Page 75 of The Choices I've Made
“You have no idea how hard it is to get into a wheelchair with one arm and a broken ankle,” he said grinning just as a knock on the door was heard.
“I can’t imagine,” I replied, watching as an adorable redhead walked in. She gave me a polite smile but didn’t truly light up until her eyes met Deans.
“And how is my favorite patient today?” she asked.
“Pretty good Cora, thanks.”
I watched as he sat up straighter and answered all her questions, checking his vitals as they made small talk. I faded into the background so I could observe them together. There was a light in his eyes that hadn’t been there. An excitement.
I saw it within her as well.
She soon finished up and said her goodbyes, and like a vacuum, all sound followed her as she left.
Dean fiddled with his blanket for a full minute before I spoke up.
“You totally have a crush on your nurse!”
He didn’t bother denying it. “God, is it that obvious?”
I laughed. “What that you’re completely besotted over her? No, not at all.”
He chuckled. “I missed this,”
“What?”
“Our friendship,” he answered, making my breath catch.
“What do you mean? We’ve always been friends.”
“Yeah, but it changed when we added the intimacy. When there should have been more transparency between us, I think it only served to distance us. Remember when we were kids and the three of us—you, Jake, and me—could tell each other anything? When you and Jake got together, that didn’t change between the two of you.”
“But it did for us,” I agreed, seeing it now.
We’d once been the three amigos. So inseparable, our parents had become best friends as well. Everyone had known Jake and I had a thing for each other, but we refused to act on it, scared the friendship between us would somehow sever if we became romantically linked.
But, eventually, we couldn’t deny our feelings, and when freshman year had rolled around, we’d finally given in and discovered that not only were we wrong, but we were also actually stronger because of it.
That was, until Jake’s mother had died.
“So, tell me about this nurse of yours,” I said, allowing my friend to indulge himself for a moment.
Because he was right. Somewhere along the way, we had lost this—our friendship, the part of us that was most sacred. Where Jake and I had been strongest in love, Dean and I were most suited for friendship.
Something we’d both forgotten.
Until now.
“She’s like Mother Teresa—with a nice ass,” he said, making me laugh instantaneously. He went on, explaining her other special traits and assets. The way she read to the elderly man in the room next to him or how she always arrived in his room with a smile.
I was happy for him Truly, I was.
I didn’t feel even the slightest twinge of jealousy, listening as he spoke about another woman. It was then that I realized just how wrong we were for each other. While jealousy should never be in the forefront of a relationship, having a healthy amount of it wasn’t always bad.
In our sophomore year, there was a senior who had gotten it in her head that Jake was delusional in his love for me and should instead date her. After her relentless letters in his locker and surprise visits at his house, I’d had enough.
I’d shown up at school, ready for war, wearing the hottest dress I owned. Looking back, it was probably something my sister would consider juvenile, but to my sixteen-year-old self, I was a badass in that outfit. I’d strutted down the halls, found my man, and marked him with a fiery kiss right in front of that bitch.
She never talked to him again.
