Page 39 of Giving Grace

“Where’s your cane?”

Not the question I expected but it’s an easy one to answer. “I don’t generally need it in the morning anymore—I mean, getting out of bed is still pretty rough but an hour in the tank—”

She gives me a weird look. “Tank?”

“Sensory deprivation tank.” I shrug when the look on her face holds. “If you want to know how or why it works, you’re going to have to ask Con. All I know is that an hour a day helps my cognitive issues and with the pain,” I tell her before picking up her coffee cup to steal a drink. It tastes like tepid, coffee-flavored hot chocolate. “This is horrible,” I tell her with a grimace.

“Oh, and I suppose you take your coffee with a stick of butter and a handful of gunpowder,” she scoffs, her chin tilted upward in mock indignation that makes me laugh at her.

“No butter,” I tell her, around the laugh. “And I prefer Napalm to gunpowder.” For some reason, the joke and the sound of my laughter pulls her mouth into a pensive slant. “What?” I say, panic sneaking in because I’m sure I took a misstep with her somewhere. “What did I say?”

“Nothing.” She shakes her head at me, her sky blue eyes a little cloudy when she settles them on my cheekbone. “I just…” She gives me a helpless shrug and jogs her gaze up to meet mine. “You’re different. Than before.”

Giving myself time to digest her observation, I take another drink of her awful coffee before setting the cup back down between us. “I think you mean better.”

“No.” She shakes her head at me. “I mean different.”

It reminds me that she’s always contended that there wasn’t anything wrong with me to begin with. That my entire problem was that I just couldn’t accept it. “Yeah...” I agree, giving her a slow nod while pinning my gaze to hers. “A lot about me is different.” Like it has a mind of its own, my gaze slip down the curve of her cheek to rest on her mouth, lingering there for a moment or two before I can gather the will to force it back up to hers. “But not everything.”

A flush blooms across her cheeks, and her lips part slightly. Just enough to show me the tip of her little pink tongue. Just enough to remind me what she tasted like when I sucked it into my mouth. What it—

My cell phone buzzes in my back pocket, vibrating against my ass, and I shoot up from the bench like I’ve been zapped with a goddamned cattle prod. Pulling it out of my pocket, I swipe my thumb against the screen to pull up my text messages.

Con: Where the fuck

are you? I’ve been

circling this lot for

fifteen minutes.

Me: Got caught up,

On my way.

“You finally figured out how to text?”

I look up from the screen to find Grace watching me like she’s not exactly sure who I am anymore. “Told you—new and improved.” I give her a smirk. “Look, I have to go,” I say, shoving my phone back into my pocket, I give Grace a quick, apologetic grin. “Con’s here to pick me up—rain check on the rest of your interrogation?” I say, backing away from the bench reluctantly.

“Oh, okay—yeah. Sure.” She nods, standing to brush at the crumbs in her lap before bending down to retrieve her backpack. “I have to go pick my parents up from the airport anyway—the wedding’s tomorrow so I’m on Maid of Honor duty,” she says as she shoulders her bag and gathers her trash off the bench. “It was… good to see you again, Ryan.”

I watch her turn away from me to drop the empty cup and bag in the wastebasket next to the bench. “Hey.” I have no idea what I’m going to say to her. All I know is that I can’t let her leave without saying something.

Hearing me, she turns, cocking her head a little in silent question.

“We’re good, right?” I take a step forward, closing the distance between us until I’m standing over her. “I mean—” My phone buzzes in my back pocket again, another text from Con, telling me to hurry the fuck up. I ignore it. “You and me—we’re okay?” As soon as it comes out of my mouth, I call myself a coward because it’s not what I’m supposed to say. Not what I want to know.

What I want to know is if she’s missed me as much as I’ve missed her. If she lays awake at night and thinks about me. Wishes things between us had gone differently.

“I don’t know.” She hitches her backpack up on her shoulder and looks up at me with an exasperated smile. “Are you going to disappear on me again?”

“No.” My phone buzzes again and I contemplate spiking in on the sidewalk like a football. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“Then yes—” the exasperation in her smile melts into something softer. “You and I are good.”

“Okay.” I’m not sure if I believe her but employing my advanced interrogation training, I don’t have much choice but to believe her. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” Stepping back, I let her go.

Grace nods her head and gives me a brief, awkward wave of her hand, before walking away from me for the second time in one day.

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