Chapter 19
Nineteen
Tabitha
The storm eats at the edges of the cabin. Wind rattles the eaves, and rain pelts the glass like it has a grudge. The power stays dead.
I find a few candles in the nightstand drawer, but no matches or lighter.
I sigh.
I guess I’ll have to ask Henry.
I pad out of the master bedroom to find him still in the living room, lying on the couch with Zach on the floor beside him.
He looks peaceful. Sort of. But more than that he looks beautiful. His hair tousled, his eyes staring at the ceiling, the corded muscles of his arms, the tendon in his neck.
“Henry?”
He sits up on the couch. “Storm’s sitting right on top of us,” he says.
“Sounds like it.” My voice is even. Barely.
I sit on an armchair because the couch seems too close. The air between us is heavy and charged. I hate that it’s like this with us, like we don’t know what to say to each other.
“I found some candles in the drawer of the nightstand, but no matches or lighter.”
“Kitchen,” he says. “But don’t light a candle if you’re going to sleep.”
“Of course I wouldn’t do that. I’m not a moron.” I don’t mean to get uppity, but I do anyway. “I thought I’d go through my notes.”
He scoffs. “So much for a relaxing weekend.”
Fuck him. I should get up. Storm out. Go back to the bedroom and study.
But I don’t.
I stay, sitting in the armchair. Silent.
He breaks first. “Why didn’t you come?”
The question lands low, right in my gut. I don’t look at him. “Because you told me we had no future.”
Thunder cracks.
His breath changes. One of those tiny shifts you feel more than hear. He doesn’t talk for a long beat, and in that time, I manage to conjure up every possible thing he could reply with.
“Okay,” he says finally. “Fair.”
It’s not a lie. I also stayed because of the seminar. The opportunity. But the more I tell myself that’s the reason, the more I know that if I felt Henry and I had a future, I would have bolted to his side.
And I both love and hate myself for that.
I rise. “I should get some sleep.”
My phone buzzes with a text. I’m pretty sure it’s Angie. I haven’t texted her since I told her, still in my car, that I’d arrived safely.
She knows. She did all of this. And while I appreciate the thought, right now I don’t want to talk to her.
I look at the phone.
But it’s not a text from Angie.
No pressure. Just checking in. Still would love to meet for coffee if you’re up for it.
Lance.
God, he has terrible timing.
My thumb hovers over the keyboard. Thanks. I’m okay. I could send that. I could send Another time. I could send nothing and be consistent.
So I do that. I can blame it on bad mountain reception.
I head back to the bedroom, toss my phone onto the nightstand, and turn off the lantern.
Darkness folds in. The storm presses at the windows.
The room feels too big and too small at once.
I lie down. Sit up. Lie down again. I stare at the ceiling and count the seconds between lightning and thunder like I did when I was a kid.
It doesn’t help.
I get up, take the phone, and open the door.
Flickering light from the fire washes the hall. I walk softly but then give up on being quiet because the storm is louder than anything else. I round the corner into the great room.
He’s right where I left him, except he’s not. He’s sitting on the floor at the hearth, back against stone, one long leg stretched out, the other bent, arm resting over his knee and petting Zach with his other hand. The scar at his hairline is a clean line. I have the strange desire to kiss it.
He looks at me. “You okay?”
No. “I’m fine.” I stay standing.
He tips his head back against the stone and watches the ceiling. “I asked for you.”
“What?”
“At the hospital.” He doesn’t look at me. “I asked my mom to call you.”
The words ricochet through my head. Same thing we were talking about earlier. “I know. Why, Henry? Why me? I mean, you said we were done, that we had no future, so why would you ask for me?”
“Because you were the only thing that cut through the noise in my mind.” He finally looks at me. He doesn’t smile. “The only thing that made sense to me.” Another pause. “Because I wanted you there.”
The stupidest heat rushes my face. I step closer to the fire. “I couldn’t come.”
“I know.” He says it without accusation, which somehow makes it worse.
I lower to a crouch and sit on the hearth just out of his reach. The stone is warm through the fabric of my sweats.
“Ask me again,” I say.
He blinks. “What?”
“Ask me again why I didn’t come.”
He studies me. “Why didn’t you come?”
“Because you told me we had no future,” I say, repeating my earlier answer, but then adding, “And because I believed you.”
He absorbs it. Resignation crosses his face.
“I said it because I thought it was true,” he says. “Because I was a mess, and I didn’t want to drag you through it. Because I thought if I let myself want you out loud, it would eat everything.”
“And?” I keep my voice steady. “Did it eat everything?”
His mouth quirks. It’s not a smile. “It’s working on it.”
A laugh tries to climb out of me, but I suppress it. I fidget with my hands, making suturing moves.
The storm drops an octave. The roof thrums. Firelight skates over Henry’s profile, and for a split second, I see the boy he was, the one I’ve seen in Angie’s old photos, with sun-bleached blond hair, eyes blue and sparkling and mischievous.
“Why are we doing this?” I ask.
“This?” He gestures between us.
“Yeah. This.” I mimic the gesture. “We could pretend we’re just two people who got stuck in a storm.”
“We could.” He pauses a moment. “It would be a lie.”
I swallow. The room angles a degree.
“Tea?” he asks. “I can heat some more water.”
“It’s fine.” I don’t know what I mean. The tea. Me. Us.
He pushes to his feet anyway. A few minutes later, the kettle hums. He brings me a mug. I take it, and this time our hands don’t brush.
We sit again, not touching. I sip. He doesn’t. He watches me sip. Must be fascinating.
“Tell me something true,” he finally says.
“About what?”
“About you. About who you are.”
I think. What does he really want to know? What do I really want to tell him?
Nothing…and everything.
Finally, I settle on, “I tied twenty surgeon’s knots in a row this morning, and my hands remembered the song.”
“Song?”
“Yeah. I know it sounds silly, but it’s like a song you’ve known forever and you’ll never forget it. Even if you haven’t heard it in ages, it can come on and you remember every single word. Except that it’s muscle memory.”
He nods. Says nothing.
“But yesterday in lab I couldn’t do a single simple square without fumbling.” I stare into the fire. “I felt like a fraud.”
“You’re not.” He leans forward, forearms on thighs, hands hanging loose between his knees. “Sometimes the brain calls bullshit on the body. I should know.”
“You tell yourself that a lot?” I ask.
“Often.” His mouth turns. “More lately.”
We’re quiet. The tea cools. I put the mug down, scrub my palms on my thighs.
“Tell me something true,” I say.
He doesn’t hesitate. “I nearly called you every night this week.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Because if I heard your voice…” He shakes his head. “If I heard you say, in your voice, that you weren’t coming, that you didn’t…” He sighs. “I didn’t want to be that man.”
Another gust hits the cabin. Somewhere a shutter slaps. Zach snorts in his sleep and rolls over, his back to the hearth.
I should go to bed. The sensible part of me, the one that makes lists and checks boxes and keeps scalpel blades counted, shoves from the inside. Get up. Walk away. Close the door. Sleep.
I don’t stand.
He doesn’t move either. The space between us is crowded with a bunch of stuff we haven’t said.
“Tabitha,” he says. “If I ask you something, will you answer?”
“Depends.”
He clears his throat. “Who texted you? You know, before.”
He noticed that?
Of course he did. He probably notices everything about me. I sure notice everything about him.
Heat flashes my face. “No one important.”
He shakes his head, forcing out a chuckle. “So that’s what you meant when you said ‘depends.’”
“I suppose so.” I cross my arms. “I’m not lying. It wasn’t anyone important.”
He smirks. “Then why won’t you tell me?”
God.
Do I have to go into detail here? About the day I drove back to Boulder from Steel Acres? And I stupidly went on a walk alone at night?
And was nearly…
“Fine.” I huff. “It was a man. His name is Lance Rodriguez.”
Henry’s jaw tightens. “Is he a student in the seminar?”
I lift my eyebrows. Interesting that he went right to the seminar. He’s trying to make it make sense. How simple it would be to go with his assumption.
Yeah, Lance is a student in the seminar. We’re lab partners and we were supposed to work together this weekend, but I texted him earlier that I decided to go out of town. He was just acknowledging and saying he’ll see me Monday in class.
How easily the lie comes to me, and it makes perfect sense.
I’ve never been averse to a little white lie if it keeps someone from being harmed. But would the idea of Lance even harm Henry?
Yeah, it would. I saw his jaw go rigid.
No problem, then. The lie will keep him happy and keep me from having to relive that awful night.
Except…
We promised each other honesty.
Honesty means honesty. It doesn’t mean little white lies that don’t harm anyone.
Besides, Henry should know why I’m not myself. Rather, that there’s a reason other than him—though he’s a big one—that I’m not myself.
“No,” I finally say. “He’s not a student in the seminar. He’s a software engineer.”
“I see.” He doesn’t react. “Do you run into a lot of software engineers on the med school campus?”
I let out a breath. “No. I met him the night I got home after the wedding.”
No reaction. Except he’s still tense and rigid.
“He…uh…” God, do I have to go there?
“Is he the reason you didn’t come to the hospital?”
I open my mouth, widen my eyes. “No! Of course not. He had nothing to do with that.”
“Then who is he?”
I sigh. “It’s a long story. I did something really stupid the night I got back.”