by Tijan
I went still.
I pushed past the pain, icing it all down, welcoming that same numbness from before again.
And then, as it all moved up, rising, covering me, I stopped crying.
I stopped feeling.
I grabbed whatever I was wearing and used it to wipe my tears clear, and then, I saw Stone’s back. He was turned toward me, his hips half angled to me, but he was twisted around, paying attention to the doctor and nurse, who I saw were looking over my chart.
The nurse pointed.
The doctor nodded. “Change it out now, especially if she’s awake.” With that, his eyes jerked to mine, went back to the chart. Then. He stopped. He backtracked and his eyes widened in horror. I saw it for a split second before he masked it. The professional coming forth, and he cleared his throat, standing upright, his hands folded over his chest. “Miss Phillips. You’re awake.”
Stone whipped back around to me.
I didn’t look at him. I didn’t want to see what was there because my memory was coming back, and I knew what news I’d still have to deal with, but not yet. Not yet. Not until I could walk out of here.
“I know you’re probably in a lot of pain, but we’ll get you handled and taken care of real quick.”
He looked at the nurse who was stringing something up, and she reached for a tube going into my arm, switching it out.
No, no, no. I knew what that was, and I started shaking my head, but my God. It hurt so bad. Everything hurt.
“No!”
Stone looked at me, his hand grasping the nurse’s in the next flash.
She froze from his quickness.
I did, too, but then I said with my lips hurting and my mouth feeling just weird. “No morphine.”
The nurse’s eyes enlarged. “But you must be in so much pain.”
“No.” It hurt to talk. “Morphine.”
“But—”
Stone let out a roar. “She said no fucking morphine. No fucking morphine.” Then, casting me an apologetic look, he quieted his voice, “She doesn’t usually drink or do drugs. She hates not feeling clearheaded.”
I did.
I gave him a questioning look because I didn’t think anyone knew that about me. I never drank or partied in school, or got high, and living where we did, so many went that route out of boredom. It was either that or trying to half kill yourself doing stupid stunts like Peter Mills who climbed the top of a crane to hide a flag for flag football and fell.
He didn’t survive.
People did stupid things where we grew up, and I had, too, with Stone when we were kids, but that all stopped.
“Sandy.” From the doctor. He seemed resigned. “If that’s Miss Phillips’ wish, then we need to adhere to it.”
She let go of the tubing and took the new morphine bag with its stand and wheeled it out of the room as the doctor came forward. A grave look in his eyes, and I knew what that was about. I was trying not to flinch, trying not to feel, but the pain was slipping in through the numb shell I pulled over me. Still. I’d deal.
I’d have to.
“Miss Phillips, do you remember what happened to you?”
I couldn’t speak, but my eyes went to Stone, and with a heaviness in his, he answered for me. “She remembers.” He told me, “You backed up and a moving truck hit you. Your car was totaled. The truck just had scrapes. I’ve taken care of that, though.”
My car.
“Your head hit your dashboard pretty hard, and we had to put you in a medically induced coma. We needed to gauge your injuries and determine if there’d be swelling on your brain. When the results came back with positive findings this morning, we decided to bring you out of the coma. And now that you’re awake, I need to conduct a few more exams. Are you up for that?”
No.
I nodded, just the slightest movement.
“You’ll be able to speak again by tomorrow. We needed to intubate you for the coma, just in case. Other than the hard hit to your head, you came out of the accident without any big injuries. No broken bones, but your body is still healing from the trauma. You will be in pain for a few days.”
Checking my pupils. My vitals. The doctor left, saying he’d return to discuss departure plans with me about going home from the hospital. He glanced in Stone’s direction as he added, “You will need to go somewhere that you can be cared for. One more person will need to be there, and we can’t allow you to drive yourself home.”
Stone cleared his throat, looking up from where he’d been standing, his arms folded over his chest. “She’ll stay with me. I’ll drive her there.”
I opened my mouth to argue, but no sound came out as Stone sent me a withering look. “All your shit’s already been moved.”
Well. That shut me up.
“There you go. Problem solved.” The doctor touched my foot, a reassuring smile on his face. “Rest, Dusty. Your body needs to heal. One day at a time right now.”
He gave Stone a nod before leaving, pulling the door shut behind him.
Then it was just me and Stone, and his hands went up to his head. He let out a sharp breath. “Fucking hell!” Bending over, touching his elbows to his knees, he swiftly jerked back up, his hands falling, and a stark look was there.
Anger. Frustration. Pity. A whole mix of other things, but he was shaking his head. “Jesus Christ, Dusty. You know how the last few days have been?”
Anger sliced through my chest, and since I couldn’t speak, I mouthed at him, “Fuck. Off.”
He read it, and then his lip twitched before a full laugh left him. “Shit. There you are. Still fucking fighting while you’re literally bed-ridden. I have no clue why I’ve stayed away.” His tone turned mocking, a hardness lining his words, and I felt slapped by his words, but also comforted because that felt like familiar ground for us.
He groaned, slumping into the chair on the other side of my bed. “Okay. You have two options. I can tell you everything that’s happened because you’ve been in your coma for four days. Or we can wait until you can talk and ream me out and I can tell you then. Which option do you want because the outcome will be the same?” His eyes latched onto mine, still so hard and half glaring.
Dickhead.
I lifted my middle finger for number one.
“The first option?” He grinned at my finger.
I nodded, just the slightest bit.
With his hands going into his hoodie’s front pocket, he pulled it low. “Since you are unable to travel by vehicle, train, or plane, a funeral was put together for your parents. Gail’s sister traveled from New York to help facilitate everything, and Jared was asked what he’d like to do. If he wanted to remain at his best friend’s house, go to New York with his aunt, or come down here to be with you.”
Pain. Excruciating. Dizzying. Blinding pain punctured me as he kept on. Every word he said was another knife being thrust into me, but I had to hear everything. I had to know everything.
“Since Apollo’s parents are open to fostering Jared the rest of his senior year, he opted to stay with them.”
A tear fell, slipping down my cheek.
It was how it should be. Jared spent more time there than at his own home, more time spent with his best friend to even get to know me. Not that I’d really been around. I’d been in school except for a few months when Gail and my father had started dating.
“I notified your parents’ lawyer and he’s traveling down here to go over your father’s will with you. Jared’s six months from being eighteen. Apollo’s parents are open to the idea of adopting him, if you and your aunt are okay with that. Technically, I believe the aunt has the option first. She agreed to the adoption, and so that goes to you, if you’re okay with them starting the process.”
I moved my head in a nod, more than I should’ve. A primal and head-splitting pain ripped through me, but I made no sound. I let no more tears fall. I swallowed and dealt with it. I knew Apollo’s parents, Bud and Georgia. They were a happy couple, and Apollo with
his little sister were both blossoming. Good kids, from good parents. A good family. Jared would be lucky to be taken in by them permanently.
“Okay.” Stone took in another deep breath, his hand coming out of his hoodie pocket and smoothing down his leg. “I’ll let them know, and Jared’s social worker will reach out. She might need to talk to you, or meet you somehow. There are papers to sign, too.”
Of course.
I couldn’t voice my question, so I motioned toward where his phone was on the nightstand.
He frowned. “You can’t talk at all.”
I made a writing gesture with my hand.
“Oh!”
He grabbed his phone, pulling up a notepad app, and handed it to me.
I typed out, “Where are they buried?” And handed it to him.
“By your mom.”
Relief tamped down some of the pain. It was a little more manageable.
I reached for his phone again, then typed, “Costs?”
He took his phone back, blacking the screen, and put his phone in his pocket. He looked away and sat back in his chair.
He wasn’t going to answer.
I hit my hand on my bed rail, a wince leaving me because it was too unbearable, but I had to know.
He swung those stormy eyes back my way, hot and angry. “What? What do you want me to say? You’re going to freak the fuck out when I answer you, but I don’t even care.” He shot forward, scooting to the edge of his seat. “I don’t give a fuck. You want to know about the costs? There are none. Wanna know why?” His chest was rising up and down, his eyes almost going wild. “Because I fucking paid for everything. Hospital, too. No. Not my parents. No, not your aunt. And goddammit, no way in hell, not you. Because after you lit all that shit up for me about what happened, I did my own digging and found out what my father did to yours. And I’m sorry, okay?!” He was almost shouting.
A nurse came to the door, peeking in, worried.
He shoved back in the chair, sending it scraping against the floor a few inches. “I paid for goddamn everything, and you don’t get to sit there and hate me because of it. Not another thing on the list. You want to pay me back? Because I know you probably will keep a fucking tally till the day you end up in an old folks’ home, fine. You can pay me back. I’ll set it up with my lawyer, but you don’t have to pay me back. I know you hate me. Fine. Dandy. Whatever the fuck. I’m not the biggest fan of yours either, but it’s done. So now you do your thing and heal. Get better, then we’ll deal with everything else.”
I…had nothing.
No words.
No emotions, angry or sad, or even relieved.
I was just empty and after hearing all of that, I closed my eyes and lay there. Stone remained, and for the next hour until I fell asleep, we sat together in silence.
Chapter Twelve
“No.”
“Fuck’s sake. Why not?”
Same dance. Different day.
It was the day I was being released from the hospital. They kept me another day, just to be safe, but I got the clear bill of health, and now here we were. On the front steps of the hospital. A crowd was starting to gather, more than a few recognized Stone, and based on conversations I’d overheard with the nurses, word had been building that he was a frequent visitor. The nurses wanted to know who I was, and the nurses who worked with me directly bit their tongue because they knew I wasn’t a fan. In fact, more than a few times when Stone tried to help me, and I snapped at him to give me space, a nurse had to leave the room.
I got it. I did.
They thought I was being ungrateful and rude and I’m sure they had worse names to call me behind my back. Whatever. That was my attitude.
Whatever to them.
Fuck ’em.
They didn’t have the history I did with Stone’s family, and yeah, an argument could’ve been made that it hadn’t been Stone who fired my dad, who blacklisted him, who tried to push him out of town when we were starting chemotherapy. That’d been his dad, but there’d been six years prior to that where Stone had been cold to me growing up, where I hadn’t been ‘good enough’ for him, and I sat and watched my former best friend become this entirely new person.
Arrogant. Wealthy. Privileged.
A jackass.
And no one knew what I’d had to endure to put me in this position where I decided to pursue a dream I never thought I could go after, and now here we were. Again.
I was sans my dad. There were no more annoying texts or calls from Gail, and I was three seconds from losing it.
“I don’t need you to take care of me.”
We were standing outside the opened back door of his truck. I was able to stand from my wheelchair, because that was their policy, but I needed to be driven home by someone. The nurse left. I was free and clear to grab a taxi, and I was trying to do that when Stone started in.
“You’re the most stubborn bitch I have ever dealt with.”
I ignored him, my hand in the air. There was a taxi two cars down. Stone just needed to move his vehicle and the cab would have a clear path to me.
Stone saw my dilemma, too. “I’m not fucking moving. Get in my truck.”
“No.”
A few guys waiting to grab Stone’s autograph heard the exchange, and a couple of them chuckled. One cheered Stone on. A passing lady cheered me on, saying, “You tell him, Missy. We don’t need no men.” And still there were a few other women who I knew thought I’d completely lost my head. I heard one whispering, “I’ll take her spot.” Her friend laughed back. “Me, too. I’m feeling faint right now and I’ll gladly get into his truck to recuperate.”
Stone growled, ignoring our growing audience. “Dusty. Now.”
I just raised my hand higher for the taxi driver, pushing up on my tiptoes.
“Do not think I won’t pick you up and throw you in my truck, head first and everything. I’m two seconds away.”
I stopped and stared at him.
Shit. He meant business. He was glaring at me with eyes that said, “Do not fucking fuck with me, you fucking twit.”
Well. Then.
I sighed. I’ll try reasoning instead. “You’re going to drive me to your house, and then I’ll pack whatever I need and call a cab to take me all the way back to where I’m paying rent. It’s not worth it. Just let me grab a cab now.”
A savage curse bit out, and then his eyes flashed.
His singular warning had been when he told me he was two seconds away. In a flash, he grabbed me, and I was airborne, right into the back of his truck. But he wasn’t done. He leapt up, grabbing the seatbelt over me, and pulled it around me, clicking it in place. He had the door shut, locked, and he was already going around the front before I could even push myself upright and then start to reach for my seatbelt.
By then, he was inside, the engine on, and he shoved off into traffic.
“This is stupid.”
“You’re right. You’re being stupid.” Cursing, he ducked down as a car sped past us. They knew he was driving because they came up on his driver’s side, their phones up and ready to go. It was a car full of teenage girls. “Dammit.”
“Where do you live?”
He opened his mouth, then caught himself. His eyes narrowed in the rearview mirror. “Why?”
I just smiled. “No reason.”
He continued to study me in between still watching the road, and with a soft growl, he shook his head. “I’m not buying it. What? You’re going to tell those girls who are trying to get a picture of me?”
“What’s the difference? I’ll know when you take me to your house. What’s stopping me from posting it on Twitter, or even posting your phone number?”
A litany of curses spewed from him, and the back of his neck was getting red. I was having a heyday with this. It was more fun than I could remember having in a long time.
Until he announced it, “I liked your mom.”
“What?”
“Your mom.” He moved into t
he far lane, settling back.
I was thinking we had a bit of drive from here, and he settled an arm back on the passenger seat headrest.
“I always liked her. She made me cookies and muffins. And I remember when she tried to teach us to bake cakes from scratch. You were horrible and your cakes tasted terrible, but we’d lie to you. Both of us.”
“You did not—” But I was remembering, and even I hadn’t wanted to taste my cakes.
A tug at my mouth. “She’d wear that ugly yellow apron. She hated that apron.”
“What? I loved that apron. Always felt like it was sunshine. Made me feel warm, even in the winter.”
I noted softly, “That’s why she wore it. For you.”
His eyes lifted to the rearview mirror, holding mine a second again. He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. “Yeah.” His voice came out raspy. “She was a good woman, and a good mom. She was a good wife. I could always tell.”
I snorted. “Why? Because she wasn’t wasting away like yours?” Then, I winced. That sounded even bitchier to my own ears, more than I thought it would be. “Shit. I’m sorr—”
“Because you guys laughed.” He kept on talking about my family, ignoring what I’d so blatantly pointed out about his own, his face hard. “My parents laughed when they were drunk, and only when they had a party. When there were other people there to laugh with, never the two of them, never the three of us. I was their only kid. I wouldn’t have known better except I half grew up in your home, too, and what I remember the most about growing up was that you guys laughed.”
My throat burned.
“Yeah, we did.” I looked out the window. A hollow feeling starting to dig in my chest. “Until she died. We didn’t laugh much after that.”
“You laughed until then?”
I nodded. I felt the chinks in my armor widening.
I remembered how he did adore my mom. The two acted as if they were conspiring together during our baking lessons, and any time he was in the house. He congregated around her. She congregated closer to him.