Page 72 of What We Had

Thatsnapped me out of whatever red tinged my vision. “I feel responsible. For all of this.”

Bennett exhaled and let his skull fall into the headrest. “We’ve got almost a half hour. I got the gist of it, but maybe you should run this all by me again. My brain isn’t as foggy anymore.”

I shared everything I could possibly think of, starting with my relationship with Johnny Parker. I explained what Deacon did for a living, what he had confessed to me in the house only moments ago. I attempted to detail the significance of the payday that came with Winnie Bridgewater’s success in a flagship role with a moneymaking series. How a studio would go to incredible lengths to secure that. I couldn’t explain the insidious underbelly of Hollywood in under thirty minutes, but I made sure he understood what people were willing to do for money.

My words ate up half the drive as I gave into the catharsis of oversharing with the man I loved. Every minute or so I would interject my own explanation and confess how silly it felt to be unburdening myself with an overdose patient sitting beside me. Bennett explained the chemical mechanics of the brain and what the Narcan actually did, that he was more in danger from the needle than the overdose itself.

My hand was back on his leg by the time I took the hospital exit off the highway. “You aren’t going to report this, are you,” I said as I followed blue H signs set along the road. “That’s why we’re down here.”

“I know pretty much everyone who works at the ERs in our area. Can’t risk it. This’ll be on my medical record, but no one will be able to see those.”

“Bennett…” I squeezed his leg. I couldn’t ask him to do this. “I won’t let you sink back into a lie. As soon as we get you a clean bill of health, I’ll talk to Deacon about ways we can press charges.”

“No.”

I released Bennett’s leg. Put my hand on the steering wheel and squeezed. “Yes. This isn’t something that should be on your shoulders.”

He turned to look at me, eyes as blue as the sky. I had to keep toggling between the road and him. “You saved my life. You said you wished you were there for me the day my coach did what he did. Well, you were here today. You saved metoday. I trust you, Connor. More than anything else in this world, I trust you so completely that I’ll follow your friend’s lead on what we should do next. He said to lethimtake this burden, so that’s what I’m doing.”

I rolled my lips together. That old feeling of cowardice slipped back inside, like I had to show off my machismo, pound my chest to let him know that I was here to protect him and his interests.

I blew out a burst of air through my nose and let that argument go with it.

I changed subjects. “How long do you think we’ll be here?”

“Couple hours at most. I need to get bloodwork to make sure there was nothing on that needle.”

“That easy? From an overdose?”

“I’ve never had this stuff in my system before. Two hours of monitoring and I’ll be fine.”

I shook my head in disbelief. “What about questions?”

“Nope.” He reached over and grabbed my knee. Squeezed. Weakly, but still a squeeze. “Let’s go back to your house afterward, okay? I’ll need to take it easy. I’ll call in sick to work.”

I grabbed his hand as I followed the signs for the ER entrance at the hospital. “I love you, Bennett. I love you more than you know.”

“I do know,” Bennett said quietly. “You’ve already shown me in the only way that matters.”

ChapterTwenty-One

MYWORLDCHANGEDovernight and I didn’t even know it. That was the beauty of the Do Not Disturb feature on smartphones. You could shut the larger world out and focus on your inner world. For me, that was Bennett’s recovery.

We arrived back to my place sometime in the early afternoon and I promptly sent Bennett upstairs to shower and then settle in my room. Rachel had a few questions that I wasn’t fully comfortable with answering, especially after she saw the shade of purple that covered half of Bennett’s face and the stitches along his right temple. I got him into some comfortable clothing, hauled up enough liquids and junk food to sate an army, and tucked him into the center of my bed. He implored we watch nonstop Connor Clarke flicks and demanded I give him all the behind-the-scenes detail every time I was on-screen. He had twelve years of cinematic curiosities that he unleashed over the course of a few hours.

We slept off and on throughout the day and into the evening. I held him as close to me as possible, as if I could merge our atoms so that I could fight off whatever demon I knew would find a home in his psyche. Would he tell his therapist about what happened? Would he regress after replaying the nightmares?

The preset Do Not Disturb hours on my phone turned off at eight in the morning, which was precisely when my phone came alive with the dings of emails, the chime of texts, and the chirp of voicemails. My phone made noise more than it was silent. After thirty seconds, my arm shot out from under the covers and slapped the nightstand behind me until I could grip the infernal device.

Bennett grumbled something angry and I shushed him.

I pressed the tab on my phone to set it silent, then regripped Bennett’s body and braced him against me. Unfortunately, “silent” was a bit of a misnomer. The constant vibration on the nightstand was almost as loud.

“Is the world ending?” Bennett growled.

“It better be,” I said as I extricated my arm from around Bennett’s waist and reached again for the phone. I swung my arm back around Bennett and held the phone in front of both of our faces as he lay nestled against my chest. The camera recognized my face and unlocked. And then…

“Holy shit,” Bennett and I said at the same time.

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