After Hours (InterMix)(109)

“Boring as we are.”

She laughed, and let my hand go to blow her nose. “Go home, Erin. Get some sleep. I’ll call if there’s any news.”

“Including good news.”

“Sure.”

“Especially good news,” I added, standing and organizing my purse. “No matter how trivial.”

“I promise.”

I leaned in and kissed the crown of her head. “Get some rest, yourself.”

On my way out I bought a shot of espresso in a tiny takeaway cup, just to make sure I didn’t nod off during the drive home. Coupled with my weariness, it made me feel high and weird, the streets of Darren and the fields en route to Larkhaven slipping past like painted movie backdrops.

The world looked so organic after the clinical white order of the ICU. There was disorder everywhere, in the twisted tree branches, the bits of litter on the highway shoulder, chaos rippling through the wavery V of geese passing overhead and broadcast in their arrhythmic honks. I draped an arm out my window to feel the wind on my skin.

I got home at six thirty, just in time to jog across campus and slip in before the end of the day shift, letting Dennis know I’d be in the next morning and apologizing in person for my absence. I think we talked, maybe even hugged. I was so pooped, I didn’t even register walking back to my apartment until I was flopped facedown across my covers.

I didn’t sleep, just lay there, grateful for horizontality and stillness. For a respite from being strong or alert or anything at all. I was a lump of flesh tossed across a bed and left alone, and it felt amazing.

After perhaps a half hour’s Zen, a rapping at the door killed the peace. Lifting my chin, I eyed the clock. Seven sixteen, as if I needed any more reason to suspect who it’d be. I rolled off my mattress and shuffled to the door.

Flip of the lock, tug on the handle, and there he was, that big old wall of calm, still dressed in gray.

“Hi, Kel.”

“How is he?”

I smiled. “He’s doing well. He’s going to be back to normal in a week or two, they think. The syndrome he’s got has five stages, and he was just reaching stage two. It could have been way worse.”

Kelly blew out a long breath, sagging with relief against the door frame.

“And it’s a really rare thing to happen these days. We’re lucky the doctors diagnosed him as quick as they did . . . You want a beer?”

His brows rose for a moment’s deliberation. “Yeah. Sure.”

“Come on in.”

Kelly took a seat on my desk chair and I locked the door, then fetched the last two beers from my minifridge. It had grown dark, and I turned on the reading lamp before sitting cross-legged on my bed. Kelly leaned forward to accept his can and we cracked them in unison.

I fiddled with the tab, back and forth and back and forth, until it snapped off. “I want to thank you again, for hanging out. Today must have been the longest shift ever, on no sleep.”

He shrugged. “I was with Don most of the day, and he was pretty calm. Took everything I had not to nod off in the rec room during the soaps.”

“And still another shift to get through tomorrow.” I’d have thought the idea of going back to work would beat me down even more, but I was actually looking forward to it. I could use the routine, some familiarity and focus.

Funny to think the ward and its faces could be called familiar, so soon. But I wanted to see Jenny and Dennis, and the friendlier residents. See if Lee was still as clearheaded as the last time I’d spoken to him, and ask how he felt about transitioning to an outpatient program. Strangest of all, I even looked forward to seeing Lonnie.

Funny how the people who are forced on you—family, colleagues, dependents—can be forgiven their faults, in light of the commitment. The inevitability of being stuck with them. Caring was all about surrender, in the end. The opposite of control. The difference between strangling someone and embracing them.

We sipped our beers for a few minutes, then Kelly reached for my can, setting both of them on the desk, half-drunk.

“Lie down.” It wasn’t an order, not like it might’ve been one of those first nights we spent together.

I stretched out on my back and Kelly joined me, resting his hands on his stomach.

“Have we wrecked all this?” I asked the ceiling. “Whatever we had between us before?”

He replied after a long pause. “What we have between us is strong and stupid.”