Chapter 10
Jade
A s Lillian’s breaths lengthened, Jade found herself torn.
She wanted to talk to her, but she was afraid of the icy cold that Lillian was prone to when her feelings became too real.
She didn’t want to just be some lust-driven excitement that lasted while emotions ran high.
She wanted something real. As much as she was enjoying this physical relationship, she knew that it would hurt her more in the end if Lillian couldn’t decide to commit to a real one.
The urge to run almost overwhelmed her. She should leave now, not give Lillian the chance to wake up and decide this was all a mistake again.
Her own eyes were heavy, though, and the bed was warm and comfortable.
She started to shift herself from underneath Lillian’s arm, but Lillian pulled her closer and her chest swelled.
She could enjoy a few more moments before it all came crashing down.
She snuggled closer to Lillian and drifted into a light doze.
A few minutes later, she felt Lillian shift and begin to pull away from her. Her heart sank as she realized that this was probably the end, but she couldn’t take any more of the back and forth. It wasn’t fair to her, and honestly it wasn’t fair to Lillian either.
Jade slipped out from under Lillian’s arm and Lillian sat up looking around.
Jade met her eyes only briefly before Lillian looked away again.
Here it comes, Jade thought to herself before she stood up and started pulling her clothes back on.
Lillian did the same from her bed. Jade tried to meet her eyes, but Lillian avoided it.
The silence was palpable. Jade’s heart began to thunder in her chest.
“What are we doing, Lillian?” Jade finally asked, surprised at how even her voice was.
“I don’t… I don’t know,” Lillian practically whispered as she pulled her dress over her head. Jade’s chest constricted at the non-answer.
“What do you want from this?” Jade asked, finally turning to look at Lillian. Her eyes were watery in the dim light, but Jade couldn’t take it any longer.
“I…” Lillian tried to speak, but nothing came out. Jade waited, trying to let her get her thoughts together, but the silence just stretched on.
“I can’t keep doing this,” Jade finally said and stood up turning toward the door.
Lillian’s brows furrowed, and Jade’s heart fluttered in her chest. A large part of her wanted to just throw herself at Lillian, take whatever she was willing to give, even if it was superficial, but she knew that would never be enough.
She couldn’t be in another relationship where she was the only one who wanted it.
“I don’t understand,” Lillian said, scooting to the edge of the bed and hanging her legs over.
“This hot and cold, this indecisiveness,” Jade pulled in a breath. “Lillian, I like you, I like you a lot, but I need to know if what we have here is real or not.”
“Jade, I don’t know how to answer that right now,” Lillian said. Jade’s heart skipped a beat at Lillian’s use of her given name, but it was not enough.
“I like you, Lillian. I want you. I want to be more than just friends, more than colleagues, and definitely more than stolen moments of lust,” Jade said sitting down on the bed next to Lillian. She touched her cheek and pressed her lips gently to Lillian’s. “Can you tell me that’s what you want?”
“I don’t… I just don’t know,” Lillian said, tears sparkling in the corners of her eyes.
Jade’s heart sank through the floor, those words delivering a crushing blow.
Jade clenched her jaw, choosing her words carefully out of fear that she would say something she regretted.
“Well, when you do know, you know where to find me.” She pressed her lips to Lillian’s again, fighting the urge to beg her, to plead with her to give them a chance.
Instead, Jade stood up and left, closing the door behind her.
She swiped at the tears forming in the corners of her eyes, but she held her head high as she left Lillian’s office.
She would not wait around for Lillian to decide whether or not Jade was worth the time or investment.
She would not sit back and be used for something if it didn’t mean anything more than that.
She wanted something real, and she wanted it with Lillian, but she wouldn’t be struggling to figure it out anymore, trying to guess what Lillian meant with each word, each gesture.
If Lillian wanted to be with her, then Lillian would have to come to her .
It was now in Lillian’s hands, and no matter how hard it was, Jade would have to accept that and give Lillian the space she needed to figure it out.
Even more, she would have to respect whatever decision Lillian made.
She headed down the hallway. She would check in on her patients one more time, but then she was headed home.
She had been at the hospital for almost sixty straight hours now, and she was ready for her own bed.
The thought actually surprised her. Generally, she was almost more comfortable in the hospital, where she could control what was going on and be the first to know what was happening.
Of course, her mattress at home was more comfortable, but she found that she spent more time worrying about what was going on at the hospital when she was home than she did when she was at work.
She glanced out the plate glass window at the end of the hallway, the sky was still dark, but it was calm. The evening was coming on quickly and she was ready for a break.
She checked in with the nurses first, letting them know that she was headed home, and let the other doctors know that she was checking out.
Most of the ones who had worked through the hurricane had already headed home, their shifts taken over by fresh faces.
Then she stopped in each of the patients' rooms.
Her heart leaped when she went into Elizabeth Rourke’s room. The woman was awake and sitting up in the bed, eating soft food. Her eyes were bright and Jade came close to laughing.
“It’s good to see you awake,” Jade said. Her spirits immediately lifted at the sight of her old friend and mentor.
“I heard it was you and Doctor Holder’s sharp eyes and hands I have to thank for that,” the woman said around a mouthful of Jello.
The bandage around her head did nothing to dull the woman’s bright eyes.
She was shorter than Jade and carried a bit of weight around the hips and stomach, but even in the relatively humble setting of the hospital bed, no one would mistake her for anything less than formidable.
Everyone in the hospital knew who Elizabeth Rourke was, if only by name.
Jade could feel the deference that the rest of the staff gave her, even as they passed by the room.
Quick glances and whispers were directed her way as they acknowledged the legend herself.
“Well, Doctor Holder is the one that saved your life,” Jade said with a smile. She tried to keep the pain from her face at the mention of Lillian’s name.
“She wouldn’t have known what to do without you,” Elizabeth chided.
“Intuition,” Jade said with a wave of her hand.
“Intuition my ass; you forget who you’re talking to,” Elizabeth said. Jade smiled, feeling like a chastised child, as she always did around her mentor. “I trained you, Doctor Lin .”
“Whatever you want to call it, Lillian’s hands were what saved your life, knowing the problem is barely half the battle.
You needed a stellar surgeon, and she just happens to be one.
” Jade beamed at the statement, allowing a brief glimpse of emotion to cross her face.
Despite the sting of rejection, Lillian was still the best neurosurgeon Jade had ever met.
“Looks like you think of her as more than just a stellar surgeon ,” Elizabeth raised an eyebrow at Jade.
Jade opened her mouth to argue but thought better of it.
She wasn’t sure if it was nostalgia that loosened her tongue, or just the overwhelming weight of the last few days, but Jade found herself confessing all to her former mentor.
Elizabeth had helped her so much along her career, and she was the reason she was in the position she was in, and they had spent many late nights here in the hospital talking about anything and everything, so it was easy to spill the details, most of them anyway.
“I think you just need to be patient,” Elizabeth said with a lift of her eyebrow. “People like Lillian need time to process big emotions. Remember, I know Lillian well.”
“You sound like you’re talking about a toddler,” Jade teased.
“Don’t think adults are that far different, Jade,” the woman said with a laugh. “Especially when it comes to regulating emotions. Adults are better at logic and reasoning, but we are all relegated to sniveling babies when we can’t identify or put a label on our emotions.”
“I’ve never seen you acting like a sniveling baby,” Jade teased.
“That’s because I do my sniveling with the doors closed, much like Lillian.” Elizabeth lifted an eyebrow and took another bite of her Jello. “The woman has some thick walls, but no amount of battering will bring them down.”
“Either way, I’m not going to try and beg her to like me back,” Jade said. She knew she sounded ridiculous, but just being able to say all of it aloud had helped more than she thought it would.
“And you shouldn’t. You know as well as I do that will only push her away,” Elizabeth said. “She will realize soon enough, mark my words.”
“Thanks for listening,” Jade said, checking her chart once again. Elizabeth knew both Lillian and Jade well, but Jade wasn’t going to put her faith in Lillian coming around eventually. She knew she wouldn’t be able to handle any more rejection. It hurt badly enough as it was.
“Get out of here, Jade,” Elizabeth chastised. “Go home and get some rest, you need it.”
“You’re not the chief anymore, remember?” Jade teased.