Page 15 of Doctor Dilemma

“I don’t think we’re meant to live together,” she told me. “Men and women, I mean. We all just end up getting on each other’s nerves.”

That wasn’t exactly what happened, but I let her talk. I wasn’t ready to fill in any details.

“I made the decision a long time ago,” she said. “I wasn’t going to live with any man. My parents didn’t really agree on a whole lot, and everything always turned into a fight. It felt like they were always playing tug of war, and I was the rope. I’m not about to have a baby in a house like that. Whatever they turn out to be, boy or girl or whatever, I’m raising them the way I think is right, and I’m not going to have to justify it to some guy who thinks he knows better than me just because he’s a dude.”

Her voice became more and more impassioned with every word until she realized she was firing herself up and stopped. Bagel looked up at her and rubbed her face against her leg.

“Sorry,” Mila said. “I probably should be telling this to a therapist, not my obstetrician. By the way, I was wondering if I could reschedule—”

I stopped her.

“Right now, I’m your neighbor,” I said. “I’m not on the clock, so I don’t talk shop. You want to reschedule, you call my office.”

It came out sounding sharp, but I’d made mistakes in the past. In my line of work, it was absolutely essential to establish a strict wall between business and personal life.

“I’m just excited,” she said. “I want to hurry things along.”

“Like I said, call the office.”

“Okay,” she said.

“I agree with you, though,” I said. “I don’t think men and women were supposed to live together like this. From where I sit, most couples are pretty miserable after six months together. Maybe a year. And the rest are either insane or lying to themselves.”

“Yeah.”

I held up one of the boards and began screwing it in place.

“Do you need me to hold that for you?”

“I’ve got it,” I said. But I didn’t have it. It was tough to angle the board in the right position while using the drill so that it stayed even. It was just as difficult to ask for help. Hannah would always make me feel like I was somehow less of a man if I asked her to help with any of the “man chores,” as she called them.

“Actually,” I said, “would you mind?”

“Not at all.”

She stood there and held the board as I used the drill and it took two seconds. What’s more, it was perfectly even and nowhere near as difficult as it would have been if she hadn’t helped.

“People need their space,” I said. “Bagel’s the woman for me.”

I looked at my dog’s face as she looked at me with awe and admiration.

Mila pet her head a few times. “I agree. You’re not going to do any better.”

She had a point. And when I let it sink in for two seconds, I realized the idea that I’d never find a human other half was pretty depressing. But, for some reason, this thought didn’t make me sad. And that indifference was probably the most depressing part.

CHAPTER7

***MILA***

With the two of us working together, it didn't take long to assemble the bed. It was cheap wood and probably wouldn’t survive too many moves, but it at least kept the mattress off the floor, and that put Leo ahead of 90% of the men I’d met in their 20s. Leo managed to get that mattress onto the frame without a problem — it was hard to say for sure, but I thought he might have been showing off — but he let me help when he had to put the fitted sheet on. He almost certainly could have done it on his own, but I was looking for an excuse to stick around.

Without Kiefer around, I was starting to feel lonely, and there just wasn't much to do without anyone else around. Sure, it was always nice to have the option of staying in my apartment by myself, but being forced to made me feel pathetic. And, unfortunately, with the bed made, there wasn’t much of an excuse for me to stay. I offered a cordial and platonic goodnight to Leo — which I deserved bonus points for, having just flipped the bean to an intense completion while thinking about him —and headed towards the door, thinking I might be able to get myself off one more time before going to sleep.

The second I put my hand on the knob, Bagel came over to me and sat. She looked up at me with those blue pitbull eyes and looked like she was on the verge of crying. I was only human. I couldn’t say no to that face.

"Looks like you made a friend," Leo said to me as he came out of the bedroom.

"Does she usually get this attached?"

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