Page 21 of Is It Casual Now?

twenty-one

Siena regretted agreeing to one of the times Jamie had sent through on her second list of availabilities. But seeing as it was actually the same time she had already scheduled Bunny and Piper to come to her office for a catch-up, she decided she really did need to stop stringing Jamie along.

She hadn’t wanted to cut their ties. Not really.

She hadn’t wanted to stop them having sex again. But she knew it would never work out. They were on opposite teams with their own chosen career goals, and that wasn’t something as simple as liking crunchy peanut butter or smooth.

Bunny and Piper walked through her door ten minutes early for the interview. Bunny was dressed in loose sweatpants and layered tank tops like she’d just come in from a long run and Piper was all done up and wearing a cute white dress.

“I can’t believe you have actually agreed to this.” Bunny shook her head as she hugged Siena and brushed a kiss on her cheek.

“I’m curious about how it might help things,” Piper said in response as she followed Bunny with her own greeting .

The three sat back in their usual seats at the small meeting area in Siena’s office after getting drinks for everyone.

“I’m hoping it helps steer things back toward your actual music, Piper. But yeah, I can’t say I had it on this year’s bingo card, that’s for sure.” Siena pursed her lips and glanced toward the door to her office, expecting Jamie to walk in any second now.

Bunny smiled and rested her arms on the back of the couch, one arm behind Piper as she spread her legs and took up space like she owned the entire office. Siena wouldn’t ever deny that agreeing to work with Bunny and Piper had catapulted her career into a whole different arena. And now she was considering signing another duo group that she’d caught the attention of. The letter she’d gotten from them had definitely piqued her interest.

“Don’t do that in the interview, yeah?” Siena said, pointing at how Bunny was sitting.

Bunny and Piper looked at each other and then turned their confused expressions back to Siena.

“Do what?” Piper asked.

“Your arm, Bunny.” Siena jerked her chin in Bunny’s direction.

“Oh for crying out loud.” Bunny pulled her arm away and leaned forward in the couch, elbows now resting on her knees. “This is one hell of a bad idea.”

“She’s getting more attention, and it’s better to get on her good side before she gets any more traction. She’s making a hell of a lot of trouble for some others at the moment. It’s what I like to think of as a preemptive strike,” Siena said, feeling slightly guilty about the twist to her own story. It hadn’t happened in this order, but it made it easier for her to justify the interview. To them, and more importantly to herself.

“Like your interview with her?” Bunny waggled her eyebrows. “That was…unexpectedly sweet. ”

Siena’s cheeks burned. She really hadn’t expected the interview she’d given on a whim to turn out as well as it had. Jamie had done a good job on it, which had boosted her confidence that Jamie wasn’t only in it for the gossip.

“It was,” Piper chimed in. “I read it even.”

Piper usually stayed as far away from tabloids or news like that as possible. Siena relaxed back into her chair and glanced at the door again. When was Jamie going to be here? She’d never been late to a meeting before. In fact, she was notoriously always on time or early.

“What crawled up your butt?” Bunny asked.

“Nothing,” Siena lied. She and Jamie hadn’t been on good terms since their last conversation, that distance between them growing with each passing day, and it didn’t sit right in Siena’s chest.

“Don’t lie to one of your oldest friends.” Bunny gave her a pointed look. “You’ve been distant.”

“I’ve been thinking about the past.” Siena sighed heavily and ran her fingers through her long hair. She couldn’t get Tori out of her head lately, not that she wanted to be in a relationship with her again, but because of how screwed up Siena had been when they were together. “Did I tell you that Harley went as a rock star for Halloween?”

“What?” Piper said. “A true rock star?”

Siena chuckled lightly and whipped out her phone and pulled up a photo that she’d taken when she and Tori had gone out trick or treating. She handed it over so Bunny and Piper could look at it. “My God, she’s getting so big,” Bunny mumbled.

“Grew a foot this last year, I swear. She looks so much older now that she’s in school. Acts older too.”

“Little bug is growing up.” Piper pouted her lips and looked like she was going to cry in an exaggerated way. “We’ve got to find some time to hang out with her again. ”

“Yes, she’s been asking for that.” Siena took her phone back and noted the time. Jamie was now officially late. And there hadn’t been a text or a call about it either. Jamie was always the professional. Siena had no doubt that she would show up when she said she would show up. Putting her phone onto the arm of the chair, face up so she could see it, Siena looked to the door.

Surely Paula would be in soon, telling her that Jamie was here and ready to set up for the interview.

“So how’s Tori?” Piper asked.

Siena frowned. Tori was doing amazing. And it irked her in a way that she hadn’t actually said out loud before, but maybe with Bunny and Piper she could. They’d been there throughout the divorce, from Siena’s bringing up the conversation to Tori to her plummeting and treating herself like shit afterwards, to slowly bringing herself back up.

“Is something wrong?” Bunny asked.

Shaking her head, Siena tried to mask her feelings. “Tori’s doing great. She and Miranda are moving in together. She and I had a whole argument about bunk beds.”

Bunny snorted. “Piper broke her arm on hers.”

“Hey now!”

“I know.” Siena rolled her eyes. “I told Tori as much. It wasn’t pleasant. But she won out. There really isn’t another option for the room. And lo and behold, Harley broke her arm on it. Remember? I had to race out when we were meeting with Bea and Jo.” She sighed heavily. “Do you ever wonder if you keep making the same mistakes because you’re not healed or if it’s just because you’re too stupid to learn from when you did it before?”

Bunny and Piper froze. They glanced at each other, clearly sharing some sort of conversation that Siena wasn’t included in. Bunny flung herself back into the couch, her hand along the top edge of it and behind Piper again. She eyed Siena cautiously.

Piper was the one who spoke. “That’s pretty deep for pre-interview conversation, Siena.”

“Sorry.” Siena rubbed circles into her temple and glanced at her phone and the door again. Ten minutes late. Jamie wasn’t coming, was she? “I just can’t stop thinking about Tori.”

“Really?” Bunny frowned. “I thought you were over her.”

“I am. I don’t mean it in a I want to get back together way. I keep thinking about our marriage, and divorce. But mainly why I asked her to get married in the beginning.”

“Because you loved her?” Piper asked, her leg bouncing up and down like it always did. She wasn’t nervous, it was just the extra energy that the woman seemed to always carry with her.

“Because I loved what she could give me.” Siena loosed the words, and she could feel the tension rising sharply. “I love Tori, don’t get me wrong, but I was never in love with her. I was in love with the idea of what she could give me that I couldn’t give myself. A family. And when she gave me that, I realized it wasn’t fair to her to keep her tied to someone who couldn’t love her the way she deserved.”

“So that’s why you divorced her.” Bunny lifted her eyebrows unexpectedly. “I never really understood that one.”

“But what if I’m doing that again?”

“Siena…” Piper glanced to Bunny before getting an affirming nod to continue. “Is there someone else? You haven’t mentioned anyone…”

Because there wasn’t anyone. Was there? Siena hadn’t worked that one out yet, and no matter how many times she told herself that she and Jamie weren’t in a relationship, it did oddly feel like that. Siena was attracted to her physically for sure, but she was also attracted to who Jamie was—the confident blonde who was brilliant at her job and amazing with words .

“Siena?” Piper asked, her head tilting and catching Siena’s eye where it still stared at her screen.

“I’m sorry. This time of year is always a struggle, you know that. Especially since Tori wants to start new Christmas traditions with Miranda, so I won’t be invited to everything with Harley this year. The wonders of co-parenting, huh?”

“What’s really wrong?” Bunny sat forward, ready to take on the world if she needed to. Siena had seen that look in her eyes so many times before, and she loved it every time. Bunny was fiercely protective of those she loved, and Siena was proud to call herself among them.

“It’s thirty minutes past the hour.” Siena stared at her phone and the door that was still closed. She knew for sure at this point that Jamie wasn’t coming. She just didn’t know why. Had she chickened out? Or was it because she couldn’t stand being in the room with Siena? Or was it worse? Had there been some sort of accident that had kept her from getting there? Was she in the hospital?

“Do you have another appointment?” Piper asked, not immediately catching the meaning behind Siena’s mention of the time.

“She didn't show up,” Bunny said, mouth dropping open as she put two and two together. “What the fuck is she playing at?”

That anger had been what Siena wanted to feel, but she didn’t. She was so caught up in the what-ifs and the worries that she couldn’t bring herself to actually focus on how ticked off she should be that she’d spent so much of her precious time setting up this interview and convincing Bunny and Piper that it would be to their advantage only to have Jamie not fucking show up.

Siena swallowed and called back the emotions that wanted to pour out instead of tears. “I don’t think she’s playing. Not really. It’s not her fault. ”

It was Siena’s fault. She’d dragged it out too long. She’d played the game and she had pushed Jamie too far. Siena had just wanted their relationship—sexual at least—to be casual and they’d never managed to pull that one off, had they?

“Are you kidding?” Bunny twisted around to look at the door. “Look, we don’t do interviews like this for extra credit. She should have shown up and done what she said she was going to do.”

“Bunny, shut up,” Piper interrupted.

Bunny angled her body toward Piper, and Siena knew a tirade was about to start but she looked up and met Bunny’s eyes. In front of her, the emotions of bent-out-of-shape Bunny morphed back into the ultimate protector Siena had ever known. God how she loved her friend. If this entire situation hadn’t involved Jamie Kettlehouse, someone Bunny already hated, Siena might have been far more inclined to actually talk to Bunny and Piper about what was going on.

“Siena, what’s wrong?”

Siena swallowed the lump and the tears that wanted to spill. Fuck, she needed to get her shit together. Standing up, she swiftly walked out of her office and into the main office area. Sure enough, Jamie was nowhere to be found.

“Did she call?” Siena asked Paula, already knowing the answer.

Paula shook her head. “No, she hasn’t.”

“Right.” Siena sucked in a breath and calmed herself down. She needed to do something with herself to burn off this energy. And what she really needed was to spend some time thinking of the farthest thing possible to what this could be. Snagging her phone, she called Tori. “Hey, mind if I grab Harley from school today? I wanted to surprise her with Zena’s Donuts.”

“Oh, that’d be great, actually. I’m running a bit late with this client. ”

“Perfect. I’ll drop her off in the morning at school and we can go back to our regular schedule.”

“Sounds good. Love you, Siena.”

“Love you, too, Tori.” That love had never been a lie, and Siena had never made the mistake of trying to play it off as casual either.

Siena checked her watch. She could do this. It would be perfect timing. But she had to make sure that Jamie wasn’t going to randomly show up in the next twenty minutes either. She took her cell and dialed Jamie’s number, waiting patiently as it rang and rang and rang.

There was no answer.

Not that Siena had expected there to be one. This was so unlike Jamie—at least the Jamie that she knew. When it tipped over to Jamie’s voicemail, Siena closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose.

“Time’s up, Jamie. You didn’t show, and I can’t keep them here. Hope you’re not dead in a ditch somewhere.” She almost added a call me to the end, but she didn’t. She didn’t even say goodbye as she ended the message and held her phone down to her side.

Walking back into her office, she caught Bunny and Piper’s attention. “Want to spend some time with Harley and me at Zena’s? I thought she’d enjoy the treat and I need to pick her up from school.”

“She’s really not coming?” Piper asked.

“Afraid not.” Siena had used those few minutes outside to set herself up for what was coming next. It had been enough time to pull her shit together and put her mask back in place. “You coming?”

“Are you driving?” Bunny asked.

Laughing, Siena nodded. “Of course. I don’t trust you within twenty miles of a car in downtown Portland.”

Bunny threw her hands up. “I’m not that bad of a driver. ”

“Says the tickets you’ve racked up. Totally believe that one.” Siena strode to her desk and snagged her purse. This was a much better way to spend the next few hours. Far more worth her time than someone who didn’t follow through on commitments.