Page 91 of Just One Look

She was still for so long, he didn’t think she would answer. Finally, though, she said, “He blamed my mom, of course. Maybe because it was too hard to blame himself, or maybe because he’s constitutionally unable to blame himself. Can we not talk about this, please?”

He said, “Sure,” because how could you say anything else? Maybe this was how she’d felt when he hadn’t told her about Lana. That was a disturbing thought, because it didn’t feel wonderful to know she had all that churning under the surface, and that she was shutting down. Shutting him out, so he couldn’t even help. “I’ll go get your car,” he decided.

“Don’t bother,” she said. “I’ll get it tomorrow, after work. Easy enough to grab a rideshare in the morning.”

He said, “Could you be just a bit needy?”

“What?” She looked startled, but still so tired, and he said, “Never mind. I’m going to get it anyway. Imagine that fetching cars is my hobby.”

When he’d come home, she’d been asleep on the couch. He’d put a pillow under her head, covered her up better, and left her there while he took Webster out, and she was still like that when he got back. That undressing thing he’d done last time had been exactly wrong, so he was trying this. Besides, Webster had her. The second they were back in the door again, the dog was trotting over and curling up on the rug, as close to her as he could possibly get, as if he wanted to be sure, if she put a hand down, that she could touch him.

That dog knew how to protect a woman. And how to get her to let him do it, too.

He woke in the darkness to the call of a seabird, checked to see if he was on a boat, heard the seabird again, checked to see if he was by any chance having sex with a woman and she was orgasming, discovered that sadly, that was not the case, and finally realized that the sound was Elizabeth. When he got out there, she was calling out some more, her arm outstretched, Webster up beside her, his nose practically in her face.

When Luka put a hand on her shoulder, she flinched. “Oh,” she said, opening her eyes. “What? Is it … is it morning?” She shoved the blanket aside and sat. “Right. I’m up.”

“No,” he said. “Nowhere close. You were having a bad dream.”

“Oh. Yeah. Doesn’t matter. I have a lot of them. Wait. Why am I here? I was supposed to …” She was standing now. Her hair was extremely messy, and his clothes were much too big on her. She looked bloody adorable.

“Want to come sleep with me?” he asked.

“With you? No. I should … did you get my car?”

“Yeh. Seriously, though. Need a cuddle?”

“Acuddle?”She stared at him like he was mad. “No. I’ll just …”

He blew out a breath. “Nothing’s going to happen. Nothing happened when I took your clothes off, did it?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I wasasleep.”

Could she be more annoying? All he wanted to do was provide some bloody comfort! He was never noble. Here he was being noble, and she didn’t even care! “Nothing happened then,” he said, “and nothing’s going to happen now. Could be good to have somebody close, though.”

“Oh,” she said. Somehow, despite her fatigue, she was wide-awake now, firing on all cylinders. “Is that what you do? Is that the reason for all the sluttiness?”

“Pardon?”

“Sort of … warm body? After your obvious childhood trauma? Real connections are too risky, so you use sex?”

“No,” he said. “Fine. You don’t want a cuddle. Go back to sleep.”

When he’d woken this morning, the blanket was folded, and she and the dog were gone.

This was not how his dates normally went.

* * *

Now, Nils said, “MRI,”to Elizabeth, who studied several sheets full of tiny pictures, then asked, “Did you order a CT scan as well? The radiating pain would suggest it. Does he have any weakness in that arm?”

Nils said, “Not so far,” and put more sheets up, and Elizabeth said, “Hmm,” and then, “I’d like to see X-rays.”

Some more pictures of Luka’s skull and neck, and she said, “Well, that’s pretty clear,” and Nils said, “Yes, I’d say so. Have a look at the chart.”

She did, making some more “Hmm” noises, until Luka finally said, “Pardon me. Patient over here. Want to fill me in?”

Nils said, in that dry way doctors had of coming crashing down on your life, “Your disc hemorrhage continues, of course, but we also see, here, a Level 2 Type IIA spondylolisthesis of C5 over C6.” He pointed with a pencil.