“You gonna be okay driving home in this?” I ask in a gruff voice, gripping my coat tightly to stop myself from reaching out to her.
“Yeah, I’ll be fine.” She pauses, her eyes moving back and forth over my face. Her tongue darts out to lick a raindrop from her lips. I stay frozen in place when she lifts one hand up, her fingers lightly brushing over my cheek.
“Isla,” I rumble.
“I’m sorry. We can’t. I know we can’t.” Her face falls as she pulls her hand away and steps back. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” She slips into her car, and I move a few steps back, out of the way as she turns it on and slowly drives away from me.
I can’t have her. But I want to. Fucking hell, I want to.
My drive home is slow, the rain pouring steadily down on my windshield. Once I’m in my austere apartment, the silence feeling oppressive, I move on autopilot. I change into workout clothes before going to the room I’ve set up as a personal gym. The all-white walls seem even more barren tonight. But maybe it’s not the walls, but me who feels empty, lost, and alone.
The punching bag in the corner by one of the large floor-to-ceiling windows is my destination, and for a while, I simply let it all out. All the frustration, all the tension, all the fuckinglongingfor the one woman I want, the one woman I can’t have, is poured into the bag.
I think about her deep red hair when I deliver an uppercut. I think about her smile when I execute a right hook. I picture her and Charlie, and a life I can all too easily see myself sliding into. But it’s a life I can’t have as long as she works for me, or more importantly, as long as I’m keeping such a huge part of myself from her. She doesn’t know about my missing limb. About the fact that I understand what her son lives with better than anyone.
I pull my last punch and let the bag swing as I breathe heavily, staring at myself in the mirror positioned in front of the weight bench. Who the fuck do I think I am, pining over a woman when I can’t find the courage to tell her I have the exact same condition as her son?
I move over to the bench and sink down on it, draping a towel around my neck. My leg starts to cramp, and I bend down and detach my prosthesis. As I peel away the compression sleeve and sock that covers my residual limb, I grimace.
Yeah, lusting after Isla when I still haven’t told her about my leg? Quite possibly the worst thing about this entire situation. Even if we never have a chance to be together, I owe it to her to come clean and tell her I have the same condition as Charlie. I just hope that when I do tell her, she doesn’t hate me for keeping it from her.
Pushing myself up with my hands, I grab the pair ofcrutches I keep in the gym room and make my way into the living room. Sitting on the couch, I grab my phone from the small side table where it sits, and unlock it, tapping into my messages. One hand massages the end of my leg while the other holds my phone, and I stare down at the message thread I have with Isla. The last thing we exchanged was a discussion about banner sizes. I hesitate for a second, maybe longer, then type out a message.
LUCA: I wish things were different.
Fuck. I can’t say that. I delete it, and then, before I can think better of it, I type again.
LUCA: How is it possible that I miss you when I haven’t ever had you.
Shit. Nope. Can’t say that, either, even if it is the goddamn truth. I quickly hit the delete button, watching my message disappear. It doesn’t matter what I wish I could say, or how I wish things were different and I was free to pursue her. I’m not. She made that clear the other night, and I have to respect it.
I drop my phone back down and push up to stand, grabbing the damn crutches again and move into my kitchen, filling a glass with some water and chugging it down. The cool liquid quenches my throat but does nothing for the other heat building inside of me. A drop spills onto my lip, and I lift my thumb to swipe it away, the movement reminding me of Isla’s hand grazing my wet cheek earlier in the rain.
I pivot and head for the master bedroom, pausing to strip my sweaty shirt off and drop it in the laundry basket as I go. In the bathroom, I turn on the shower before setting the crutches aside and sitting down on the chair next to my shower.
Most of the time, I’m accepting of my disability. Hell, sometimes I forget about it entirely. But ever since meeting Isla, I’ve found myself resenting it more than normal. I hate being different. Feeling incomplete. Like she could look at me and find me lacking. I hate that I need crutches, and fucking chairs or benches to shower. I hate that I’ll never be a regular guy, free to pursue a woman without worrying she’ll be turned off when she sees the stump I have instead of a leg.
I shove my shorts down and transfer into the shower onto the custom bench designed to make everything easy for me. All the fucking money in the world might buy me accessibility and fancy gadgets, but it can’t buy me a fully-formed leg.
I shower quickly, then dry off and pull on a clean pair of shorts before crutching back into the kitchen and throwing some leftovers in the microwave. I ditch one crutch and precariously—even though I’ve done it plenty of times—carry my food in one hand and crutch-hop over to the couch.
From my pocket, my phone starts to vibrate, and I’ll be damned if I don’t wonder if it’s Isla.
It’s not. It’s my mom.
“Hey Mom,” I say before shoveling a mouthful of reheated chicken and quinoa in my mouth.
“Hi honey, how are you doing?” Mom’s warm voicecomes down the line. “I had a feeling in my gut that you might benefit from a chat.”
I swallow and chuckle, shaking my head ruefully. “How do you do that?”
“Do what?” she asks, but there’s laughter in her voice. She knows.
“Always know exactly when I’m in a shit mood.”
“Mother’s intuition. You’ve always worn your heart on your sleeve, Luca, and I can always sense when that heart is feeling a little bruised. So, what’s going on?”
I exhale, letting my head fall back against the couch. Obviously, I can’t tell her I’m fighting feelings for my employee. But I can talk to her about the other shit bothering me.
