Chapter 9
Chapter Nine
Connor fell asleep. I’ve been watching his chest rise and fall. Something is wrong with him. I don’t know what, and it’s driving me insane. I don’t like seeing him hurting, and as much as he’s trying to hide it, I know he’s in pain.
I really wish I could call my mom. She’d know what to do. I’ve thought about picking up the phone... I could ask her not to tell anyone, and she wouldn’t. I don’t know to what extent her phone is watched, though. And I can’t put Connor at risk, especially when he’s not one hundred percent.
He’s been struggling for a while now, but for the last two days, it’s been worse. It’s more than just being tired. He’s fatigued, and in pain. Not that he’d tell me that.
A knock at the door has me on my feet and rushing for it. Finally! I want to scream at the damn doctor for taking his time. I don’t, though. Like Connor said, we are normal people here.
“Hi, thank you for coming.” I hold the door open, and a young woman walks through.
“Sorry, it took a little longer to finish with my last patient. I’m Dr. Morgan,” she says.
“Ah… Rose. My husband Justin isn’t feeling well,” I explain as I escort her to the bedroom.
“What seems to be troubling him?” Dr. Morgan sets her bag down on the desk.
“He’s fatigued, and in pain. It’s been going on for a while,” I tell her.
“I’m fine. My wife is overreacting,” Connor calls out from the bed.
“You’re awake. And you are not fine.” I shoot him a warning glare. “You’re going to let the doctor look you over.”
“Fine, but I am good. Just tired,” he says.
“Where is the pain?” Dr. Morgan asks.
“I’m not in pain,” Connor denies as his face scrunches up. In pain.
“Let’s pretend you are. Where would it be?” Dr. Morgan puts her stethoscope in her ears. “I’m going to listen to your heart and lungs,” she says, placing the other end on Connor’s chest. “Take a deep breath for me.”
“It’s my head, and my stomach,” he tells her.
“How long have you had symptoms?”
Connor looks at me. He clearly doesn’t want to tell her. “Just do it. She can’t help you if you don’t,” I say. “Please.”
“It’s probably just the man flu or something,” Connor mutters.
“How long?” the doctor repeats.
“A few weeks.”
“What happened here?” Dr. Morgan looks at the wound that’s still healing on Connor’s shoulder.
“I was shot,” he says.
“Shot?” Dr. Morgan looks between us, clearly surprised.
“Yeah. A few weeks ago.”
“Okay.” She doesn’t ask any more questions. “I’m going to draw some blood and run some tests. I’ll leave you with a bottle of pain medication and a packet of sleeping pills.”
“That’s it?” I ask her.
“Until I run some tests. If I don’t know what is actually wrong, I can’t treat it,” she tells me.
“How long do these tests take?” I’ve never been the patient type.
“I’ll have results back in a few hours,” she says. “Your heart sounds good, your lungs are clear, and you’re not running a fever.”
“Like I said, I’m fine,” Connor adds.
“I didn’t say that. We will know more once the results are back.”
“What are you testing for?” I need to know what’s wrong with him. I can’t fix him if I don’t know.
I really wish I was Dante smart. My cousin could probably run tests and diagnose someone after reading a few medical textbooks. I’d be left confused after staring at page one.
“I’m going to run a full blood panel and see if anything looks out of the ordinary. We can go from there,” Dr. Morgan tells me.
“Okay.” I have no idea what that even means.
After she takes a few vials of Connor’s blood, I walk her to the door. “I’ll be in touch as soon as I have the results,” she repeats.
“Thank you.” I close the door, go back into the room, and lie down next to Connor. “I need to call my cousin.”
“Which one?” he says.
“Dante.”
“Why?”
“I need to ask him something.” I don’t want to admit to Connor that I have no idea what the doctor was talking about.
“Ask me.”
I look at him. “I can’t.”
“Aurora, you can ask me anything.” He sighs. “Besides, you said it yourself: I’m smarter than your dipshit cousin.”
I throw out a hand and whack Connor in the chest. “Dante is my favorite cousin. He’s not a dipshit.”
“Ow, fucking hell, that hurts.” Connor rubs at where I hit him. “You can ask me.”
“It’s not the same. I don’t want you to think I’m more stupid than you already do.”
“Aurora, you are not stupid. I’ve never once thought you were, and I never will. If you can’t ask me anything, what’s the point of this? We’re married. I’m the person you’re supposed to be able to be your true self with. I am not judging you, and there’s no such thing as a stupid question.”
I take a deep breath. “What do they test for in a blood panel?”
“That’s it? That’s your question?” Connor asks. “That’s not stupid, Aurora. They just test for random shit like: liver function, vitamin deficiencies, blood cell counts, insulin levels. Basic shit.”
“How do you know that?” I huff. “See? It is stupid. You know that. Why don’t I?”
“I just know random shit. It doesn’t make me smarter than you are.”
“Okay, Harvard.” I laugh and shake my head from side to side. “You knowing more than me does make you smarter.”
“Have you ever heard of the hundred languages theory?” Connor asks.
“Don’t tell me you know a hundred languages.” I look at him. Is there even a hundred languages?
“No, it refers to the thought that people have a hundred ways of learning, a hundred ways of understanding and doing, and school systems tend to only use one of those. The traditional school system isn’t set up to make every student succeed, because they don’t allow every student to shine in their own way,” he says.
“You are not stupid, Aurora. You just weren’t given the opportunity to shine like you should have been. ”
“Well, I, for one, hope that our children inherit your way of learning and not mine,” I tell him.
“I hope our children are mini versions of you because you are fucking perfection.” Connor reaches out and pulls me into his arms. My head rests on his shoulder.
“You want little girls?” I ask him.
“I want as many as we can possibly have,” he says.
“You do know girls like me… date boys like you, right? You want your daughters dating bad boys, Connor?” I do my best not to laugh when I feel his body tense.
“Our daughters will be homeschooled, and they won’t be going to any parties where they meet boys like me,” he says it like he’s got it all figured out.
“Sure. Well, I hope we have one of each.”
“You only want two kids?”
“I don’t really want to be pushing anything out of my vagina, but I think two is a good number,” I admit. “But this isn’t happening for a really long time. I like us being just us.”
“Me too,” Connor says, pressing his lips to the top of my head.
It doesn’t take much longer for him to drift back off to sleep.
I stay right there in his arms, not wanting to move.
I send a little prayer up to whomever is listening that he’s okay.
That whatever tests the doctor is doing are all going to come back normal and he really does just have a case of the man flu.
As I lie here, I envision our future together.
Two kids. One boy, one girl. We live in Boston.
Connor runs a bunch of successful legitimate businesses, including the one he and I talked about.
Designing weapons and gadgets does sound like something I would want to do.
Something I could do. I’m sure whatever I come up with I’ll find a way to test them out on my brothers or cousins. Market research is important after all.
I think we are going to be happy. We are going to get our own fairy-tale ending.
I really do wish I could call Dante. He would know what to do right now. How I could help Connor deal with the information he found. Figure out how to use it to his advantage to get him out of his family’s organization.