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He snagged the cloth from her hand and finished wiping down the counters, and then it was time for them to have a conversation Cricket was probably not going to like. No one ever said being a doctor was easy, but giving people news they would even perceive as bad was definitely one of his least favorite parts.
“Come sit with me.”
Owen took her hand and led her over to the couch, and sat close to her.
“Now we’re going to have that talk about how you’re feeling. How’d you sleep?”
Cricket’s usually full and plump mouth thinned into a line.
“You’re going to tell the truth, remember?”
“Yes. But I don’t want you to feel bad. The bed was really comfortable, but I don’t think I slept very well. I’m still super tired. I hope I didn’t keep you up with my snoring.”
There was a beat as he tried to figure out how to answer her. He never wanted to lie, but— The pause was long enough for her to pounce on.
“I did, didn’t I? It was awful and you couldn’t get any sleep just like I said. I’m sorry. I told you I—”
Owen shook his head. “I don’t care about the snoring, sweetheart. Not a lick. If anything, it’s comforting to me.”
Cricket narrowed her eyes, clearly not believing him, and probably wondering why snoring would be a comfort. He supposed it was similar to first time parents with new babies—they desperately wanted their infant to sleep for more than a couple hours at a time but when the baby finally did, the parents woke up in a panic wondering if the baby was still breathing. If Cricket was snoring, she was alive.
“Then what’s the problem?” she asked.
“Okay, maybe it’s a little about the snoring, but not in the way you think.”
Cricket threw her hands up in the air. “What is that supposed to mean?”
He gathered her hands and held them, stroked the backs of her wrists with his thumbs so she would settle down. She’d always been so mild when he ran into her at the office but he was beginning to realize Cricket had some big feelings—yet another tick in a box of the “You Might Be a Little If” checklist.
“It means I think you have sleep apnea. Do you know what that is?”
“No, but it doesn’t sound good.”
“It’s not. It’s unhealthy for your heart. And you said you got fired for falling asleep at work, right?”
“Yes.”
What a pretty little frown she had. It was almost a pout with her bottom lip pushed up like that.
“When someone has sleep apnea, it means they stop breathing when they’re asleep and then their body wakes them up so they’ll breathe again. And not just once. It can happen many times per hour overnight. That makes it really hard to enter deep, restorative sleep which would explain why you’re tired all the time.”
Cricket looked pensive, a slight crease forming between her brows that he wanted to smooth away with his thumb. What was stopping him? They’d already shared a bed. So he did. Reached out and rubbed the line away and was startled again by how green her eyes were.
“Could that be why it doesn’t seem to matter how much I sleep? I don’t feel any more rested after I sleep for ten hours than when I sleep for four.”
“Exactly. Clever girl,” he told her with a nod and a smile even as he felt queasy knowing how much she must’ve been suffering, and for how long? Well, she wasn’t going to suffer any more. “It’s because no matter how long you sleep for, you’re not actually getting any rest.”
“You said it was bad for your heart, but it doesn’t sound like it would be good for your brain, either.”
“Sure isn’t,” he agreed. “Why do you say that though?”
“I’ve been having really bad… I call it brain smog because it seems worse than brain fog. I forget things a lot when I used to have a good memory, and sometimes I can’t solve problems that should be easy. I can’t find words, not just big ones either. And everything takes longer than it should. Longer than it used to anyway.”
His chest felt hollow listening to Cricket describe her symptoms. He wished he’d done something about this sooner, insisted that she talk to him before now. But knowing Cricket, she probably would’ve been embarrassed and avoided him. Still the guilt scraped at his ribs and he vowed he would make it up to her somehow. For now, he smiled tightly.
“Brain smog. I like that. Not that you’ve been experiencing it, but that’s a good description.”
Chapter Eight
