Page 76 of What You Wish For

“That’s me. You asked me to pick you up.”

“I did?” He turned to the nurse behind him for confirmation. She nodded. “That was smart of me,” he said.

Wow. What had they dosed him up with?

The nurse gave me a stack of discharge instructions and a small batch of “hard-core” painkillers, saying he could switch to Tylenol tomorrow, but to definitely stick to the hard stuff through the night.

“My name’s Lisa,” the nurse said next, circling her name on the discharge instructions, “and you can call me with any questions.”

“Okay,” I said, nodding. “I’m Sam.”

“Oh,” she said then, turning to take in the sight of me. “You’re Sam!” Then she just smiled.

“What?” I asked.

“He was telling us all about you.”

I frowned.

She smiled again and nodded. “Don’t worry,” she said. “Good things.”

“Like?” I prompted.

“Oh… I feel like you must already know.”

“I definitely do not.”

“And if you don’t know,” she went on, “then he should be the one to tell you, not me.”

Well, that was unsatisfying.

Lisa helped me wheel Duncan out to the parking lot, where the driver was waiting. “He sang about you, too,” she said as we walked. “In recovery.”

“He sang about me?”

“You know,” she said. “The ‘Oh! Susanna’ song—but adjusted for ‘Samantha.’”

“Do a lot of people sing in recovery?” I asked.

She shook her head. “Never. No one. He’s adorable. How long have you two been”—she gestured between us with her hand—“ya know?”

“Oh!” I said. “No. We’re not… we’re just work colleagues.”

She laughed like I was joking. Then she stopped walking when she realized I wasn’t. “Wait—you’re not even dating?”

I shook my head. “Not even close.”

She opened her eyes wide, likeWhoa. “He has got a thing for you, lady.”

I shook my head. “He doesn’t even like me. Like, at all.”

“I’m telling you,” she said, “he does.” Then she added, “The opiates never lie.”

At the car door, Lisa flipped up the footrests on the chair so Duncan could set his feet on the pavement. Before we hoisted him up, she said to be careful of his left side—hip to ribs. He was harder to lift than I was expecting—so much dead weight. I wedged myself up under his armpit and clamped his arm over me as I rotated him.

He was bigger than I’d realized.

I maneuvered him into the backseat with a plop, and he was so out of it, I had to lift his feet up for him, and lean across him to buckle him. He kept his eyes open the whole time, watching me without helping—like his brain was in slow motion and couldn’t catch up.

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