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She’s washed her face, and attempted to tidy her hair, but it’s the stress lines around her red eyes that let me know she’s in a lot of pain.
I grab her a bottle of water out of the refrigerator, open it, and hand her some pain medicine from the cabinet.
“Here, take a few of these. Who knows how long it will be before they can prescribe you something?”
A flash of relief passes over her eyes and she doesn’t even hesitate.
“I also grabbed you a clean shirt. Not sure if you want it or not, but it’s here.” I glance toward the shirt on the counter and her eyes follow. She bites down on her lower lip, looking at the shirt, then at me.
“Will you help me change?” Embarrassment stamps her face and I grin at her. She has no idea how much I’d like to help her change. Part of me wants to be flirty and say, “I thought you’d never ask,” but I already know she’d run right out the door. Her eyebrows furrow and little wrinkles form just over her nose. “Why are you smiling at me?”
“Just because. I mean, how hard was it for you to ask me that?” I’m teasing her and her face relaxes a little.
“Really hard,” she huffs and my grin stretches into a smile.
Moving closer to her, I keep my eyes locked on hers. For a brief second, there’s fear, and I don’t know if it’s because I’m close to her or if it’s because she’s worried about her arm.
“Bend over for me.” She does and I take the hem of her pullover on her lower back and pull so it comes up and over her head. Once it’s over her head, she shrugs her good arm out of it and then carefully removes the other. Her injured wrist looks terrible. On the outside, there’s a bump about the size of a lime and it’s already turning nasty colors. Looking away from her injury, I take her in from head to toe.
She’s wearing some type of workout tank top that hugs her perfectly, almost like second skin, and she looks so tiny. Tiny and hot! Her arms, upper chest, and most of her back is showing. Inwardly, I groan and shift my weight as everything tightens. I could look at her all day, but instead, I drag my eyes back to her face. She’s looking at the ground and her shoulders are hunched inward. Shit, now I feel bad for checking her out; waves of pain and vulnerability are pouring off of her. She’s so uncomfortable, I quickly grab the clean shirt and help her as she slides her arms into it and then back over her head. Slowly, her eyes travel up and lock onto mine. “Thanks.”
In my shirt, she looks amazing, and I’m not ashamed to admit how much I like it.
I give her a small smile and tuck some loose hair behind her ear. “All set?” I ask her.
“I guess so,” she frowns, running her hand over the shirt to smooth it down.
Grabbing my keys, we head for the door.
It takes close to forty-five minutes for us to drive around the lake and across the little town to the urgent care clinic. She’s quiet the entire way, and I can’t say I blame her. At one point I saw her shaking—I wasn’t sure if it was the downfall from the adrenaline or because she was cold, but I turned the heat on anyway. Anything to make her more comfortable.
Once we get to the clinic, I’m happy to see it’s essentially empty. I’ve already inconvenienced her with this and feel like a complete ass.
“How can we help you today?” the check-in nurse says. Ava holds up her arm and pulls the sleeve back. The lady winces at the sight of it. “All righty then, I’ll need you to fill this out, and we’ll call you right back.” She pushes a clipboard toward us.
Ava takes a look at it and frowns. It’s her right arm that’s hurt, her dominant arm, and my heart sinks even more. I take it from the nurse and we make our way over to the waiting room.
“I’ll fill this out for you, and I’m paying, so we don’t need insurance information or anything.”
She tilts her head to look at me. “I don’t mind. It’ll just be a co-pay, and I can submit the paperwork later.”
Angling my body a little more toward her, I lean over so we are eye to eye. “It doesn’t matter; this is my fault.” She bites down on her lip, worrying it as her eyes search mine for something.
“Okay,” she says, still unsure about it. I give her a lopsided smile and her eyes widen.
Shifting the clipboard between us, line by line I begin to ask her personal questions. I learn her last name is Layne, her birthday, her address, that she had an appendectomy when she was fifteen, and she’s allergic to Sulfa antibiotics. It’s awesome getting to know these little details about her, and it makes me want to know everything. Right before turning the clipboard back in, I glance at her address and take a mental picture of it.
Sitting back down next to her, her silence continues as we wait. I want to talk to her, but she’s propped her head against the wall and closed her eyes.
“Ava Layne.” We both look over at the nurse waiting at the door, and we stand together. She looks up at me and the hesitation is written all over her face.
“I’m going with you.” My tone let’s her know I’m not up for arguing. Irritation flares across her face and then it’s gone. I lift my arm to wrap it around her shoulder and she flinches away from me. My heart sinks, so I drop my arm and watch her. I know we haven’t known each other for long, and I know she doesn’t like to be touched, but throwing an arm around someone doesn’t mean anything other than being friendly, and she let me do it earlier.
Leaning up on her toes, I bend down so I can hear her. “This place reminds me of a hospital. I. Hate. Hospitals.” She shrugs her shoulders, attempts giving me a small smile, and then walks to the triage nurse. I follow her, but give her distance too. People who hate hospitals have a reason. I wonder what hers is.
It’s her wrist, not her arm, and it has a pretty sizable crack in it. It’s not broken clean through, so she won’t need to have it pinned, but it’s going to take some time to heal. I thought the silence was bad on the way to the doctor, but this is worse. I don’t know what to say to her, and she’s clearly internalizing her thoughts. Just looking at her, I can’t tell if it’s the pain causing her this stress or something else. She never turns her head to look at me. She just stares out the window, thrumming the fingers on her left hand a mile a minute. There’s no consistent rhythm to the movement, and she doesn’t even seem aware that she’s doing it. I just want to stare at her.
“Do you mind if I use your phone? I need to call my friends.” She’s been so quiet most of the day, I’m startled when she speaks. I look to her face and those blue eyes pin me to the seat, watching me.
