Page 42 of Who I Really Am

“Of course I m-memember. But…” But her gaze roves the unfamiliar setting.

I squeeze her hand. “You’re in the hospital. Got a bad infection.” That’s only half the story, but she wouldn’t want to hear the rest from me. This is stuff I should not know.

“’fection?”

Uh… “I don’t, um…you know medical stuff. I bet the nurse can explain.”

Wow, I’m a real boy-wonder, aren’t I?

Conversation is taxing, and her eyelids droop. I breathe out. Turns out, for all my macho bravado, I’m a chicken. I don’t want to watch her remember.

But I see the instant my luck runs out. Her eyes fly open wide, then cinch down tight. Almost immediately, tears seep from the seams. It feels like forever they leak out. Quiet sobs rattle her body. I continue to hold her hand; she continues to allow it. At some point, I realize that, lost in her grief, she’s probably lost the sense of my presence.

Finally, the tears subside, and she drifts back to sleep. I’m glad. She needs all her energy to fight.

As for me, I fight my conscience. The right thing to do is call my friend.

I think.

I just don’t know. Certainly, thanks to a clueless doctor, I now better understand her desire to keep her family in the dark. But if her life is at stake…

I drift into a light slumber for some indeterminate time until the same nurse—her badge saysAmy—comes back in. Sets an IV bag on the bed tray and checks the equipment. Takes Annalise’s temperature.

“What is it?” I hold my breath.

“It’s good, Mr. Walker. Still elevated but going in the right direction.” She sort of smiles at me, something of a challenge in it.

I sigh. “We both know I’m not Mr.—”

She holds up her hand. “Don’t say it.”

Squinting, I try to figure her game.

She sighs. “I didn’t tell the doctor because she needs someone with her, and I’m assuming you’re better than no one. Don’t make me regret this.”

I snort. “Tell me how you really feel.”

She chuckles. “Sorry. All I meant to say is that patients need someone pulling for them, keeping watch. I can tell you really care for her, so…”

She can?

I do?

I focus on Annalise’s face. Yes, yes I do, but I’m confusedwhyI care this much.

Nurse Amy picks up the bag of some sort of medicine and proceeds to switch it out with the old one on the IV pole. “Are you two dating?”

I shake my head, then answer verbally when I realize she’s focused on the IV. “No. Just…friends, I guess.”

She throws a glance over her shoulder. “But you’d like to be more?”

“Oh, I…well, it’s complicated.”

“How so?”

Nosy thing, isn’t she? Especially for someone who said she didn’t want to know who I really was.

I push back in the chair, releasing Annalise’s hand for the first time in a long while, working the kinks from my fingers as I speak. “She’s my partner’s sister.”

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