He woke up two weeks later.
I had taken up work in a café a little way down the street from his apartment, and that's where I was when my phone started to buzz.
It being the lunch hour rush, and me not being entirely attentive what with remembering the orders-now that I had been promoted to being a waitress-and yelling at overly zealous patrons, that I ignored it at first, figuring if it was important, I would soon get the news one way or the other. I might not be living in my own homely home at the moment, but I still had payments to attend to.
Now that the threat of discovery wasn't hanging over my head as heavily as it had been before, I should have moved back home as soon as I was able...but somehow, through some unnerving workings of fate-or my own general inclination towards tardiness probably-I kept putting it off. When Mrs. Rodwell, who I was supposed to call Clara now, had mentioned that I could stay in Alex's apartment as long as I wanted to, I had jumped on the opportunity with my claws out. I knew deep down that, even though I should have moved back immediately, something in me balked at the idea of returning to that place. I didn't tell anyone this as of yet, but I never wanted to see it again.
Also, call me crazy, but somehow there seemed a sense of urgency in the world for me, nothing quite settling down straight, nothing stopping to spin. After that day at the hospital, I had come back to fall down on my bed the moment I was close enough, and the next morning a whirlwind had started in my small life.
Now that I could walk, getting employment as a waitress was as easy as snapping my fingers; and I didn't have to content with shady back alley places either. Hiding wasn't my objective anymore, though I did feel a prickle up my spine at the thought of Frank still out there somewhere, waiting for just the right moment to pounce, though I classified it as my overactive imagination. You didn't just get up and continue with your big, bad wolf routine after getting squashed by a wall days before. I felt like we had a breathing space, a break. And I was going to use it to my full potential.
What with my work hours, Ella and Hannah going to school, and Granny Tonks doing only god knows what, going back to my place seemed like the most difficult thing I could think of at the moment-and the most despicable. I wanted to find us a new home, a home that wasn't surrounded by darkness and shadows like the last one had been. A home that was actually a home...and I was in the market, though no one knew, not even Tasha.
Still sometimes I did catch myself feeling frustrated, and almost awkward, at taking Mr. Rodwell's home. He didn't need it right now, that was true, but I didn't belong there. It wasn't mine. I had to wonder how exactly I would explain to him my longer than intended stay when he finally got back.
Everything will work itself out.
Yeah, as if.
My phone, after repeatedly vibrating for two long sessions, had gone silent by the time I got back to the relative safety of the kitchen. Depositing my orders on the counter, from where the chefs were energetically ripping them off, I delved into my apron pocket and pulled it out.
Switching it on, I noticed that the caller ID said 'pain in the arse'. Why was Tasha calling me now? She should have been in her studio right about this time of the day, getting morally questionable pictures of herself taken.
I called her back.
Ring. Ri-
"Zara!" she practically screamed. There was an element of barely controlled excitement in her voice that had my hackles rising. "Where have you been? Why didn't you pick up the first time?"
I was perplexed. When was the last time she had picked up the phone so quickly? I couldn't remember ever.
I raised a premonitory hand when one of the chefs, Asim, started towards me, his chef's hat teetering at an endearing angle. I had to wonder what expression was on my face, for he stopped short on noticing and, when I didn't cut the call immediately, raised his eyebrows inquiringly at me. I shook my head to tell him everything was alright, and turned my back in his direction. Asim was a true gentleman, but sometimes he was suspiciously too sweet. I didn't think I could deal with him right now. "I was working, Tasha," I told her dryly. "You know that."
I bit my lip as I stepped into a corner besides a counter, out of the way of the running people. I tapped the heel of my flats on the ground in an attempt to give my toes some space. The shoes were incredibly cute, with a giant bow and multi-coloured cartoon elephants on a black background, but sadly slightly on the snug side-though who cared?
My heartbeat was starting to spike and I could feel an inexplicable tremor in my extremities. I had a feeling that I almost knew what news it was she was so excited to tell me. It was like that cloud of premonition that sometimes engulfs you, the idea that you just know what's going to happen, though you are hesitant to accept it even to yourself. My mind refused to string the words together, refused to conjure up the pictures associated with it, but my chest was starting to feel horribly hollow.
"Zara..." Tasha's voice was almost too silent for me to hear.
My ears were starting to feel hot. "What happened, Tasha?" I asked, my voice barely decipherable to my own ears, the words leaving my mouth almost without my say so. "What is it?" The room was starting to swim along the edges.
"He's awake."
My breath hitched in my throat and froze into a fist.
I ran.
It took me nearly an hour to get to the hospital through the congested streets, and the only reason I knew that was because I kept glancing at my watch as the terribly difficult to attain taxi, when finally on the move, stopped so many times that I was ready to just brave the distance on my feet come what may. But I knew that once we did get out of the traffic, the remaining distance was too long to travel on my own, and hailing a cab from that area was going to be nigh on impossible.
So I sat through the excruciatingly slow movements of the vehicle, alternating between biting my lips, biting my nails, and tapping my foot so fast and hard that once I did stop, I couldn't feel it anymore. In addition to the frustration of it all, I was suddenly assailed by a storm of contradictory feelings as well, like I didn't have enough to think about already. I was going to see him, but should I? Why did I feel so eager, like a bird about to fly for the first time, like a fish finally released into the lake again?
Driving along this street of thoughts, my mind would suddenly brake and start to backpedal. I shouldn't be so eager. I should have just completed my shift at the café before I left. What had gotten into me? It wasn't like he was going to waltz away anytime soon. It is not my place to be eager. For all intends and purposes, I was nothing more than a friend to him, if that even.
But if I am a friend, it was alright for me to feel this way...right?
I groaned to myself, making the cabbie look in the rear-view mirror with morbidly expectant curiosity.
I couldn't reconcile my feelings. What was happening to me? Why was I so unsure of myself? I couldn't think of a moment in my life where I had been unsure of my position, of who I was...but now? Now I knew seemingly nothing. It was like there was a chuck of space in the world where his and my life connected, and it was always stormy there, always a tempest brewing over the horizon. There were moments when the sun shone, when the flowers felt its warmth over their desperate faces, but the clouds of uncertainty were always nearby, always ready to cast everything into doubt again.
No matter the train of my unsettled thoughts, the moment the cab stopped before the hospital, I all but threw the money on the driver's face as I tore the door open and ran inside. I could hear his confused exclamations, rapidly descending into profanity, follow me through the doors-till they shut behind me and locked everything out, that is.
I raced down the corridors with wings on my feet, slipping and sliding dangerously as I turned the corners at top speed (my shoes might be super cute, but they had no traction-still, worth it). The people in my way exclaimed and threw themselves to the side as I barrelled forward in my headlong rush. Dodging wheelchairs and ducking past men, women and children, I had to wonder what it was these people thought they were seeing. A concerned someone rushing to see her loved one...but who? Did they think I was a friend? A mother, a sister, a cousin? A lover? Who was I? Who did I want them to think I was?
By the time I reached his room, I was out of breath, this fact coming to my notice only when, on stopping, I nearly passed out by the wall. Clutching the stitch in my side with one hand and the wall with the other, I lifted my gasping head and looked at the door. It was ajar.
I gave myself a moment then. My mouth had gone dry. Letting my back fall against the wall, I slid down to the ground and wrapped my arms around my knees.
I watched the door.
There were voices coming from the other side. This corridor was a relatively quiet one, the only individuals in the hall being an old lady slowly trudging along with her walking stick, a nurse holding her hand and helping her along. I buried my face in the hollow between my knees and listened.
"-be dead again," Alexander Rodwell was saying. I swallowed. "Stop that, seriously." His voice sounded raspy and quiet, but there was laughter at the edges of it, a sound I had only so rarely heard.
"You cannot make me do anything, Alexander," Mrs. Rodwell said sharply. From the way she sounded, it wasn't exactly hard to guess that she had been crying. I huffed to myself. Us, women, I thought, mentally shaking my head, we cry over everything. I sniffed.
"Mother, please," he said again. "I am in pain, high on heaven knows what, and all you can think of is wiping my forehead?" I think he was trying to sound irritated, but there was no annoyance or exasperation in his voice. The lightness in the corners of his words put a smile on my lips, which I hurriedly suppressed. Now I am smiling at hearing him voice? God, but I was in trouble.
"You are a terrible arse, Alex." It surprised me, though it shouldn't have, that Tasha was in there too. There was something funny with her voice as well, though I was apprehensive to call it what I thought it was. "Funnily enough, everybody is happy you made it out alive. Enjoy the moment."
He grunted, causing a ripple of laughter to disperse through the room. I huddled more into myself, pulling my legs closer and burrowing my head further.
Silence dispersed into the corridor from beyond the door for some time after that, making me wonder what they were doing now. Then Tasha whispered, "I called her. She will be here soon."
My head snapped up.
There was no answer from him, causing my heart to veritably explode as it picked up speed thumping inside me. Slowly, I place a hand on the ground and started to get my legs under me again. My breathing was inexplicably shallow.
By the time I reached the door, Mrs. Rodwell had again launched into a monologue about how irresponsible her boys were and how she was sometime surprised they had even made it out of diapers. No one dared mention to her that she had nothing to do with them getting out of diapers one way or the other. For everyone concerned, she had and always would.
The placement of my hand upon the door knob must have caused it to make a sound, for the silence that descended over the room was too sudden to be normal. I swallowed the stone in my throat and pushed it all the way.
All of them were looking at me. I had only one place I could look.
The picture was practically the same as it had been every time I had come to see him through the week. The only difference was that before, when I talked shit to him, or read to him, or only just sat with him, his eyes had always been closed. Now those aquamarine orbs were fastened on me like a hook. I would never know if it was that I had forgotten how they looked or if it was just the flavour of the moment, but they looked so dark a blue today that the actual colour would have been ashamed.
Mrs. Rodwell cleared her throat as she got up from her chair. My eyes snapped to hers for just a second, during which I also simultaneously noticed Christopher and Tasha standing on the other side of the bed, before fastening on him again.
"I...I will just get something to eat, shall I?" she said awkwardly, from the very edge of my consciousness. "Tasha, Chris, won't you join me?"
Nobody answered her, but a general exodus of feet started towards the door. I didn't question.
Tasha gave my hand a gentle squeeze as she went past, not saying anything. What was there to say, even? Christopher gently touched my shoulder on passing too, before following her out. Only Clara stopped by my side, pulled my hand up and patted it, and said, "Everything will be alright." I looked at her to find her smiling. She glanced back at the bed for an instance and then leaned closer to me. "He's high on painkillers right now. Charles said to take it easy."
The only reason I replied was because she kept a firm grip on my hand as she waited for one. "Of course." It was barely more than a distracted mumble. "I understand."
She nodded encouragingly, continuing to clutch my hand till Chris whispered from behind us, "Mom, you are foiling your own plan,"; hearing that, she let go with suspicious eagerness, muttering a sheepish, "Sorry," as she shut the door behind her.
The two of us were alone.
The silence stretched for so long that for a distinct moment I could almost hear the three who had recently taken their leave talk in excited tones about something that was most certainly not the day's stocks. I thought they would have stayed behind to eavesdrop-in fact, I was pretty sure Tasha and Mrs. Rodwell would-but the fact that their voices were growing steadily weaker alerted me to the fact that Christopher had indeed succeeded in getting them to leave.
My eyes skittered across his face. The tome-like silence was gradually descending into territories of awkwardness.
I cleared my throat. He shifted to the side.
"Hi," I said. My voice sounded old and dry. I cleared it again, a little louder this time.
He smiled. There was something in his smile that was so young and vulnerable that I couldn't help smiling back. It was probably the drug in his system, for he would have died before showing that smile sober.
I stepped to the side of the bed.
"I thought," he said, his eyes twinkling slightly. My breath was doing odd things in my throat. "I thought you would be here when I woke up."
I sat down on the chair Clara had been sitting on, methodically arranging my work skirt over my legs before looking up. Something was itching in my eyes. "I wanted to be here when you woke up," I said, striving to keep my voice as normal and light as possible, "but that would have been terribly cliché, don't you think?"
He smiled some more. Slowly, he lifted his hand, as if to give me time to move back if I so desired, and then placed it on my cheek. His fingers were warm as they skittered across my cheekbone. "I was so sure you would be there. Maybe it was the dreams. I had a lot of those."
I watched him, feeling somehow cut off from the world, like it was only this room that existed in the whole universe, and we the only living people. At the risk of sounding corny, I would say my heart felt light as a bird, where I would have expected to feel troubled and unsettled. "God above, you are so high," I said softly, smiling in return, placing a hand over his.
His brows furrowed as he gave a weak little laugh. "How do you know?" he asked.
"Well, you always say things you never would have otherwise, do things you never would have otherwise, when you are high. And...your mother told me," I admitted. I leaned my head against his hand and moved a little closer. "It seems we are fated to have civilised conversations only when you have shit in your bloodstream."
The smile on his lips stretched further. It brightened his face, that smile, in such a way that you found yourself less inclined to notice the harsh lines and commanding façade, but rather the soft upwards tilt at the tip of his nose and the fascinating sparkle in the corners of his eyes. "I suppose you are right," he said, his thumb sweeping across my skin. His fingers were so long that they rested under my jaw, cupping my face. "We do seem to follow that procedure."
He had an almost captivated look on his face, his lips twitched to the right in the most funny of ways. His fingers kept moving in hypnotic swirls. I could feel an odd kind of trance come over me. It was like my soul was leaving my body in vapours till I was nothing but bodily sensations.
I snapped my eyes open, only then realising I had closed them.
"W-who was it, then?" I stammered.
It took a second for his eyes to focus on me again. This is going in all the wrong directions, I thought to myself. All the wrong directions and yet I couldn't stop.
"What?" he asked. His hand fell to the bed again.
"Who was it? Who was with you when you woke up?"
He stared at me for a moment, and then gave such an explosive laugh that within seconds he was reduced to groaning, his hand clutching at his chest as he pulled himself up the pillows. I sprang forward, my arms wrapping around his shoulder to help him into a more comfortable position. "Careful," I warned, feeling lightheaded with sudden panic.
By the time he was back in control, the rapid spell of laugher had subsided into occasional snorting. I sat back down, feeling a little irritated. "What the hell was so funny?" I asked, fingering the edge of my scarf as I glared at him.
"Oh," he said, shaking his head, looking impervious to, or maybe rather amused by, my exasperation, "you asked who had been with me. It's just...it was Tasha, actually." I frowned. Tasha? I had thought she would be at the studio. What had she been doing here? My internally asked questions must have shown on my face, for he answered, "I understand she had been sitting in for Christopher since he had something important to do. As I recall," he continued, scrunching up his face in mock thought, "she screamed when she saw my eyes open. She might have shed some tears too, though I can't be sure, but I am entirely positive she kissed my nose."
At this, I laughed too. It made sense. Tasha wasn't what one would call a workaholic. It wasn't a new occurrence that she had just picked up and left whenever she saw fit. Having had some painful conversations with her agent myself, as I tried to pacify her, I knew about this practice more than I wished to. Besides, she had always had a rather obtuse way of showing love. "That sounds like her. Though I must warn you, she would rather send you back in a coma than have other people know about that."
He grinned sheepishly, showing all this teeth, even the slightly crooked right incisor that had always fascinated me. That's when my first tear fell. It was that grin. How was I supposed to control myself? It was so boyish-so childish even. So carefree.
I hung my head, trying to hide it, feeling almost embarrassed by the continuous occurrence of tears. One had to get irritated by them-I knew I was.
"Hey..." he said softly-clearly having caught them-and his hand was back on my face, lifting it up like it was the most tender of things, like it was fragile and would break at any moment. I heard him grunt as he pulled himself to a better sitting position. "There's no need for that now. Everything is fine."
I looked up at that, only to find I had involuntarily leaned closer. His face was barely an inch from mine. I stopped breathing. "Don't cry," he whispered. His lips swept closer and brushed my cheek, ever so slightly. Something exploded in my head. "Everything is fine. Don't cry."
I pulled back in a jerk. It was a reflex action, almost, like my body knew this was where dangerous territory lay. He stilled for a long moment. We looked at each other, trying to send some telepathic message, maybe, to make the other understand what we didn't-or I didn't-understand. Then he dropped his hand and pulled back, resting back on the pillows again.
Before the reserve could settle between us once again, I ploughed forward, lifting my head and sniffing like nothing world-shattering had happened. As mentioned repeatedly, I was pretty good at ignoring things. "I am sorry for this," I said, wiping under my eyes to pin-point exactly what I was talking about. "I don't know why I feel like crying all the time. It must be pretty annoying by now. I mean, I am guessing Mrs. Rodwell cried too? And Tasha, as you already told me. Why the hell is it that women are more inclined to cry than men, do you think?"
I had meant it as a rhetorical question, and he must have caught on, for all he said was, "Hmm."
"I know," I continued, taking his mumble for affirmation, not that I had needed it. "It must be something in our genes that makes us women. It is bloody irritating, though, I must tell you. Take it from a woman. I mean, all the times when you are trying so hard to look calm and collected, or even angry sometimes, and then suddenly you feel this blasted wetness trickle down your cheek, and your nose starts running, and you know no one is going to take you seriously anymore, and-"
He had been smiling as he listened to me rant. For it was nothing but that, a rant, for us to forget what had just almost happened, for me to vent the roiling bundle of some strange unnameable thing inside me. He must have guessed I had entered a loop, though, and wasn't going to shut up about this anytime soon, for he overrode me, saying, "Thank you."
I was stumped into silence. Then, "What for?" I asked automatically.
"For saving my life," he said.
Pause. "Oh," I scoffed. Then I narrowed my eyes and shook my head slightly in exasperation. "You have saved my life too, you know...technically, if not explicitly. We are even now. There is no need to mention it again." I felt slightly uncomfortable.
"I was the reason your life was in danger in the first place. If I had just left you alon-"
"Not that again," I said, this time getting off the chair in a violent movement, banging my knee quite sharply against the edge of his bed. I bit my lip to keep from exclaiming as I hobbled to the side and picked up a bunch of white roses from his bed side table. I wondered who had sent those. "I was the reason your life was in danger too. I told you, we are even." I lifted a rose to my nose like you were supposed to-even though I was one of those people who didn't like the smell of roses, to be honest.
Noticing him opening his mouth from the corner of my eye, I hurried to drown him out. "If I hadn't been so stupid in the first place, none of this," I waved a distracted hand in the general vicinity of the bed and his own prone self over it, still concentrating on the roses, "would have happened."
Again, he started to speak. "I-"
"I mean," I rode him over, putting the rose down and turning towards him, hooking a hip over the edge of the table, "I can't even begin to express how glad I am that there was a plan to get out of there. If there hadn't been one, I shudder to think how screwed we would have been."
He was silent for a moment, gazing off towards the ceiling, giving me an opportunity to study his profile and just...look. Suddenly, he swivelled his eyes towards me again. I blinked.
"The shit in my bloodstream is making me do something crazy again," he informed me.
My brow furrowed. I smiled wryly. "Is that so?" I asked, not able to stop myself from sweeping a strand of hair off his forehead. I hoped he would forget all of this when he was sober again. "What craziness is it this time?"
"What you just said, about us being so screwed if there had been no plan," he explained, quite abruptly shifting a little to the side and grasping one of my hands, and then the second. The drip on his right hand stretched as he cupped both of mine in his. "It just reminded me," his eyes looked distant, like he was reliving something else, "about how close we were to not having a plan." I frowned, causing him to squeeze may hands. "I would have done something so stupid then. I was going to run over there without a second thought. I would have, if Chris hadn't stopped me. I wasn't thinking straight. I never think straight anymore, not where you are concerned. It scares me, Zara. It scares me so much."
The monitor by the side started to beep rapidly as he shook his head. His eyes were wide, as if he was imagining again what would have happened if Chris hadn't been there. His hands squeezed mine almost involuntarily. "I am scared, Zara. You scare me."
My heart thumping wildly, I pulled my hands out of his grasp and put my arms around him, settling at the edge of the bed and gathering him to me as best as possible. "Sh...Alex, everything is alright. Calm down, everything is fine. Everything is fine." I weaved my fingers into his hair, pressing his head to my shoulder like a mother would a child's. Tremors ran through his body. He wrapped his arms around me too, pulling me closer till I could scarcely breathe. I rested my cheek against his hair. "Everything is alright. We are both alright."
I was gasping softly, like I had run a race. This was going into dangerous territory again, so dangerous, in fact, that I would probably never get out of there alive. Not that I would want to. So, being me, I just had to continue talking. "You need to calm down," I said, running a hand down his head and over his back, "before the doctors notice that bloody machine beeping away and come running to kick me out. Or," I tilted my head against his to emphasise my point, "worse yet, your mother comes to know I haven't taken it easy with you. She would hang me upside down from a tree and whip my butt like a piñata."
He burrowed his nose against my neck. His shoulders were shaking slightly, with laughter now, I assumed, judging from the snorts coming from the general vicinities of his nose. "You think so?" he asked, his voice muffled. His fingers were doing crazy things across my spine. He seemed to be back in control of himself.
I bit my lip. "I do think that she would love to do it," I said, mouth shooting off words without much thought, "but since it might be slightly illegal, I also think she won't think me worth going to jail over. So there's both ways this could go. Best not find out, shall we?" I let enough lightness suffuse into my voice to give him the impression that I was smiling, even as my heart debated with my brain over the possible health issues that would arise if it spontaneously exploded.
He snorted again. Then he whispered, "Only you."
I frowned. Shaking my shoulder slightly, I got him to look up, and then asked, "Only me what?" His nose, for all intends and purposes, was touching mine.
"Only you can make gross jokes when a drugged man tells you his deepest secret," he said softly, bringing a hand up to trace the side of my face.
I swallowed. "Deepest secret?" I asked, wondering why I wasn't stopping him right away. "This is your deepest secret? And to get you to reveal it one has to shoot you up with something? You sound like there is no other way around."
"I would have told you someday...I think." He rested his forehead against mine. "Maybe in fifty years or so."
I stared at him for a long moment, shifting focus from one blue eye to the other, and then burst out laughing. A confused expression stole across his face. He unwound his arms from around me and pulled away.
I scooted back, still laughing so hard I was almost reduced to tears. Like so many times in my life, these seemed like my only options. My existence was an interesting contradiction of these two extremities, always had been...but since I had stepped into his bloody office that day long past, this choice seemed to have been pushed before me with almost sickening frequency. Either laugh or cry. There was no middle ground.
So, I chose to laugh.
"Not the reaction I was expecting," he muttered.
With almost herculean strength, I controlled the inelegant snorts coming out of my nose and looked up. I wiped a sleeve under my nose. "You were expecting something?" I asked. Yeah, savage.
He settled back against his pillows, a strange expression on his face. "This scenario has been playing in my head for some time now, under different circumstances-though never the present one, true-and in none of them do you laugh."
Something sizzled in my chest. The laughter evaporated almost as fast as it had come. Following routine, tears prickled my eyes. "Where would this go, Alex?" I asked softly. "Where?"
He look away and up at the ceiling. A sad smile played over his lips. "I don't know," he said, sounding like we were having the most normal of conversations possible. "I don't know, but I do know that you are fucking with my head. That doesn't usually happen." He shook said head in such a melancholy gesture that I almost shut his mouth with mine right then and there, hang the consequences.
Thankfully, I retained a tenacious hold on my good senses. I didn't say anything too disastrous. Or maybe not. "Why, have you given someone else a chance?" I was aware of the fact that I sounded jealous. I was also aware of the fact that it seemed I didn't much care.
He huffed. "I am not a saint, Zara. Never have been, cannot say ever will be. I have had dalliances high and low, relationships I think even you would cringe over." His eyes flickered to mine, possibly to gouge my reaction. I didn't give him any. "Some of them were close to me, close enough that I could call them friends. But," he turned his head, "I didn't feel hollow when they left my life. Not how I felt when I heard your voice on the phone. Like everything had crashed down around my ears. I was expecting that call, Zara. And yet..." he let himself trail off. Then, "What of you?"
"What of me, what?" I asked. My voice sounded curious to my own ears.
"Did you give someone a chance?"
I huffed too, quite like he had when faced with the question. "I didn't get much chance myself, to give someone else a chance, did I?" I asked, turning my face away.
"No, that's not what I meant." His hand found mine again. "Before, after, whenever. Was there someone else then?"
I smiled slowly. What was it with him that we somehow always ended up talking like children, sharing secrets? "There was never anyone, actually. I don't believe in dating. Before you ask," I raised a premonitory hand on espying him opening his mouth, "I will tell you myself. See, I have a theory. Dating is for having fun and trying out new people, possibly to find the one for you. Where I am concerned, though," I pointing to myself, "I have never had much time or need to have fun. Besides," I shrugged sheepishly, "I am one of those who think if something is meant to be, it will be. There is no use trudging around with random people when the one might come along anyways. Or not at all," I added, to be fair. I sounded like an idiot. I felt like an idiot.
"That's an absolutely stupid theory," he stated bluntly.
"So I have been told," I agreed graciously.
We shared a knowing smile. In that moment, everything felt alright all of a sudden, like all the conversations left unfinished between us hadn't happened, like there wasn't a course we both had to select for ourselves. All the pieces of the puzzle seemed, for a moment, to be perfectly in place though, deep down, of course I knew that they weren't, and one of them would spring out of position no matter what I did.
I rubbed the back of his hand, looking down. "You know nothing about me, Alexander. Nothing at all. None of the details."
His fingers tightened around mine. I glanced up to find him watching me with such a knowing smile that I knew I shouldn't have put my hand in this particular hole. "Do you really believe that?" he asked.
"I-"
A knock stopped me.
Both of us snapped to attention, me more so than him of course, considering his convalescent condition. We looked at the door.
Now, the general purpose of a knock, as one would assume, is to announce a person's presence and simultaneously ask the people inside said room for their permission to enter. Nobody taught Tasha that, though, for the sound of the knock had barely the time to disperse before she was pushing it open, exclaiming, "That was long time chatting, you two," as she led the people she had brought with herself inside, completely at ease with herself and the world.
Ella sprang into the room as if on springs. "Mr. Rodwell!" she screamed, causing the harassed looking Charles, who was following her inside, to wince. She bounded towards the bed, energetically endeavouring to climb on top. "I am so glad you are awake. And Mommy is smiling again. She hasn't been smiling since-"
"Ella," I said in exasperation. Having shot off the chair almost as soon as I had seen her, I by now had my arms around her waist, hoisting her off the bed, kicking and groaning. It was the training I had had in raising such a child that enabled me to move that fast, for I had already anticipated her general destination as she pranced into the room. "You mustn't do that. He's hurt."
"He's fine," she announced, squirming in my arms. "Let me go, he's alright." Then she stopped and glared at him. "Aren't you?"
Alex had been watching these abrupt new developments all this time with a kind of dazed wonderment that led me to think that his mind was yet too sluggish to comprehend the rapidity of everything. On hearing Ella's question, he looked at her quizzically for a moment and then, finally caught up, pulled himself upright with a strained expression, saying, "Er...if you mean alright as in alive, then yes, I guess I am." He gave her a tight smile, looking slightly panicked when she started to try to eel out of my grasp again. I had to restrain myself from laughing. For all his talk, he sure did not look at all comfortable with the thought of children anywhere near him.
"Ella, seriously, stop," I said tightly, placing her firmly on the ground and keeping a restraining hand on her shoulder. "There is absolutely no need for you to get up there with him. Who brought you here anyways?" I asked, feeling absolutely annoyed and irrationally betrayed, as I turned around to glare at the possible culprits.
Tasha immediately had a finger ready to point at Granny. "It was all her," she said, raising her other hand, palm outwards, in surrender. "I swear I had nothing to do with it one way or the other."
"But wh-" I started at Granny, only to glance down and realise the uncomfortable feeling at the waistband of my skirt was due of a small hand wedged around the fabric. "Hannah," I said tiredly, "what are you doing?"
She peeped out from around my side at him. "I brought him a flower," she said sweetly, holding out a slightly squashed rose up to Alexander.
I turned to find him staring at the rose as one might a poisonous reptile. It was obvious to anyone who cared to see that he had absolutely no idea what to do now.
I sighed, grasping Hannah's hand in mine and gently pulling her forward, at the same time not forgetting to keep a hold on Ella. On reaching the bed, I leaned close to him and whispered, "Take the rose, and thank her." Then I presented Hannah's hand to him and showed all the teeth I had. "Go on, darling," I said, "give it to him."
Hannah held the flower forward shyly.
His cheeks looked so flushed one would think he had been offered more than just a rose. I was so amused I debated just abandoning reason and descending into the throes of laughter I could feel bubbling at the surface. Alexander extended his hand forward and gently grasped the stem of the rose. "Thank you, Hannah," he said, not looking at her. Instead, his eyes found mine in an almost beseeching look, probably asking me silently to get these little strange creatures away from him for he knew not what they wanted.
I smiled teasingly.
"I have a rose too," Ella declared. Everybody turned around to find her tugging a flat green stem from her pant pocket. The stem hand only one red petal hanging off its end. Even as we watched, her relentless tugging loosened its tenacious hold and it fluttered sadly to the ground. She held the bare stalk up. "I think I sat on it."
I closed my eyes briefly to pray for strength.
Doctor Williams cleared his throat. All eyes swivelled to him. He was twiddling with the bags of drips hanging by the side of the bed. "Alright," he said, gently putting a hand on his patient's shoulder and guiding him to put his head back on the white pillow. He pulled out a thin light from his white coat and proceeded to pull Alex's eyes open and shine the light in them. "I think all this excitement is about enough. All of you have said what you needed to, and now I believe he needs to rest."
I took a deep breath. "Yes, that's right," I agreed, grabbing Hannah's hand and then Ella's. "He needs to rest now. Come on." I didn't want to leave, but suddenly it seemed very important that I did.
"But I haven't said all I wanted to!" Ella wailed. She planted her feet firmly on the ground, so much so that I had to almost drag her with me. "I have to thank him for saving my Mommy."
I groaned. "Mommy didn't need saving. Mommy was fine on her own. But," I said, "if it helps, Mommy already thanked him for everything. Now, come on, we need to let him get his rest."
It took some time, but finally I did manage to get her outside. Charles, done with all the assessment he needed to, administered a sleeping dose to the patient-who was starting to look slightly green around the edges, truthfully-and then accompanied us outside.
Me being the last one to exit the room, I turned around one last time to look at him.
He smiled at me beautifully. "We aren't done yet," he said.
I shut the door before he had time to say more, fighting the maddeningly irrational grin on my lips.