Chapter 19 Noel
Noel
“I suspect the most we can hope for, and it’s no small hope, is that we never give up, that we never stop giving ourselves permission to try to love and receive love.” - Elizabeth Strout
I tapped my fingers against my knee as I pressed my phone to my ear, waiting for someone to answer.
Pick took his sweet time before giving a sleepy greeting as if I’d just roused him from bed at four thirty in the afternoon. “Yeah?”
“Hey, can you cover my shift tonight?”
“Fuck, you have the worst timing ever, Gamble. Why can’t you work it?”
“Long story.” I glanced over at Aspen laid out on the bed next to me, her arms resting placidly at her sides while her feet stretched out toward the end of the mattress. I suspected she was awake even though her eyes were closed. “I’m at the hospital...with a friend.”
“Everything okay?” The concern in Pick’s voice made me smile. He could act like a thug all he liked, but the guy’s heart was as soft as a kitten’s. He’d cut off his own leg to help a friend in need.
“Nothing a couple stitches can’t fix.” My gaze found the gauze patch at the top of her arm almost to the curve of her shoulder. Fifteen stitches to be exact.
“Okay, fine. But you owe me.”
“Thanks, man.” I hung up and lowered my phone just as Aspen’s lashes flickered open. The pain medicine they’d given her must’ve kicked in because her green gaze looked glassy and incoherent.
“You don’t have to stay. Really. I’m fine. If you need to go to work, go to work. They’re probably going to release me pretty soon anyway.”
“And you’re going to need someone to drive you home once they do,” I argued in a soft, reasonable tone.
I felt like shit for getting her hurt. But who knew corners of cardboard boxes could slice open such deep, nasty gashes?
Jesus, I should’ve let her pull the damn thing down off the shelf by herself.
She’d no doubt be uninjured right now if I had.
And I know it had hurt, a lot. She’d let me drive her to the hospital without a word of resistance.
“I can drive just fine. I have a small nick. It’s not like they cut off my whole arm.
” But as soon as she spoke, color seeped from her face.
Her eyes went sallow and lost as if her own words had elicited a painful memory.
Slamming her lashes closed, she let out a regretful whimper. “I shouldn’t have said that.”
I tilted my head to the side, confused. “Why not?”
She blinked me back into focus. “Because...” She didn’t answer, just stared at me with wide eyes. “My dad,” she finally added, but that was all she said.
From her purse, a phone started to ring. Since it sat on the cart next to me, and I didn’t want her to move, I reached into it without asking for permission and snapped open the top clasp. Her phone rested near the top. As I pulled it out, I saw the call was from Parents.
“Here.” I handed it over, but she just stared at me. You’d have thought I was handing her a poisoned apple or something. So I tried to be helpful as I said, “It’s your folks.”
“Oh, God.” If she’d been pale before, she was sheet white now. “It’s karma.”
I grinned, glad to know I wasn’t the only person who blamed all my bad shit on karma. “Why would karma use your parents’ phone to call?”
I was trying to be cute enough to make her smile. It didn’t work. If anything, she looked even sicker. “If you only knew.”
For some reason, I did want to know. “So tell me.”
Aspen stared at me, her expression startled. The phone continued to ring between us. She blinked and shook her head before taking it with shaking fingers.
“Hel...hello?” Her voice sounded so young and afraid. I didn’t like that. I thought I hated it in class when her pitch turned professor-ish. But right now, I would’ve given anything to hear her powerhouse, self-confident tone again.
From where I sat, I heard a muffled woman’s voice tell Aspen her father was in the hospital. Hmm. What a coincidence. Must run in the family to visit a hospital today. National Kavanagh Hospital Day. I waited for her to explain she was in one too. But she didn’t.
“I...um, how long has he been there?” She nodded as a muted answer came through the receiver. “And his leg?” she asked next. “Is this going to affect that at all? He still has it, right? They haven’t amputated anything yet?”
Oh, so that was why lost-limb jokes were taboo in her book. Good to know.
When she closed her eyes and crossed her fingers, I experienced this unavoidable urge to reach out and clasp that hand, or at least cross my fingers right along with her.
She looked so alone and small on that bed, her fingers crossed with hopeful, childlike anxiety. It made me uncomfortable to watch her this way, mostly because I couldn’t do anything to help her, or more accurately because I shouldn’t.
Thinking screw it, she needs this, I reached out and took her hand.
Her fingers were cold and gave a startled jerk under my grip.
But I didn’t let go. Her eyes flashed open to peer up at me, but I just nodded, letting her know I was there.
When her fingers finally squeezed back, I swear I felt the grip tighten around my heart instead of my palm.
“Well, that’s good,” she said into the phone only to wince as if she knew that was the wrong thing to say. But it must not have gotten the response she feared because she let out a relieved breath a second later. “Okay, then. Thank you for calling.”
And that was that. I glanced around the room before turning back to her. “Is that all?” I asked. “Why didn’t you tell them you were in the hospital, too?”
She flushed and handed the phone back to me. I regretfully let go of her fingers to take it. “I...” She shook her head and waved her bad arm. “This isn’t a big deal. She only would’ve derided me for being clumsy.”
“But you weren’t clumsy. It was my fault you got hurt.”
“No...” She sighed as if exhausted. “It wasn’t your fault. And even so, she would’ve somehow found a way to blame me.”
I frowned, which only caused her to glance away. Her fingers fidgeted with the blankets.
From listening to her drunken rumblings on Saturday, I already thought her parents were complete assholes.
But now, I really didn’t like them. I didn’t like the way they affected her, making her stammer and turn placating.
This was not the woman I’d seen lead a class for the last few months.
And it certainly wasn’t the woman I’d held in my arms all Saturday night.
“After everything they’ve done to you, I’m surprised you still talk to them at all,” I blurted out before I could stop myself.
“What?” Her face once again leached of color. “How do you know—I mean, what’re you talking about? You don’t know anything about my relationship with my parents.”
I winched. “Yeah, and you obviously don’t remember everything you told me Saturday.”
“Oh, God.” Her eyes looked too large for her head as she gaped in horror. “What did I say?”
No way could I repeat what she’d told me. My mouth opened, but no words came.
“Noel?”
My first name on her lips slayed me. It made me want things, like hurting her parents or that other asshole football player who’d hurt her. It made me want to reach for her hand again or lean down and kiss away all the pain in her eyes by touching my lips to her brow.
Yeah, I definitely loved how she said my name. But before I could make a fool of myself and react to it, the door opened, and a nurse walked in.
“Okay, Miss Kavanagh. You’re free to go.”
“It’s doctor,” I said before Aspen could, not that she looked as if she was going to correct the nurse.
Both women blinked at me. “She’s a doctor, not a miss.
She’s...” Crap, now I felt like a pretentious ass for making a big deal about her fucking title.
But Aspen deserved the respect of such an address.
She’d worked her ass off through school to earn it.
“A literature professor,” I finished lamely.
The nurse flushed. “Oh, I...excuse me, Dr. Kavanagh.” She turned to Aspen apologetically, but Aspen waved it away before sending me a strange look.
I shrugged, not caring if I’d sounded prissy. Right now, I wanted everyone she encountered to worship her and treat her as if she was the only thing that mattered.
It took a few minutes after that for us to leave the hospital. When I drew her car keys from my pocket, she zeroed in on them.
“I can drive, you know.”
“Oh, really?” Flipping her off, I asked, “How many fingers?”
Instead of getting offended and telling me to behave, she squinted and leaned toward me, stepping off balance and nearly falling into me. I caught her around the waist, keeping her upright.
“Wrong answer. I’m driving. Besides, we came here together. How do you expect me to get home?”
Instead of pulling away to walk on her own as she would have if she were completely coherent, she leaned a little more heavily against me. “I could drive you back to campus to get your car.”
There she went again, thinking I had my own set of wheels. I sighed. “You can’t even see three feet in front of you. I’m driving.” When she frowned at me, I merely sent her a saccharine smile. “Deal with it, sweetheart.”
She sighed, giving in, and rested her head on my shoulder as I led her the rest of the way to her car.
It felt nice, but I still had to glance around to make sure no one saw us.
I doubted anyone would fire her just because she was hurt, and drugged, and had no idea what she was doing.
But I knew I shouldn’t risk it, except she felt too nice in my arms for me to let go.
“There you go.” I handed Aspen a glass of water.
“Thank you.” She accepted it and popped a pill into her mouth before swallowing the contents.
I sat on the edge of her bed beside her, my hip dangerously close to hers, even though she was covered by a few layers of blankets. I could still feel her warmth soaking through them.