Page 130 of Drown Like Heaven
“She’s not hard to read,” Dr. Killshaw answered, neither of them looking away from what they were doing. “You just have to pay attention.”
“Well, yeah. I just mean she’s pretty quiet.”
There was a slight pause, tension lining Dr. Killshaw’s shoulders as he shifted his stance. “Quiet doesn’t mean absent. She notices more than most people,” he responded, his voice sharpening, cutting.
Silently, I backed away from the room, nearly tripping over my own feet as I went back to the bathroom, pressing my sleevesto my lower lashes to dry my tears before they could fall. This was so stupid.I’m so stupid. Breaths tripped in and out of my chest. Nick wasn’t even being rude; he was simply making an observation. Atrueobservation. Any normal person wouldn’t get their feelings hurt by that.
But it was the same wound that’d been slowly bleeding me dry my entire life.
I had no armor for this vulnerability.
Dr. Killshaw’s words seeped into my memory, and I couldn’t figure out why he would say that. Was he defending me? Was I misreading this again? What if—
Stop.
I stared at myself in the mirror, a lump in my throat and my eyes slightly red, but I was determined to stop my spiraling. I had to go back into that room no matter what, even if just to get my stuff. It was unavoidable, so I needed to pull myself together long enough to do that.
As much as I wished I could disappear, make time stop for a little while, avoid all this, I couldn’t.
When I walked back into the lab, my pulse a drum in my ears, my fingers trembling, I found that Nick was gone. It made me pause.
“Nick had other responsibilities to tend to,” Dr. Killshaw explained, that same hardness in his tone. Almost like he was angry. “Did you get enough to eat?”
“I…”
He turned. “Did you?”
“I guess so.”
“Why don’t you sit down. We can do some exam review.”
I couldn’t move, though. Indecision had stolen all the space in my brain.
“Didn’t you want to do that?” he questioned, fully facing me.
“We don’t have to. I should’ve probably just gone to office hours,” I said. “It would be unfair.”
“Sit. Get out your exam review.”
His commands made it easier to get my body to move again. Following orders was doable. I sat on the same stool as always, then grabbed my laptop, balancing it on my knees.
“We’ll start with P&IDs. Fair?”
“Yes.”
Dr. Killshaw scribbled something on the whiteboard, then faced me expectantly, apparently wanting me to identify the symbol. I looked at the figure, then back at him, at a loss. After a second, he glanced back at what he’d drawn.
“That looks like shit. Sorry.” He smeared the side of his fist over the streaks, erasing and redrawing the symbol more neatly.
I pressed my lips together, a surprised laugh building in my chest. “Pressure relief valve.”
“Attagirl.” He sketched something else.
“It’s either a butterfly valve or a gate valve.”
“See, this is why I’m not drawing the exam. It’ll be printed.” Amusement glinted in his eyes. “It’s a gate valve, but yes, that line looks pretty diagonal. How about you draw them? Get up here.”
I hopped off the stool, a small smile pushing at the corners of my mouth.
