Chapter 20

I went into the kitchen and looked at the message board next to the wall phone. There was a message that Jill called with a phone number from our area code that I wasn't familiar with.

I dialed the number and a man answered, "Talk to me."

"Uh, I'm trying to reach Jill O'Hara. This is the number I have for her."

"This is Dr. O'Hara, her father. Who is this?"

"Oh, hi John. It's Jack Hill."

"Oh, Jack. Hang on a minute... Jillian, there's an obscene phone call for you." This last part was shouted, the phone held away from his mouth.

About 20 seconds later Jill came on the phone.

"Hello?"

"Jill?"

"Jack?"

"Yeah."

"Why did you call me?"

"I wanted to come over and see you. There's something I want to talk to you about."

"I'm afraid you can't come over, Jack."

My worst fears were coming true. I steeled myself.

"Why?"

"We're in Santa Barbara. My aunt died yesterday."

"Oh, Jill, I'm sorry."

"We were kind of expecting it. She was 92 years old and has been in a nursing home for the last seven years. She hasn't been herself since she fell and broke her hip last spring."

"So, how long are you going to be in Santa Barbara?"

"We're driving back tomorrow. The funeral was today. She had everything arranged and we were the only family so we pushed everything through. If you don't mind going to a Highpoint game, we can talk tomorrow night."

"I don't mind at all. I sort of promised Mary I'd ask if it was OK for her to go with us. I totally understand if you don't want her."

"Hold on a sec... Daddy? Can Jack and his sister come with us to the game tomorrow?"

I heard something in the background.

"He says it's OK. Why don't we pick you up around 6:15?"

"That will be great. And I'm sorry about your aunt. Give your father my condolences."

"That's sweet. I'll tell him. See you tomorrow night."

That was that. No "I don't ever want to see you again," no "I don't want to talk to you, you loser," just "we can talk tomorrow night." She didn't even ask what I wanted to talk about.

It was beginning to look like I nearly drove myself crazy and lost my first ever swim events over nothing. Was Mary trying to drive some kind of wedge between the two of us?

No, she just said that Jill had her claws out, she was checking out Sara and making sure Sara knew I was taken. Evidently Sara had gotten that message and then some. The poor girl was afraid to talk to me or walk to school or from class to class with me. In case Jill found out. And Mary had said Jill wouldn't go to all that trouble if she was going to split.

That was something I wanted to straighten out. Hopefully I could talk to Jill about another girl without her getting bent out of shape again.

The bottom line was if I hadn't spent ten minutes telling Jill what a wonderful girl Sara was and how I enjoyed talking to her, I would have saved myself a lot of grief. I guess there's a fine line between hiding things from a girlfriend and shielding her from things that could be uncomfortable.

No, I shouldn't have to "shield" her from anything. That's just another word for hiding. Or lying. I needed to get Jill to the point where she was secure enough in our relationship that I didn't have to avoid half the population of the planet just to keep her from being jealous. I realized it was going to be very tricky.

Mary came into the kitchen.

"Hey, I finally talked to Jill. She had to go up to Santa Barbara because her aunt died."

"Oh, that's too bad."

"Yeah. I guess they were kind of expecting it. She was in her 90s and she broke her hip a while ago. She's been in a nursing home for the last seven years."