Chapter 4
My alarm startles me out of a dream where I’m trying to climb onto my dad’s hospital bed to lie next to him.
But no matter how hard I try, my hands slip off the metal rails.
I keep falling to the floor until my mom drags me away, out the door, her eyes empty, as lifeless as they were for months after his death.
And then, as I’m trying to push past her to get back to him, I feel a jagged pain rip through my chest. Somehow, I know my chest is about to split open, and suddenly, I’m running through the hospital, begging every person I pass for another heart because mine is dying.
These lovely nightmares like to grace me with their presence whenever I’m stressed out, and thanks to the financial worries at the bakery multiplied by Hunter being such a jerk, I’m apparently quite stressed. The alarm is a welcome relief.
Lou’s date went so well that she texted me at eleven to tell me not to wait up for her, so I finally switched off the TV and said a little prayer that I could get ready for bed and into my room without another run-in with Hunter since the water is turned off in his half of the duplex.
I’ve never washed my face or brushed my teeth so fast in my life.
I almost texted Lou to ask exactly how long Hunter was planning on staying but decided against ruining her date.
I try to shake off the lingering terror of my dream as I stumble to the chair where I laid out my gym clothes. Wednesdays are Mom’s day to start at the bakery, so I go to the gym with Talia. Lou even joins us sometimes, but I’m guessing, based on her late night, that she won’t be today.
I hop around my room, pulling up my leggings and wrangling my sports bra on while still half asleep.
Before I put on my high-necked tank top, I pause and look in the mirror.
My gaze immediately goes to the thick scar that bisects my chest. A ghost of the pain that lingered long after my life-saving surgery shivers through my memory when I trace the scar with one finger.
I’m used to the feel of the puckered, discolored skin.
But I never let anyone else touch it, not when just seeing it often inspires morbid curiosity or barely concealed aversion.
I’ve been asked all sorts of questions about what it felt like to have my chest cracked open, my heart literally cut out and replaced.
Jordan, a guy I dated for a month in college, asked if I’d ever had memories of the other person’s life.
That question sent me into a panic attack in the middle of Texas Roadhouse.
I can never adequately explain the simultaneous gratitude and guilt I live with every day because someone else’s heart is in my body.
And his question drove that reality far too deep; it’s haunted me ever since.
It clearly freaked us both out, because he lasted only another week before breaking up with me.
I was devastated; I’d really fallen for him, traumatizing questions notwithstanding.
Now, as I stare at the ridge of flesh, Hunter’s words from last night rise up again. I don’t do scar buddies.
Why didn’t Lou tell me? I have a vague memory of her saying he’d been in a car accident, like, five or six years ago, but she never mentioned he’d been burned.
If I’d known—if I’d been warned—I could have avoided the shock he saw on my face.
How different would our first meeting have gone?
Would there have been a chance of becoming friends?
With someone who maybe, just maybe, wouldn’t have been turned off by my scar or frightened by my health history and my loaner heart?
Who might have seen me as me—just Olivia?
Not Olivia, heart-transplant survivor who would beat the odds to live past forty.
Who may never be able to have a baby, who has to take medicine every morning and night to keep my body from rejecting the foreign organ keeping me alive .
. . and who will need another person to die so I can keep living when the day comes that this heart quits or I get so sick that all the medicine in the world can’t keep my body from rejecting the heart that saved my life at eighteen.
“It doesn’t matter,” I tell my reflection quietly. “I don’t need him. I don’t need anyone.”
It’s the mantra I’ve told myself for years because I have no choice but to believe it.
I pull my tank top on right as my phone vibrates. I glance down to see a text from Talia.
Just leaving. See you in fifteen?
Yep, about to head out, I reply.
I put on my socks and shoes, grab my keys, headphones, and water bottle, and open my door to a silent hallway. The sun is beginning to rise, gilding the condo in golden light as I head down the stairs to the kitchen. I inhale and exhale slowly, breathing in the peace of a quiet morning at daybreak.
I’m screwing the lid back on my bottle after filling it with water when I get another text, this time from Lou.
Keep it down. I’m trying to sleep in.
If you’re up, then come with me, and fill me in on the Dream-boat Banker!
Chris is amazing. And NO.
“Headed to the gym?”
The deep, sleep-husky voice makes me jump, and I whirl with a screech, instinctually swinging my water bottle in self--defense.
Hunter is more prepared this time and leaps backward before the heavy cylinder impacts any part of his body.
I gasp and clutch my chest.
“Is this a habit of yours—throwing things at people?” He quirks one brow.
“I didn’t throw it this time, and I only react this way because you keep scaring me,” I retort testily. “What are you doing here right now?”
His gaze drops to where I clutch my tank top, willing my heart to calm.
I glance down and realize the top of my scar is visible.
I straighten the shirt, hiding the puckered skin once more, and glare up at him.
Our eyes meet and hold for a brief moment, the infinitesimal pause between one breath and the next.
In the morning sunlight streaming through the window, I realize his eyes are actually hazel; flecks of green and amber rim his pupils.
Then he looks away, toward the window over the sink, the edge of his jaw flushing a dusky red beneath his tan.
“Apparently there’s no water in my half of this place,” he says.
“I needed to go to the bathroom and fill my bottle.”
“Well, next time, warn me you’re coming over—-especially if the sun hasn’t even come up yet.” I turn and grab my stuff off the counter.
“Noted.” There’s a clink as he sets his keys down on the kitchen counter. “Where are you headed so early?” he asks again.
“To the mall.” I face him once more, glancing down at my workout clothes with raised eyebrows. “What does it look like?”
“Are you going to power walk for half an hour?” Hunter smirks, drawing heat to my cheeks. He looks far too good in his shorts, T-shirt, and Nikes.
“I’m going to the gym.”
“Oh . . . You can work out after having a heart transplant?”
I can’t tell if he’s genuinely asking or mocking me. “Of course I can,” I say, annoyed. “In fact, I have a very strict regimen of cardio and weights to keep my heart as healthy as possible. And I’m going to be late. So have a good—-whatever you’re going to do.”
The corners of his lips turn down. “I’m going for a run. No one stares at me like they do at the gym—or if they do, I don’t notice if I’m sprinting fast enough.”
His admission is a kick to the stomach. His scars are much worse than the puckered skin that bisects my sternum and are impossible to hide, unlike mine. It’s not hard to imagine the stares and comments he must get.
I suck a breath through my teeth, wrestling my instinct to lash out into submission. It’s disconcerting how angry he makes me. “You must be pretty fast, then.”
He shrugs, those impressive shoulders rising and falling. He didn’t make muscles like those only from running. He must have found somewhere to lift if he avoids the gym. I wonder what he’ll do here in Arizona.
“Well, have a good workout.” He pulls out some over-the-ear headphones from the case he’s holding and puts them on, shoving his phone into his shorts pocket.
“You too,” I say as I trail him out the door.
I try not to watch him stretch in the front yard as I climb into my car, but it’s hard not to.
His thighs are powerful, his calves toned.
His biceps move and flex beneath the short sleeves of his tech shirt as he stretches his quads.
He takes off in the opposite direction with a nod of his chin as I pull away from the curb and shoot off a text to Talia telling her to start warming up since I’m going to be a few minutes late.
I’d like to say I didn’t watch his long, loping gait in my rearview mirror and nearly run a stop sign in the process, but then I would be lying.
The fact that he admitted he likes to run to avoid stares at the gym feels like an olive branch of sorts.
A pang of sympathy for him rises, but it doesn’t erase what a jerk he was last night.
I blast my workout playlist with my windows rolled down as I drive to the gym, letting the balmy morning breeze blow away all thoughts of my new neighbor.
Later that afternoon, I’m back in my uniform of jeans, T-shirt, and apron, hair pulled up, standing outside, spraying the glass doors of the bakery with Windex and wiping off fingerprints during a lull in customers.
“What is a Konditori?”
I whirl, brandishing the Windex, and Hunter lifts his hands in submission. “Don’t shoot!”
“Quit scaring me! My heart can’t take it.”
He blanches, and I quickly add, “Not literally. My actual heart is fine. I don’t like being scared.”
“I didn’t mean to. I thought you heard me coming.” He gestures toward the office where he now works a few doors down.
“Well, I didn’t,” I huff. Our eyes meet and hold again. The flecks of green in his are even brighter in the direct sunlight. His hair is strategically placed to cover his ruined ear, but his other scars are fully visible.