Chapter 44
My last training day fell through. While out on my early morning jog, I felt the first drops of rain, and the rest of the morning it poured buckets.
The courts were flooded, so I had no choice but to use the fitness room.
While I sat on the ergometer and pedaled, I wrote a message to Gabe to cancel our PT session.
I highly doubted I’d set foot on the court today.
Even if it stopped raining soon, we wouldn’t get it dry.
I would do a bit of strength training, shower, and then go home and finish packing in peace.
He replied with a thumbs-up and said that he would come by later to say goodbye.
Only then did I really realize that our appointment today was also our farewell.
A numb feeling spread through my stomach as I imagined not having him around tomorrow.
Over the last few weeks he’d become a good friend, and I wanted him and Kay to realize what they could be for each other.
In a pause in the rain, I walked home. Steam was rising off the street.
The potholes were filled with a kind of brown soup.
I’d hardly gone a hundred feet when a clap of thunder caused me to start.
My eyes darted upward and the next moment the rain came down so intensely that in a matter of seconds I was completely soaked.
I began to run but came to an abrupt stop when a flash of lightning lit up the sky.
Beyond a few palms and banana trees there was nowhere I could take shelter.
Cursing, I decided to keep on going. The rain slapped my face while the weight of my tennis bag slowed me down.
I could already see Kay’s house when another boom of thunder caused me to jerk.
The next moment I stepped into a pothole and began to stumble.
I landed on my stomach, half buried under my tennis bag and with two scraped knees.
Though I couldn’t see them, I could feel the burning pain all too well.
A few seconds later, the pain was replaced by panic.
My ankle! No. Nononononono. I quickly tried to stand up and groaned when my bloody and dirty knees touched the ground.
I was overcome by a wave of nausea and had to close my eyes.
But when I opened them again, I wasn’t alone.
“Lou! Are you okay?”
Vince had appeared from out of nowhere. He was kneeling in front of me and looking at me with concern as the rain continued to stream down my face. For a few seconds I simply stared at him, overwhelmed by memories.
“Lou!” He shook my arm. “Are you okay?”
“My ankle,” I croaked, but the loud bangs of thunder swallowed my words.
“What?!” he cried.
My index finger trembled as I pointed to my ankle. Vince’s eyes followed the movement. And widened in fright.
That was the moment that all the previous days’ misery just burst over me. I began to sob, which was followed by an uncontrollable trembling.
“Hey! Heyheyheyheyhey,” I heard him say. “It’s all good.” I felt his hands upon my cheeks and saw his eyes looking to meet my own. “Can you hear me? It’s all good.”
I pressed my lips together and shook my head, but his eyes said, Believe me.
“Can you…can you move it?” he asked.
“I don’t know.”
He blinked against the rain. “You haven’t tried yet?”
“I don’t dare,” I said fearfully. “What if it’s broken? If I tore my ligaments again? If I can’t…”
“Shh.” With his finger he closed my mouth, and, for some reason, I found it calming.
Even if a part of me expressed the completely misplaced wish that he had done it with his lips.
“First of all, we’ve got to get you out of the rain.
” He pushed his wet hair out of his face and thought for a moment.
With a determined look, he threw my tennis bag over his shoulder, crouched down, and slid one hand under my knees, the other beneath my back. I stiffened immediately.
“What’s going on?”
“I’m carrying you home.”
My lips parted to object, but he’d already lifted me up. Groaning slightly, he said, “All I’ve got is the scooter.” He nodded toward the side of the road. “And you’re just right here.”
He was right. Kay’s house wasn’t even a hundred feet away. Nevertheless, everything within me bristled at the idea of him carrying me.
“Nothing you haven’t experienced,” he said with a smile.
“Yeah, but at least I was unconscious.”
He laughed and pulled me closer, brushing my knee in the process.
“Ow,” I moaned, making a face.
“Does it hurt that bad?”
“It burns like hell.”
“That’s good. That means your ankle’s fine.”
I frowned.
“You know that. The bigger pain eclipses the lesser.”
I nodded, though I wasn’t sure if that was true or not. The last few feet I could see how much it was costing him to carry me. His expression was tense, and his neck veins were becoming increasingly prominent.
“Sorry,” I said when he paused to catch his breath.
He looked at me with an expression as deep as the ocean. “I’m not.”
My breathing quickened, and I could feel my heart beating all the way to my ribs. It took a flash of lightning in the sky for me to take my eyes off him.
Shortly thereafter, he was opening the security gate with my help. His gaze darted around as he carried me up the driveway. I realized that he was here for the first time. The rain had eased slightly by the time we reached the front door. He entered the code I gave him.
“Man, is it cold in here,” was the first thing he said.
“That’s the AC. I can… You can turn it off. To the left of the door.”
“I don’t have to live here.”
The smack of his sneakers was the only sound as he carried me over to the sofa and put me down. Softly and carefully.
“You’ve got to disinfect these,” he said, looking at my bloody knees. “And get out of your wet clothes.”
“You too.”
His T-shirt was so wet that his skin was shimmering through it and his cotton shorts were sticking to his thighs.
“And we’ve got to take a look at your ankle,” he said, ignoring my observation.
For a moment the we in his statement helped to keep my panic in check. But then it came roaring back.
“I’m scared, Vince.”
“I know.” He held out his hand. “Your ankle doesn’t look swollen, and you’re not in pain,” he said calmly. “I think you just had a scare. Or…a kind of flashback.”
“You think?”
It was nothing but a hopeful croak, but he nodded.
“Take my hand!”
Hesitatingly, I did as he said.
“And now, stand up real slowly.”
I felt his eyes on me as I pulled myself up from the sofa with his help.
I put weight on my left foot, then my right.
The expected pain didn’t materialize. There was no pinching, no stinging, no throbbing.
Just a ridiculous smacking sound. I clutched my heart and whispered, “Oh god.” My head sank down and the tension left my body.
I was about to burst into tears again when Vince pulled me into a hug.
His body was wet but warm, and I had no energy left to fight off the memories flooding in from all sides.
To fight off the desire to snuggle up to him and inhale his scent.
So I just did, and he let me. He stroked damp strands of hair from my face and planted a kiss on my head. We stayed like that for quite a while.
“Be honest: How much does it hurt that you let me carry you for nothing?”
Even though I knew he was just trying to escape the heaviness of the situation, I smiled. Leaving our embrace, I noticed the traces of blood my scraped hand had left on his T-shirt.
“Sorry.” I wrinkled my nose regretfully. “Maybe it’ll come out if I wash it right away.”
“Oh…don’t worry about it, it’s ancient.”
With a doubtful glance I replied, “You say that whenever I ruin one of your T-shirts.”
It was supposed to be a joke, but neither of us laughed. Because it came with too many memories attached. For both of us. Our first night. Our last one.
“Come on, give it to me,” I said into the tense quiet.
“Kay’s washing machine has an express cycle, and I’ve got to wash this thing here the way it is.
” I tugged at my tennis skirt, which was covered not only with blood, but mud.
I was almost surprised that he didn’t say no.
As he pulled his shirt over his head and stood before me, I nearly regretted my offer.
Especially when I realized that in Kay’s man-free house there was absolutely nothing for him to wear.
“What?” he asked, irritated.
“Nothing,” I said quickly and grabbed his shirt. “I’ll be right back.”
I could feel his gaze on my back until I reached the bathroom.
After closing the door behind me, I slipped out of my skirt and underwear and put on Kay’s bathrobe.
With the dirty laundry pressed against me, I left the bathroom and ran next door to the laundry room.
I stuffed everything into the top loader and alternated between the twelve- and thirty-minute program.
Twelve more minutes with Vince or thirty?
I knew it was the wrong way to think. That the duration of the wash wouldn’t change the fact that we didn’t have any future.
And yet my finger was magically drawn to thirty.
I waited for the standard beep and turned away when I saw him standing in the doorway.
The way he looked at me made me think he’d been watching me for a while. My face immediately turned red.
“The blood, you know,” I began to babble. “I didn’t know whether the short cycle… I don’t think twelve minutes would have been enough. That’s why…thirty. I hope you have time? Otherwise, I can…bring it by later. Or you…”
“I’ve got time,” he interrupted me with a tiny smile. “And I agree: Thirty minutes are better than twelve.”
Somehow I managed to nod.
“Meanwhile, we should take care of your knees. You have some disinfectant?”
“Yeah,” I whispered, in a daze. “In the bathroom.” I pointed to the right with my thumb. But it was on the left. Thank god Vince didn’t know his way around enough to notice.
A few minutes later I was sitting on the edge of Kay’s bathtub, letting warm water run over my knees. The right had been hit worse than the left. I could only hope that they’d be healed in time for my opening match in six days’ time.
“You want a Band-Aid?” Vince asked, digging through the first-aid box.
“I definitely need one for my right knee.”
He appeared next to me with a bottle of disinfectant spray and a package of Band-Aids and got moving. With concentration, he took care of the open wounds on my knees, looking up now and again to make sure I wasn’t in too much pain. And every time he did, my heart bled a little more.
“Sorry,” he murmured as he palmed the Band-Aid flat, and I jerked. “Show me your hand.”
“Oh, it’s fine!”
I made a dismissive gesture, but he grabbed my hand and examined my palm. It was lightly scraped and was no longer bleeding. He sprayed it, and I winced.
“I’m sorry, Lou.”
“Nothing you can do about it.” I sighed, wanting to retrieve my hand.
“That’s not what I meant.”
I held my breath and looked up into his beautiful blue eyes, which were now flat and sad.
“I wish I could have given you more than the express cycle.”
I lowered my eyes to our hands. His thumb was resting softly on my wrist, and I wondered if he could feel how much my pulse had shot up. For a long time, all he did was continue to hold my hand. As if he wanted to remain connected to me somehow, even if circumstances were tearing us apart.