Chapter 49
MITCHELL
“Alright, dish,” Amy said, cornering me at the elevator the next morning.
“I’ll tell you at lunch,” I promised her. “I want to tell it only once, so Darla is joining us. We’re going to Rosa’s and yes, we have permission to take a two hour lunch today. Doc said he figured he wouldn’t get much work out of either of us until I’d gotten to share what happened.”
“At least let me see your ring!” she demanded, grabbing my hand.
“Oh my gosh, it’s to die for! Far too wide for my fingers but that width looks good on yours.”
“Yes, thank you, I have man sized hands,” I replied drily.
She giggled. “Does Jolar have one like it?”
“Yes, and I’ll share the story of how we got them during lunch.”
She pouted, looking so much like Neal in that moment I couldn’t help but laugh.
“Look at you! What are you, five?”
She stuck her tongue out. “I’m six if you must know.”
The door slid open and we hurried across the corridor.
“Okay, being serious now,” she said. “Big news, but they’ve expanded the nursing program and they’re going to accept applications from experienced nurses who wish to train in the Mylos medical field.”
“Really?” That was big news. “Is it because not a lot of students are applying?”
She nodded. “There’s a shortage of nurses everywhere so I think it’s a case of not enough to go around plus a lot of major teaching hospitals are offering heavily discounted tuition if you agree to work for them for five years afterwards.”
“Huh. That does sound like a pretty good deal.”
“Mmhmm.”
“Hello you two,” Doc greeted us. “”Mitchell, you look positively radiant.”
I blushed. “It was a great trip, sir.”
He smiled knowingly. “I’m sure it was. Now, let’s take a look at today’s patient charts.”
The morning sped by, doing much of the same as I had before I’d left. Though I did get to learn how to use a hypo spray and how to program nanites using Xero. Lunch came far sooner than I expected, though my stomach wanted me to know it had indeed been nearly five and half hours since I’d eaten.
“Off you go,” Doc said, shooing us away.
“Aren’t you going to lunch?” Amy asked him.
“I’m having something in my office today while going over the parameters for the additional nursing recruitment with Xeranos.”
We said our goodbyes and headed out the door to the elevator.
“I honestly don’t know how Xero keeps track of so many things at once,” I said to Amy as we got in.
“I know, right? He has a lot of helper programs that are also sentient but more limited in scope. They report to him and handle certain functions like air and water, I heard.”
“Okay, that makes a lot more sense. I was worried he was practically god-like or something.”
“”Or something,” Xero piped up, making me jump.
“You startled me, Xero!” I scolded.
“Sorry, Mitchell. “I have a message for you. Jolar wished me to tell you that you are both having dinner at Taco Taco tonight and that he will meet you there at six. Also, that he arranged for Neal to go home with Larry, and he will be spending the night.”
“But it’s a school night!”
He said if you mentioned that to tell you that he has something important he wanted to talk to you about and that it is nothing bad.”
“Oh, okay.”
“That sounds intriguing,” Amy said slowly.
“Don’t I know it. I wonder what it is. Whatever it’s about, if he says it’s nothing bad, I trust that it isn’t. So, I have nothing to worry about. I just hope he isn’t wanting to plan three more weddings for our first anniversary or something silly like that.”
The elevator came to a stop and I got off. Turning around when I realized Amy wasn’t following me. She was standing there, staring wide eyed. “Did you say three weddings?”
“Hey, guys!” Darla called, hurrying over. “Come on, the shuttle’s about to leave.”
“Once we are onboard, you are definitely explaining what you meant by planning three more weddings.”
Darla’s head whipped around as we joined the line of people getting on the shuttle to go to the leisure ship. “What what, now?”
I groaned. “I’ll tell you once we’re there and order food. This story requires a lot of carbs.”
“Sounds juicy,” Darla said, eyes dancing.
“Mmhmm. Did you see this absolutely gorgeous ring?”
Darla’s eyes darted down.
“The line’s moving, come on.”
When I didn’t have any friends, I used to wish I did. Now that I had them, I found they could be a big pain in the butt. Though it was much more worthwhile having the aggravation they could bring compared to not having friends.
Once we sat down, Darla reached for my hand. “Oh! It’s gorgeous.”
“After we order our food,” I replied sternly.
“This sounds like a story that’s going to be so epic, we will need cannelloni,” Darla decided.
“I love cannelloni, but I need to be able to walk so I can do rounds.”
“We can order smaller plates so we aren’t too stuffed.”
I scoffed. As if that would happen. I, for one, was going to eat a regular sized portion of lasagne and garlic bread.”
“Come on, not even a clue?”
I pursed my lips. “You will see I am actually wearing three pieces of jewelry and that’s all I am going to say for now.”
The two women zeroed in on my bracelet and necklace.
“Three pieces of jewelry, all different,” Darla mused.
“Three weddings…oh my God, did you guys have three weddings?”
I simply cocked my eyebrow at the pair of them, set my lips in a firm line, and refused to say anything else until we were sitting at Mama Rosa’s and we’d given our food order.
“Now?” Amy prodded.
I gave them an evil grin and then started from the beginning, watching them melt into puddles of romance infused goo as my tale unfolded.