chapter thirty-four

DOCTOR MARTY ALLEN was called in to speak to me since he was on my record as my therapist. There was no warning that he was coming; he just knocked on the door out of nowhere with his clipboard and striped tie and spiffy suit. I'd been incredibly awkward sitting across from him on a couch, so imagine my incapability of speaking properly when I was in a hospital bed.

Was it a trick for therapists to not get uncomfortable? Marty hadn't even flinched in the tense atmosphere. In fact, he was trying to go about a normal conversation as if I wasn't losing my mind gradually each minute. He was doodling on his clipboard like a child might've since I wasn't exactly giving him anything to write down. It was hard to answer a question in more than one word, so I didn't.

"How's your family?" he asked.

"Fine."

"Even with the situation at hand?"

"Yeah."

"Are you okay?"

"Sure."

At this, he finally heaved a sigh and peered up at me. "Delilah, I know this isn't your favorite thing, but you could at least give it a try. Have more of an open-mind, and you might just realize that this isn't the worst thing in the world."

Biting the inside of my cheek, I glanced down and picked at my nails. "Sorry."

"Let's try again, shall we?"

"Okay."

"And let's try to answer with more than one word..."

"Okay." He frowned at me, so I added, "I'll try."

Marty seemed to learn from our previous--and only--session. He kept the conversation simple and calm for a while instead of diving straight into the hard stuff. When he did start dancing around the bad things, somehow he'd managed to get me comfortable enough to tell him about Lacy and her visit the night before. I admitted that I was scared of filing any reports in case they didn't work or Justin found out and went crazy.

His reply was, "It's reasonable to be anxious, but perhaps in the future you'd regret not speaking up, yes?"

That made me think a bit more than I wanted to. The future had never been something that worried me before. I used to have my whole life planned out, but clearly things didn't go according to the plan. I didn't like thinking too far ahead now. Too much of life was unpredictable, and when a prediction of yours shatters into pieces, you're left disappointed and miserable. I wanted to try and spare myself the misfortune of pulverized hope.

Talking wasn't so bad anymore, not after a while. It was weird how peaceful it had started to become, almost like I was speaking to myself. Every now and then I'd get caught in a monologue of something dreadful, but it was like talking to a mirror because Marty stayed silent until I had finished. I think that helped a lot to know he was actually listening, or at least very good at acting like he was.

After an hour or so, Marty stood up and stretched and gave me a friendly smile. "Thank you for opening up to me, Delilah. It's been a pleasure. I hope this time has convinced you to try another session when you're feeling better."

"Maybe..."

"That's not a no," he said with a laugh. "Feel better, Delilah. Hopefully, I'll see you soon in a much happier state."

When he left, I sank back into my pillows. There was a lightness in the air despite the building itself. I hadn't told Marty the gruesome bits or even most of my inner thoughts during and after my unhealthy relationship, but I'd told him more than I would've ever thought I could. It gave me a headache and made me nauseous, but I did it nonetheless.

The nurse came in for a blood sample to check my iron levels and such, though she didn't look as if she had much hope for the results. They'd been doing it every couple days or so, and I'd been in a little over a week now. Each time they'd change out the IV liquids for something else that I didn't understand, and they'd try to talk to me about eating some Jell-O or a fruit cup just to get something in my system.

Of course, I couldn't do that. It wasn't that simple.

A little while after the therapist left, Nat showed up for his daily visit. He had been bringing a deck of cards, always trying to show me a magic trick he supposedly learned and always failing to do it properly. Today, however, he had Battleships and a cheeky grin on his face.

"For nostalgia," he said, raising the box as if we were having a toast.

"For nostalgia," I agreed, then laughed.

There wasn't much to talk about, but somehow Nat always found a topic. We'd started off talking about the football playoffs last night that I hadn't seen, and then we managed to get ourselves on the subject of being a banana mascot.

"Remember when I thought that's what you'd succumbed to since I'd been gone?" he asked. "Well, they've got a poor soul working there now. I passed him on my way here. He's got a sign and everything."

"Maybe he likes being a banana mascot."

"His face was the epitome of regret."

I laughed. "Maybe he regrets that he hadn't become a banana mascot sooner."

"Why are you trying to make the situation better? No one wants to be a banana mascot. Unless that's why you're defending it, because it's your secret passion."

"Oh yes, I've dreamed of nothing more than waving a sign in Florida heat wearing a banana costume."

He tsked. "I knew it."

"Or," I said, "maybe you're bashing it so much because you don't want anyone to find out that it's your secret passion."

Nat looked up at me, his eyebrows furrowed and eyes narrowed. Without moving a muscle, he murmured, "Well played, Delilah. Well played."

I shrugged, smirking. "What can I say? I'm pretty brilliant. I should be a detective."

"Now you're getting cocky. Tone it down a bit, Sherlock."

"Technically, you just called me a detective."

"I called you Sherlock."

"Who is a detective."

"Dammit."

"Just give up."

Nat groaned when I sank his submarine. "Stop cheating!" He bit his lip in concentration, guessed wrong, rolled his eyes and said, "I'll outsmart you one day."

"'One day' is not today, though, is it?"

"B-7," he said.

"Miss. E-3."

He was quiet a moment. "I genuinely believe you're cheating now."

"Nathan, you're putting them in the same place every time."

"To confuse you!" he argued. "You're not supposed to assume I put them in the same place!"

"This is our fourth time playing," I countered. "I think it's quite safe for me to assume."

"Okay, fine. I brought a backup." He slid off the bed and walked over to his bag, rummaging through it for a brief moment before pulling out another old game that I hadn't seen in years.

"Candy Land?" I asked, raising my eyebrows.

"Found it in the depths of my closet."

"Why was it in your closet?"

"You don't remember? I took it, like, forever ago when I got invited to Mira Stafford's birthday party. She was friends with Brianna Mitchell, and apparently Brianna had this thing for Candy Land. So obviously, I was going to bring Candy Land so she would have a thing for me."

"It didn't work," I noted the obvious.

"You could've said that less harshly. You've wounded my ego," he muttered, cleaning up Battleships.

"It was too big, anyways."

So we played Candy Lane for nearly an hour and a half. Nat won only once, but it made him determined to win again and he refused to quit playing until he did. Eventually, I got a bit bored and lied about the card I picked up so he could get ahead of me in the game. When he made it to the end first, he had acted like someone bought him a dozen cheeseburgers.

I let him gloat, though, smiling at the mere fact that he was smiling. He was so lively and talkative that I had forgotten all about being in a hospital room. It had felt like we were back at home in the living room, reliving all of our younger years. I missed those times terribly, so I absorbed this time together and held it close to my heart.

He was picking up the game when a knock came at the door. Lacy popped her head in, and I was just as surprised to see her as last night. She had her hair down and carefully angled her head so it hid the red mark, but no one would've noticed that unless they knew what was under her bangs. She was very subtle, excruciatingly believable, in portraying normalcy. Like nothing at all was wrong in the world.

"Hey," she said softly, giving me a smile. "I was going on lunch break, but I thought I'd stop by and see how you were doing. And, you know, if you wanted I could sneak you in some food. It'd be much better than what they serve here."

She then seemed to realize that Nat was in the room and she blushed. "Oh, sorry. Am I interrupting?"

"No, he was just leaving," I told her reassuringly. "Lacy, this is Nathan, my brother."

Whoa, hold up. Is that redness appearing in Nathan's cheeks?

"Hey," he said, almost sounding shy as he held out his hand, and she shook it timidly. "Nice to meet you. You can call me Nat, by the way. Everyone else does..." He trailed off sort of awkwardly.

"Nice to meet you too." She nodded, withdrawing her hand and turning to me quickly. "Um, anyways. Did you want anything?"

"Oh, no, I'm all right. Thank you, though."

She smiled, gave another nod, bid farewell, and made her exit.

Nat turned to me almost immediately. "Who is that?"

"I told you, her name is Lacy--"

"Yes, yes, I got her name. But, like, where did you meet her? Have you known her for very long? I mean, surely you haven't or I'd have met her before--"

"Nathan, chill." I looked at him with surprise. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say you've got a little crush forming."

"Crush? No way. She's just.... Well, she was... you know, cute." He shrugged, his cheeks flushing as he rubbed the back of his neck.

I was laughing, but then realization dawned on me and I deflated, pursing my lips. Nat caught on and gave me a worried look. I tried to explain, but it was more difficult than I thought. "She, uh... She's got a boyfriend?" I said, yet it came out more like a question. Would Lacy consider herself still taken? Strictly speaking, she was.

His shoulders slumped. "Figures," he mumbled. "Do you know him?"

"More than I'd like to..." It was my turn to leave the sentence hanging awkwardly in the air.

Nat frowned, frowned some more, then his eyes widened and he looked at me in disbelief, almost in fear. "You mean she's dating...?"

"Justin," I breathed, wincing as I said it.

He clucked his tongue. "Huh." Then he shifted from foot to foot and questioned cautiously, "Does he... does he treat her the way he did you?"

"Nat..."

"How many more people does he plan on hurting?"

"She's getting out of it," I told him. "Or, trying to, at least."

"There shouldn't even be anything she needs to 'get out' of," he remarked. "And not just her, but anyone else he'll ever be with. And other people that suffer because of people like him."

I sighed. "Can we not go into this conversation, please?"

He grumbled under his breath before exhaling loudly. "Yeah, yeah, you're right. It just really irks me every time I think about it."

"Irks you?"

"Don't even start."

I smiled. "It's just a funny word, that's all."

"Well, I'm a funny person."

"That was funny because it isn't true."

"Says the one who makes horrendous puns." He squinted at me. "What are you doing?"

"Trying to come up with a pun for you being angry."

"Please don't."

"All the ones I can think of don't relate to this conversation, so they wouldn't be any fun. Like if we were talking about rabbits, and you were upset because you think dogs are better, I could say you were having a bad hare day." I shrugged. "But it just wouldn't work for this."

Nat blinked slowly, then shook his head. "I think this is my cue to leave."

"And see, if we were talking about utensils--"

"Why would we be talking about utensils?"

"--I could say have a knife day, or see you spoon, or fork off already."

"This hospital has given you too much free time," he said, patting my knee. "Try sleeping. Or read a book."

"I've done both already. Bring me another book from my room tomorrow?"

He rolled his eyes. "What do I look like, a servant?"

"If I close my eyes slightly and tilt my head a bit, then yes."

"You're something else." He chuckled and kissed my forehead, then slung his bag onto his shoulder.

It was just me once more.

I tried to take a nap and failed. I tried to find something good on the limited television channels and failed. I tried to reread my book yet lacked the excitement from the first time and failed. I tried to come up with my own magic trick from the deck of cards Nat left me and failed. It was awfully lonely and quiet and none of the nurses or doctor hung around long enough for me to get persuaded to create small talk.

But trying to do all of these things passed a decent amount of time. By nightfall, I was snuggled up watching reruns of NCIS and waiting for sleep to hit me.

However, my phone dinged before I could shut me eyes all the way.

From Nat:

DELILAH, I THOUGHT YOU WERE GOING TO TELL HARRY YOU WERE IN THE HOSPITAL!

Confused that he'd written in all caps, I went to reply, but he had already sent a second message and didn't give me the chance.

From Nat:

YOU CAN'T EVEN LIE BECAUSE HE JUST CAME BY THE HOUSE. YOU'VE GOT A LOAD OF EXPLAINING TO DO WHEN HE COMES BY IN THE MORNING...

My heart plummeted, my phone shaking slightly in my now trembling hands. I had forgotten that Harry had come home today. I thought there were still a few days left of his trip. Had time really escaped me so quickly?

A cold sweat broke out on my skin.

I couldn't see this ending well.