Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Sadie
A w, shit.
That horrid stinging cramp in my gut has started up, rumbling and demanding my attention when I listlessly pick at my toast the next morning. It’s a warning sign I know all too well. To make sure, as if I even need to, I try to read something on my phone, and it’s like my brain has forgotten how, the words distant and unreachable.
Looks like I didn’t avoid that migraine after all.
Gary squawks. “Fucknuggets,” he declares, making my skull vibrate sickly.
“Fuck off,” I whimper, and then coo at him apologetically when he lets out an affronted cry. “I’m sorry, darling.”
“Cock,” he says, sounding conciliatory. He knows I didn’t mean it.
My contraceptive implant keeps my cycle light, even makes me skip a period every so often, but it does nothing about the menstrual head nukes I get about seven times out of ten. If I take my sumatriptan soon enough, I can head it off at the pass, salvage the day with nothing more than low grade dizziness and fatigue. But when I fumble my handbag open to find nothing in my meds compartment, I realise I never managed to get my last prescription refilled due to a national shortage of one of the key components of the drug. I close my eyes, wanting to cry. I think the sumatriptan shortage is still a problem, and without it, I’m looking at twenty minutes, half an hour at best before I can expect to be blinded by aura and have pain so intense that if someone offered me a gun, I’d put it to my head and pull the trigger.
I call my doctor asking for an urgent telephone appointment, and by some miracle, they have a backup locum doctor available for me within ten minutes. When I explain the situation, he takes pity on me and prescribes me an alternative, together with a new prescription for a drug designed to prevent the migraines from ever happening, to stop it in its tracks at the first threat of one. I might try it, but to be honest, I just said yes to anything he said so that he’d get the prescription emailed over to the pharmacy.
Unfortunately, the jagged silver lines start zig zagging across my vision before the call ends. It’s too late. All I can hope for now is that the meds reduce the pain.
Trouble is, I don’t really feel well enough to walk to the pharmacy to get them. I can’t see clearly enough to get there.
Leo . He’s always been happy to help me before, and I can’t imagine he wouldn’t now that we’re… involved .
He answers on the second ring, which is a mercy because the sound is painful. “Hi, gorgeous.”
“I’m having a migraine,” I mumble, rubbing my eyes even though I know it won’t do any good. “I’m out of my meds, can you please - ”
“I’m on my way.” He hangs up, and before I’ve finished trying without success to text Em so she knows to rebook my appointments, he’s tapping on my door. The sound feels like it’s being tapped directly onto the surface of my brain meats. I open the door, the hammers on my skull intensifying, and the next thing I know, I’m lying on my bed in a haze of pain, the cool pillow cushioning my poor head, with Leo telling me not to worry and that he’ll take care of it all for me.
Leo
My time to shine.
While I carried her to her bedroom, she managed to mumble out something about her prescription at the Tesco pharmacy. Covering Gary’s cage with his cloth to keep him quiet so he doesn’t hurt her with his cawing and profanities, I head out, a man on a mission.
I’ll admit I derive a certain amount of pleasure from telling the chemist that I’m picking up a prescription for my girlfriend .
If we haven’t yet said the words or agreed on terms and labels, that’s what she is to me. That’s how I’m going to treat her.
It’s not long before I have both packets of pills, along with some cooling gel strips, a drum of ginger chai latte because I heard that ginger and caffeine are both good for migraines, and a tub of her favourite Ben & Jerry’s for when she’s feeling better.
She looks terrible when I get back, holding her head like her skull will split apart if she doesn’t. I read the instructions on her prescriptions and, picking the one for when a migraine has already begun, manage to get her to sit up enough to lean on me and slip one of the tablets under her tongue. I can’t make her truly comfortable, but when I reluctantly leave, I know that I’ve gotten her as close as possible, with a tall glass of water on her bedside table, the blackout curtains drawn, and a cool strip on her forehead above her right eye.
I don’t have a choice about going back to work. Nate Woodruff’s coming in specially, my afternoon got booked out just for him, and he’s not going to be in the country much longer. His dad’s latest cerebral western blockbuster is premiering in LA in a few days, and he wanted this ink done before then. Besides, he’s a mate, and I don’t want to let him down.
When I get in, Emily, bless her heart, is busily rebooking Sadie’s appointments for the day. She came up with the excellent idea of leaving the last day of the month free in Sadie’s calendar in case she has a migraine and needs to move her appointments, and that’s certainly paying dividends today. The newest Mrs G knows how to keep us organised and running smooth as silk. “Nate’s in your room,” she mouths to me, and then carries on her current phone call. She doesn’t bat an eyelid. Between Chris Richards and the rest of the Turn It Up band members and Nate the up and coming actor, she’s not phased by celebrities anymore. She knows they’re just people doing a job who are employing me to do mine.
Nate’s father is one of the most famous and iconic film stars of all time, a genuine Hollywood legend, and Nate resembles him so closely that even someone who didn’t know who he was would say he looks just like Mac Woodruff. But the resemblance begins and ends there. They’re completely different people, and they’ve only recently developed anything resembling a father-son relationship with each other.
Nate comes to me because I’m good at what I do, and also because I’m a good listener. He hasn’t had many people to confide in so far in his life. So I’m not surprised when his main topic of conversation was how badly his dad fucked up with his birthday, sending him a card with his older brother’s name on it three weeks late and telling Nate he was overreacting when he called him on it. They still have a long way to go before they’re fully on board with each other, I reckon.
As I continue with his sea life themed tattoo sleeve, a long term project we’ve been doing off and on for the past eighteen months or so whenever he’s in town, he gives me an odd look. “What’s her name?” He smirks. “You’ve got that low key permanent smile that can only mean one thing.”
I look up from my shading and consider talking to him. I haven’t said anything to Eli and Dean, even, despite their curious looks and obvious restraint, and they’re my blood. But Nate’s still a friend, and he’s outta here next week. And the urge to tell someone about what’s been happening without having to deal with the third degree is suddenly irresistible. “I do, huh?”
“Unmistakable,” he confirms, and there’s a tension around his eyes making them crease ever so slightly, like someone who’s broken the same bone as me before and knows how it feels.
Fuck it . I’m only human. “Sadie Stewart,” I mutter casually before reapplying the needle.
He bursts out laughing, holding his other hand up so I’ll stop. “You’re shitting me?”
“I shit you not, amigo,” I reply, a smile spreading unstoppably across my already smug face.
He punches the air. “Alriiiiiiight! About time you two hooked up.” He shakes his head, still chuckling. “After all this time, what finally made it happen?”
I think about it. “You know, I’m not sure,” I say slowly, wondering when the point of no return took place. Sure, there was the wedding kiss, but she could have backed away afterwards, although she did run the hell out of there like a bat out of hell. But in the end, she didn’t. She followed my trail of breadcrumbs, and now I know what it feels like to sleep with her bare skin against mine. I cover my thoughts with a cocky shrug. “Guess she finally saw what a handsome, smart, hilariously funny guy I am, and you can’t blame the poor girl for wanting a piece.”
He snorts. “Well, whatever it was, I’m glad, man.” He gives me a genuine, kind of sad smile. “You’re a lucky guy, and I’m happy it finally happened for you.”
I tip my head to one side. “You knew?”
“Not for sure,” he admits, “but now and again I caught you looking at her, and…”
“And you know the look.” Damn empathy. I feel for him, and I hope he has the same happy ending that I do. Now that I know how it feels to be with the person I’ve always wanted, I can’t bear the thought of going back to the yearning, the pain, the raw existence he’s still going through if my guess is on point. “You know, you can talk to me about anything, man, not only about your dad.”
He looks me in the eye, and I can see I called it. “Maybe some other time,” he finally says, resigned and quieted.
Just like I used to be.
The second Nate’s session is over, I high tail it back to Sadie’s. I’m meant to be finishing off payroll, but I always start that early enough in the month that it ends up being just a click of a few buttons when the time comes. I can delay it for a night.
When I open her door using the keys I kept from earlier, I’m relieved to see that she’s up, sitting on the sofa and listening to an audiobook on low volume with a blanket wrapped around her, blowing on a mug of soup. She’s still pale and with tired eyes, but smiling. I was prepared for her to still be asleep, so this is a very pleasant surprise. I tell her as much, and she reaches towards me.
“The meds did the trick,” she says, her voice still quiet, so I lower mine too. “I’ve still got the postdrome nonsense to get through, but I no longer want to rip my own brain out.”
“Always a good thing. I like your brain where it is.” I give her the gentlest kiss, trying not to nudge her head at all in the process.
“You do, huh.” She leans her head against mine, a little heavy, like she’s sleepy.
“Definitely. It’s big and sexy and fits perfectly inside your cute as fuck skull.”
“You honestly do talk the biggest load of shit sometimes,” she murmurs.
“You love it, really.”
“Bunch of wank ,” Gary pipes up from shelf near the door, giving his wings a good flap. I swear he smirks at me with his wry little beak. I grin back. He’s worth his weight in gold.
“You said it, Gaz,” Sadie giggles quietly.
I sit on the arm of her sofa and let her rest against me for a few moments. And this is the time I notice what she’s actually listening to. Some guy named Remy has a happy trail and looks all sweaty, and that definitely seems to be doing it for the female narrator. In fact, it sounds like he’s on a one way ticket to getting profoundly laid, from the desire tingeing this woman’s voice.
“Are you listening to smut?” I ask, my mind zinging with thrills at the thought of her reading good romance and getting all worked up. And they intensify when I think about myself getting involved with that… Fuck yeah, times a thousand.
She gives a little laugh. “ Wood You Marry Me ,” she says.
“Absolutely. Just name the date and time.”
She laughs and gives me a playful little shove with her fingertips. “No, you assbutt. It’s the title of the book. Wood You Marry Me by Daphne Elliot. Lumberjacks are my jam.”
“Assbutt?” I laugh. “Well, if that floats your boat, I’m gonna order a box of flannel shirts and some Timberlands. I think I could do the lumberjack thing.” I stand in front of her and give her my best guess of a lumberjack style pose, which appears to be standing up straight, shoulders back, crotch out, with my thumbs in my belt loops. “Seriously, any lumbersexy scenes you want to act out, I am one hundred percent down.”
She laughs and reaches for my hands, squeezing them both. Her smile fades, and she actually looks rather serious for a moment. What’s coming? I wait as she visibly gathers her thoughts. “Hey, listen,” she says finally, her voice a little stronger now, but still not normal volume. “I want to thank you for this morning. You really helped me out a lot when I needed you.”
“Anytime, Pumpkin,” I say, kissing the back of her hand.
She sighs. “I know. Literally any time I’ve ever needed you, you've been there. You’ve always been there, straight away. And I appreciated it every time, but…I feel like I’ve never really properly thanked you for it all. The many, many times you’ve gone above and beyond for me. I’ve thought about them all afternoon, and I’ve said the word ‘thanks’, but never really told you how much you mean to me, and how incredible you are for doing it all.”
I melt like hot wax.
Reaching forward to lift her chin with a couple of fingers, I kiss her, a little firmer than before, but still not pushing my luck. The last thing I want is to make her head hurt again. “I said ‘anytime’, and I mean it. You can rely on me being there whenever, for whatever, whether that’s picking up a prescription or hiding bodies and giving you an alibi.”
She looks me in the eye, her lids heavy but her gaze sharp and keen. “You mean that.” It’s not a question.
“One hundred percent. I’ll always be there for you.” One more kiss, this time on her cheek.
I spend the night with her, not doing anything except holding her while she sleeps. My body wants her, but my heart is happy she’s getting some rest and wants her to sleep undisturbed so she feels better tomorrow. She curls into me in the crook of my arm that’s always been reserved for her. When I shift my body at one point, needing to stretch because my shoulders are getting stiff, she frowns, mumbling a little as she unconsciously tries to pull me back to her. I chuckle quietly. “Alright, woman,” I whisper. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Mmhmm,” she replies without waking.
“And I’ll love you until I die,” I whisper, just so the message gets planted into her subconscious like sleep hypnosis.
“Mmmhmm.”