Page 17 of I Still Love You

“Why aren’t you excited? You’re the one shagging the man.”

I stifle at her words and focus on the click-clack of the keyboard as I type, forcing myself to avoid making errors. “Just because we’re dating again,” I start, wincing at her choice of word, “does not mean we’re shagging.”

“Are you kidding me, Layla?” Her head hangs between her petite shoulders, and she lowers it to knock her forehead off the counter dramatically. When she lifts her head to look at me again, I don’t miss the bravery written across her features. “If it were me, I’d definitely be shagging him.” She sighs. “Lord knows I could use a little attention in the nether regions.”

Where Sierra thrives in all other areas of life, she withers when it comes to sparking a connection with the opposite sex. I’ve never been able to figure it out. Why, of all the things, this beautiful, caring girl has difficulty getting the attention of the male species.

“Do you hear yourself?”

“I totally do, and I hope you don’t take offense. I know he’s all yours, but a girl can look, right? Ugh, I’m sorry. I sound like a total wench. But you really should be more grateful.” She fans her face and blows out a dreamy breath.

“I’ve been here for less than two weeks. No matter what we are, it wouldn’t be enough time to shag. Why are we using that word, anyway? It’s very…Austin Powers.”

She shrugs a shoulder. “It’s less offensive than saying,” she lowers her voice, “fuck.”

“Since when do you care about that? You just asked me if you could fornicate the guy I’m dating.”

It’s moments like this, when I’m deep in conversation about my and Luke’s relationship, that I regret telling Andrew we’re involved. I freaked, panicked, and this is what I’m left to deal with. I blasted myself to the past in the worst way, and now, I’m going to have to live with it. Going to have to deal with lying to people I care about.

“Since a sixty-seven-year-old patient reprimanded me when she overheard me saying it.” She looks skyward, the soft cleft in her chin becoming more noticeable from the movement. “It was mortifying. I felt like I was ten again, and my grandmother overheard me calling my cousin a jerk.”

I quirk a brow. “Jerk isn’t a bad word.”

“Exactly, Layla,” she says, leaning in. “Exactly. So, now I say shag because I cannot go through that humiliation again.” A tint of pink breaks through her barrier of make-up like she’s back in that moment again, and I smile because this is the Sierra I’ve missed—sweet, caring, and embarrasses easily.

“Good to know,” I say, hitting the enter button on my keyboard and exiting out of the patient’s profile on the screen. I shift to a different task, preparing the discharge paperwork for a thirty-three-year-old man who came in with an acute case of poison ivy.

Running a hand through her wavy hair, she says, “So you’re really telling me that you two haven’t, you know, got it on yet?”

I shake my head.

“Well,” she tilts her head sideways as if she begins daydreaming, “I know something that might get those panties wet. He hosts an annual hospital baseball tournament that gets the hospital a lot of recognition. The Quentin Wolves clear their schedule for the week of the tournament and end up bringing in big donors who help keep that division of the hospital running, along with the rehabilitative and restorative departments,” she explains. “They’ve done it since the hospital finished construction on the sports therapy office. From what I hear, it was Luke’s idea. But…if you think he’s hot, seeing the Quentin Wolves on the field, sweaty and doing what they’re best at…” She clicks her tongue, and it makes me wonder how long it’s been since she’s had a boyfriend, since she’s had a companion to fall into.

But I’m also wondering how I’ve been here for two weeks and haven’t heard of Luke’s hosting an annual charity game. Luke always knew his way around athletes. Knew what to say to feed into their egos, how to get them to crack a smile as if they grew up together. And I’m aware that’s partly because he knows the game. He grew up watching baseball. According to Mason, he hid out in his bedroom and avoided going to school functions because he’d rather understand the physics behind an injury.

I click the print button on my patient’s discharge paperwork at the same time one of Sierra’s patients presses their nurse button. With a cheeky smile and that dream-like look on her face, she disappears down the hall, and I head back to the guy with the poison ivy, wondering if I bit off more than I could chew when I chose to come back.

I smack the side of the vending machine, hoping it’ll spit out Sierra’s candy bar and my bag of kettle-cooked chips, but it’s useless. The hunk of metal doesn’t even grunt. The metal arm that’s supposed to collect my stuff doesn’t budge.

“Come on,” I drag out, anticipating the second the gears shift into movement. “It’s been a shit day. The least you can do is give me what I paid for.” Because I’m desperate as hell, I flatten another five-dollar bill, rub it along the edge of the machine and offer it. Like before, the machine sucks it into the slit.

When I see the red numbers on the screen recognize my bill, I almost jump for joy, but I’m leery. “You better work this time.”

I press the same numbers into the pad I did a minute ago and sigh in relief when the internal arm acts. It collects Sierra’s candy bar, a caramel coated pretzel wrapped in chocolate, and my bag of chips.

I would have loved an iced coffee, but the cafeteria is closed, and I drank the one I brought in this morning, not realizing that I should’ve saved it for the end of my shift. All in the space of four hours, we had a toddler come in with a piece of corn shoved up his nose, a case of alcohol poisoning, an older gentleman with a bout of kidney stones who had an allergic reaction to the pain medication we gave, and a contractor who took his finger off with a table saw on the job.

He was kind enough to bring his finger in a coworker’s lunch box. A lunch box that had half melted ice inside of it. The finger was floating next to a piece of shaved wood and bologna. I shiver at the memory because while I’m not afraid of blood or guts, there are just some things you shouldn’t have to see.

I grab my change and our snacks from the mouth at the bottom of the machine. Ready to hightail it back to the nurse’s station, I turn and catch a glimpse of a navy-blue polo not five feet from my face. I freeze, wanting to spin back around, put another dollar in, and claim the dark chocolate bar I initially wanted because I know that chest. And how didn’t I hear him approach? I internally cringe when I realize he probably heard the entire conversation I just had with an inanimate object.

Even worse, I don’t like the fact he’s glaring. Nor do I like the fury that builds in my chest from it because who does he think he is, looking at me as if I purposely infiltrated his home, his life?

Without saying a word, I walk around him. I may be slightly salty over him being more worried about the stupid hot lunches than our unfinished business. That he made a cafeteria meal sound more important than our history.

“Oh, no, no, no,” he calls out quickly. “We need to talk.”

My feet halt, merging into the pine vinyl of the floor as my eyes flutter shut. For a fraction of a second, I wish it were his playfulness I was hearing. Not the stiff-necked grating that makes my ears ring and my heart burn. “I don’t want to talk, Luke.”

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