“Of course, you have to do what’s right for you,” the woman said in a neutral tone.
“Listen, we can leave,” Daniel offered. “Lydia still has her rental house and I can get the care I need there—”
A pair of noes came right back at him.
“You will stay here,” C.P. said.
“I’m not your problem—”
“I didn’t say you were,” she snapped. “You’ll stay here because—”
“You’re hoping I’ll change my mind,” he countered.
C.P. took a deep breath and held up her hand. “Daniel, don’t take this the wrong way—but fuck you and fuck off.”
Daniel had to laugh. “You know, I’ve always liked the fact that you’re a straight shooter.”
“Not as straight as you think,” Gus said under his breath. “Well, except in the—”
C.P. shot him a glare that, under any other circumstance, should have blown the scientist out of his chair, through the wall behind him, and onto the terrace.
Gus just gave her one of her own eyebrows back at her. Then he seemed to—did he just hum boom-chicka-wow-wow?
As silence landed like a piano dropped on the table between the four of them, Daniel felt like he was in an MRI machine, trapped even as he wasn’t tied down. Meanwhile, out in the kitchen proper, it was a case of business-as-usual, utensils clanging on steel pans, chefs chatting, something hitting a saucepan with a hiss—
“Oh, my God.” Daniel frowned. “Onions.”
“I’m sorry?” Lydia said.
“I smell onions.” He tapped the side of his nose. “It’s funny. I haven’t realized how much my olfactory sense has been off.”
Gus cleared his throat and leaned into his forearms. “You’re going to find a lot of things returning. The side effects from the immunotherapy will retreat quickly. You’re young and otherwise healthy, except for the cancer that’s killing you.”
While Lydia recoiled, Daniel blinked at the images that came back to him. In the course of his clandestine work, he’d dropped all kinds of enemies, in all kinds of ways. With knives, guns, his bare hands.
None of his training was helpful in this situation.
Then again, cancer was hardly an opponent you went at like that.
“Sorry.” Gus rose to his feet and slapped a hold on his Coke. “Didn’t mean to be too blunt. Come to the lab tomorrow. I’ll run some fluids into you to support your kidneys, and I’ll take some bloods and see what we can rebalance. I’m not a juice-cleanse kind of guy, but there are things I can do that’ll help you feel better.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
As Gus took off, Lydia covered a yawn with the back of her hand and Daniel got up—and though getting to the vertical involved his cane and some careful balancing, she knew better than to try to help him. Relying on that kind of assistance always made him terrified he would lose what capabilities he had left, even if, thanks to the neuropathy in his feet, he was always a drunk, even when he was sober.
Always on the deck of a boat, with only his eyesight to orientate him.
“Let’s eat something in our room tonight,” he murmured. “Come on. You’re exhausted.”
As she looked up at him, her eyes were drooping. So were her shoulders. “That sounds amazing.”
Daniel stood up a little taller. It felt good to take care of his woman, even if it was only with the suggestion of a night in—and about time, too. She’d been his nurse instead of his lover for way too long.
He carefully turned his head to C.P. so he didn’t end up going throw rug on her marble floor. “I’ll tell Chef we’d like trays sent down.”
As their eyes met, the way she looked back at him was intense. Then again, she’d put so much into this drug she was developing, and after all the things she’d done for him, he didn’t like letting her down. Especially because he had a feeling she had invested in him and his health care fiesta because she’d assumed when he got to the point where he was out of options… he’d take the only one that was left.
“I’m sorry,” he said softly.
She just shook her head. Then gave him the oddest little smile. “Don’t be. I get it.”
* * *
When Lydia came up to the door of their bedroom, she was surprised as Daniel lurched forward and got things for her, pulling the panel open and holding it in place with what certainly passed as a flourish.
“If you go take your shower,” he said, “I’ll let in the food when it comes.”
She moved past him, and felt curiously off balance, even though he was the one who had the cane. “I, ah, I’m sure it will appreciate the warm welcome.”
“Only if it was raised right.”
Flustered for no good reason, she watched Daniel shuffle over to their bed and sit down with a groan. As he closed his eyes and released a ragged breath, she knew that the only thing worse than being in their reality… would be returning to it from some fantasy that, with their joint resolve, he was suddenly going to survive. They were getting a respite, not any true relief.
And they’d just closed the remaining door they had.
As she thought about what lay ahead, a flush rose up her throat and she put a hand to her frizzy hair. Before she fell apart again, she said, “I won’t be long. In case the food comes.”
“Don’t worry about it. I can get the door.”
“Thank you.” She shook her head. “I mean—”
“Take your time,” he said gently.
For a moment, she tried to remember the last time she had felt seen by him—and not as in come-into-a-room-and-be-identified, but seen.
“I’ve missed you,” she blurted.
Daniel opened his mouth as if to point out the obvious. Then he nodded. “I know. I’ve missed you, too.”
This was what they needed, she reflected. He’d been right all along.
As the quiet stretched out between them, Lydia felt the absurd impulse to kiss him. Which shouldn’t have felt strange, should it?
“I won’t be long,” she repeated awkwardly.
In the bathroom, she reached into the marble shower and turned on the fixture that was mounted on the ceiling. You’d think it would be the greatest thing, a “rain” effect that made a person feel like they were communing with nature. In reality, because you couldn’t vary the angle, if you wanted to get the shampoo out of your hair, your nose was getting a fill whether you enjoyed drowning on an otherwise dry vertical or not.
Given the luxury she was surrounded by, it was hard to imagine she’d pine for her little rental, but as she suddenly missed that modest house like it had been burned to the ground, she wasn’t stupid. It wasn’t just about the cheap shower stall.
God, all the introspection lately was giving her heartburn.
Taking her clothes off and letting them fall to the black marble floor, she got into the shower before the water was all the way warm, and as she shivered, she thought about everything Daniel had had to endure. This was what was on her mind as she efficiently shampooed and conditioned and soaped, and after she was finished, she stood under the falling water, closing her eyes and feeling the tapping massage on her tight shoulders—