Sweet Nothing(5)

“Of course. I will. Thank you.”

He left me standing on the curb in front of the stoop of my building. I waved and then padded up the steps and pulled open the door, glad my apartment was only on the second floor. After just half a flight, my body slowed, barely able to put one foot in front of the other. I slid the key into the lock and turned it, shoving open the door and then leaning back against the wood until it closed.

“TGIF,” I said with a sigh, sliding down to the floor.

Almost two years in the same apartment, and it still looked like something a property manager would use to entice a potential renter. Nailing holes into walls that didn’t belong to me just didn’t feel right, but that didn’t explain why I hadn’t bought real plates, either.

I looked over at the door-less kitchen cabinets, exposing my collection of paper plates and plastic cups to match the plastic cutlery in the drawers below. Just one glass casserole dish, a skillet, and one pot were sitting in the space beneath the countertop gathering dust. Eating out had been more of a pastime than a necessity until that moment.

I pulled myself up and forced my feet across the room in order to rummage through the medicine cabinet for an old bottle of Lortab. I rolled the tiny robin’s-egg-colored pill in my palm before tossing it to the back of my throat, chasing it with a gulp of flat Mountain Dew.

The Formica felt cold against my backside as I waited for my veins to carry the hydrocodone and sugar through my body.

Once I began feeling human again, I showered, slipped an off-the-shoulder sweatshirt over my head, and stepped into my favorite royal-blue cuffed sweatpants. As I piled my still-damp hair on top of my head, it crossed my mind that I would probably meet who might be the love of my life while dressed like a colorblind cat lady. But I had to eat, and I would rather make the walk across the street without a bra than try to scrounge up something to cook—not that I had any groceries.

I glanced in the mirror and paused. My face was not the frightening mess I’d imagined. Instead, I looked … normal. Tired, maybe, but otherwise fresh-faced and not at all like a mushy tomato.

Keys in hand, and gripping the railing the whole way down, I headed back downstairs, pausing just long enough to check for traffic before crossing against the light to JayWok, my favorite Chinese eatery in Philadelphia.

The soy sauce and grease filled my nose before I even opened the door, and I smiled. The takeout line was long, so I sat at my regular table and waited for Coco to take my order.

Within moments, she was standing next to me in a maroon apron over skinny jeans and a name tag that read Cocolina pinned to a too-small white polo shirt. She was holding a menu I didn’t need and filling a glass with water I wouldn’t drink. “The usual?” she asked.

“Probably,” I said.

She frowned. “Did you quit the hospital? I don’t think I’ve seen you without scrubs on.”

“I have the day off.”

“Sick?”

“Not really,” I said.

She turned on her heels, knowing I wouldn’t expand on my answer.

I cupped my chin in my hand. Dozens of people of all shapes and sizes passed by the large window next to the booth I’d made my own since I’d first walked through the door twenty-three months ago. Summer break was in full swing, and now that the sun was out, tourists grouped in families and crowded the sidewalks, making an old wound throb in my chest. I was an adult, but still, I missed the feel of my father’s large hand around mine. I envied the little girls who passed by with wide grins and impatient, pointing fingers, either being pulled by or tugging their daddies along. By now, I knew it would never go away. I would always miss my parents and mourn every moment they couldn’t experience with me.

A white sack crinkled when it was set in front of me, bearing the simple JayWok logo on the front: a cherry-red medallion with thick, mirrored lines and spaces. I always wondered what the mini-maze meant, but I was distracted by the knuckles covering the rolled-down top of the sack.

“Eating alone?” the man asked.

His hands were sexy. Yes, sexy. Thick, just the right size, and muscular. Yes, muscular. When a woman had been single as long as I had, we began to notice certain things, like hands, that others may not. The tiny dark hairs on his fingers, his freshly cut nails, and the scar on his right index finger. Most important was what his hand was missing: a wedding band. The only thing worse than a wedding band was the dreaded tan line on the ring finger of a man looking to stray. He was missing that, too, and I couldn’t help but smile.

I looked up, seeing a familiar pair of gray eyes belonging to a guy I knew was definitely single. “Excuse me?”

“Are you eating alone?” he said again, this time enunciating.

“Uh, yes.” His assessment was more than a little embarrassing. “I know. It’s kind of pathetic.”

“I don’t know,” he said, sitting in the chair across from me. “I think it’s kind of romantic.”

I narrowed my eyes. Romantic? That didn’t sound like the obnoxious paramedic who flirted with every nurse in my ER.

He let go of the sack and held up his hands. “I’m glad to see you’re okay. If you’d taken off a few seconds earlier, it would have been a lot worse.”

“It’s all pretty fuzzy.”

He frowned, lost in thought. “Not for me.”