Page 28 of His Curvy Distraction

“Now what?” I asked no one.

Tossing the muddy clothes into the washing machine didn’t seem like a great idea, but we didn’t have a utility sink and I didn’t have a better idea. I could wash them more than once if I needed to.

“Ugh.”

My underwear needed to go into the laundry, too. I debated for a few seconds, then stripped my bra and panties off. Right there in the middle of the house I shared with my best friend.

“Please don’t come home,” I sang to myself, praying I wasn’t about to bear it all to my bestie.

I dumped the detergent into the dispenser and started the machine. I covered myself with my muddy arms and hobbled to my room, closing the door with no incident.

At least something was going my way.

I turned on my shower and let the water warm up before I climbed in, wincing and cringing with every step on my left foot. The boot and the cold had kept the swelling down, but I knew it was going to blow up as soon as I was warm. Especially if I didn’t get off my foot.

I washed my hair and body thoroughly, twice, then plugged the drain and added bubble bath to the tub as it filled. I sank into the warm water and sighed.

So much better.

I stayed in the bath until the water cooled and my ankle throbbed. I pulled the plug and pushed myself out of the tub, as awkward as a baby deer. I sat on the edge to dry myself off and watch my ankle swell.

Dammit.

I made my way back to my room and found my most comfortable clothes and got dressed. My bathroom was as stocked as a pharmacy for bandages, so I grabbed an elastic bandage that would stick to itself and hobbled to the kitchen.

Ice for my ankle, a sandwich for my belly, and water for my headache. Then I was on the couch with the remote and wrapping the ice around my ankle before the swelling got too bad.

That was how Daisy found me an hour later when she made it home, looking like her day was no better than mine.

“I’m so tired,” she breathed, hanging her coat in the front closet. “How was your— What the hell happened to you?” She rushed to me, sitting next to me. Her eyes widened at the wrap around my ankle.

“I was trying to dig out the old connections for the campsites and fell.”

“Are you okay? Do you need to go to the doctor? Why didn’t you call me?”

I shrugged. She was my best friend in the world. The only person who wasn’t family that I felt like I could be my whole and true self around. She didn’t judge me or criticize me. I loved her like the sister I never had, and I knew the feeling was mutual.

Which was why tears welled up when I heard the concern in her voice. I would have been equally upset if she was hurt.

“You’re not okay,” she said. “What do you need?”

I laid my head on her shoulder before she could get up. “I’ll be okay. I probably need to burn my coat, and my clothes might have ruined the washing machine, but I’ll survive.”

“Okay, go back to the beginning and tell me what happened.”

I took a breath and told Daisy about digging up the campground and how easy it started, then leaving my phone in the car and throwing my coat in there with it, and finally slipping on the mud and getting stuck in the hole.

“Do you think it’s broken?”

I shook my head. “Sprained probably. I could have torn something, but I don’t think it’s that bad. I need to replace the ice and put my laundry in the dryer. If it’s clean.”

“Sit down,” she said as I tried to get up. “I will take care of all of that. Did you eat?”

“I wasn’t sitting here waiting for you to come home and take care of me.”

She glared at me. “What would you say to me if I were the one with the ankle injury?”

“The same,” I admitted.

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