Chapter 11 #3
The waiting room was small, almost like it had at one time been an office but it had since been converted into this surgical waiting area. I’d packed my books and cue cards into my bag. I’d studied enough. An extra few minutes running my cards wouldn’t change anything.
I plopped down in one of the six chairs facing a small table. There were three tidy piles of reading material on it. One of magazines, another with ratty paperbacks and the final one, children’s picture books. But I wouldn’t be needing any of them.
Professor Stahlbaum would be calling me in ten minutes. I popped my earbuds in, leaned back and listened to my favorite painting music, letting it take me away so I would be relaxed when I got the call.
A nurse popped in and gave me a thumbs up just as my phone started buzzing.
“Exam time?” she asked.
I nodded, my stomach flipping.
“Good luck, honey.”
I smiled. They were all so nice here, taking an interest in mine and my mother’s lives, not just my mother’s medical care.
“Hello?”
“Hello, Mira. Are you ready? We’ve got an hour, but I don’t think you’ll need it.”
“Yes, I’m ready.”
“Professor Holland is calling you in a few hours with his exam, right?”
“Yes. Mom will be in recovery still as they wait for her to come fully out of sedation.”
“Good luck with his exam, but I know you don’t need it with mine.”
By the time both exams were done, I felt like a balloon. I could’ve floated away with how light I felt. No matter if I did well or not, it was out of my control and didn’t that just compare to BDSM.
That thought reminded me of the upcoming session Professor Stahlbaum had set up with me once my exams were done. In a week’s time, all of them would be done, and I would scene with Mistress Maureen, and hopefully sleep for a month afterwards.
“Hey, Mira,” a nurse said popping her head around the corner. “How’d the exams go?”
“Good. I mean they didn’t tell me how I did.
They both said I had to wait like everyone else, but I feel good about them.
” I pointed at the pile of binders and textbooks around me.
“I went through my books and notes to double check what I wasn’t sure about too…
” I felt my face flushing pink even though I’m sure it wasn’t all that weird to go through your notes after an exam. “I’m confident.”
“Fantastic!” She walked in giving me a high five and I laughed.
“Thanks.”
“Anyway, the other reason I popped over here is to tell you, we just moved your mom from recovery to Room 512. You can head on up whenever you’re ready.”
“Oh perfect!” I gathered my stuff, putting it all in my book bag with a big smile on my face. But when I stood and started for the door, the smile slid off my face in an instant.
“Mira.”
“Hi.” My heart pounded and my head felt light. Was it possible he’d grown more handsome in just a few weeks?
He looked over his shoulder at the hallway. “I was just walking by and heard your name.”
“Oh.”
“You good? Your mom?”
I hugged my bag to my chest, my gut churning. “Yeah, we’re good.” Guilt flooded me. “Well, no, Mom’s not great but they just put a stent in, so she’ll hopefully be able to eat.”
His eyes, so filled with concern, held mine as I rambled on.
“She’s in hospice now,” I said, hating myself because I couldn’t stop talking. And worse, longing for one of his hugs.
Stop this, I growled inaudibly and straightened.
“Well anyway, she’s out of recovery now, so I gotta go.
” I moved toward the door, even though every step that brought me closer also made my heart pound harder.
And when I passed him, and his scent hit, I had to grit my teeth and force myself to keep moving.
“Have a good day,” I said, sounding cheerful even though I was suffocating being near him and not touching him.
“Hm. Yeah, you too.”
I had a running mantra of “don’t look back” going the whole time I walked away, at least until I turned the corner and saw him in my peripheral, still there, still watching me.
I thought I’d made it. I thought I was in the clear, but then I heard him call my name, and his rushed footfalls as he tried to catch up to me.
I stopped, not because I wanted to, but because with his much longer legs it was inevitable. Okay, maybe because I wanted to breathe in his scent again, just one more time so I could commit it to memory.
“Mira, please stop shutting me out. Stop avoiding me.”
I swallowed hard, looking down at his red chuck T’s and pressing the smile from my mouth at them.
“This is my fault. I know. I asked for that night, not the other way around. And I’m awful for changing my mind.
I know you thought it went well, but the truth is, it was fun, yeah, but do I need it?
No, not at all. I guess I just needed to prove that to myself.
BDSM is rooted deeply in some people, but I guess it was just a phase for me.
” My eyes slid up until they landed on his.
I was a damn liar. The biggest liar on the planet.
“Bullshit, Mira. You needed it that night. You needed to let me take over, make the decisions for a while. You needed it like you need oxygen. And you still need it.”
Anger grew in me, not because he doubted my words but because he was right and we both knew it. And because the next words out of my mouth would be a mind fuck for him. One he didn’t deserve.
“Ever think this isn’t about me, Wes? And maybe, just maybe, this is about you?
You needing to be needed. When your brother died and no longer needed you, you started looking after Jesse, and then Beth and Marni.
And when Beth died, you inserted yourself into Marni and Jesse’s lives.
How are they getting along by the way? Maybe they’re actually doing better than you let on, and that’s why you sought me out?
” I spun on my heel and walked away, my heart in my gut and self-hatred beating in its place.
“Maybe you need to stop figuring out other people’s shit and fix your own, Wes,” I spat over my shoulder. And then shame filled me as the brutality of my words sunk in. Maybe I was cruel for being so blunt to the man who’d done so much for me, but I also knew he needed to hear it.