Chapter 39 Scare Test
Scare Test
ADRIAN
I’d promised myself I wouldn’t get pulled in. Not today. Not on his second week back at work. Not after nights of sleeping with Eli’s head tucked under my chin like he belonged there—which he did—and watching color return to his face in degrees I’d memorized.
But medicine is medicine, and sometimes it shows up like a mugger in the alley of your good intentions.
The emergency hit at 4:42 p.m. A cardiac case with numbers diving faster than my patience. By protocol, I should’ve stayed. By instinct, I wanted to run.
Eli would be home alone. Watching the clock, no doubt.
I tried to delegate. Tried to peel myself out of the room twice. Both times, the universe said cute and dragged me back.
By the time we stabilized the patient, it was 6:31, and my phone had four missed texts.
You okay?
Just checking.
Please tell me you’re on your way.
Adrian?
My pulse dipped. A guilt bomb exploded in my chest.
I called, but it went straight to voicemail.
Eli must’ve muted his phone and turned it over, screen down—his version of white-flag surrender.
The drive home was a blur of red lights I absolutely obeyed but mentally cursed at. When I opened the door, the air felt… wrong.
Still and quiet and accusingly empty.
Eli stood in the kitchen, back rigid, one hand braced on the counter like it was the only thing keeping him upright. Music played low from the speaker—cheerful, upbeat, defiantly normal. The kind of soundtrack people used to scare away ghosts.
He didn’t turn.
Didn’t greet me.
Didn’t breathe
“Eli,” I said softly.
His shoulders tensed. He set the knife down a little too carefully.
“You’re late.”
Two words. Thin as a thread. Stretched to breaking.
“I know,” I said. “There was an emergency. A real one. I got stuck.”
“You said you wouldn’t stay late.” His voice was calm. Terrifyingly calm. “You promised.”
My stomach twisted. “I know. I tried to leave.”
“Tried.” He let out a brittle laugh. “Right.”
That one punctured me. I stepped closer but stopped when I saw the tension sharpen in his spine.
“Eli, come on,” I murmured. “Talk to me.”
He finally turned his head, eyes bright and too wide.
“I watched the clock tick past the time you were supposed to come through the door,” he said.
“I knew it would happen eventually. I told myself it was fine. I made dinner. I played music. I kept busy. Everything was coping manual perfect.” His breath stuttered.
“But seven came and went, and you weren’t here.
And it all—” He swallowed. “It all felt exactly the same as before.”
My heart cracked at the edges.
“This isn’t before.”
He made a sound, hurt disguised as disbelief. “It felt like it.”
I dragged a hand through my hair, frustration and love tangling in the same fist.
“Eli, I’m trying,” I said, voice rougher than I meant.
“Fuck—I am trying so hard. Between therapy, work, and us, there are only so many hours in a day. Some days, something has to give, and today it was you.” I exhaled sharply, forcing the next words out softer.
“That doesn’t mean I’ll make a habit of it. I just… I need you to trust me.”
The silence wasn’t cold or sharp, just tired. Familiar.
Eli looked at me for a long, excruciating moment, and I held his gaze even though part of me wanted to look away, wanted to hide the desperation in my own.
Then he nodded. One small, slow dip of his chin.
“Okay,” he whispered. “I’m trying, too.”
Relief hit me so hard I had to brace a hand on the counter beside him.
I didn’t touch him. Not until he turned fully toward me, closing the space between us an inch at a time, telegraphing every movement in slow motion.
Then he stepped into my chest and exhaled against my shirt, and I wrapped my arms around him, careful and firm.
“I’m home,” I murmured into his hair.
“You are.” His fingers curled into my back. “That’s what matters.”
I nodded against him. “No, what matters most is that no matter where I am, this, right here,” I squeezed him tighter, “is where I want to be more than anywhere in the world.” I pulled back and tilted his chin up to face me. “With you, my husband, my love.”
And I kept that promise—for three solid weeks. No late nights. No emergencies I didn’t bolt away from the second I could.
He relaxed by degrees, and I learned to live by them. One night of slipping didn’t break us.
It tested the seam. And for the first time in years, the seam held.
We weren’t planning to be out long—just a Saturday drive, coffee in hand, windows cracked, the kind of easy quiet that had started to feel real again. Stable. Like we were practicing being an actual couple instead of people trying to glue a broken thing back together.
Then the street sign appeared.
Decatur.
I felt him notice before I slowed—just a subtle shift in his breathing, a glance toward me, checking an old scar for tenderness.
Eli turned anyway. His throat bobbed. My stomach dipped.
We rolled down the quiet block past the house we started out in, the house we built dreams in.
The house he’d idealized as a postcard for our future stood at the corner, sporting fresh paint, a new porch swing, and a flowerbed that hadn’t existed the last time we drove by.
I slowed without being asked. Maybe because I knew he needed a second.
Maybe because I did. At first, I didn’t say anything, just let the hush settle, let Eli look.
The cheerful blue door. The fresh hydrangeas.
The new owner’s touch that made the whole place look…
well, better than when we’d resided there.
Finally, he reached across the console, threading his fingers through mine.
“It looks good,” he murmured, staring through the passenger window.
“It does,” I agreed. “Is this still a dream you want?” I asked, thumb brushing his knuckles. “Because we can put our place up for sale tomorrow. Start shopping for a charming little dump like this one.”
Eli snorted, startled into a laugh. “That ‘charming little dump’ looks like it has a gardener and a mortgage I’m not emotionally prepared for.”
“Semantics,” I said, tightening my grip on his hand. “I’m serious. If you want it… if you still want that version of life—porch swing, peeling paint, creaky floors—I’ll find it. We’ll build it.”
He turned to me fully, eyes soft in a way that never failed to wreck me.
“No,” he said quietly.
I blinked. “No?”
“Adrian,” he said, squeezing my fingers, “it was never really about the house.”
I eased the car to the curb because whatever he was about to say deserved more than my divided attention.
He shifted closer, free hand sliding up the back of my neck. His voice was soft. “It was us,” he said. “We had cracks in our foundation. Our paint was peeling, and we needed a new roof to shelter us from storms.”
My heart squeezed.
“But…” He leaned in, dropping teasing little kisses along my mouth—one word, one kiss, one breath at a time. “We,” kiss, “fixed,” kiss, “us.”
I tasted his smile against my lips.
“We repaired our home. And now?” Another quick kiss. “It’s not so bad. Even if the kitchen is a bit too modern for my taste.”
A laugh burst out of me—a helpless, stupidly happy laugh.
“You hate our kitchen?” I asked, feigning shock.
He kissed me once more, slow and lingering. “I love our home. I love us.”
And somehow, right then, parked on Decatur Street in front of someone else’s dream, I finally believed him.