Chapter 13 #2
For a second, I laugh. It hurts, and yet I do it anyway.
He gives me a look before setting the heating pad on the table where I was sitting. “Can I plug it in?”
I blink at him. “What?”
“The heating pad.”
“Yes, Warren. You can plug in the heating pad.”
He plugs it into the outlet near the shelf, and then glances around the kitchen. His gaze briefly sweeps over the front of the bakery, the case lights, and everything else.
“You need somewhere you can spread out.”
“I need to work.”
“You can do both.”
He walks over to the door and throws it open. “Oliver!” he calls.
Oliver yells, “No!” from the bar, but he appears anyway.
“You don’t know the question,” Warren says.
“I know the person asking.”
“Is your office open?”
He pauses and looks around the doorframe at me, suspicion on his face. “Why?”
“I want Halston to go somewhere to spread out for a bit.”
Oliver’s expression changes immediately. “How bad?”
“I’m standing right here,” I mutter.
He looks at me. “The office is open. The couch is awful, but it’s better than the floor or sitting here on the table with zero back support.”
“I don’t need a couch.”
Both men look at me.
“Can I move the heating pad to his office?” Warren asks.
His politeness is going to ruin me. “Okay.”
“Do you want to walk on your own?”
I frown. “Yes.”
“Do you want anyone with you?”
I shake my head.
There’s no argument or hovering.
I walk myself to Oliver’s office. It’s exactly what you would expect.
Small and dim, smelling faintly of paper, whiskey, and existential dread.
There’s a desk and a stack of paperwork, a battered leather couch, a lamp with a crooked shade, and three framed photos lying face down because Oliver claims sentimentality weakens everything.
Warren plugs the heating pad in and sets it on the couch. He leaves the room and returns moments later with a glass of water and my bag of emergency gummy worms. Then he goes back for the latte he made me.
I sit before I fall. The heating pad is warm already, and I press it low against my abdomen and try not to make the small, pathetic sounds that I want to make.
Warren reaches for the lamp. “Light off?”
“Dim.”
He adjusts the lamp so the light is dimmer and steps back. “I’m going to handle everything else. Lisa and Dev can manage other duties. They’re coming in early.”
I stare at him. “You texted them?”
“I asked Oliver to.”
I bite my lip. “Can you do me a favor?”
He eyes me. “Maybe.”
“Can you make sure you’re not talking to them like a robot? They’re not used to it.”
His cheeks pinken, and he nods.
I lean back against the couch, heating pad pressed to me, my eyes heavy. Warren remains standing near the desk, broad and steady.
“You can go,” I say.
“I can.”
I look at him. “What?”
“Pain-safe food?”
The question catches me off guard. “What?”
“What can you eat during a flare?”
I blink.
No one asks it like that. People ask if I need anything. People tell me to eat. People offer random things that sound soothing and make me want to die.
Warren asks like he wants to follow orders correctly.
“Toast,” I say after a second. “A banana. Sometimes rice. Eggs if they’re plain. Nothing too greasy. Nothing too sweet when it’s this bad.”
He nods once. “And pain meds?”
I reach for the bottle he set down on the table, and he unscrews the cap on my water bottle. I throw two pills back as he takes out his phone.
“What are you doing?”
Setting a timer to go off in four hours so we make sure you take more.
I close my eyes. “I hate this.”
“I know.”
“I really hate needing help.”
“I’m aware.”
“I hate that everyone is going to think I’m scared of Barrett.”
Warren is silent for a second. Then, he says, “Barrett Whitaker doesn’t get an opinion on your pain.”
My eyes jump up to his. They’re steely.
“No customer gets one either,” he says. “No vendor. No man who benefited from your work. No one.”
My throat closes. “Warren.”
“You’re in pain. We adjust the schedule. That’s all.”
That’s all.
It’s not a tragedy or a spectacle or proof that I’m not worthy.
It’s simply a schedule adjustment.
My vision blurs. “You make it sound so simple.”
“It’s not.”
“No?”
“No. It’s just not shameful.”
I press my lips together, but the first tear falls anyway. And then another. I look down quickly, struggling to hide the tears.
He doesn’t panic. He doesn’t even come closer.
“I don’t want to be smaller,” I whisper.
His voice is low. “You’re not.”
“I feel like it.”
“That’s okay.”
“I hate it.”
“I know.”
I laugh. “You’re really bad at normal comforting.”
He shrugs.
“But you’re—” I wipe under my eyes with the heel of my hand and look around the office at the water, heating pad, gummy worms, and medicine. He adjusted my schedule. And I’m here, not suffering in Bitter Bloom. “You’re good at making room.”
His jaw shifts.
“Good,” he says simply.
For a second, neither of us speaks. The office hums softly with the old building. Through the wall and across the alley, I can hear muffled movement from the bakery.
The world is still moving.
Warren steps toward the door. “I’ll go check on things.”
“Warren.”
He stops, but I don’t know what I mean to say until he looks at me.
“Thank you.”
He nods once. “You’re welcome.”
“And…”
His gaze holds mine.
My fingers tighten around the heating pad. “If I ask you to stay for a minute later, after you deal with the dough, will you?”
His expression softens, and his shoulders loosen. “Of course.”
There’s no hesitation.
“Okay,” I whisper.
“I’ll be back.”
“I know.”
Warren leaves the door cracked just enough for air and sound, but not enough for anyone to see in. Not that there’s anyone here.
I sit in the dim room with my heating pad pressed to my body. I’m still in pain, but for the first time in what feels like years, I’m taking up space without forcing myself to apologize.
Warren doesn’t make me smaller or force me to do anything I don’t want to do. I’m not upstairs, where I can’t hear what’s going on. I’m here, just feet from my bakery, and in control.
I’m never smaller with him because he makes the room bigger.