Page 29 of We Can Stay
Like how the divorce nearly broke me. How I’ve been running ever since, filling every hour with work so I don’t have to feel the failure. How she’s the first person in years who makes me want to slow down, to risk being still.
My phone buzzes with a text from Rach.
Stop brooding and go home. Yes, I can see you from the window.
But I wait another ten minutes, just in case Flick changes her mind. Just in case she needs me.
She doesn’t come back.
When I finally lock up the shed, I’m already making a list. Things that might help with rheumatoid arthritis pain. Ways to make her life easier without making her feel weak. Because I recognize that fierce independence—it’s the same wall I’ve built around myself.
The difference is, she makes me want to take mine down.
I just hope she’ll let me help her with hers.
CHAPTER 9
Flick
What about this? Is this better?
A moment later, a photo arrives of Sebastian holding two puppies in his hands. He’s in one of the exam rooms at work, dark stubble dotting his face and wearing that expression that makes my pulse race.
Heat rolls through my body, and I shift uncomfortably on the hard waiting room chair.
Tease.
The little dots bounce as I wait for his response.
Can I see you tonight?
I bite my lip, considering.
It’s been two days since our date in the supplies shed, and in between working and beating back a flare, I’ve been thinking about him constantly. Maybe too much.
Usually, even with the hottest guys, I’m over them after a week. And maybe that’s because I don’t entertain the possibility of anything more. From the beginning, I’m clear withmyself about what things will be—a fling, nothing more. With Sebastian, though, it’s different. My body and heart don’t seem to have gotten the message.
He’s unexpectedly burrowed his way into my life. No warning. No explanation. He’s just there all the time, in between my every other thought. Like a splinter I can’t remove, except one that feels good. Too good.
And it’s terrifying.
Because what happens when people get too close? They see too much. They want to fix you. Or worse—they leave when they realize you can’t be fixed.
“Flick.”
I startle and put my phone down so I can follow the nurse back to see my rheumatologist, but it’s not someone in scrubs with a clipboard who’s called my name. It’s Hannah, in a crocheted dress and carrying a Knit Happens tote bag.
I blink at her, confused. “Hey.”
That’s right. She told me she also had an appointment today. Not with my rheumatologist, of course, but an appointment related to her fibromyalgia. And since this is a clinic that houses multiple specialists, I should have expected to see her here.Shit.
“I didn’t know you had an appointment today.” She takes the seat next to me and pushes her gold-rimmed glasses up her nose.
“Oh yeah. I forgot about it, and then it popped up on my calendar.”
It feels beyond awful to lie to my best friend, but she doesn’t know about the pericarditis. And for a reason.
Inflammation around your heart is scary stuff. Serious stuff that can even lead to, one day, deadly stuff. For one thing, I can’t take people feeling sorry for me. The way their faces change, their voices soften. Like you’re suddenly made of glass. And I also can’t make the lifestyle changes that Hannah would urge me to. Not with my business and everything else I need to get done.
