Jax shook his head ruefully. “It’s starting to, but I think I’m still about twenty hours of sleep under par. Hard to say.”
“I understand.” Ari often felt that way at the tail end of writing an album.
Naomi and Calvin found them then, with an extra glass of champagne each. Calvin handed his to Jax, while Naomi gave hers to Ari.
“Everybody got a glass?” Calvin shouted.
It seemed that everyone did.
“All right, then.” He was beaming as he raised his glass. “To Jax!”
HALFWAY THROUGHthe party, it finally started to feel real. Jax was done.
It felt great.
“So, not to spoil the party,” Hobbes said, promptly spoiling the party as he sidled up to Jax in a rare moment without Ari, who had volunteered to play the piano, “but there’s something we should talk about.”
Jax stared at him. “Oh my God, Naomi’s pregnant?”
“What? No. Did you see the way she’s putting away the champagne?” Hobbes huffed, his cheeks red. “Way to take the wind out of my sails.”
Jax gave him a flat look. “I haven’t slept properly in, like, three months. I couldn’t pass a blood test right now. Just spit it out.”
“I’m selling the house.”
No wonder he was worried Jax might panic. Fortunately it wasn’t as though Jax had long-term plans for living there anyway. “Yeah?” He glanced at Naomi, who was at the bar doing shots with Theo—that was going to end badly. “Shacking up?”
“Yeah.” He was still blushing, but now he had a helpless smile too. Aww. Adorable. “Naomi doesn’t want to sell a house that’s been in her family for three generations, so….”
“Good. Maybe she can get you to stop working so much.”
Hobbes furrowed his brow. “Did I forget to tell you, or did I tell you and you forgot?”
Oh great—now what? “Forget what?” Jax asked, alarmed. Hobbes hadn’t proposed and decided to ask Jax to be his best man or something, had he?
“I left the hospital in January. I’m doing family practice at a clinic on Wonderland Road.”
Well, shit. “No wonder you look so well-rested,” Jax quipped, then easily dodged Hobbes’s halfhearted swipe. “Come to think of it, no wonder Naomi’s looking so smug—”
“Jax—”
He grinned. “Congratulations, though, really. Let me know when I need to move my stuff.”
They talked a little about the details—Hobbes wasn’t in a hurry to get the house on the market, so there was no rush for Jax to make a decision before the tour started up in April—and then Afra came over with a couple plates of cake, and Hobbes retreated to the bar to get fresh with Naomi.
“So,” Afra said, handing him a plate, “I talked to Ari.”
And there it was: the first piece of the new chapter of Jax’s life falling into place. Or maybe not.
Jax cleared his throat, trying not to let on how fast his heart was beating. He forked off a big chunk of vanilla cake with chocolate buttercream. “And?”
“And I told him Ben and I have a foster placement coming up and I’m officially retiring from going on tour.”
Jax nodded and licked frosting from the corner of his mouth. He and Afra had been over this by email. “And you really think it’s a good idea for me to take over?”
“Well, you won’t really be taking over,” she pointed out. “Most of the organizing is still going to happen on my end. You’d be more of a deputy. But as for whether it’s a good idea… you’d have to ask Ari.”
“Ask me what?”
