Page 4 of Giving Grace

“Easy,” I tell her with a laugh. “I’m slow, remember?”

“Oh, yeah—sorry. I forget.” She gives me a quick look through her lashes before she busies herself with putting the game pieces back in the box. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Traumatic Brain Injury.” Usually, when I say it out loud, I feel bitter. Angry that the words have to be a part of my vocabulary. Saying it to Molly, I don’t feel bitter at all. Maybe because she has no idea what it means. That hearing me say it is supposed to make her feel sorry for me. “It’s just a fancy way of saying my brain is broken,” I tell her when her face scrunches up in confusion.

“Oh…” Game tucked safely in its box, she fits the lid in place and sets it aside. “Is that why you don’t know how to make French toast?”

“No.” I shake my head at her. “I just never learned.” Thinking about it, I realize I never learned to do a lot of things. “What’s it with you and French toast?”

“Uncle Patrick said he’d teach me how to make it but then he and Aunt Cari left and…” She lets her explanation trail off with a shrug. “We could Google it on your phone.”

Reaching into my pocket I pull out the cell Hen gave me. “I don’t know how to do that,” I tell her, swiping my thumb over the screen to wake it up. “I can barely make phone calls.”

“It’s easy,” she says. “Want me to show you?”

This time I don’t fight the grin tugging at the corners of my mouth. “So, we can make French toast?”

She jogs her head at me, her eyes widened slightly. “Well, yeah.”

“Fine.” I toss the phone onto the table between us with a chuckle. “We’ll take a stab at it but if we start a fire, I’m blaming you.”

Now, standing in front of Grace I realize I shouldn’t be here.

Last night, after I put my foot in my mouth and Grace slammed her bedroom door in my face.

I should’ve left.

I was going to, but I only got as far as the living room before I bitched out. Dropping my duffle on the floor before dumping myself on the couch. Sitting there, I reasoned that there was no way I could make it down the stairs. That even if I wanted to, I couldn’t leave because I didn’t have anywhere to go. No way to get there.

All lies.

It was Friday night and every Gilroy in Boston was downstairs, working the bar. I could’ve called my sister. I could’ve called Tess. I could’ve called any one of them and they’d have been up here and willing to take me anywhere I wanted to go.

So, I told myself that I just didn’t want to deal with the bullshit that would accompany sending up the Bat-signal, which is closer to the truth, and dug in a little deeper. Wrestled my shoes off and stretched out on the couch and closed my eyes. Told myself I’d leave in the morning, before either of them woke up. I’d leave. Hobble my ass down the stairs and out the door. Down the block to the Vet Center and camp out until one of them showed up. It’d take me the better part of an hour and every fucking step would feel like someone what trying to saw my leg off with a rusty blade, but I’d get there. Get myself away from her. Start thinking rationally.

Or as rationally as possible for someone with brain damage.

That was the plan.

What I was supposed to do.

Why the hell I decided to stay, let her daughter whip my ass at Candyland and make her breakfast, is a goddamned mystery.

No, it isn’t.

You might be dumb, Ranger but you aren’t stupid. You know exactly why you stayed.

Grace.

“I hate the way you say my name.” I must’ve said her name out loud because she snaps it at me while trying to swipe the fork out of my hand.

I jerk it out of reach, more out of instinct than an actual want to piss her off. “Seriously?” I can hear a hard edge creeping into my tone and even though I know I’m the one in the wrong here, that this started off as a much-deserved apology, I do nothing to temper it. “Now there’s something wrong with the way I say your name?”

“I didn’t say there was something wrong with it,” she says, glaring up at me. “I said I didn’t like it.”

“Nooo…” I draw the word out to piss her off even more, because now that I’ve done it, pissing her off seems like the thing to do. “Actually, you said you hated it.”

“Same thing,” she snipes back, making another grab for the fork.

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