Don't You Go and Carry On With Your Life

Alex

I couldn't believe how great everything was going between Jack and me. After our "date" last night I felt better than I had in a while. I couldn't stop myself from smiling all day. It wasn't even just the sex that had me excited, it was the whole night! The fact that I took him on a romantic date and that we actually enjoyed ourselves is what really excited me. Having sex with Jack was amazing too; it was the cherry on top.

I talked to Jack earlier today and he told me that Kellin knew something went on between us because he saw the hickeys I left on Jack's neck. I didn't mind him knowing, he was old enough to understand. Jack seemed a little worried, but he was probably more embarrassed. Jack and I also talked about how amazing last night was and how we couldn't wait to go out again. It actually felt like we were starting over and beginning to date again. Dr. Pope was worth every penny I was paying her.

I decided to go have a celebratory drink with myself at a nearby bar. I was making serious progress with Jack, and I was proud of myself. I drove myself to the bar and went inside. There was a decent amount of people in here. I spotted an empty spot at the bar and went to sit down.

I picked up a drink menu and gazed over the drinks so I could choose what drink would be best to celebrate with. I decided a Jameson and Coke seemed like the best way to go for this occasion. I looked up to get the bartenders attention but he was already walking my way with a drink.

The bartender smiled and sat the drink down in front of me. I looked at it confused, I hadn't ordered anything yet.

"What is this?" I asked before the bartender could walk off.

"Oh uhh it's a Jack and Coke. That guy down there bought it for you." He said pointing a few seats down from me.

I turned to follow where he was pointing and I saw Austin sitting there. He waved at me and finished off his own drink before walking down to where I was sitting. I had no idea what his end game was, but I wasn't in the mood to deal with his negativity.

"What is this?" I asked, Austin, while pointing down at the drink.

"It's a Jack Daniels and Coke." He said sarcastically.

"Yeah no shit, I mean why did you buy it for me?"

"Think of it as a peace offering." He shrugged.

"Peace offering in what sense? Like you'll leave Jack and me alone and let us finally fix our family?" I asked and he chuckled.

"On the contrary actually. It's more like a 'you take the drink and leave Jack alone and I'll let you keep all thirty-two of your teeth' drink." He threatened.

"You actually think threatening me is going to keep me away from Jack?" I raised an eyebrow at him.

"Yeah, I do. Jack deserves to be with someone that will treat him right. You've already proven that you can't do that. Do you know how hard I've worked to boost his self-esteem? You were the worst thing that ever happened to Jack, all you've ever done is hurt him. So to keep that from happening again, I'm telling you to stay away from him."

Part of what Austin was saying was true. Jack does deserve to be treated like a king and I did ruin his self-esteem, but I wasn't worse thing that happened to Jack. Jack and I had so many good times together that weighed out the bad. It was going to take a lot more than a few threats to keep me away from Jack.

"Thanks for the drink, but I'm gonna have to decline your offer." I told him.

"I'm not playing around." He said through gritted teeth.

"Yeah neither am I. And I'm not planning on staying away from Jack either. I actually might pay him a visit tonight." I said smugly.

I immediately felt a punch to the left side of my face. The hit knocked me to the side. I turned around to see Austin's fist still up. Anger filled me as I jumped on him and tackled him to the ground. I sat on top on him and punch him in the face once but he stopped my other attempts to hit him. He grabbed my fist and used his body weight to flip us over. Soon I was pinned under him and felt two more punches to my face before two security guards were pulling him off of me. I laid back in relief that the fight was quickly over. Austin was a personal trainer so I knew he was stronger than me and that I most likely wasn't going to win against him.

One security guard had restrained Austin in while the other came over to check on me. I knew I was bleeding because I felt the blood that was coming from a cut on my cheek.

"Do you medical help?" The security guard asked.

"No I'll be fine." I groaned. I sat up and he helped me stand up.

"Okay well I can't allow you to leave until the cops get here." He said and I sighed. I'm a lawyer I could lose my job for having the smallest thing added to my record.

Soon police lights flashed through the bar windows and two officers came in. They talked to the two security guards about what happened.

"You're gonna have to come with us." An officer told me as he put hand cuffs on me.

"I was acting in self-defense!" I defended, but he ignored me and took me out of the bar. Being in hand cuffs and getting in the back of a police car was really humiliating. There was only one police car so Austin and I sat right next to each other. We didn't so much as look at each other the entire ride to the police station. I was so furious, all I wanted to do was celebrate my relationship with Jack not get in a fight because of it.

Once the officers took us inside they placed us in a holding cell. This was a good sign because we probably weren't in serious trouble since we didn't get fingerprinted. I sat on the right side of the cell and Austin sat on the far left. I glanced over in his direction to see him looking down at his knuckles. He barely had a scratch on him, and I could feel my face began to swell.

"Here you go." An officer told me as he handed me an ice pack.

"Thank you." I mumbled and sat it on my left cheek. It felt like heaven against my heated skin.

"No problem. So you two have a bail of five-hundred dollars once we receive payment in cash, you're free to go."

"Nothing will be on my record?" I asked and he shook his head and I exhaled in relief. Then I remembered that I didn't have that much money in cash on me.

"You both can make calls to figure out how you'll pay, but I can't let you go until you pay it or stay a few nights in here to credit it." He said and walked off. I couldn’t stay all night, I had to go to work tomorrow.

There was a phone inside of the holding cell, but I needed to figure out who I should call to get me out. Jack was out of the question. He would flip shit if he found out about this. He told me to stay away from Austin and even though this wasn't my fault I still fought back. Austin definitely wasn't going to call him since this fight was all his fault. I wanted to call Rian but I didn't know his number by heart. The only people numbers I knew by heart was my mom, dad, Jack, and Kellin. I did not want to call any one of them.

"Shit." I said to myself.

"Just call Jack." Austin told me.

"You should be last person that wants Jack here." I spat at him and he sighed.

"Look I'll admit I let my anger ge-"

"-Shut the fuck up." I stopped him and went back to the phone. I'd rather have Jack here yelling at me than listen to his apology.

I dialed Jack's number and it rang for a while and went to voicemail. It was only eight pm so I didn't think he was sleep. I hung up and called his phone again. This time he answered. A digital message had to play first to let Jack know that he was getting a call from jail.

"Hello, you are receiving a call from...." the machine asked me to say my name at that time.

"...Alex..." I mumbled.

"...an inmate at Baltimore State jail. Do you accept the call?"

"Umm Yes?" Jack said sleepily. He was probably taking a nap.

"Jack I need you to do me a big favor just please don't be mad at me." I rushed out.

"Wait wait." He yawned. "Did that thing say 'an inmate?'" He asked.

"Yeah I-"

"-Inmate? As in jail inmate? As in you're in jail?" He cut me off.

"Yes Jack, and I need you to come bail me out."

"I have to be dreaming." He said to himself.

"Pinch yourself, check the time, or do whatever you have to do to show yourself that you're not dreaming." I said.

"You're really in jail?" He asked.

"Yes Jack, and I need you to come down here and bail me out."

"What did you do?" He asked. He sounded like he was fully awake now.

"I'll tell you when you get here."

"No. Why should I come bail you out if I don't even know what you've done? You could have killed someone for all I know."

"Ugh no I didn't, but I want to. I got into a fight with Austin."

"Alex, I specifically told you to stay aw-"

"-I know but it wasn't my fault. He just happened to be at the same bar as me and he hit me first!"

"I don't even know what to say to that."

"Don't say anything, just pull five hundred dollars out of your account for me and I'll pay you back as soon as I'm out of here."

"What about me?!" Austin asked.

"You can stay in here and rot for all I care." I rolled my eyes at him.

"Is it a thousand dollars to get you both out?" Jack asked, angrily.

"Yeah, but don't worry about him. It's his fault we're in jail in the first place."

"Don’t move!" Jack demanded.

"I don't have a choice." I said and he hung up on me.

"Is he coming?" Austin asked and I simply ignored him. "Look Alex I-"

"-I'm not interested in an apology." I cut him off. He didn't attempt talking to me for the remainder of our time in there.

We waited thirty-five minutes for Jack to finally make it. One officer led him back to the holding cell where we were sitting. He looked at us in shock when he saw us in the cell, but mostly he was shocked at the brusies on my face.

"Oh my god! Are you okay?" He asked worriedly.

"Yeah it's not that bad." I said, trying to act tough. Jack sighed and looked at both of us disappointedly.

"Don't let them out yet." He told the officer and the officer nodded. "Both of you explain." Jack demanded.

"I lost my temper and punched Alex and then it got worse from there." Austin admitted. I was pretty caught off guard. I wasn't expecting him to tell the truth.

"You hit him! Austin what the hell is wrong with you??" Jack scolded him.

"I just didn't want him to hurt you anymore so I told him to stay away from you and he didn't agree. You deserve way better than him, Jack."

"So you thought you should hurt him to make everything better?"

"I wasn't really thinking." Austin said while rubbing the back of his neck.

Jack turned to me to see if I had anything to say.

"He hit me first so I was acting in self-defense." I defended and Jack sighed.

"Alright you can let them out now." He told the officer.

The officer came to open the cell to let us out. He gave us our stuff back and told us we were free to go. I followed Jack out of the holding cell and into the lobby. Austin stopped Jack before we could leave the lobby and I glared at him.

"I'm sorry for all of this. Let me pay you back for bailing me out." He told Jack.

"I'm not the one you should be apologizing to." Jack said stubbornly.

"I tried apologizing, but he won't listen." He complained about me.

"Can you blame him?? Look at his face Austin!" Jack told him and he sighed. "You don't have to pay me back with money. Just stay away from us."

“Be careful Jack.” Austin sighed while glancing at me. Then he left out of the station to get a taxi.

"Come on, Alex." Jack demanded and I followed him out to his car.

“Where’d you get the money to bail us out?” I asked.

“I borrowed it from Kylie.” He said and I looked at him confused. “Her child support money.” He clarified and I laughed.

"Oh yeah. Well I’m going to pay you back in full when I get paid next week.” I promised.

“Don’t worry about it.” He brushed it off, but I still made a note in my phone to put the money back in his account.

“Thanks for coming." I told him.

"You’re welcome." He said. "Let me see your face." He demanded once we were sitting in his car. He pulled my ice pack down and looked at my bruises. "Shit. That doesn't look good. Do you want to go to the hospital?" He asked worriedly.

"I feel fine. It doesn't hurt as badly anymore." I told him.

"Yeah because you've been pressing ice on it."

"I don't need to go to the hospital. Promise." I said.

"Well how about you come over for a few hours so I can keep an eye on you. I don't want you to have a concussion or anything." He said worriedly and I nodded.

"Yeah I'm okay with that." Spending time with Jack and the kids sounded great.

"Okay." He said and drove in the direction of home. "I'm really sorry, Alex." He said as he drove.

"Sorry for what? You didn't do anything."

"Yeah but it's still my fault. Austin hit you because of me."

"Jack you didn't tell him to hit me. It's not your fault. He's just an asshole." I said and he laughed.

He pulled into the garage a few minutes later. I was kind of afraid for Kellin to see me like this. He would worry just as much as Jack with my cheek swollen and a cut on my cheek. Plus I was kind of embarrassed since I lost the fight.

"What's wrong?" Jack asked.

"I'm worried about Kellin seeing me like this." I told him.

"Oh Alex he'll be worried, but he'll see that you're not in too much pain." He assured me.

"No I mean he'll know that I lost to Austin." I said, looking down.

"Lex, it wasn't a fair fight. Austin probably caught you off guard. Plus he's a fitness trainer. You did the right thing by trying to protect yourself."

"Yeah you're right. It wasn't a fair fight." I mumbled, trying to make myself feel better. Jack leaned over and kissed me on the cheek, making me smile.

"What was that for?" I asked.

"To make it all better." He said.

"But I told you my face doesn't hurt right now." I said, confused.

"It wasn't for your face." He smiled at me and I returned it. It was for my pride.

I opened my door and got out ready to get out and go inside now. Jack unlocked the door for us and I didn't feel so bad anymore.

As I followed behind Jack, into the house, I realized I actually did win the fight against Austin. I was the one that walked away with the prize.

Notes

I think there are only six chapters left but don't quote me lol