Page 25 of Full Tilt
I toyed with my medic alert bracelet under the table. I could at least tell her why I had to eat a fucking salad instead of a burger. I started to, then the waitress appeared with her coffee carafe. She refilled Kacey’s mug, then started to fill mine.
Kacey’s hand shot out and covered my mug. “Wait! Is that regular? He can only have decaf!”
The waitress jerked the pot back with a small cry. “Damn, honey, I nearly scalded you.”
“I’m sorry,” Kacey said. “I just…it’s important.” She glanced at me.
“It’s not worth you getting burned,” I said. But the gesture touched me.
“I’ll get the other pot,” the waitress said, and retreated in a huff.
Kacey’s hand was back in her lap and her cheeks were pink. “Sorry. I got a little over-excited.”
“You go all the way up to eleven,” I said, figuring an eighties movie quote would smooth things over.
Her head shot up, a smile breaking across her face like the dawn. “This is Spinal Tap,” she said. “A classic.”
I held onto her eyes, felt the moment between us, warm and thick. “Thanks for guarding my coffee,” I said. “It’s important.”
Her eyes softened. “Will you tell me why?”
“I uh…I had a heart transplant,” I said.
“Oh,” she said, sitting back in her booth seat. Her eyes stared far off a moment, then she gave her head a brusque shake. “A heart transplant. But…you’re so young. Twenty-five?”
“Twenty-six. The virus that wrecked my heart didn’t give a shit how old I was.” I smiled ruefully. “Viruses are assholes like that.”
Kacey didn’t smile. She pointed toward my wrist and themedic alert bracelet. “Can I see?”
I slid my arm toward her on the table. She flipped the rectangular tag over, from the red enameled cross to the words inscribed on the other side.
“Heart transplant patient. See wallet card.” Kacey looked up at me. “What’s on the wallet card?”
“My emergency contact info, my blood type, yadda yadda.”
Her gaze pressed me. “‘Yadda yadda’?”
“What to do in case I get in trouble.”
She nodded. Next, she’d ask what kind of trouble I could get into, and I’d make up something about medication side-effects, which was a hell of a lot easier to hear than total heart failure.
Instead, she asked, “Was it recent?”
“Almost a year and a half ago.”
Her eyes widened. “That’s really recent.” She let go of the tag and the heel of her hand settled on mine. A frozen, soundless moment, then her hand slid backward, palm to palm. Her fingers curled around mine and held still. I stared as my thumb came down on top of her knuckles and slowly moved back and forth.
The waitress came back with the orange-lipped, decaf pot. The look on her face was sour, until she saw our hands. She smiled as she topped up my cup.
“I’m sorry to hear all this,” Kacey said, when the waitress had moved on. She gave my fingers a final squeeze and let go.
I put my empty, bewildered hand in my lap. “So am I.”
Kacey toyed with her spoon. “Is it hard to talk about?”
“Yeah,” I admitted. “Only the people closest to me know.”
“And I’m the newcomer busting into your personal space and asking all kinds of questions.”
