Page 70 of Icy Heart, Empty Chest
The witch spoke up in a languid tone, “You must be very good friends with Filla for her to write you such a glowing recommendation.”
I was floored. “I did not know she did. I’d helped her a few times with things but I didn’t ask for one from her.”
She laughed. “That’s Filla for you. Always keeps you guessing. She told the committee that we’d be absolutely stupid to ignore raw talent such as yours.”
“That’s quite kind of her,” I managed. Wheels set off in my brain. Why would she do that unprovoked and who in the world told her that I had applied?
“It’s one of the biggest reasons we’re considering you,” stated the warlock. “She’s not easy to impress, whatever you did.”
“So, despite your resume not being exactly what we typically admit, we decided to give you a bit of a bench test,” the witch tells me. What I’m not expecting is for her to take out a largeknife, lay her left arm down and slice into her wrist with a bloody pffssst sound. I saw spurting and my mind went blank.
On pure instinct I launched forward, clamping my right hand around her wrist and let off a quick blast of magic, like a shotgun going off. No thinking. I think it was the fastest I’ve ever called the magic forth. Strangely, the color was my usual light blue, instead of the gold I’d had whenever I was around Damien.
The witch let out a barking laugh as one of the others got up. She pried my hand from her wrist to reveal my results. No damage at all. Her tissue was intact without so much as a mar. One of the other healers handed me a towel to clean the blood off my hand. The other handed me a folder.
I could only look up quizzically. With a smile she confirmed, “Classes start in two weeks.”
I left the hall that day and my knees nearly buckled from the adrenaline rush. I really did it, didn’t I? I made it into the accelerated program. Two years of studying with overlapping clinicals. Being back in the hospital and not sneaking around it was new but I liked it. I felt most at home in the most emergent cases. I could focus most during those. It was a mix of instinct and training, doing what needed to be done most of all. Damien met me at the door, looking quizzical and then hugged me like a rag doll in glee.
Damien started running again shortlyafter our ordeal. I made him promise to wait two weeks, which he did, impatiently.
In the weeks following his heart “transplant,” he was back in the gym with as much gusto as he could contain.
About three months into my program, Damien was hit with heartache. His mother was sick with a brief illness but eventually succumbed. He was near inconsolable and racked with the guilt of not moving back in to the family house after his father passed.
The funeral was a quiet affair with his mom buried next to his father. It was the first time since his “transplant” that “pre heart” Damien was back. Tired, moody, grieving. I gave him as much space as he wanted. Some days he wanted to be attached at my hip, like only my presence could give him any solace. Others, he’d try to run it out, stay some time alone.
I had some experience with the grief process so I kept the fussing to a minimum, no matter how badly I wanted to console him. He had to go through it on his own.
We went back to his childhood house for the first time in a while. The property was sprawling in size, with a spacious lawn.
As soon as we stepped out of the car, I saw his eyes go out of focus, lost in memory. I walked over and took his hand, squeezing tightly. He gathered me into his arms for a quick hug and then fished the key out of his pocket.
It was still clean on the inside, primly decorated. Damien had described it as feeling more like a mausoleum than a house, more law and order than homey feeling. My house always had an element of chaos in it, growing up.
He made his way to the couch, dropped onto it like a rock, sitting forward, running his hands through his hair.
“Cor, what I am going to do?”
I knew what he meant. The memories associated with this house were painful to say the least.
I sat next to him and put an arm through his.
“From the way I see it, you have a few options. You could clean it up, rent the house out. You could move in if you wanted to, completely redo it. You could demolish it and rebuild whatever you wanted on the land. Or, maybe, you could sell it and maybe we move in somewhere together.”
I hadn’t voiced that thought out loud yet. We’d only been together a few months and while he practically lived at my apartment, we hadn’t talked about another place.
His eyes bugged for a moment.
“You want a place together?” he confirmed, voice calm.
“Well, yeah, you practically live with me anyway,” I teased. “I’d like to but if it’s too soon we can wait.”
“No, sweetheart. I’d like to build a place with you.”
I smiled and nodded, feeling a warmth float through me. It was the first time in days I heard hope in his voice.
The process of sorting through his parents’ belongings took a few weeks, on and off. I hadn’t been to his house as much when we were kids; we practically lived at mine. The very air felt strict and confining. Kid Damien’s bedroom was spartan except for the medals, trophies and certificates he’d earned from school and sports.
