My Turn to Ask

For six days, Dominic did exactly what I had asked.

He didn't appear at the hospital. He didn't send dinner. He didn't ask Clara to call me, although she had enough opinions to qualify as an independent communication service.

I discovered that space could be the right thing and still feel unpleasant.

On Thursday, a man I'd been caring for since Monday died just before the end of my shift. His daughter had made it in time. I had helped her lower the bed rail so she could hold him without leaning across metal.

Afterward, I sat in the locker room with my coat on and couldn't remember where I had put my keys.

They were in my hand.

Lena crouched beside my chair.

"Come home with me. We've got leftovers."

"You have two kids with stomach flu."

"They're recovering. Mostly. The sofa has been professionally threatened."

I managed a smile. "Go home. I'll call you when I'm in."

She waited until I looked at her and repeated the promise.

Outside, the cold hurt my teeth. I opened Dominic's message, read it, and typed before I could turn wanting company into an ethical seminar.

Are you busy?

He called a moment later.

"What's wrong?"

That was all it took. My throat closed.

"Nothing unusual. That's the problem."

He didn't tell me to explain.

"Where are you?"

"Outside work. I don't want to go somewhere crowded."

"Would you like me to come to you?"

"Yes."

He arrived eighteen minutes later in the same black sedan. This time, I opened the front door.

He took one look at me and put his phone away.

"Home?"

"Can we drive for a while first?"

He nodded and pulled into traffic.

We drove along the lake. I watched the dark water appear between buildings, and slowly the words came. The daughter's face. The wedding ring I had put into a little belongings bag. My irrational fury at somebody asking where the clean blankets were ten minutes afterward.

"I answered her like she was stupid," I said. "She wasn't. She was just asking for a blanket."

"You can apologize tomorrow."

"I know. I just wish being tired didn't make me less kind."

"It makes you tired. You can still decide what to do afterward."

He said it without taking his eyes off the road. I let my head fall back against the seat.

"I was angry with you," I said after a while.

"You had reason."

"I still am, a little."

"That doesn't mean you have to sit alone tonight."

I turned toward him. He looked tired himself, the skin beneath his eyes faintly shadowed.

"Did I interrupt something?"

"Dinner with a man I dislike. You've considerably improved my evening."

A laugh escaped me, unexpected and shaky.

At my apartment, I invited him upstairs. He followed me into a kitchen with crooked cupboard handles and three mugs drying beside the sink.

"I'm afraid there isn't a staff," I said. "You'll have to suffer ordinary hospitality."

"I've survived worse."

I opened the refrigerator and found eggs, spinach, and half an onion. He took off his coat.

"Where's your frying pan?"

"You don't have to cook for me."

"I haven't eaten either. You can supervise if that helps."

We made omelets badly enough that he admitted his mother usually let him chop things. I found a bottle of wine, and he declined because he was driving. We ate standing at the counter because my table was covered with laundry.

When a sock fell onto his shoe, he picked it up and placed it on the pile without comment.

That felt more intimate than the restaurant.

Afterward, I washed while he dried. His sleeves were rolled back, and a faint old burn marked his wrist.

"Was that your father's doing?" I asked before I could decide not to.

He glanced down. "Kitchen. I was nineteen and confident. Two conditions that should never occur together."

I laughed. "Sorry."

"You can ask me things, Emma. Everything doesn't have a terrible answer."

I handed him the last plate.

"Then why didn't you call?"

He set it carefully on the counter. "You asked for space."

"You wanted to?"

"Every day."

The apartment became very quiet.

"I wanted you to," I admitted. "Which was unfair, considering what I said."

"I'm willing to hear revised instructions."

I dried my hands slowly. When I turned, he was looking at me with none of the amusement left in his face.

"I don't want to be something you manage," I said.

"You aren't."

"And I don't want you pretending to be harmless. I won't believe it."

"I wasn't planning to."

He stayed where he was while I crossed the small kitchen.

I put a hand against his chest. His heartbeat wasn't nearly as composed as his face.

"I would like you to kiss me," I said.

His eyes dropped to my mouth.

"I've been trying very hard not to misunderstand you."

"Then let me make it easy."

I rose onto my toes and kissed him.

For a heartbeat, he didn't move. Then his hand settled at my waist, warm through my sweater, and he kissed me back with a restraint that lasted approximately three seconds.

My fingers tightened in his shirt. He drew me closer, his other hand cradling my jaw, and the sound I made belonged to a woman having a much better evening than the one who had left the hospital.

When we separated, his forehead rested against mine.

"Still angry?" he asked.

"Don't become smug. It'll come back."

His laugh brushed my cheek.

He stayed until I started falling asleep against his shoulder on the sofa. At the door, he kissed me once more and waited while I locked up.

The next morning, Mom called.

"Your father found a sealed envelope in the rest of the boxes. Your grandmother's handwriting. It's addressed to you."

I sat up in bed.

"What's in it?"

"We haven't opened it. But there's something else on the front. The name of a law firm."