Total pages in book: 244
Estimated words: 236705 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1184(@200wpm)___ 947(@250wpm)___ 789(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 236705 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1184(@200wpm)___ 947(@250wpm)___ 789(@300wpm)
That’s why I won’t tell him I’m writing a novel. I’d be exposing a piece of my vulnerable heart to him. Jude’s already hellbent on figuring me out. He delights in it. He’s been trying to get me to share writerly things with him today. Maybe even to admit what I did this morning at the coffee shop, why I read Agatha Christie, how I want to steal “The Duck’s Nipple” to use it in my book.
But telling Jude my dreams is dangerous. It could lead to closeness.
He already knows my habits, what I eat, when I exercise, and yeah, what I sound like when I come in the shower.
He knows my taste in books, music, and home decor. He knows I had no style and that I like the kind he just found for me.
I’m sure he knows, too, that this is both lust and so much more than that for me.
If I let him into my head, I would become completely infatuated.
I prefer slightly infatuated, like I am now.
But Jude deserves something.
After I buy the shirts and we leave, I silently practice what I want to say. Something I once thought he’d have to get out of me with his tongue.
“Jude,” I say, my tone serious once we’re walking down the street.
He stops in his tracks. “Yes?”
I exhale and choose sincerity over style. “It’s Terry Jerry.”
15
WHAT’S IN A NAME?
TJ
Gotta give him credit—Jude hasn’t erupted into peals of laughter yet.
We swing into a nearby pub, order two beers, and grab a booth.
Jude lifts his glass, tips it to mine. “Here’s to you for saying that. I could tell it wasn’t easy.”
“Nope,” I say, then drink some of the brew.
When I set it down, he does the same, then waits patiently.
Might as well serve up the whole enchilada. “It’s officially Terry Jerome. For my mom’s dad and my dad’s dad. But they called me Terry when I was younger.”
“Terry’s a decent name for a bloke.”
“I suppose, but it’s not my favorite. It’s kind of like Larry or Bob.”
Jude arches a brow. “You mean, plain?”
“Yes, but when you put it together with Jerome, it’s a living hell for a ten-year-old.” The memory flashes bright and awful in my mind. “A couple of boys in fourth grade figured out that Jerome can be shortened to Jerry. And once that cat was out of the bag, it wasn’t going back in.”
He smiles sympathetically. “It was Terry Jerry all the way?”
“On the playground. In the halls. Every-fucking-where. All thanks to this punk—Robby Linden. And I think it goes back to the time our teacher praised me for writing a really creative poem, that, well, rhymed, since that was the assignment, and his did not. He liked to cough whisper Terry Jerry under his breath whenever I walked into class.” I pause to drink some more beer for fuel, then say, “At the end of fourth grade, I asked my parents to change my name to TJ, since I said I liked my initials better. And they were super chill about it and told the school I was TJ. My brother asked me why I changed it, and I just said I preferred it.”
“He didn’t know what was going on?”
“No. He was an athlete by then, and I didn’t want to be known as the artsy twin who needed his sporty brother to defend him. But I hoped things would change for good in sixth grade when we moved to a different section of Seattle. That I’d start over in middle school with a new name. My brother had already done that long ago with his given name – Chauncey for our mom’s stepdad. But Chauncey was hard to say, so I started calling him Chance when I was two or three, apparently. And it stuck.”
“So, he had the cool name sooner,” Jude says, sketching air quotes.
“Exactly. But it was finally my turn. Except, guess who shows up at my school?”
“Robby the Wanker?”
“The one and only. And he decides to tell some of the other boys in sixth grade that my initials stood for Terry Jerry and that it would be fun to call me that, so he enlisted his dipshit friends in mocking my name.” Another drink, then I soldier on. “But I ignored them. That was my new strategy, and that’s why I never told my brother what was going on.”
The way I saw it, I was protecting Chance from trouble. He’d have been pissed off—probably have confronted them. Maybe that made it easier to keep other things from him later on, like the nitty-gritty details of our parents’ divorce. “Some things you have to handle on your own,” I add, explaining my choice to Jude.
“I get that completely. My brother is nine years older, so we’ve always had to figure things out on our own,” Jude supplies, and his reassurance that we’re on the same wavelength feels good. “But what was Robby’s deal?”