She stepped out of the room, light with elation. The assignment was a success.
Star and her other colleagues hugged her goodbye, tears in their eyes.
“I’ll be back,” Orchid promised.
The next day, she boarded the plane with a sense of satisfaction.
Over the ocean, one movie into her flight, New York suddenly seemed closer than it’d been during the past month and a half.
Phoenix hadn’t contacted her. Not once. After they’d spent months talking or texting several times a week.
Caleb’s warning echoed, again, that Phoenix lost interest easily. Her parents. Phoenix. Will he even remember to meet me at the airport?
CHAPTER 18
THE DENIAL TWIST
Phoenix
An unexpected thing happened when Phoenix’s phone buzzed. His heart ramped up with the thrill of seeing a text from Orchid.
“Hey Phoenix, I’m in baggage claim. Are you meeting me, or am I walking home?”
One side of his mouth quirked up, maybe for the first time in weeks. Then he shook his head, attempting to clear memories of Orchid’s heated stare, the tingle of her lips against his cheek, and her rose-tinged scent. Orchid’s honeyed voice filled his mind. These six weeks of therapy had worked him physically harder than any sport he’d ever played, or any triathlon. He’d fought to strengthen what remained of his muscles and learned how to manipulate prostheses.
During the lulls in therapy and exercise repetitions, he’d ruminated on solutions to an impossible problem.
The potential of their relationship, he realized, hinged on what he represented. They only made sense as a couple if he could be her protector and model of physical perfection, workout friend, dance partner, European travel guide.
At work, when he’d presented ads of injured soldiers, Orchid couldn’t even bring herself to look at the images—and those survivors had injuries less egregious than his.
He could find no way around the fact that he could not be who Orchid needed. There was no way she’d accept him.
He imagined her reaction to his wounds, flaps of muscle pulled taut over abrupt endings of bone, visible stitch lines. She’d be repulsed. Maybe her kindness would obligate her to look the other way, and he’d selfishly gain comfort from her presence. Then, even if she could get past the shock of seeing him so changed, how could he ask her to live this life? How can I hold her back from travel and beaches and everyday normalcy?
Orchid, who loved cobblestoned Paris and dancing, wouldn’t love wheelchairs and canes. Orchid, who couldn’t look at a cut on her own foot, wouldn’t be able to look at rows of stitches closing the blunt ends of limbs that made no sense. Maybe she’d suppress her disgust, at least at first. She’d go along, following a path out of pity for which she’d find no escape.
He’d pondered for long minutes. The phone rang. He startled at the vibrating cold steel in his hand. He answered before he could decide what he’d say.
“Hey,” he said, his voice sounding surprisingly raspy.
“Hey yourself. How are you? Are you picking me up?” she got right to the point.
“Nope.”
“What, did you forget about me?”
“Not exactly,” he answered. Guilt washed over him. Protecting her was no longer in his capability. He thought of calling her a car service.
“Are you okay? You sound funny.”
Phoenix recovered, basking in the normalcy of her sweet voice, in contrast to the sympathy and unease which tinged the calls from his office and friends.
“Funny?” he asked, delaying the response to the real questions. “You know me, I’m always funny.”
“That you are. You would’ve found me funny in China. Like, trying to speak with taxi drivers was a hoot.”
“Yeah? How was your trip?”
He really wanted to know, and to hear her talking in her bubbly, happy voice before he broke the news. He could hear her heels clicking along the tile floors of the airport.
“Good. Crazy. I called for your advice. You didn’t call back,” she said.
“You did?”
“You didn’t get my messages?”
“Nope, I’ve been kind of out of touch.”
“Have you been busy? What have you been up to these last six weeks?”
He paused. “You’d run away screaming if I told you,” he said dryly, picturing Tish’s look of horror and Orchid’s amplified one from his dreams.
“Let me guess. Clients from hell? Creative teams pitching multiple accounts at once? Don’t tell me you lost that coveted elixir brand.”
“No, I’m happy to report we landed REBBL.”
“Wow, congrats, that’s a coup. I didn’t keep up on the news much from over there.”
“Yeah, we know how much you love watching the news,” he said.
“Very funny. So, I’m all screwed up on time and desperate for a shower, but we should make plans. To catch up.”
End of the idle chitchat.
“I actually wanted to talk to you about that.” His throat tightened, giving away more in his tone than he intended. He heard her footsteps halt on the other end of the line.
“Orchid, you there?”
“Yeah, I’m here. What do you mean, you want to talk to me about that?”
He almost changed his mind. He didn’t want to do this. He thought about telling her the truth. The truth would end up damaging her more than his evasion of it.
“Orchid, I can’t be your mentor anymore.”
She was quiet for a moment. “Meaning?” Her tone sounded hopeful.
“Meaning that we shouldn’t work together. It’s probably better if we don’t see each other.”
“Why?” Her confusion pained him. Then, the pain of his wounds steeled him.
“I’m really sorry. It’s just not a good idea.”
“Um, you know, if it’s that silly thing I said at the airport, just ignore me. I hadn’t really slept the night before. I was rattling off some nonsense. Like now. When I’m tired, I’m a mess. Really, I’m not expecting any—”
He could hear the hyperventilation in her machine-gunned words. He cut her off.
“It’s not you. It’s me. I really don’t have time for anything extra. I’m all tied up with the agency and everything.”
“Well, if you’re going through a busy period, we could just catch up afterwards. You know, figure out our next project to work on?”
“No, I don’t think that’s a good idea. Better just make a clean break.” His voice stumbled at the unexpected image of clean breaks where limbs had been.
“Well, I don’t see what the big deal is. Like I said, it’s just work.”
He wavered, wanting to buy into her optimism. He pictured what she pictured. The two of them, bent over drawings, pointing at one headline or another, debating each other in his agency’s board room. That was the old him. I’ve been hurt, he thought of saying now. You’re not going to like this. Instead, he spoke different words, imparting gentleness in his tone.
“It’s not you. You’ve been great. But best not to call anymore, okay?”
He could hear her suck air. “I should just block you from my phone.”
He nodded. It had worked. “You should.”
She was gone, the phone dead against his palm. In a prison where he couldn’t control basic mobility, he could protect Orchid. Dreams—of a dark-haired beauty, traversing the Andes, or cradling his own child—scattered like dust.
Goodbye, Orchid.
CHAPTER 19
ALONE IN MY HOME
Orchid
In disbelief, Orchid rode the subway to her downtown apartment. She sure scared off Phoenix. He didn’t buy the “I was just babbling” claim. She didn’t either.
Now what was she going to do? Forget him. Move on. Just like
she had after every other heartbreak in her life.
She dragged her luggage over the dirty platform. The damned elevator was broken. The Times had published an exposé that two-thirds of New York subways weren’t wheelchair accessible. Normally, she wouldn’t notice. Today, she really needed the lift. She stomped up the stairs, huffing under the weight of two suitcases.
Her apartment felt cold after six weeks away. Nothing but condiments in the fridge. She could eat dressing, she supposed. She wasn’t hungry anyway. She turned on the TV just to hear a human voice. Weird to see American personalities instead of Chinese newscasters.
Then, the shock hit her in waves.
A world devoid of Phoenix. She shouldn’t have dreamed. Hadn’t he hinted at other trips, after they’d returned from Cannes? Her foolish heart had hoped that France might be the romantic spot where they’d return, recapturing their first magical week there. It was too much, she couldn’t think about their trip to Paris, down the shore. His dark scowl.
Maybe she shouldn’t have confessed her attraction. Maybe she’d pushed too fast. What if she’d played hard-to-get? Did men like Phoenix just get bored? The stupid questions all led to the same conclusions: there was no changing this outcome. He’d avoided her for six weeks, why would he change his mind now that she was back in New York?
She’d survived the death of her parents, been independent since she was eighteen, and thrived for six weeks in a country where she was illiterate. But this was too much.
Phoenix had been kind when they were together. First, he had kept her cover when her boss had introduced them. He took her lead and didn’t mention that they’d actually met the night before. When she’d stumbled into him in the men’s room at a club.
After letting her save face, they’d worked together on a military campaign. At their first meeting, Phoenix had presented images of fit men and women proudly exhibiting missing limbs or gapped teeth. Orchid had stared at the scarred skin and twisted muscle. Without wanting to, she had pictured the trauma that must’ve caused those wounds. The possibilities unspooled memories from when she was twelve, jolted awake as locked wheels skidded over ice. Her parents’ car crumpled into a tree.
Phoenix’s voice had faltered then as he noticed Orchid’s reaction. He had skimmed ahead until the presentation stopped on a page of logos.
“Enough about the creative. Maybe you want to talk about plans to drive awareness?”
Orchid had lowered the hand blocking her view of the screen and nodded, thankful for his thoughtfulness. His gaze had caught hers. Deep and blue and kind. “You okay?”
With him, she was more than okay. Later, he’d flown with her to Cannes, guiding her through her first creativity festival. Invited her to the Effies awards show. After which, she had cheered him on at a triathlon, met his brother, and visited their family’s beach house.
She’d watched the way his mouth widened when he smiled. He’d looked at her from under his lashes.
Their heat ramped up that last week before her trip. He touched her arm while they talked. The night before her departure, they’d connected on another level. He had walked her back to her apartment, even though she didn’t want the evening to end. Before she could help herself, she’d kissed him. If he wasn’t going to ask her out, she’d be the provocative one. And he’d reciprocated. He had kissed her temple, then her cheek and then landed on her lips, while one hand fingered the pleather-edged sash of her dress.
Now this rejection was too much. “Can’t see each other” . . . “better not call.”
Her apartment echoed empty. If only she had a cat, or even a goldfish. She flung her suitcase open and threw her clothes into a dirty hamper. She knew the antidote to her foul mood.
She scooped her phone out of her bag and checked her friends’ social media feeds. Hi hon, guess who’s home? she texted Mandy.
While she waited for a response, she pulled up her email.
In her inbox, a message had arrived from a name she hadn’t seen in forever. With a grimace, she clicked on it.
Hello Orchid,
I’m sorry it’s been sixteen long years. Your dad would whip my ass for being a stranger (may he RIP). I married a few years ago. And now, we’ve had a baby. So, you have a new cousin. I’ve thought of you often. Please give me a call sometime, I’d really like to talk.
Uncle Zach
What? Why now? From memories of childhood, she pictured the gangly grad student who sought her out at her parents’ funeral and put his arm awkwardly around her. He was a skinny version of her dad, both with dark eyes and wavy hair. She’d often thought of her dad’s brother, too, his unexplained abandonment of her as an orphaned twelve-year-old. He’d left her with her mother’s sister one day and never called again. She refused to think about him, a reminder of another person who’d left her.
A text. From Mandy. You get in okay?
Not really, she started to type. No more Phoenix. He didn’t want to see her ever again. This sucked. Reality sunk in. He doesn’t want you.
Before finishing the text to her best friend, Orchid chose Phoenix’s name off her address list. There it was. In block letters, every detail from his business card. No social media links. Because he lived off the grid.
“No need for clients to see me with other clients,” he had explained about his lack of online presence. So, despite living in the same city, she felt as if he’d disappeared among its eight million residents. Caleb had warned her. It hadn’t even taken Phoenix three months to sway her with false charm and then leave with the flimsiest excuse, over a shorter call than she’d received from the dry cleaner.
She made up her mind. Never again. She swiped her phone and deleted his contact info.
CHAPTER 20
LOVE IS BLINDNESS
Veronica
Veronica Walker knew something was amiss. She’d witnessed Phoenix’s grief, his denial, anger and sadness. She’d also seen him pull out of it with resilience that astonished her, faster even than she was able to stop grieving for the son that had been.
She repeated the words she had heard come readily from the rehab staff. “Prostheses are amazing now. You’re lucky to have both knees and elbows. You’ll be able to try whatever you want.”
Maybe the encouragements helped. Or maybe it was the same stubborn determination that got him through grad school, pushed him in sports and led him to risk entrepreneurial pursuits despite everyone’s warnings.
Today his silence alarmed her. He refused every activity she suggested. Shopping? Restaurant? Stroll around the park? No, no, and no.
“It’s good news that you’ll be discharged and ready for outpatient rehab in just another week,” she said, trying again to make conversation.
“That’s good. You can go then, you know,” Phoenix said, striking his now familiar refrain.
“Son, there’s nowhere I’d rather be,” Veronica said firmly, kissing him on the cheek before he could turn away.
“I don’t need you.”
“I know. You don’t need anyone. It’s not need. I want to be here.”
“Well, at least go sleep at my place. You don’t need to stay here on that cot anymore.” Nighttime had gotten easier. Phoenix was no longer waking too hot or too cold or frantic with bad dreams.
Leveraging the rare instance in which they agreed, she broached a new topic.
“So, what’s wrong? Are you okay?”
“I hurt, Mom,” he said simply.
Her gut clenched. She looked him all over, seeking signs of fluid buildup at the wound sites or some other discomfort. She suspected pain was a constant, dulled with narcotics, but not eliminated.
“More than usual?” she asked.
“No,” he admitted.
“Is there something else?” she asked, tugging the sheet straight in an attempt to do something, anything, for this independent son who wanted
no help from her.
With fury she didn’t expect, he punched the mattress with his hand. “I’m missing half my limbs, Mom. Does there need to be something else?”
She stared at the desperation lining his face. The emotions she’d held in check nearly caved.
“What am I going to do when I’m not being coddled in rehab?” he demanded.
She’d had the same worries, especially in the early days before he’d woken. But he’d moved past the useless what-if’s.
“Honey, no one’s coddling you. And you’re going to do whatever you want. You’ll go back to your place, back to work.”
“And then what?” he growled, “Who’s going to want me?”
So, this is it.
His pain pained her. She tested his prickly edges.
“What about your co-worker who was maybe more than a friend?”
“You mean Orchid? I talked to her. Last week. She’s back from China.”
Veronica studied her son’s blue eyes and dark hair as he lay back on his pillows. If she squinted a little, she could almost see hints of the little boy she had raised. She pictured the photo she’d seen on his phone. Her boys had dated all types, from perky to moody, sports-jocks to artists, raucous rebels to refined debutantes. Orchid was a stunner. The two of them, squeezed into one frame, looked like they were having fun.
She asked, hopefulness evident in the upward lilt in her tone, “So? Is she coming to visit?”
“Nope, we’re not talking anymore.”
“What happened?”
“She’s not one to deal well with imperfections.”
“You don’t mean she didn’t want to see you because—”
“It wasn’t her. It was me, but c’mon, Mom. I’m half a guy. What woman is going to want me?”
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