Sweet Nothing

by Jamie McGuire

  I rolled my eyes and threw a soy sauce packet at her face. “I’m outta here.”

  “Break’s not over yet!” Deb called after me.

  I walked out of the break room and down the hall, pressing the button to the elevator. It opened, and I stepped inside with a nervous new father and a brand new, empty car seat.

  “Going home today?” I asked.

  He beamed. “Yeah.”

  I looked down at the carrier. It was brown and cream. No help at all. “Boy or girl?”

  He couldn’t stop smiling. “Girl.”

  “Congratulations,” I said.

  The elevator doors opened to the maternity ward, and I waited for him to step out, then followed, stopping at one of the three large windows of the nursery. More than half the cribs were taken.

  Georgia walked by in bright scrubs. Large pieces of golden-brown hair had fallen from her ponytail, and her eyes were red and tired.

  “Full house?” I asked.

  “Let me tell ya somethin’,” she said in her thick Mississippi accent. “It’s a full moon tonight. If you get bored in the ER, you come on up here and I’ll show you busy.”

  I chuckled, and she winked, her scrubs swishing as she made her way to one of the delivery rooms.

  “Cute, aren’t they?” Dr. Rosenberg said from behind me. “I come up here a lot to center myself and recharge.”

  “I’m just trying to get away from Deb,” I joked.

  Dr. Rosenberg laughed. “I haven’t seen you at Corner Hole lately. I guess you’ve been busy.”

  “I guess so,” I said, staring through the glass with a smile. The babies were cute, but I was thinking of Josh. My face fell, and I looked at the doctor. “Since when are you a regular at Corner Hole?”

  “Since I never see you anymore, I guess.”

  I pressed my lips together, but the edges of my mouth turned up anyway. “I know. I’ve been preoccupied.”

  “How is that going?” Dr. Rosenberg asked.

  I didn’t mean to, but I sighed. And then I gushed. And then I couldn’t stop, even when I saw the doctor’s expression change from polite to blank.

  “That’s great,” he said. His tone was the one he used with Deb or the other nurses when they tried to chat with him. “I wish you all the happiness.”

  “You wish me all the happiness?” I said, disgust dripping from every word.

  My reaction put a spark back in his eyes. “No, actually, I don’t, but you haven’t taken my advice thus far. I don’t suspect you’ll start now.”

  “What are you talking about? What advice?”

  “That you should stay away from him. He’s bad news, Avery. I know things are new and fun now, but …” He looked around and then took my arm, gently guiding me around the corner. “Would you just listen to me? We were friends once.”

  “Were we?”

  He seemed hurt. “I thought so.”

  He touched my face with his fingertips and I pulled away, glancing around. I startled when I saw Josh standing ten feet away, murder in his eyes.

  I took a step back. “You knew he was there, didn’t you?”

  “Of course not,” Dr. Rosenberg said. “Josh.”

  Josh nodded once, and the doctor excused himself, walking toward the elevators.

  When Josh approached, I pointed to the empty spot where the doctor was standing. “That wasn’t anything. He’s being really weird, but I didn’t … that wasn’t …” While I fumbled for words, I noticed Josh’s jaw twitching. “I know how it looks.”

  “How does it look?” Josh finally managed to say. His words were short. He was trying his best to keep from losing his temper.

  “I can see that you’re angry, but I’m at work. He’s my boss.”

  Josh shoved his hands into his pockets and shrugged. “What the fuck does that even mean, Avery?”

  I leaned in. “Keep your voice down!” I hissed. I started to walk past him, but he reached out, grabbing my arm.

  I looked around to see if anyone noticed, and then back at him. “Let me go before someone sees.”

  “Are you still in love with him?”

  My mouth fell open. “I was never in love with him. He’s married. What kind of person do you think I am?”

  Josh’s brows pulled together. “C’mon, baby, open your eyes. He wants you.”

  I looked around. “So what if he does? Am I a robot? Just because the beautiful doctor all the nurses want is interested in me, I have to fall on my back with my legs spread? Give me a little more credit than that, Josh. Just because I fell for you doesn’t mean I’m naïve.”

  Josh blinked, unsure whether to be flattered or insulted. “I don’t know how to take that.”

  “Take it any way you want. My break’s over.”

  “Let me walk you down.”

  “Dr. Rosenberg is likely down there. It’s probably best you stay away from him,” I said.

  “Oh, he’d fucking love it if I stayed out of his way.”

  “Like it or not, I work with him. You’re going to have to trust me.”

  “It’s him I don’t trust.”

  “Josh,” I warned. “I love my job. If you can’t be professional, stay away from Dr. Rosenberg. Don’t ruin this.”

  He was clearly unconvinced, so I shouldered past him to the elevators.

  “Avery,” he called over his shoulder. He turned around, but the elevator doors were already closing.

  I made my way to work, unable to ignore the stress and tension crawling through my muscles. What I needed was to hit the gym and empty my mind, but I didn’t have time. I couldn’t miss work, and any free time spent without Avery felt wasted, even if the late nights and early shifts would eventually make me crash and burn.

  I’d scrubbed the back of the meat wagon after our last patient until my knuckles felt raw, but there was still a residual discontent rumbling just under the surface. The conversation we’d had about my sister still haunted me. Avery hadn’t run away screaming, but I’d seen the pain in her eyes when I’d told her it was all my fault. I don’t know why she’d stuck around after that. Maybe it was the alcohol. I worried that she would come to her senses any minute.

  It was a relief that Avery hadn’t insisted that I go into detail about each stripe tattooed on my ribs. If she had, I’d be even more of a fucking mess. Women usually just assumed the tattoos didn’t have any meaning, so I’d never had to explain what it meant—not that I would tell them the truth anyway.

  I was caught off guard that Avery not only asked, but cared enough to listen.

  “Earth to Josh.” Quinn waved his hand in front of my face and I slapped it away. He chuckled. “That girl has you sprung.”

  I shook my head as I rounded the back of the ambulance, stopping mid-step when I saw Doc Rose. He was checking his phone as he walked across the parking lot toward the ambulance bay doors, but when he recognized me, he dropped his phone into his pocket, staring right at me with a smug smile.

  I nodded back to him, whispering a string of expletives under my breath.

  “You really don’t like that guy, do you? He still trying to put the moves on Avery?” Quinn asked, closing the back of the ambulance.

  I wiped my hands on my pants, fantasizing about using the shears hanging from one of the loops in my cargos. Doc Rose was a cocky fucker now, but that fake smile would disappear if he was stabbed in the face. I shook the violent thought away. “Whoa.”

  “What?”

  “Feeling stabby. Is this what it’s like to be jealous?”

  “Want to kill him?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Yep. You’re jealous. Is he bothering her?”

  “She doesn’t see it that way, not that she’d tell me if he were.”

  “Can’t blame her there. Get your hand off your shears.”

  I pointed my whole hand in the doctor’s general direction. “How does a guy like him, who has everything, just throw it all away? He’s married, with kids. He has the whole American dream
waiting for him at home.”

  “Pussy is a powerful thing, man. Look how it has you twisted.”

  “Don’t talk about Avery like that,” I warned.

  Quinn held up his hands. “Who said it’s the American dream to have kids? I don’t want no little Quinns runnin’ around here.”

  “No one does, brother,” I agreed.

  Quinn shot me a look, and then something in the parking lot caught his eye. “Speak of the Devil.”

  Avery was making her way across the lot, smiling brightly, a paper bag in her hand. My stomach growled as the red symbol on the side came into view, but my attention quickly returned to the skintight jeans she wore with a simple white tank top. I’ve never known another woman to look so fucking good with no effort.

  “She’s off today?” Quinn asked.

  I kept my gaze on Avery. “Yeah.”

  “Did you know she would be here? Is that why you spent so much time cleaning out the back?”

  “Maybe.” I wiped the ridiculous grin off my face, crossing my arms and leaning against the fender of the ambulance, trying not to look too eager.

  “I thought you could use some lunch,” Avery said, stopping a few feet from me. She held out the bag from JayWok.

  I walked toward her, looping my arms around her waist, lifting her feet from the ground and planting a kiss on her lips. She let hers part, granting me deeper access. I groaned, reluctant to pull away. Needing her had become worse, not better, and I wondered if it was normal to feel so desperate for her, a deep-seated worry that we didn’t have much time left.

  “Only if you join me,” I replied.

  Her smile widened, and she gave a quick nod to Quinn before returning her attention to me. “Of course. Let me go say hi to Deb, and then we can find some shade. It’s too nice to eat inside, and we’ve only got a few weeks of summer left. Might as well enjoy it.”

  “Tell Deb I’d like to eat out too,” Quinn interrupted. I recoiled watching him wink and then run his tongue over his lower lip. “She’ll know what it means.”

  Avery made a gagging sound as she walked away.

  I smacked him on the chest. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

  Quinn rubbed his chest, not looking the least bit apologetic. “What the fuck is wrong with you? You’ve lost your sense of humor. That girl has you wrapped around her little finger, man.”

  I watched Avery disappear behind the emergency room’s sliding glass doors. I couldn’t argue with Quinn. Avery scared the hell out of me, but I couldn’t stay away from her, even if a part of me knew it wouldn’t end well.

  Before Avery, I’d made mistakes I was too ashamed to ever admit. I knew when I did, she wouldn’t look at me the same way. Running my hand absentmindedly over my side, I pictured the large gray door that stood between my future and me only a few short years ago.

  “Brooke!” I yelled, running into the lobby of the clinic.

  Seeing Daniel pacing in front of a door, I knew exactly where she was.

  Daniel took one look at me and shoved his shoulder against my chest, using all his strength to keep me back from the doorway. He was my closest friend, but if he didn’t get out of my way, I was going to slam my fist into his jaw.

  “You have to calm down, Josh,” Daniel said. “You can’t let her see you like this. She needs you to be strong for her.”

  I gripped his shirt at the collar. “What happened? I told her I would be back tomorrow. Why? I left for one fucking day!” I stared at the door, knowing I was already too late. My body shook, and I pushed against Daniel.

  He put his hand against my chest and held me back. “Josh, stop. You’re going to regret this.”

  I looked down and then glowered at him.

  “You’re my friend, Daniel, but if you don’t take your hand off me, I’m going to break your fucking fingers.”

  Daniel sighed. “I can’t. You know I can’t. If you bust in there now, she’ll hate you for it.”

  “You think I don’t know what you did?” I said through my teeth. “What you’re hoping you’ll get out of this?”

  I stepped back. I could have easily overpowered him, but I was so gutted I couldn’t find it in me to follow through on my threats. Maybe what was really holding me back was what it would mean if I stopped her.

  My face crumbled, and I rubbed the back of my neck. Maybe I was the selfish bastard Brooke had accused me of being.

  “She needs me to be there for her,” I said.

  “If you had been, she wouldn’t be here,” Daniel spat out.

  In one movement, I shoved him against the wall. He tried to push me off him, but I didn’t budge.

  A short, squat woman with chains hooked to her glasses touched me on the arm. “Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to leave if you can’t calm down.” Her slicked-back bun barely moved when she moved her head. Her matching blue scrubs had been ironed and starched, but the bags under her eyes told a long story of hard work and experience. She wasn’t going to allow any nonsense, and even if she did, I couldn’t make her day even harder. She was a nurse, just trying to do her job.

  “Keep it down or you’ll be sent outside,” she said, her eyes focusing on my grip on Daniel. She would keep order, but I could see she was sympathetic to the guilt in my eyes. “Don’t make me call security.”

  I released Daniel’s shirt and shoved him one last time, walking several steps away, breathing hard.

  “I should have left earlier,” I said, pacing. “I wouldn’t have hit traffic.”

  “It wouldn’t have made a difference, Josh. She made her decision.”

  I thought back over the morning commute back to college after break. An accident on I-95 set me back a few hours. It was stupid, turning off my phone when she was two hours away, scared and pregnant.

  “I didn’t get her voicemail until this morning,” I said.

  Daniel stopped trying to pretend to comfort me. He was only there for one thing. He wanted to be the shoulder she cried on after she ended the only thing standing between them.

  “We got in a fight,” I said.

  “I know.”

  “Of course you know,” I snapped. “You just loved it, didn’t you? Her crying to you about what a selfish jackass I am.”

  He didn’t respond.

  “I had to clear my head, Daniel. We don’t even know each other, and we had a baby on the way.”

  Daniel barely listened, watching the door for signs of Brooke.

  “I knew she was just scared. I knew she didn’t mean it, but I’m scared, too,” I said to no one. Daniel had turned his back to me. “I wasn’t sure if I could handle this. I was terrified something bad was going to happen … to her and the baby … because of me. Because of my past. I’m a fucking tragedy magnet, you know that.”

  “Ironic, isn’t it?” Daniel said, all pretenses vanished. “You ran because you were scared of something bad happening to them. Now Brooke is behind that door, doing something she swore she couldn’t do. You look away for a second, and someone dies. Just like Kayla.”

  “Fuck you,” I said, sinking down on my haunches. I hung my head in my hands as I thought about the disastrous visit with my parents. I’d gone home to take a break from Brooke and the mess I’d created. Instead, Mom and Dad yelled at me for an entire evening. They’d said they didn’t blame me for what had happened to Kayla, but I could see it in my mother’s glassy eyes and smell it on her whiskey-laced breath. I’d managed to ruin everything for everyone who got close to me. I was fucking cursed.

  “I just need to see her,” I pleaded to the nurse.

  She looked down at me, sad. “I’m sorry, I can’t allow that. Family only.” Her painful words were cut off by the door opening behind her.

  I quickly pushed to my feet as Brooke came into view. Not so long ago, we had been strangers. The past two months had been a crash course of getting to know each other once she told me she was pregnant, and that the baby was mine.

  Her eyes were red-rimmed and swollen
, her platinum hair mussed. Her russet irises fell on me, and she wrapped her arms around her waist.

  “It’s done?” I asked, feeling the blood drain from my face.

  Brooke nodded, a fresh sob racking her body. I wanted to wrap my arms around her, but it felt too familiar for two people who’d spent one drunken night together.

  “I had to do it, Josh. I’m not ready to be a mom.”

  I nodded, linking my fingers behind my neck and blowing out a long breath. There was a lot I wanted to say. I couldn’t understand how she could be so impulsive, why she didn’t wait for me to call her back so we could discuss it, but I wasn’t angry. We had both been so scared, and now I wasn’t sure how to feel. She’d made her choice, and neither of us could take it back.

  I watched, helpless, as Brooke fell into Daniel’s arms. Daniel’s. He’d made sure it was him she ran to for comfort, and I stood there alone, feeling like I’d stepped into an intimate moment between them that I had no business interrupting. Perhaps I didn’t. Daniel had told me after I’d slept with Brooke that he’d been in love with her since high school. When I told him the news about the baby, he had gone to her and promised to stick around, no matter what I decided.

  Brooke’s cries from the night before rang in my ears. She had said she didn’t know me, didn’t trust me, and she was at home worrying about the future while I was busy trying to deal with my own feelings about it all. She was right, and I couldn’t blame her for saying it out loud.

  Brooke’s knees buckled, and Daniel held her, stroking her hair. He looked at me as if he felt I was intruding, too.

  “Should I go?” I asked Brooke.

  She turned to look at me, her cheek against Daniel’s shoulder. “You’re free, Josh,” she said, sniffing. “We both are.”

  The sliding doors opened across the lot as the air whooshed, and Deb slipped outside, smiling brightly at Quinn.

  I was gripping the JayWok bag so tightly in my fist, my knuckles hurt.

  “You all right, man?” Quinn asked as he stood at the rear bumper of the ambulance.

  “I’m good.” I turned my attention back to Deb. “Where’s Avery?”

  “She’s talking to Dr. Rosenberg.”

  My body moved toward the door of its own accord, but I stopped as the doors opened. Avery stepped out, laughing as she glanced back over her shoulder to Doc Rose, who followed closely behind. His palm was pressed against the small of her back as they walked, but she didn’t seem to notice, or maybe she didn’t mind.