Page 44

Seth Mays

When are you coming over today?

The surgeon wants to talk to both of us.

Elliot Crane

I was going to do laundry because neither of us has clean underwear.

But if you need me, I can be there as soon as I put on pants.

And feed your stupid cat.

Sassafras is not stupid.

She’s been sitting on the bed screaming at me for the last half-hour.

Because she’s hungry.

I was in the shower.

The whole time?

Well excuse me if I have to take a shit sometimes.

I couldn’t help laughing at that.

Pretty long shit.

Do I need to give you a minute-by-minute breakdown of my bathroom habits?

I know your bathroom habits.

And you don’t take that long in the bathroom, even when you do take a shit.

I’m sore as fuck and moving like a turtle.

Do you need to get checked out again?

I’m fine.

Just feel like a half-dozen wolves did a tapdance on my back.

Are you sure?

I’m sore, but fine.

Promise.

I even have pants on now.

You’d tell me if you weren’t fine, right?

I would tell you and I would even go to the doctor all by myself.

Should I wait on the laundry?

No. The meeting with the surgeon isn’t until three.

I’ll be done with laundry and over there long before that.

Great.

That means you can have on clean underwear when you get here.

Anything for you.

I’ll bring you some, too.

I didn’t like that he was still hurting, although I suppose I couldn’t really be one to criticize, given my own tendency to not go to doctors even when in more pain than I knew I was supposed to be in.

At the moment, I obviously wasn’t being given much of a choice, since I was still in the James Blair Ward, awaiting a pre-surgical consult this afternoon—the reason I wanted Elliot to be here—to have my knee surgically rebuilt.

They’d tell me what, exactly, they had to do to it.

I wondered if this would actually be an overall improvement, or if I was now doomed to an even more shit knee than before.

It would be nice if I could get some sort of benefit out of this whole shitshow of a trip.

Along with more medical debt, because I was willing to bet anything that Augusta Health was going to be out-of-network for the Shawano County government employees’ health insurance.

Of course, if Walsh got her way, the law suit she was filing on behalf of Noah would end up including both Elliot and me, too.

Humbolt had graciously offered to serve as co-council, and had also agreed to only require a fee if they were successful.

And, in that case, the fee would be covered by the suit itself.

But I knew how slowly the legal system worked, so I wasn’t going to hold my breath. Instead, I was probably going to have to come up with some sort of payment plan, and that would eat into what little savings I’d managed to accumulate over the last year.

I also really hoped that I’d still have a job when I got back.

You can’t just fuck off from work for a month and then expect them to take you back, no matter what assurances Lacy kept sending in her emails.

Lacy might want me to come back, but I knew better than most that county—or state—policies might get in the way of that.

I had to remind myself to deal with one battle at a time. Right now, I needed to heal so I could have surgery, then heal again, and then I could worry about going back to work.

And somewhere in there I was sure there’d be fallout from my father’s arrest. I’d have to give statements, recorded evidence, and then a trial, although that would likely be far enough in the future that I’d be able to go home for a while first.

Home.

Shawano was home now.

Well, Elliot was home. And I liked the life we were building in Shawano.

I liked my job, I liked the work I was doing with arson investigation and was looking forward to being a CFI, I liked my coworkers, I loved Elliot’s house and gardens, I liked Henry…

And of course I loved Elliot and our life together.

I wanted desperately to get back to it.

I sighed and leaned my head back, trying to resign myself to the fact that I was, yet again, out of control in my own life. Subject to the consequences of actions that weren’t mine—to the actions of my father and the other members of the Community.

Again.

I was really fucking sick of the Community and my father controlling my life.

Anxious and unable to do anything, I wanted to talk to someone—Noah was with Lulu in Charlottesville and needed a break; Elliot was busy, but would be here in about an hour or so; Hart was working, having been released yesterday, although Taavi was sticking around for the time being to make sure he didn’t relapse himself back into the hospital, although I knew he’d have to go back before too long because of work.

Hey. You free to talk? We have a lot of catching up to do .

My phone started buzzing, Quincy’s face—sticking out her tongue—in the little round icon in the middle.

“It’s been forever!” Quincy exclaimed. “What’s going on?” she wanted to know.

“Hoo boy. Do I have… a lot to tell you.”

They were going to have to replace most of my knee joint—femur head and patella, as well as my ACL, MCL, and patellar tendon—all of which were going to come from cadaver donors.

The surgeon promised that if I did my physical therapy, I’d be able to walk again unaided within a few months.

I might have to wear an offloader brace, but it turns out there was a company in Charlottesville who specialized in custom braces of exactly the right sort, and they’d do a scan of my leg once the surgical swelling went down to make one for me.

All of that was, supposedly, good news, but both Elliot and I were tense in the aftermath of the consult.

I’d never had surgery before, and that was putting me on edge—and while Elliot had known people who’d had surgery before, he was still worried because it was me.

Not that he thought I wouldn’t be okay, but he was just worried.

He hadn’t said so, but I could read the set of his jaw, even through the scratches and swelling and bruises, even though all of those were starting to heal and fade.

“I know a guy in the Nation who’s a PT,” Elliot said, and I forced myself out of my thoughts. “He’ll be able to help.”

“Okay,” I agreed. “Although I don’t want to take him away from someone who might need him more.”

One corner of Elliot’s lips twitched. “Nah. He needs rich white clients, too,” he teased.

“Well, that’s not me,” I told him. “Especially after what this surgery is going to cost me.”

“It’ll be fine,” he replied, his tone unconcerned. “We can afford it—Dad actually left me quite a bit, and I don’t exactly live the high life.” His lips quirked. “Miller or otherwise.”

I felt my neck heat. “That’s your money, El.”

He sighed. “Okay, fine,” he retorted. “And I want to spend it on you.”

“Elliot—”

He leaned forward in his plastic chair, catching my hand in both of his. “Tell me what it will take for you to believe me when I tell you I love you.”

“I do?—”

“You do not,” he argued, but he sounded more sad than angry about it, which made me feel even worse. “Because you keep trying to push me away.”

“I’m not pushing you away,” I insisted. “I just don’t want to take all your money.” My face was hot now, too.

Elliot gently squeezed my hand. “It’s just money,” he replied. “Which means nothing to me next to your health and happiness. I will spend everything I have if that’s what it takes.”

“ Elliot —”

“Fortunately,” he interrupted me. “It won’t take that. Not by a long shot. Especially because even out-of-network, that out-of- pocket maximum is going to kick in well before you’d bankrupt me.”

I stared helplessly at him.

“Blame Menominee culture if it makes you feel better,” he said, then.

“What?” Now I was just confused.

His lips turned up in a shadow of his crooked smile.

“We’re a people of generosity,” he replied.

“What we have has value only because it can be given as a gift or in kind. Because it makes the world or our community better. I have enough money to pay for the business, enough to hire help, enough to pay for Henry’s house?—”

“You pay for Henry’s house ?!” This was the first I was hearing of it.

He shrugged. “It’s nearly paid off, anyway,” he replied mildly. “But Dad worked out some sort of deal back when Henry bought it so that Henry would only pay the first half of the mortgage, and then it would default to Dad. I just… took over. Only another three years, I think.”

“You’re paying two mortgages?”

Elliot shook his head. “Fuck, no. Just Henry’s, and it’s really not all that much. Our house was paid off a long time ago. That’s how Dad could afford Henry’s. But that’s not the point , Seth. The point is that I can pay for this, I want to pay for it, and I believe it’s right to pay for it.”

I didn’t like it. I didn’t like owing him again . More. Whatever.

First, it had been housing and feeding me.

Then the hiking boots he’d bought to replace the ones he’d thrown up on.

Food for the last year, because he definitely hadn’t been letting me pay for half of our meals.

Housing, since he wouldn’t let me chip in for heating or AC or water or any of the house bills, either.

And now this. And probably a new fucking car to boot, since I didn’t have enough saved up to pay for that, either, because he probably wouldn’t let me buy a shitty junker.

I mean, he’d let me. He would just make a very convincing argument for why I should get something newer if not completely new because I would need to be able to drive in to work in winter storms, and there would only be more miles in brutal weather, rough track, and long hours.

Apparently he didn’t even have to make the argument.

I still didn’t like having to rely on him in order to pay for any of it.

But it was either Elliot or massive debt. And I didn’t like that, either.

“But I don’t want you to have to,” I said softly.