Page 11 of Grumpy Sunshine (Content Advisory #1)

Eleven

It’s like these kids see the room clean and think, “Absolutely not.”

— Text from Aella to Silver

AELLA

I wouldn’t admit this, but I watched for him to come out of surgery for half the morning.

When he finally did, the butterflies in my belly started to fly.

I quickly looked away, focusing on filling up my cart in the supply closet and not at his overwhelmingly handsome form.

This was the way it went for me.

I looked at him when I could do it in a way that he wouldn’t be looking, or noticing, and I ran away when he got too close.

Honestly, I was surprised that I handled myself as well as I did last night and this morning.

I must’ve been high on adrenaline or something.

When I noticed that he was coming my way and not stopping at the nurses’ station, I promptly dropped an entire box of four-by-fours on the floor.

“Shit,” I said as I hunched down.

I could feel him getting closer despite the fact that I was doing everything in my power not to look at him.

I’d just picked up a handful of four-by-fours when I heard the yelling.

If the way that Chevy dealt with the young boy in room three didn’t do my heart in, the way he picked up his niece and whirled her around would have.

“Unca Evy!” the little girl cried.

Catalina.

His brother, Cutter’s, daughter.

I’d seen her before, of course.

Cutter, Keely and Copper came to the hospital all the time—though Copper was the most recent brother to start visiting, and I was still curious as hell to know where he’d been this entire time.

One day, maybe I’d have the courage to ask Chevy.

Until then, my mind made up elaborate dreams that were likely really far from the truth.

“There’s my girl.” I watched as Chevy bent down, picked up the young toddler, and threw her high in the air.

The mother, who’d been about halfway down the hallway, let out a squeak.

“Chevy,” Milena gasped as she placed her hand over her heart. “Don’t do that.”

“It’s fine, Mil,” Chevy teased as he brought the young girl close and blew raspberries on the side of her neck.

“We ame to swee woo.” The little girl threw both of her hands onto Chevy’s face and squeezed.

“I can see that,” Chevy replied. “You’re lucky you didn’t miss me. I just got out of surgery.”

I loved that he talked to her like a grownup.

I loved even more the look in his eyes when he stared adoringly down at the little girl.

“We had her two-year checkup today, and she demanded that we come see you,” Milena said. “I didn’t even know if you were working today.”

“I’m off tomorrow through Friday,” he said. “Then I work the entire weekend.”

My schedule.

A delighted shiver went down my spine.

Though I wasn’t supposed to work this weekend, the charge nurse, Dru, had asked me if she could rearrange my schedule because a tech had quit. I’d agreed, and now I was really glad that I did.

More time to ogle the sexiest man alive sounded pretty freakin’ sweet.

I finished picking up the gauze four-by-fours and stuffed them into my cart, then backed up and closed the door to the supply closet.

I was about halfway to the nurses’ station when Dru stopped me and said, “Would you mind showing Mr. and Mrs. Spurlock to the cafeteria?”

I could read between the lines.

They needed a break, and I was to show them the good stuff.

“Sure thing,” I said. “I was about to take my lunch break anyway.”

That was a lie.

I wasn’t due for another hour, but Dru smiled and gave me a thumbs-up, indicating that she’d cover for me.

We were supposed to have two patient care techs per shift, but we were short one due to one quitting after finding out that she was pregnant.

Which meant that I was overworked and tired, and to be quite honest, maybe I could use the good stuff, too.

“Right this way, y’all,” I said.

“Thanks,” the big man said. “You worked here long?”

I nodded as we started down the hall, passing the three Claybornes in the hall as we did.

“For about two years now,” I answered. “Do y’all live here?”

“No, we live in Kilgore, Texas,” she said. “It’s about…”

“I know where that is.” I smiled. “I have a good friend that lives there. We met in high school when she moved here with one of her divorced parents. She didn’t like the big city much, though, and moved back home. But we’ve kept in touch.”

“Small world,” the woman replied, sounding tired.

“The surgery went well, I heard,” I said. “Bet you’ll be heading home tomorrow.”

“That’s what the doctor said,” the woman replied.

“Ashe,” the man warned.

“Dammit, Ford, that guy is a creep,” Ashe, the mother, replied.

“He is,” I agreed quietly as I headed for the stairs. “But he’s an excellent surgeon, which is why they keep him here. He may not be the nicest, or the most understanding, or even be able to control his mouth, but he’s one of the best surgeons in the state. Dallas Memorial had to fight to get him here.”

“Doesn’t mean that he can say what he wants,” Ashe muttered.

“Don’t worry, we left him with my parents.” Ford chuckled.

I kind of wanted to meet them if the man’s parents could make Dr. Marsh hesitate.

Another person that could make the asshole hesitate was Chevy.

I loved when the two of them locked horns.

Chevy always came out on top.

“This is the cafeteria,” I said. “Most people would send you to the restaurants, but this place is a hidden gem.”

And it was.

They had the best chocolate cake in the damn county.

I got it every eight shifts like clockwork.

I would get it more if I could afford a piece of five-dollar cake.

For some reason, once you ate in the cafeteria eight times, they gave you a free piece of chocolate cake, and today was my day!

An excited squeal had me turning to notice that Chevy and his family had followed us.

The excited squeal had the couple beside me looking over their shoulders.

“I can see why he’s so good with kids.” The mother sounded happy. “He’s got a cute kid.”

“That’s his niece,” I said. “His family comes up here all the time to visit.”

The couple went through the line and got their food.

I waited for them to get all the way through before I ordered mine.

I usually got whatever was cheapest, and sometimes the lunch ladies had leftovers from the day before that they’d share with me if I was alone.

Today was my lucky day, too, because my favorite lunch lady, Manuella, was here.

“Oh, I have a surprise for you.” She smiled and hurried behind the counter.

I watched as she went to the warming area and pulled out what looked like a hamburger.

“Someone ordered this, asked for mustard, then complained about their mustard. So I saved it for you when we refunded them.” She smiled. “Voilà!”

Because Manuella was so sweet, I wouldn’t admit that I loathed mustard.

I’d just wipe it off with a napkin, and load the burger up with as much ketchup as I could grab without feeling bad for grabbing too many packets.

“Thanks, Manuella!” I grinned. “I’ll have a cup of soup today, too.”

She got my soup, my burger, and then headed to the checkout.

When she saw that I had the free cake, she went to the back and brought out a fresh piece.

“Here you go.” She beamed. “I just iced it.”

Even better.

My mouth was literally watering when I took my seat, and as I looked up just as I got situated, it was to see Chevy there, standing with his niece, staring at the lunch lady with a questioning look on his face.

Had he heard what we’d just been talking about?

I hoped not.

Chevy spoke low to the lunch lady, and she smiled.

She spoke animatedly with her hands, and then started to gesture to Catalina in his arms.

I looked down at my food and groaned.

A burger.

It’d been months since I’d had a burger to eat.

Honestly, it’d probably been longer than that, because I could trace my food consumption down to specific times and places.

I loved food, which sucked when you were poor as hell.

If it wasn’t ramen, I ate what was on sale that week from the grocery store.

Certainly, they never put anything super good on sale to the point where I could afford it, and if they did, it was gone in moments.

On the day I’d last had a burger, I could specifically remember it because Chevy had been the one to provide food for everyone.

It’d been Dru’s birthday, and he’d gone out of his way to provide lunch for everyone that was on shift that day.

I’d been intending to eat a salad for lunch, and had fully expected to get a wilty one from the lunchroom when a full catering order of burgers and fries from a popular burger joint down the street had arrived.

There’d been so much food that I’d even had two orders of fries.

It’d been one of the happiest days of my life.

Which was pretty damn sad that I called it one of my happiest days because I was given a burger and two orders of fries for free.

I took a large bite of the burger and realized that this day was a pretty good one, too.

I’d fully expected my birthday to suck because not only did I have to work, but Silver was out of town.

Usually, we ate our ramen together and celebrated by eating whatever pastry was on super sale from the grocery store. You know the kind. The ones that they have to pull off the shelves and throw away if they get too much older.

They weren’t the best of the best, but they were still decent enough that we could say we’d had something special.

But today, Silver was out of town with her family for a week in Broken Bow, Oklahoma.

It sounded pretty sweet, and I was happy for Silver, but that left me all alone with no one to celebrate with.

Though, a hamburger and cake sounded like a win to me.

I smiled as I started to dig into the hamburger.

I didn’t glance up from my food once, too busy eating and enjoying to watch what was going on around me.

I’d just finished my last bite of cake when another piece was slid in front of me.

I blinked and looked up, finding Chevy with his niece in one hand and his fingers pushing the cake toward me.

“I don’t like chocolate cake,” he said when he saw my questioning look. “And this one’s not allowed to have it yet, according to her awful mother.”

“I heard that!” the ‘awful’ mother in question called from her spot at the table.

Chevy grinned and shrugged as if he couldn’t care less what she’d heard.

“I can’t feed her in front of Milena, so we’re going to pretend like she doesn’t get sweets anytime she’s with me. So you get my cake today.” He lowered his voice so that only I could hear.

Elation poured through me.

Another piece of cake!

Yes!

“Best birthday ever,” I said as I reached for the cake.

His eyebrows rose. “It’s your birthday?”

I knew that my face was flaming when I said, “Yep.”

“Why didn’t anyone know?” he asked, frowning.

I shrugged. “No one asked when it was, so why would I just give that information out?”

He didn’t like that answer, either.

“Hmm,” he said.

“All right, my darling child.” Milena walked up to the frowning man in front of me. “You ready to give her up?”

“I’ll walk her down to the car,” he said. “I have a little bit more time.”

I waited until they walked away before going up to the counter and asking Manuella for a box.

She gladly gave me one and gave me a conspiratorial smile before she went back to work.

Gosh, I loved her!

My day went about as good as could be expected for someone that was having to work on their birthday.

I never saw Chevy again that day, though, which sucked.

Sometime in between me heading to a patient room and him coming back, an emergent case had appeared, and he’d had to go into a spinal surgery with the head of ortho.

I spent the rest of the day looking out for him, but came up empty.

Sadly, my luck didn’t hold out, because I had to jump start my stupid car by pushing it down the hill again.

When I got home, my air conditioner was also not working.

When I sent a message to the super, he told me he was out of town and the soonest that he’d be able to get to it was the following morning.

Needless to say, by the time I’d collapsed into bed that night with my chocolate cake, I was in a whole lot worse of a mood.

I ate my cake, bite by bite, and contemplated whether or not to open the window or not.

In the end, I decided that I’d better do it.

My box fan had died last week, and likely the only stupid air flow I’d get was by whatever breeze was blowing inside.