Start Me Up

Tessa had officially survived five entire playoff games.

The games in Nashville were a lot easier because she got to be there but the games in Anaheim were awful. Losses were bad enough, but they were easier when she was there in person after them, there was just only so much that she could do over the phone for Shea, win or lose, and now she was faced with their first road loss so far. It was a bad one too, and now the Ducks had the series lead and Tessa knew Shea would be in a foul mood, though he would probably hide it from her over the phone because that’s just how he was. He tried so hard not to bring the game home with him, even though Tessa, surprisingly, understood it when he did.

She kept her phone by her while she got ready for bed, it was late in Nashville but still relatively early in Anaheim and Tessa wasn’t sure how long he would be. So her phone sat on the counter while she washed her face and brushed her teeth, she carted it into the kitchen where she turned the kettle on and grabbed a mug and a tea bag from the cupboard and she placed it on her dresser as she put on a pair of pyjama pants and a Preds shirt.

She nearly jumped out of her skin when a knock on the door interrupted her otherwise quiet night. She kept her phone tightly clasped in her hand and she stopped only to turn the kettle off as she headed to the door, and pulled it open, and she could have dropped it when she found Jacob standing in the hallway outside of her apartment.

He smiled gently, but a little awkwardly, and as it appeared that Tessa had no voice he asked her, “Aren’t you gonna invite me in?”

She didn’t make any motion to move out of the way, instead, it appeared as if she had made the space between herself and the door even smaller in response to his words. She asked him, “What are you doing here, and how did you even get my address?”

“Your mother was kind enough to give me the address of the place I’m paying for.” He told her, and she rolled her eyes at him. He scolded her as if she were a child, “Don’t roll your eyes at me.”

She wanted to tell him that she could do whatever she wanted now, that it was a free country and if she wanted to roll her eyes three hundred times at him she could. She wanted to prove to herself that she wasn’t the same spineless little girl that she always had been when it came to him, and yet all that came out of her mouth was, “Please leave.”

“Just invite me in Tess, I want to talk.” His words were softer this time than they had been before as if he thought he could sweet talk his way into her apartment.

She shook her head, “Go away.”

“I’m not going anywhere, so you might as well just invite me in.” Jacob told her, his voice level and void of any real emotion, so she didn’t know whether or not he was angry. She had always been able to tell when he was angry or not, she may not have been able to gauge any of his other emotions during their years together but anger was the one she memorized. She would have had to have been pretty stupid not to; it was the emotion she got the most from him.

She should have slammed the door in his face, locked it and called for security but instead, she simply sighed and stepped aside, holding the door open for him. Jacob walked in, not even bothering to slip out of his shoes, as if he owned the place, though in his mind he did.

He took a good glance around the apartment and then he turned to Tessa and told her, “I didn’t realize I was paying you this well.”

Translation: he didn’t realize he had given her enough to live comfortably, and now he was regretting giving her anything at all.

She narrowed her eyes at him, “Not that it’s any of your business but I have been working while I’m here.”

He let a small laugh bubble out of his mouth when he asked her, “You? Working? Doing what?”

“I did have a career before we got married.” She reminded him.

He still held that amused look on his face as he looked down at the coffee table, which was littered with scraps of paper, paint swatches and fabric pieces for Roman’s house and then Jacob looked over at her and asked, “You’re still trying to make this little hobby work?”

“It is work. I’ve been here three months and I’m already on my second house.” Tessa told him, she was admittedly a little proud of that fact.

But just as soon as that feeling of pride surrounded her it was beaten back down when Jacob told her, “Eventually, you’re gonna run out of Shea’s teammate's charity.”

“Did you come here for a reason other than to insult me?” Tessa asked him, crossing her arms over her chest as she narrowed her eyes just the slightest at him.

He seemed all too content to walk around the living room looking at things, touching things. When he picked up the birthday card from Shea that Tessa still had sitting on the window sill by the couch he read the front out loud before he opened it up, “’Happy birthday, I love you…’ Isn’t that a little intimate for a brother-in-law?”

“I didn’t tell you that you could touch things.” Tessa told him, taking a few strides to him to rip the card from his hands and put it back where it belonged.

He made a face as if he were surprised by her actions and then he smiled and said, “Oh right, your mother did mention something about that to me.”

“What do you want?” Tessa asked him, hand on her hip as she watched him with hard, narrowed eyes.

“I believe the exact words she used were that you were so consumed by your own failures in marriage that you ruined Amelia’s just for the fun of it.”

Part of her didn’t want to believe that her mother had said that to him but Tessa was smarter than that. She had spent thirty-four years with her mother and she knew her well enough to know that Elanor would have said exactly that. Even not being surprised by the words didn’t save her from the hurt that she felt hearing that.

She couldn’t help but fire back at him, “My own failures? Last time I checked it was you who wanted the divorce, not me.”

“Why do you think I wanted a divorce in the first place?” Jacob asked her, his voice was full of surprise and he looked at her as if she had three heads. When she didn’t answer he told her harshly, “I wanted a divorce because I couldn’t handle being married to you anymore. I couldn’t handle having to deal with you every single day. It was like dealing with a child, I mean God, you couldn’t even follow simple instructions. I wanted a divorce because I was sick and tired of being the only one who did anything for our marriage.”

“I’m only going to ask you once more to leave.” Tessa told him, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Oh, did I strike a nerve there?” Jacob asked her, eyebrow raised. Tessa simply stared at him, her jaw clenched tightly, and so he continued, “The truth hurts Tessa. But I guess at least now you know your faults, now you know you’ve already ruined one relationship just by being yourself so maybe you should just quit while you’re ahead.”

“Get out of my apartment.” She told him, taking the lead and heading to the door hoping he would get the point.

He didn’t, he simply stared at her from across the living room, and then he told her, “I came here for your rings.”

“I’m sorry…what?” Tessa asked him, surprised by his statement, her brows raised.

He rolled his eyes and spoke to her as if she were stupid, or five, “Your rings? You know, the rather expensive two piece set? One was an engagement ring with a lot of diamonds, the other was a wedding band?”

“I know what you were asking for. Why do you want them?” She explained, her patience with his games wearing thin.

“Because I just do, and seeing as I did pay for them I think I’m entitled to want them back.” Jacob informed her, as if she didn’t know that he had bought them. Somehow, as usual, it all came down to him and what he was entitled to.

Tessa simply asked him, “Why do you want them back? What, so you can use them again?”

He didn’t answer right away, which was an answer that in itself to her, and so after a moment of silence between them Jacob finally told her, “Not that it’s any of your business but yes, I am proposing to someone. I was going to sell the rings to buy a new set.”

“Are you kidding me?” She wasn’t sure why but she was surprised.

As if this were a perfectly planned and rehearsed scene Tessa’s phone lit up on the TV stand a few feet away from her, it buzzed against the wood loudly. Shea’s name and a picture of them was displayed on the screen and Jacob glanced over at it before he looked at her and he asked her, “You’re seriously in a relationship with him?”

“That is none of your business.” Tessa told him firmly, her eyes watching the picture disappear on her screen to be replaced with a notification of a missed call, no voicemail was left.

“You moved on too, you know.” Jacob pointed out.

Tessa wanted to point that yes, she had moved on, but that she wasn’t about to get married again when she hadn’t even been divorced a full year. She kept it at, “What is she, some twenty-three-year-old bimbo? Honestly, in what world would anyone get married after not even knowing each other for eight months?”

“Kelsey’s twenty-five, actually, and we’ve known each other for years.” He knew he had slipped up the moment the words left his mouth.

It was evident by the expression on his face when Tessa’s brow raised and she asked, “Kelsey as in your assistant Kelsey?”

“I hardly think you get to judge me given your romantic situation.” Jacob fired back with and Tessa rolled her eyes at him.

She pulled the apartment door open and told him with harsh words, “You have two seconds to get the fuck out of my apartment before I call security to have them drag you out.”

She was surprised when he did as he was told and left the apartment, and before she could close the door he stuck his foot in the way and he asked her, “The rings Tessa, that’s all I came here for.”

Tessa couldn’t resist getting one last lick in before slamming the door in his face so she smiled gently and informed him, “Yeah, I sold those to a pawn shop and bought myself a really nice pair of shoes.”

She locked the doorknob, and the deadbolt the moment the door latched shut and then she leaned back against the door, hands on her knees and sighed.

- - - - -

Shea hadn’t heard back from Tessa before he got on the plane that night to head back to Nashville, and so when they landed early that morning and he found that he didn’t have a text or a missed call waiting for him from her he got into his truck and drove the opposite direction from the arena to his own place. Obviously, if she wasn’t going to return his calls then he wasn’t going to waste his time by going over there.

So he put his truck in park in the driveway and locked it as he dragged himself and his bags up the front steps to the door. The light by the door had clearly blown its bulb because he had to guess three different keys before he got the right one for the front door in the dark. He closed the door behind him, kicked out of his dress shoes and headed to the bedroom down the hall, stopping only to drop his bags on the couch.

He practically dove into bed, on top of the covers, still in his suit from the plane and was out like a light the moment his head hit the pillow.

When he woke up hours later, close to nine-thirty in the morning Shea was still exhausted. So he got out of his suit and hopped in the shower, taking a nice, long break in there before he got out and pulled on a t-shirt and a pair of jeans. He cleared his bags off of the couch, bringing them into the bedroom and unpacking everything before he went back out and made himself breakfast.

He had just finished eating and putting everything away when his front door opened and he turned to find Tessa walking into the house. She stopped when their eyes met, and her brow quirked just a tiny bit as she stated, “Oh… you are home.”

“Yup.” He stated.

“I… I thought you were gonna come by my place when you got home.” Tessa spoke softly, and Shea had to force himself not to roll his eyes at her.

All he told her was, “We got in late.”

So Tessa nodded her head slowly and she looked around the house. They got in late, but not so late that he had, had time to get up, shower, unpack and eat breakfast. So she asked him, “Why didn’t you tell me you got in okay?”

“Why didn’t you answer my phone call?” He challenged back with, turning to watch her with dark, hard eyes.

Tessa stared at him for a moment in surprise, before she asked him, “Is that why you came here instead of my place like you said you were going to?”

“I didn’t know what you were doing, I figured you were probably busy so yeah, I went home because what was the point in showing up at your place when you couldn’t even pick up your phone to talk to me?” Shea asked her, and Tessa was having a really hard time holding her temper in hearing all of this.

So she asked him, arms crossed over her chest, “This is how it’s going to be? So, instead of realizing that it was late when you called and maybe I was asleep so that’s why I didn’t answer or call back you just ignore me and pretend I don’t exist?”

“Were you asleep?” When Tessa didn’t answer Shea shoved it back in her face, “Exactly.”

“Oh for fuck sakes. You wanna know what I was doing when you called? And why I didn’t call you back right away?” Tessa asked him her voice raised, her knuckles were going white from gripping her arms so tightly across her chest. Shea didn’t answer, he didn’t even nod his head yes or no which only further infuriated Tessa so she told him, “Jacob showed up.”

“Oh.” She rolled her eyes and nearly scoffed when that was all that came out of his mouth.

“Yeah, so your neurosis was completely off base. I’m really sorry that I didn’t drop everything to answer your call, I’m really sorry that I was too busy being insulted, and humiliated and then asked for my wedding rings back so that my ex-husband could propose to his twenty-five-year-old assistant.” Tessa told him, and when again he didn’t answer but he looked down at his feet as if he were embarrassed she continued, “I’m sorry you had a bad game, I’m sorry you guys lost, but do not expect me to be okay with you acting like a five-year-old every time you have a bad game. Your career doesn’t give you the right to act like this.”

“I didn’t know he was there.” Shea started, and Tessa rolled her eyes which caused him to stop.

“Exactly, you didn’t know and instead of finding out why or being concerned that I never answered or called back you just decided to do this.” Tessa told him, and when he went to speak she spoke before he could, “If this is how things are going to be with us; if this is what you’re going to be like when I miss one phone call then I don’t want to do this. I will not put myself through this bullshit again Shea, so make up your damn mind and let me know when you do.”