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He waited, silently, beside me, staring holes into the side of my face.
“What?”
“Something is on your mind, Nay. I know you, and the prettier you get, the madder you are. Talk to me. Tell me what’s wrong. What did I do this time?”
Sighing, I prepared to voice my concerns and my feelings toward the situation at hand. Before beginning, I was sure to maintain focus, keeping things centered around Mason because that’s what truly mattered.
“You’ve seemingly been preoccupied with work whenever you’re here. I understand that you decided against paternity leave, but when you’re here, Milo, be here,” I begged.
Nodding, he refused to combat my statement.
“You’re right. It feels like I’m trying to be in two places at once,” he admitted. “Maybe that leave of absence should’ve been on my list of things to do. I just figured I could balance the two, but it’s proving to be difficult.”
“It’s hard and I’m not at the office anymore. I’m home. So, I can’t imagine the pressure you must be under. If it’s not too late, take the leave, Milo. It’ll save us both the headache.”
“I’m at the end of this trial, Nature. Taking a leave now would honestly kill all the work I’ve put into this project. They’re willing to shove anything down my patient’s throats and I can’t allow it. For most of them, it’s life or death. For my mother, it was life or death. I don’t want to keep shoving drugs in their systems that make them walking zombies. They need solutions, not sedation. They want to live. Most of them, anyway. Not be confined to a facility or a bed because they can’t get past the fog the medicine creates. I have to thug it out, and once this ends, I’ll take leave.”
Remaining silent, I nodded. He sounded so much like my father. There was never the need to confront or argue with anyone who had their mind made up, already. Those people were only listening to respond, not listening to understand. Milo’s promises to prioritize Mason hadn’t been directly affected yet, so for now, I’d let him continue the work he’d began without the lengthy interruption.
“Don’t you have anything to say?” he asked, still gazing in my direction.
“I don’t,” I confessed.
“I wholeheartedly believe that’s bullshit, Nay.”
“Well.” I cleared my throat. “There is one thing.”
“What’s up?”
“Calls between you and your assistant, please take them elsewhere. Not in my bedroom, bathroom, house, or porch. You can get in the car and drive down the street to take them for all I care. Just not here.”
“Understood,” he responded, both hands in the air as he shook his head up and down.
“Now, do me a big, big favor and put Mason in his bassinet. I think it’s time I showered for the day. Are you staying, or should I bring the monitor in with me?”
“Nah,” he started. “I’m not going nowhere. I’m staying put.”
As the words left his mouth, he removed one of his cells and powered it down. When he laid it on the nightstand beside me, I realized it wasn’t the phone I saw him with on a daily basis, which could only mean it was for business purposes only.
“Am I supposed to clap, now?” I tittered with a smile, slightly moved by the gesture, though I didn’t want to reveal it.
Just as he rescued Mason from my arms, my phone chimed on the bed. My soul almost left my body completely as my eyes zeroed in on Zane’s name. Just as the first message came through, a second notification piled on top of it.
With crinkled brows and lines across his forehead, Milo stretched his neck and lowered his head, staring at the screen as if he was seeing the unimaginable. In an instant, I snatched the phone from the bed, taking off for the bathroom, ready to put the desolate look on Milo’s face in my rearview. I managed a few centimeters before I felt his hand on my arm, pulling me in his direction, and back onto the bed.
“Milo!” I chuckled, trying to deescalate the situation in advance.
“Who the fuck is that?”
His nostrils flared, widening his nose on his face.
“I’m not exactly sure yet and neither am I sure why you’re screening my texts.”
“Get fucked up, Nay,” he fussed.
“Your level of delusion is what you should be studying to find a cure for.”
“You heard what I said.”
