Chapter 19 Andy
Chapter 19
Andy
The first time Chi and I sleep in a bed together isn’t exactly the way I’d expect to sleep in a bed with someone else. Not that I would know. I’ve never actually shared a bed with anyone before.
I always expected to hate this. I figured we’d be hitting each other with elbows, knees, and feet, accidentally smacking each other and shit. Chi is a lot stronger than she looks too, so an elbow to the face could really fucking hurt. But none of this happens. It’s like those stupid fucking songs that talk about how perfectly you fit together.
I can’t turn on my side because of the surgery done on my abdomen a couple of days ago, but even with all the wires sticking out of me, her chin finds a place right between the crook of my neck and my shoulder. Her body connects with my side so perfectly and softly, and she somehow falls asleep before I do. Her breath on my neck gets me hard, even despite the pain and the drugs, and I’m irrationally proud of myself for that.
I fall asleep a few minutes after she does, but we are unceremoniously awakened from our nap by Miller’s stupid voice not long after.
“You gotta be fucking kidding me.”
Chi startles awake, and even just that small movement against my side makes my breath catch as she pulls my bandage. Maybe letting her lie next to me wasn’t the brightest idea, but I’d do it again anyway.
When she sees that our intruder is a doctor, she seems to write him off as no threat because she looks at me without a second glance at him. “Oh my gosh, I’m sorry, Andy. Are you okay? I told you this was a bad idea—”
“Oh, so it was your idea to have someone lie on top of you in a hospital bed after multiple surgeries, huh?” Miller is annoyed, I can tell, even through that stone mask of indifference he wears all the time. “Really not the brightest fucking idea you’ve ever had. One wrong move and those stitches holding your insides together could rip open.”
“That’s gross.” Chi looks faintly disgusted but directs it toward me instead of the doctor. “Andy, why would you let me lie here with you?”
I roll my eyes and level them at Miller. “We’re going to need something more comfortable than a rickety old metal chair in here, then. Another cot or something. She’s not leaving, and I’m not allowing you fuckers to put your hands on her again. She’ll leave with me when I’m ready. I’m the only one taking her out of here.”
Miller laughs. “You can’t lift anything over ten pounds for four to eight weeks. But what do I know? I’m just a fucking doctor.”
“Barely,” I say with a laugh that turns into a grunt when I feel pinching in my stomach.
“No one is lifting me. You’re not drugging me again. That made me feel really gross, and it’s just… fucking rude.”
I can’t stop chuckling at Chi’s offended tone, and I get another side full of pain as I do. “We can put the blindfold and noise-canceling headphones on her.”
“Didn’t work for the last guy. They counted their footsteps, and we had to wipe out an entire platoon of Russian soldiers.”
“Oh, well Andy just killed a bunch of Russian soldiers the other day!” Chi says, looking between us as if she’s part of some inside joke. Even her misunderstanding of the situation is funny and cute.
“He’s talking about Russians working for the Russian government. Not the mob.”
She looks around in confusion. “So… what is this, some kind of military hospital?”
Miller looks at me sternly, and I look at Chi in turn. “Chi, stop asking questions. Especially if you want to walk out of here instead of being carted out in a fucking wheelbarrow.”
She looks slightly affronted, then dejected, but she stops talking.
“You assholes owe me. She’s with me, Miller. You can trust her.”
“It’s not her I’m worried about,” he says, taking her arm. She goes to protest, but after he flashes the blood pressure cuff at her, she relaxes. I guess even here on a top-secret military base, he still has someone to answer to and has to make sure she’s okay, being Chichi Yan and all. It makes me feel a little better. “I’m worried about anyone she might offend after she steps into the role of all-powerful Yakuza queen.”
Her eyes narrow. “Did those guys tell you that? I probably shouldn’t have even said anything.”
“Chi, it’s best to assume they know everything about you already,” I say as softly as I can. She’s the one who came here, against what I’m sure was good advice not to, but I know she’s freaked out.
The fact that she’ll be the Yakuza queen soon isn’t exactly confidential knowledge. I’d bet half the American government, and even more of the Japanese government, know it’s going to happen. At this point, many of the crime organizations in the world simply run parallel to the governments, intersecting occasionally, but trying not to step on each other’s toes.
Miller finishes taking her blood pressure, and she lies back on the bed. “We’re gonna need a cot in here,” he yells out through the open door. “It’s not going to be nice, by any means, but it’s something to lie down on that won’t possibly kill your boyfriend,” he says to Chi.
The most beautiful redness I’ve ever seen suddenly blooms across her face as she scoffs. “We’re not—I mean—”
“She’s in denial,” I say to Miller as he walks over to check my IV.
“I really don’t give a shit, guys. It was just a turn of speech,” he says, writing a few notes on his clipboard. “You need more painkillers, Scutari, or are you good for a while?”
“Fuck painkillers. But probably in an hour or so,” I say, testing my range of movement and finding quickly that it’s far more uncomfortable than it was when I fell asleep.
Chi leans into me and puts a hand to my ear, whispering one word, “Food?”
I smile, knowing that Chi is going to complain about anything they bring us but excited to see her reaction to it anyway. “Can we get some dinner in here?”
“Yes, your majesties, of course.” Miller rolls his eyes and walks away without another word.
“He likes you,” Chi says with a smile. “He’s a total asshole, but he has a soft spot for you.”
“Well, I would hope so. I saved his ass on numerous occasions. Every time we see each other, he tells me he owes me. But I think after this favor, especially after you coming here, we might actually be even.”
*****
Chi calls her father before dinner comes. I’m amazed by how matter-of-fact she can be with such an important man, making it sound like she simply lost her security detail, but it’s fine because she’s with me, Cas, and Mara. And technically, she’s really not lying. Her father would like to know where the fuck we are, of course, but Cas and I are his heads of security, and he knows Mara is her best friend. Chi tells me he’s just made bail and was able to pay it immediately, but none of the charges are going to stick anyway, and he is considering legal action against the city of Boston.
At the moment, the city is not having an easy time of things. The dirty politicians who chose the wrong side in the war are scrambling, trying to figure out how they can turn things around for themselves. The heads of the families who were against us are playing bitch to their county prison’s top dog.
For now, with everything so upended, Chi and I are free to hang out here for the few days it takes me to heal enough to be discharged. To my surprise, Chi eats the food she’s given with little to no comment. She sleeps on the tiny army cot they bring in with only weak complaints in the morning when I ask her how she slept, always followed up by, “But it’s fine!” She came without any extra clothes, but she even tries to make the best of the standard issued hospital scrubs and undergarments by saying, “The undies are so soft and, uh… stretchy.”
I can tell she’s trying so hard to act like she can handle the terrible food, the stiff sheets, and the hard, lumpy bedroll; but I know there’s just about no time during the day that she feels comfortable here. It occurs to me that she’s doing this all for my benefit. She’s doing this all to help me, and I know that’s not normal for some girl you’re simply having great sex with. There is so much more behind this gesture than I think either of us want to admit.
There’s the gesture, but there’s also the long stretches of time together, too. Chi works her charm on one of the staff and they find her an old chess set for us to play. Each night, when we’re lying in the dark talking, she seems possibly happier than I’ve ever seen her.
“Andy,” she whispers, and I already know by now what she’s going to ask. “Tell me a story?”
I tell her stories from the army, how I got to know Miller from an ambush of our base in Iraq, and how he came to feel indebted to me through multiple near-death experiences in which I saved his life. He was the one I saved when we were both 19-years-old in that Humvee that got hit by a grenade. We were the two that survived, and he was so injured that I had to carry him to safety.
Once I joined Special Ops, and he came to work in this underground shithole, I got beat up pretty bad a few times and had to come see him. Once he even had to shock my heart back to life, after some rich Chinese officials poisoned me for trying to steal some of their government’s secret computer codes. Unfortunately, they won that round.
I tell Chi all about it, night after night. During the day, she really stays true to her word to take care of me: walking with me around the hospital, grabbing me things so I don’t have to wait for a nurse to come get them for me, and basically being really fucking helpful all the time. She seems so happy simply being here with me. I can’t believe that a woman like her can act like this. I can’t believe she’s hanging out with me in this dingy, beaten down hole in the ground masquerading as a hospital. Instead of the clubs, fame, and attention, she’s opting to play fucking Scrabble or chess and cater to the needs of a boring, wounded man with a fresh scar down his face.
After only three days, I’ve had quite enough of it, and I’m starting to walk okay on my own. I’m taking less and less pain meds also, on top of everything else. I’m ready to get the fuck out of here and go home.
“If you leave, you know what to do, but I doubt you’re going to do it. That’s the problem. You need to keep resting. Tell Chi to wear a maid outfit and cater to your every whim. Aside from sex. No sex for two weeks,” Miller says.
Chi’s face goes red as a tomato, but I scoff. There’s no way I’ll be taking that advice.
“Chi? Don’t have sex with him. Use the safe word if you have to.” I shake my head and smile. He knows me too fucking well.
Chi’s eyes go wide, and her face is brighter than the fucking chili pepper on those underwear she wore for me weeks ago. She looks at me and gulps.
“I would never fuck a girl who used the safe word.” I look back at her and cock an eyebrow. “Never. Ever. Again.”
“You’re still as fucked up as you were when I met you, sir,” Miller says with a little salute.
“You’re way worse than when I met you,” I retort with a lopsided grin.
He looks at me with a hint of fondness that no one else would ever see in his gaze besides me. “I know.”
*****
Chi and I sit together the day before I’m scheduled to leave, although I’m worried that if Miller isn’t happy with my progress by tomorrow morning, he’ll chain me to the bed so that I can’t force my way out the doors. He probably wouldn’t even have to chain me to the bed if he wanted me to stay, though. There’s a slight chance I’d be able to get out of here without being high on drugs and having my insides sewn up with stitches, but as it is right now, there’s no way.
Chi laughs as I plead my case to Miller, but as we sit together after I’ve succeeded, she stares serenely out the tiny window near the ceiling of the room, seeming deep in thought.
“What’s up, Chee-chee?”
She looks over at me quickly, her brows rising. “Hm?”
“What are you thinking about in that gorgeous head of yours?”
She gives me a melancholy half-smile. “You really want to know?” She looks down at her clasped hands in her lap. “I’m thinking about the real world. Going back into it.”
I chuckle. “I think you’re the only person who’s ever spoken about leaving this place in such a wistful tone.”
She gives another half-smile, but doesn’t laugh. “I know it’s not exactly the most beautiful place. But it’s… our place to me now. I can… act in a way here that I can’t… out there.”
This admission falls over the room like a heavy blanket, coating everything that might come next with a meaning I’m not sure I even fully grasp. This seems like a pivotal moment for us, and I find that instead of backing away or making a joke, I want to lean into it and dig deep to see what I’ll find.
I shuffle over to where Chi sits and take the chair across from her, making the decision to grasp her hand in mine. I don’t say anything, because I can simply sense that she wants to say more, and I don’t want to ruin it. So I let it come.
“Andy, I… really care about you. If we were different… if we lived a different life, I think this would have a shot. I know you realize that, too. This thing we have… it could really be something.”
Everything in me wants to agree, but I'm wary. Can I be certain she’s going where I think she is with this? “Sure. Maybe. What’s the point of wondering about it, though?”
I can tell now that she’s starting to get emotional by the small downturn of her lips right in the corners. She looks down again at our entwined hands, as if ashamed by her lack of control. “Maybe there isn’t one. But maybe there is. Maybe it would be even better if we acknowledged it. If we acknowledged how good we could be together. No holds barred.”
I think it over for a minute, turning it over in my mind, before looking back at her. “Do you really want to do that? I’m not sure it would be a great idea for either of us, but especially you. I know you’ve begun your Omiai, Chi. I’m not stupid.”
The mention of the archaic arranged marriage process she must take part in seems to break the thin control she has over holding back her tears. A fat droplet falls onto our tanged flingers and she lets out a small sob. “I had a feeling you knew,” she whispers, clenching my hand to hers. “I’ll be fine. I think it would be worse for me if we didn’t try this, honestly. I’d always be wondering.”
Keeping her one hand clasped in mine, I reach up with my other to cup her cheek. She leans over to meet it, giving in for once, despite the painful vulnerability this shows. She’s allowing me to peel away this barrier she’s always had up, if only just a little. I want to let go of my own reservations, too.
“So… you want to be… together. Like more than casual friends who have sex?” I caress her cheek and she leans further into it.
“Yeah, I guess,” she says, with a slight hiccup. “I want more. If only for a short amount of time.”
I sigh as I wipe her tears away before grazing her jawbone with my knuckles. She’s a purring kitten in my hands.
“You’re lucky you’re cute, Chee-chee. You’ve got a deal.”