Page 28 of The Devil You Know
“He’s been coughing on food and they’re talking about putting in a feeding tube.” He shakes his head. “But… I don’t think… I wouldn’t. I think he should just…”
He blinks a few times, staring into the distance. He’s made it clear to me several times that if he had been in his father’s shoes, he never would have allowed things to go on as long as they did. He would never want to live that way.
“Butyou’reokay,” I say, looking him over. He’s just as strong and healthy-looking as he ever was, even eight years older than the last time I saw him. “Right…?”
He grins crookedly. “Yeah. Looks that way.”
I let out a breath of relief. I’d been terrified he’d say he was having symptoms, despite how good he looks. “So you’re probably in the clear?”
“Maybe,” he says with a shrug.
“Was your brother having symptoms at your age?”
Ryan nods.
“So…” I allow myself to smile. “That’s great! I told you that you should have gotten tested!”
He laughs. “So now I have to admit you were actually right about something?”
Something else occurs to me, something I’m not sure how I feel about. “You can get married now,” I point out. “I mean, if you want.”
“Yeah,” he agrees. “I can.”
I clear my throat, busying myself by pulling some fresh tissue paper onto the examining table. Thanks, Ryan. “Any possible candidates?”
He’s quiet for a minute. When I look up, he’s staring at me with those penetrating blue eyes. Silly as it sounds, my knees get wobbly. I haven’t thought about Ryan Reilly in such a long time, except for the once a year when he emailed me on my birthday. I’d forgotten how he made me feel.
“Maybe,” he says. “I’m not sure yet.”
I want to remind him that I’mmarried. I’ve got a great husband who knows everything about computers, loves cooking shows as much as I do, and gave me a beautiful daughter (even if we can’t seem to make any more babies). But I don’t say any of that. I just stare rightback at him until his phone buzzes a minute later and he has to leave.
_____
I am utterly exhausted when I get home. My clinic ran late, thanks partially to Barbara’s overbooking habit. For the first half of the drive home, Leah treats me to verse after verse of “Row, row, row your Mommy,” until it suddenly occurs to her that she’s absolutely and painfully starving.
“I’m huuuunnnnngry!” she wails like a child who has not eaten in several days, instead of a kid who was munching on graham crackers a mere ten minutes earlier when I picked her up.
“Leah, what do you want me to do?” There I go again, attempting to reason with a three-year-old. “I don’t have any food right now.”
“I’m huuuuuuunnnnnnnnnngry!” she sobs desperately.
I try to ignore her best I can, but by the time I pull into the garage, I’m ready to lose it. I’ve got some chicken nuggets in the freezer that can be cooked in sixty seconds in the microwave. I’m going to make a beeline there as soon as we get out of the car.
Leah is still wailing as I unbuckle her from her car seat. She now weighs over forty pounds, but I have to break my back every day wrestling her into this stupid carseat becausethat’s the law. I don’t get it—when I was a kid, not only did I not need a car seat, but I used to sit shotgun in the front. Now it just seems like height and weight limits for car seats keep increasing every year. I think it’s only a matter of time beforeI’mgoing to be forced to sit in a car seat, or at least a booster.
When I get to the kitchen with a sobbing Leah trailing not too far behind, I feel my stomach turn. The kitchen looks like a hurricane hit. Ben has obviously been working from home today and the packaging from every bit of food he made himself is on the counter, as well as all his dishes. I grab the box from the TV dinner he made for himself and pop open the trash, which is too overflowing to accept one more morsel.
I’m going to kill Ben.
“I’m huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuunnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnngry!” shrieks Leah, clearly about to faint from hypoglycemic shock.
I pull open the freezer and remove the bag of frozen chicken nuggets, which is still unopened. I take out a handful of nuggets and put them on one of Leah’s plastic plates—the ones that have a smiley face on them, the only ones she’ll eat off of. Her eyes widen in horror.
“Mommy!” she whimpers. “Those aren’t dinosaurs!”
Sadly, I know exactly what she means. I asked Ben to pick up some chicken nuggets a few days ago, and I musthave neglected to tell him that they had to be dinosaur-shaped. Or maybe I told him and he forgot. That’s more likely, actually.
“Leah,” I say with all the patience I can muster, “they taste exactly the same.”
