by Claire Raye
“Pfft, what a load of shit,” Mila says, now laughing.
“Totally, but you know, being the professional, you just gotta go with it.”
“How the hell do you keep a straight face?” she asks.
“It’s tough, but somehow you do. I guess helping someone, being able to ease their pain and embarrassment, does help,” I add, knowing as funny as this is, it’s somehow different when you’re actually treating someone. Because as ridiculous as their story might be, everything changes when you witness their vulnerability, their fight to maintain some level of dignity during a situation they have no desire to be in and absolutely no control of, too.
Having been on the flip side now, I understand it even more.
Mila and I chat for a bit longer about her classes and random stories from my nursing days, until eventually she glances at her phone and sees how late it is.
“Shit, I should go. I have an anatomy lab in the morning.”
“Good times.”
She turns to me, her beautiful brown eyes looking at me in that way she always seems to do. The way that makes me think she sees right through me. It’s both unnerving and strangely calming and there’s something about it that makes me want to tell her everything.
Unload all of my secrets and all of my pain. All of the things that I can see reflected back at me in those big brown eyes of hers.
“Well, thanks for tonight,” she says.
“Thanks for the pizza.”
“Anytime.” She doesn’t make any move to go and the longer she sits there watching me, the more I find myself wanting to lean closer.
“Ditto,” I say, my word barely a whisper.
Her mouth curves into a half smile. “Well…good night.”
I return the smile, my foot brushing against hers again. “Good night.”
Mila stares at me for a second or two before she finally stands, grabbing her phone from the bench. Just when I think she’s about to leave, she turns, leaning over and brushing her lips against my cheek again. My hand gravitates to her hip without thinking, my fingers gripping her body, wanting to run my hands up the back of her legs and pull her closer.
“Sleep well,” she whispers, not moving.
I’m two seconds away from pulling her down onto my lap, but before I get a chance, Mila straightens and gives me one last smile before walking out the door.
Chapter Five
Mila
It’s late, but I can’t seem to fall asleep. I cycle back and forth between staring at the ceiling and checking my phone for the time. If I fall asleep right at this exact moment, I’ll get four hours of sleep. But then I don’t, and I go back to staring at the ceiling and obsessing about what’s the right thing to do.
My thoughts are consumed by Adam Cooper and rightfully so. There’s no straight girl in the world he couldn’t charm the pants off of, me included. And while four months ago I’d be jumping into the sack with him, things have changed. I may make it appear like I’m still up to my old ways, but I’m never going back there. Sleeping around and flitting from bed to bed just created more drama than I needed.
But Adam, fuck my life if I don’t actually want to hop in bed with him. The flirting is too much, but neither of us have even attempted to act on it and that’s probably for the better. Something about it is comforting. He isn’t going out of his way to be aggressive or to unexpectedly touch me. But that doesn’t mean I’m not laying here in bed analyzing the shit out of every single word we’ve said to each other.
I really thought declaring my major would give me this great sense of peace too, but that also came with its own challenge. Turns out when you wait as long as I did, most of the classes are full. I had gone over to the registrar’s office following my last class today to see if I could add some more courses. All that was left open was an eight a.m. anatomy lab and when I rolled my eyes and asked for a different time, the woman behind the counter just swiftly replied with a no and proceeded to lecture me on the benefits of registering early.
But I tried not to let her kill my already dying buzz. Meeting up with Adam in the hallway was a nice surprise and even better when he showed up at my door with that bottle of champagne.
And now this is where I find myself, analyzing whether he likes me or not, whether I should just go ahead and sleep with him or not and whether I’ll be a fucking disaster in what is now three hours till my anatomy lab.
Instead of trying to sleep, I pull my ass from the bed and throw on a pair of leggings, figuring I might as well go for a run and try to clear my head. It’s the one thing Ruby and I have in common and while I know she’s probably not up, I think I’ll run on over to her place. Maybe she has some decent advice on what the hell I’m even doing.
I run for a solid hour, jogging up the steps to Ruby’s house around six-thirty and using my key to let myself in.
Reid is sitting at the kitchen table shirtless and looking far too hot for his own good. The boy knows he’s got this killer body and he has zero problem showing it off. Wish I could say the same for Adam. He tends to cover up immediately, but after seeing him at the pool, I’d love to see more.
“Hey Mila. What you doing up so early?” he asks, getting up to pour me a cup of coffee.
“Couldn’t sleep. Lot of shit...” I start to say but fall quiet suddenly not really wanting to share.
“Yeah, I hear ya,” he laments back at me. “Ruby’s still out cold. Probably will be till at least ten.” He looks in the direction of the stairs that lead up to Ruby and Caleb’s bedroom.
“I know, I guess I was just...” Again, I stop. I have no idea why I’m here or what I’m even looking for. I guess for so long I’ve just floated along not really having much responsibility and now it’s all sort of hitting me at the same time.
It isn’t just the Adam thing or taking on more classes or finally deciding what I plan to do with my life. There’s this nagging reminder in the back of my mind that sits unspoken, quietly screaming to be let out, but I won’t. Not here, not now. And even though I have Charlie and she knows almost everything; we don’t talk about it. It’s become a bit of an ugly secret.
“Can you just tell Ruby I stopped by?” I ask, taking a big drink of the coffee Reid gave me before tossing the rest down the drain.
“Yeah, no problem.”
“See ya, Reid,” I say, tossing a wave at him as I walk back over to the door.
“Hey, Mila?” he now calls after me and I turn to face him, my hand on the doorknob. “Whatever it is, don’t let it eat at you. Talk to someone.”
“What?” I question, shrugging my shoulders and trying to play it like I have no idea what he’s talking about. This is one of those times why I’m certain everything is written on my body, out in the open for everyone to see. Reid can read it on my face, in my demeanor and in my actions.
“We all have our demons,” he touts, almost like he’s reading my mind.
“Yeah, I guess we do,” I respond, not letting it go any further as I open the door and leave, but I linger a few seconds longer on the porch, feeling like I should go back in there and confess everything to him. He’s far enough removed from the situation to be impartial and after what he’s been through, I’m certain he wouldn’t dare judge me.
But I don’t bother; I just head back toward my apartment to grab my things for class. This is me turning over a new leaf and getting my ass to class on time.
“Shit, you’re up early,” Charlie announces when I walk through the door. She’s wrapped in a towel and eating an apple as if getting out of the shower and eating are two things people normally do simultaneously.
“Yeah, couldn’t sleep so I went for a run and now I have anatomy that I gotta get to.”
She pauses, her mouth open, the apple held in mid-air as she looks dumbfounded at what I’ve just said. “You’re going to class?” she now asks, a bit of skepticism in her voice that makes me want to roll my eyes, but I refrain from bein
g too big of a smartass.
“Yes, I am, and I plan on going every day, so you can stop with the mothering, got it?” I quip back, my hands on my hips.
“Good. I’m glad because it feels like you’re finally...” She shakes her head, lifting a shoulder, but never actually finishing what she wanted to say. We both know what she wants to say, but it feels like neither of us can ever bring ourselves to say it out loud.
It feels like I’m finally getting back to normal. I was never a terrible student, but after what happened, I had a hard time getting out of bed in the morning. Hell, I had a hard time just getting out of bed in general.
It’s easier to be the party girl because if you never stop moving you don’t have time to process your feelings. Running away feels easier, like happiness is found in a new place or in a new guy or in a new creation of who you once were.
“Whatever,” she now says, flitting her hand around as she pushes our thoughts aside. “I’m just glad you’re going to class and personally, I think it has something to do with Adam.” She waggles her eyebrows at me and opens her mouth seductively.
And all I can do is shake my head at her. “I’m going to class. Get dressed, you hussy!”
Class is definitely better today or maybe it’s just my mindset, because I haul ass home after my last class determined to create some structure. And also because I have a quiz on Friday in anatomy already.
I’m looking down at the stack of books in my arms and mentally creating a list of things I have to do before Friday when I slam into something hard. The books go flying along with me landing smack on my ass in some shrubbery outside the door to my apartment building.
“What the fuck!” I call out, realizing I wasn’t paying attention, but still. Totally not my fault that whoever crashed into me wasn’t paying attention either.
“Of course it’s you,” Adam’s deep voice croons all sexy and perfect, letting out a few clicks from his tongue, mockingly shaming me.
“Of course it’s you,” I chirp back, lifting my chin pompously in his direction. “You just going to leave me on my ass? I thought you had more manners than that.”
He now extends a hand, helping me up with a cheeky grin on his face. “My manners are perfectly fine, but it’s girls with smart mouths that make all that go out the window.”
“And why’s that?” I ask, baiting him. “The daddy thing again?”
He laughs out loud. You’re really hung up on that, huh?”
“Nah, I just like to give you shit about it. Like I said, it’s kinda gross. I’d rather level the playing field in the bedroom.”
“Mila, Mila, Mila,” he says, tsking and shaking his head. He reaches down to pick up one of my books, looking over the cover. “How’d class go today?” he now asks, his demeanor changing from this flirty playful thing we have going on to being genuinely interested.
“It was good actually. Overwhelming but good. I have an anatomy quiz of like a million vocabulary words on Friday so I’m off to study right now.”
“You want some help?” he offers, and I pretend to be shocked by his offer. My hand is against my chest and my mouth falls open.
“Why Adam Cooper, you’re such a gentleman.” I push up on my toes and kiss his cheek making him smile a little brighter. “I’d love some help. You can quiz me.”
“I’m heading to the gym now, but I should be back in about an hour or so if that works for you.”
“Yeah, that works. Just come on over. I’ll leave the door unlocked for you,” I tell him, taking my books from his arms and heading inside.
“Sounds good. I’ll see you then.”
As soon as I’m in my room I begin rifling through a drawer looking for a marker and some notecards to create flashcards. Old school style like I had in the third grade when I was learning multiplication facts.
I toss what I find onto my bed and begin to jot down the vocab words from the notes I took in class. There are at least one hundred words and as I write them, I sort them into piles: words I know, words I don’t know and words I sort of know.
All of this a distraction from what’s really going through my head. I’m about to have a boy in my bedroom, alone. Everything about this is something I should be afraid of, something I never should’ve suggested, but something about Adam feels right. There’s no recklessness in my decision to accept his offer, no second thoughts, but there’s definitely that underlying sense of worry.
I have no idea how long I’ve been working for, but I’m about twenty definitions in when the door to the apartment opens.
I call out, “In here!”
“What are you doing?” Ruby’s voice chides, loud and clear as she now stands in the doorway of my bedroom.
“What are you doing?” I shoot back, looking up at her and she flops down joining me on the bed.
“Are you studying? Oh my god, you are. Mila!” she shrieks, throwing her arms around me in an awkward embrace, as I don’t return her hug, my arms hanging loosely at my sides.
“Why does everyone think I’m this mindless idiot?” I ask, not really to her, but more to the world, wondering where I went wrong. I guess you’re only allowed to party and sleep around, but not actually be smart too.
“I don’t. It’s just...whatever.” She pooh poohs me, with a flit of her hand. “Reid said you came by, so I thought I’d stop over and see what you wanted.”
“Nothing really,” I lie, the words falling from my tongue so quickly I almost believe them myself. “I was out for a run and figured you might want to join me.”
“At six-thirty? Do you know me at all?” she scoffs.
I want to ask her the same thing. I want to ask her if I seem different. If she notices what I feel deep within me, but I don’t.
“Yeah, sorry. Not sure what I was thinking,” I start, my words a little quieter and I look down at the cards in front of me. “Epidermis,” I say, holding it up for Ruby to see and she laughs.
I know exactly what she’s thinking, and I laugh along with her as she quotes the line. “Your epidermis is showing!” she yells out, making both of us laugh even harder.
“Who would’ve thought a Simpsons quote would help me with anatomy?” I joke, still laughing as tears form in the corners of my eyes.
“Me. I pretty much learned everything I know about life from Simpsons reruns.” Ruby states, just as the door to the apartment opens again. “You expecting someone or is that Charlie?”
“It’s Adam.”
Chapter Six
Adam
I walk through Mila’s apartment to her bedroom, stepping in through the open door to find both Ruby and Mila, sitting on her bed, surrounded by notecards and now staring at me.
“Ladies,” I say, giving them both a grin.
“Hi, Adam,” Ruby replies, quickly glancing at her sister before turning back to me. I can almost see the questions she wants to ask, but just as she opens her mouth to ask them, Mila cuts her off.
“Adam’s here to help me study,” she says.
“What…how do you…” Ruby stammers, turning to Mila.
“He’s helping with my anatomy.”
I have to swallow hard at the almost suggestive way Mila says that, having thought about her anatomy an embarrassing amount of time already.
Ruby’s gaze snaps back to me. “Anatomy, you know anatomy?”
I chuckle, leaning back against Mila’s desk, my arms crossed over my chest. “I do, yeah.”
“How?” she asks, before slapping a hand over her mouth as though she realizes how that sounds.
It’s funny, as different as Ruby and Mila are, they do share a lot of the same traits. And watching them together, side by side like this, it’s easy to tell they’re sisters.
“Because I used to work as a nurse,” I tell her, “so I studied anatomy.”
“You did?” she asks, her eyes widening in surprise. “Does Caleb know that?”
I burst out laughing at
her question. “Nope, he does not. Why, do you think he’d think differently of me if he did?” I ask, a brow raised in question.
Ruby’s cheeks darken just a little. “Oh my god, I don’t even know why I asked that. Such a dumb question.”
I hold up a hand. “It’s cool. It’s never really come up and obviously I’m not working as a nurse over here, but since that’s what Mila’s studying now, I offered to help her out.”
Ruby smiles now as she turns to her sister again. “So nice of him,” she says, her voice low as if she doesn’t want me to hear her.
“Yes, obviously,” Mila says with her signature eye roll. “Now, if you don’t mind.”
I laugh at the way she’s trying to get her sister to leave, maybe before she asks too many more questions. Ruby stands, leaning in to hug her sister as she says, “I think you’ll make a great nurse, Mila.”
She straightens and walks toward me, but my eyes remain on Mila who seems suddenly self-conscious, as though she’s embarrassed or shy by the compliment her sister has just given her.
“Thank you,” Ruby says, pausing in front of me as she rests a hand on my arm.
I shrug. “No probs,” I tell her. “Say hi to Caleb.”
Ruby smiles now, that same sappy loved up look on her face she always has when she comes into the bar to see her boyfriend. It’s identical to the one Caleb wears whenever she’s around and it would be nauseating if I didn’t like them both so much.
“I will. And you guys should come over sometime, come for family movie night.”
I glance at Mila who does that eye roll thing of hers that makes me laugh. “Sure, sounds good,” I tell Ruby.
She nods once, throwing one last wave at her sister before she disappears out of her room. Seconds later, we hear the front door close and suddenly we are alone.
In Mila’s bedroom.
“Okay,” I say, clapping my hands together as I walk toward her bed, trying to ignore this latest revelation. “What’s the plan?”