And she hadn’t even seen him with his daughter yet.
“I’ll try and run interference, but you know the other three aren’t going to let this go.”
I did know. But there wasn’t anything to say. Did I find him attractive? Yes. I could admit that because I never lied. But my friends would want to speculate and make conjectures, twisting the truth into a story to fit their fancy.
Ben pulled on some purple nitrile exam gloves, then lifted the paper towel from Amanda’s shin. “Knife?”
She shook her head. “Clumsiness. I dropped a glass blender.”
Betsy held Amanda’s hand while Ben gently did his examination.
“We’ve got plenty of needles and thread in the living room, doc,” Betsy offered with a grin.
He glanced up, eyebrow quirked. “Oh?”
“I’m not a length of linen.” Amanda folded her arms with an exaggerated pout.
“No, I think you’d be more of a jersey girl,” I tossed her way.
She laughed. “If it’s a sports jersey then you’ve got that right.”
Ben rotated in his seat to look back at me, a smile playing on his lips. “I think I’m missing something here.”
“You’ve stumbled upon a truly rare event, Dr. Reed.” My lips pressed into a smile, but I didn’t add anything, even after his curious tilt of the head.
“Definitely a never-seen-before moment,” Betsy added.
He grinned. “Why do I feel like I’ve just stepped into a nature documentary and David Attenborough is going to start explaining the peculiarities of the subspecies of female Millennials?”
“As if a man, even if he does have an English accent, would know anything about human females.” Nicole laughed.
“We sew,” Amanda finally supplied. “At least, they sew. I make the drinks. Or attempt to, anyhow.”
Ben squirted a clear liquid over the wound and caught the pink overflow as it ran around to the back of Amanda’s calf. “Who creates the neatest stitches?” He looked up into Amanda’s eyes. “This cut is going to need to be closed up.”
Amanda nodded and squeezed Betsy’s hand. “Jocelyn has the prettiest stitches. They’d even make a granny cry.”
“Jocelyn only sews fabric, not people!” Jocelyn shouted from the living room. “Chloe and I are doing fine right where we are, thank you very much.”
Ben chuckled. “I think I’ve got this covered.” He looked back to Amanda. “Are you allergic to anything?”
She shook her head.
“Diabetic or have a condition where wounds heal slowly?”
“No, doctor.”
He smiled. “Ben is fine.”
Betsy leaned close to me and whispered, “Yes, he is.”
I groaned. Between Amanda spending too much time in locker rooms and Betsy behind the scenes with fast-living musicians, the two had picked up on a few bad (male) habits.
Ben rifled around in his medical bag then produced a squat bottle with a long-nosed tip like a nasal spray. “Unlike the king’s horses and men, I can put Humpty Dumpty together again.”
“Did he just call you Humpty Dumpty?” Jocelyn yelled from the other room.
My lips twitched. “Yep.”
