The potassium level measured for my patient is wrong, I’m sure of it, and that’s the only thing I should be dealing with right now. In the hallway I almost bump into Autumn.
‘Oh,’ is all she says, smoothing down her fiery red hair, visibly confused.
‘Are you okay?’ I scrutinize her. ‘You look like you’ve just seen a ghost.’
Her cheeks immediately turn bright red. ‘Yeah, yeah, everything’s fine.’
‘Mhm.’ Nothing is fine with her, I can see that. Sonora mentioned something the other day about the father of Autumn’s little patient. It was all very cryptic, but she still hinted that something might be brewing there. ‘Does it have something to do with your patient’s dad?’ I ask.
Her shocked expression is answer enough. ‘No,’ she replies in a shrill voice, clears her throat and exhales quickly. ‘No, really not, I’m just in a hurry… because of… because of a patient’s test results.’
‘Sure.’
‘He has pneumonia, he was on the mend but now his cough has gotten worse and …’ she stammers incoherently.
I consider pretending not to notice that she’s completely falling apart and that it’s blatantly obvious this has somethingto do with that man. But then I nod in understanding; after all, she’s not the only one on an emotional roller coaster. If she were to ask me what’s going on with me right now, I wouldn’t know what to say either.
That there’s a man whose effect on my heartbeat is stronger than any physical exertion, even when he’s not doing anything special?
That when I’m near him I can simply forget everything and that it feels so liberating I just want more and more of it?
Or that all of this—as wonderful as it is—could end in disaster?
No one knows what things will be like in a month, a year, or a decade.The memory of Jaden’s words is everywhere inside me. Maybe they should scare me more, but they also feel liberating.
What he said yesterday is true. Day after day I treat one-percent people who, from one second to the next, no longer are, while I’m healthy despite my twenty-five percent.
And I am; Dr. Becker confirmed it, I’m healthy and I might even stay that way.
Besides, my calculation isn’t entirely correct. My risk might not actually be twenty-five percent. That’s just the most pessimistic figure that can be derived from the probabilities.
The most optimistic one is six.
Six percent risk that my illness will come back.
Six percent.
‘Nyla?’ Autumn waves her hands in front of my face. ‘You still with me?’
Her question echoes inside me. It should be easy to answer, and yet I can’t. Because I can feel that the Nyla she knows is just about to dissolve.
Somewhere between the Nyla I’ve been since my diagnosis and the many versions of me I could become, I give my roommate a meaningful smile. ‘Yeah,’ I reply. ‘I’mstillhere.’
Chapter Twenty-Eight
JADEN
I sneak a look at the clock. Our shift is over in fifteen minutes. My gaze drifts back to Nyla. With the results of MsRodriguez’s repeat potassium test tucked under her arm, she walks beside me.
She seems relaxed—in contrast to me. The questions she asked me yesterday at Spruce Hill Lake, the memory that suddenly felt so present I couldn’t push it away. Again and again it’s caught up with me—last night, this morning, late this morning. Along with Nyla.
What am I running from, she wanted to know. And I want to know how she would react if I told her. Could she really help me get out of there?
I take a deep breath, don’t know what to do with this thought, but I also know it won’t let me go.
‘What do you think about a drink after our shift?’ I ask Nyla, because here at the clinic we can’t talk about it anyway.
Hardly have the words left my mouth when I already see the two of us sitting in a bar. Nyla’s fingers wander along the stem of her wineglass, so tenderly that I can’t stop staring at her. She’stelling me something I don’t understand, but I hear her laughing vividly. It’s a moment full of beauty, confidence, warmth.
