She takes off my cardigan at some point. I take off her flannel.

Jack lifts me up and sets me down on the edge of the sink, and then she takes a step back. She looks at me. She steps between my open legs and stares and stares and stares. “So pretty,” she says, in her Jack-whisper that’s still loud enough to hear over the music. And I know this compliment comes at the intersection of too many IPAs and bad bathroom lighting, but I don’t care.

I reach up, and I push that sweaty chunk of hair out of her eyes, and I stare back at her. At the beautiful slope of her jaw, at the twist of her swollen mouth, at the subtle glint of hope in her eyes. It’s the hope that fucking kills me every time.

How did I manage to mess this all up last year? How do I make sure I don’t mess this up again?

I take off my shirt. Arguably a great way to mess this up, but Jack’s eyes go even darker. She crowds in closer to me, her hands chart their way from my soft stomach up to the front of my nude bra, and then she’s kissing me again. Deep, wild kisses. Kisses that ride the wave of her body as she grinds against me, the seam of my jeans against her hip bone, her mouth on my mouth, my shoulder, my collarbone, the top of my breasts.

“You’re so pretty.” She breathes these words against my skin, tucks them into all my soft, fragile places. “Thank God you’re not marrying him, Elle,” she moans. “You can’t marry him. I—I don’t know what I’ll do if you marry him.”

I freeze on the edge of the sink.

For a moment, Jack’s mouth goes still against my skin. Then she pulls away.

She stares at me again. I’m shirtless, horny, kissed within an inch of my life. Absolutely panicking. “You’re…” Jack licks her swollen lips. “You’re still going to marry him, aren’t you?”

“Jack—”

That’s all I manage to say before the hope flickers out of her. She blinks, and then she’s taking another step back from me, reaching for her flannel on the sticky floor. “I’m sorry,” Jack says, without looking at me. “Shit. I’m sorry.”

“Jack, I can explain.”

“This was a mistake.” Jack snatches up my T-shirt and holds it out for me. I take it, drape it across the front of my body like it might protect me from this moment. “We can pretend like this never happened, okay?”

Her voice is hard as flint, her face turned away from me. Physically, she’s still here in this bathroom, but emotionally, she’s already hidden herself away in her Airstream again, already retreated back behind her aluminum shield.

“No, Jack, listen—”