Nine Years Ago
nine years ago
DELANEY
“Do you think the library would notice if I stole one of their big whiteboards on wheels?”
“I think you might draw some attention pushing a huge whiteboard out of the library, yeah,” Blake replied calmly as he typed on his laptop.
“Ugh,” I groaned. “This tiny-ass diagram is way too small for me to study off of.” I waved the piece of paper in front of him, which had a drawing of the human body that needed to be correctly labeled for anatomy dissection. “And I just need something more, I don’t know, hands-on or something big to scribble all over, but I can’t focus in a setting where I’m not in control of the environment, and I ? —”
“Hate to break it to you, Lane, but that might be something you need to work on. Pretty sure hospitals are not exactly environments you can control completely, but you’ll still have to bring your A game every day.”
Blake looked up at me from his screen, his expression empathetic despite his words—the ones that had sent a shock wave of reality through me. I breathed in through my nose to temper my reaction as I nodded silently.
“You’re right,” I croaked after a second.
A feeling of defeat coursed through my veins, and I could tell the second that Blake realized.
“But one thing at a time.” He popped out of his seat and grabbed a marker from the table. “If you need a life-sized diagram, I can help you out with that.”
And then Blake did the last thing I expected and whipped off his shirt.
My lips parted, my words stuck in my throat.
Blake London was… I shook my head, refusing to finish that thought.
He was my friend; that was all.
And the only thing I should be thinking about was how he was willing to help me.
By lying on the floor half-naked so I could write all over him.