddenly darted to the side at me, as if he could feel me staring, and I looked away instinctively.

  Even though I wasn’t facing toward him anymore, my mind still went to places I knew it shouldn’t, like what his tongue would feel like…on me. I knew the answer. I wasn’t sure if it was because I was overtired or merely the fact that I hadn’t been with a man in so long, but I was suddenly experiencing sensory overload when it came to him.

  He stopped writing and looked toward me. “Okay…so two trains 150 miles apart travel toward each other along the same track…” He paused and waved his hand in front of my face. “Earth to Nina.”

  “Huh?” I then realized I had been staring at his mouth the entire time.

  “You’re not paying attention,” he said firmly, his gravelly voice vibrating through me.

  “I’m…I’m sorry,” I said.

  “You want to just stop?” He sounded frustrated with me.

  Instead of providing a yes or no answer, my exhausted (and horny) mind decided to take a detour.

  “Did it hurt?” I asked.

  Jake squinted his eyes. “Did what hurt?” he asked abruptly, almost seeming annoyed at me.

  “That,” I said pointing to his lip ring. “The tongue ring, the lip ring, the brow ring…all of them. Was it painful?”

  Shrugging his shoulders, he said, “I don’t really remember. I got them when I was like sixteen. I had way more of them back then, too. I don’t think it was that bad, though.” He lifted his brow with a smirk. “Why…are you considering getting one?”

  I giggled like a drunk schoolgirl. “Me? No. Uh-uh. I don’t think I could withstand the pain.”

  Jake’s eyes darkened and met mine. “Sometimes if you are willing to withstand a little pain in life, Nina, you might discover a pleasure that you never would have otherwise known existed.”

  I felt flushed. “Are we still talking about piercings?” My voice lowered to a whisper. “Are you talking about…piercings…down there?”

  His eyes widened, and he slammed the textbook down. “Down there? No, actually. I was referring to your fear of everything, Nina, but now I believe you might be referring to whether or not my cock is pierced.”

  Mortified, I looked down at the ground and shook my head vigorously. “Oh my God. Forget I ever s
aid anything! I think I am so tired that I am delirious. It’s probably time for me to hit the hay.”

  I immediately started messily gathering papers, along with my textbook and stood up. Speed talking, I said, “Jake, thank you so much for this. I think I really get it now. I’ll let you know how I make out tomorrow.”

  He got up but didn’t say anything.

  I walked backwards out of the room, dropping things and tripped over his wastebasket which made him chuckle.

  I practically ran to my room, and as I opened my bedroom door, Jake’s voice stopped me from down the hall.

  “To answer your question, Nina, that pleasure is worth the pain too.”

  Speechless, I entered my room and shut the door behind me, gearing up for another night of restlessness.

  CHAPTER 6

  As I sat in class thinking about last night’s tutoring session, Professor Hernandez began to address the room and startled me out of my daydream.

  “Please quiet down, folks. We have a lot to get to today. We’re going to spend the first half of class running through some of the examples you turned in. Then, the last half will be the exam.”

  He paused for about a minute looking through the stack of homework submissions.

  “Where is Ms. Kennedy?”

  I raised my hand. “Here, sir.”

  Professor Hernandez put his glasses on and examined the paper in his hand a bit more closely before looking over at me. “Pimps and whores, Ms. Kennedy?”

  My heart fell to my stomach, remembering that I had submitted the two examples Jake and I put together for the transportation and nutrition word problem assignment. Whoops.

  Please don’t mention Mrs. Ballsworthy’s shit cake.

  The class erupted in laughter at the pimp reference, and when it started to die down, I said, “Yes, sir.”

  He shook his head and examined the document again. “All I can say is, you’re lucky the solution is correct, Ms. Kennedy.”

  I nodded silently, wanting to crawl into a hole.

  When the attention of the class finally left me, my breathing settled. Just as the professor moved onto another student’s assignment, my phone vibrated then began to play a song I didn’t immediately recognize, loudly disrupting the lecture.