Page 15 of Time for You
Daphne stifled a jaw-cracking yawn and nodded to Michelle, who was headed to her day shift at the OB clinic.
Daphne had spent the night at the hospital—a blessedly uneventful shift, for once, just the usual moderate chaos—and was really looking forward to collapsing into her bed until midafternoon.
She was halfway through daydreaming about her pillow—so soft, so perfect—when she opened the door and jumped about half a mile.
Henry stood in the middle of their living room, a paperback clutched in his left hand, looking expectantly at her. It wasn’t so much his presence, since she knew he had a key now, and more that she wasn’t expecting to see him so goddamn early .
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to frighten you,” Henry said with an odd, overly excited-looking smile. “Ellie’s still asleep, but I simply had to talk to someone.”
Daphne yawned again. “About what?”
“This. I found it in Helen’s apartment,” he said, and held up the paperback. It was older and clearly well loved, if the cracks on the spine were anything to judge by.
Daphne squinted. “I hate to break it to you, but Jurassic Park will not help us with time travel.”
“It’s not that. It’s—is this real?”
Daphne had had to function at an extremely high level for twelve brutal hours, and her brain just straight up didn’t work anymore. “I have no idea what you mean, I’m sorry.”
“The science in it. Is this real?”
“Like, DNA? Yeah, that’s real,” she said, toeing off her shoes.
If Henry weren’t around she’d probably just strip out of her scrubs and throw them straight into the wash, but he’d nearly had a heart attack from the idea of her washing her underwear with his clothes.
Stripping down to her underthings would probably kill him on the spot.
“No, the science. All of it.”
Daphne stopped in her tracks, doing her best to keep a straight face. “You mean, do we have dinosaurs?”
“Yes,” he said, and then took another look at her. “But given the grin you’re failing to hide, I’m assuming I’m wrong.”
She gave up. “You are, I’m sorry.” She tilted her head to the side as a rueful smile spread across his face. “Did you think you were going to get to see dinosaurs?”
“Well, excuse me for thinking I’d get to see one of God’s most majestic creatures.
You do have contraptions that take people to the stars, you know.
To me, that’s equally difficult to comprehend,” he protested, but he was starting to chuckle while Daphne burst into giggles.
She was doing her best to stay quiet—Ellie slept like the dead, but she didn’t want to risk waking her anyway—but the giggles were slowly winding up and out of control.
“I’m sorry, but how—how far did you get in that book?”
“The first few chapters.”
Daphne’s giggles were full-on laughter now, and Henry was grinning broadly. “You’ll want to read—a little further,” she said between cackles.
Ellie came out of her room in her bathrobe, yawning. “The hell is so funny this early?” she asked with good humor.
Henry was laughing too, now, and held up the book as if that were an explanation.
“He—he thought—he thought it was—” Daphne stammered, gasping for air.
Ellie looked at the book and wrinkled her nose. “Aww, did Henry think we had dinosaurs in the twenty-first century?”
“Again—you’ve been to the moon,” he protested, still laughing.
“Fair enough,” she said, shoving her hair back from her face with her hand. “Come on, Henry, I’ll show you how to make scrambled eggs.”