Yellow Submarine
Murphy
Icarried her to her bed. Not in the way I might have wished, but in the way she needed. After last call, I sent her to take a break before closing up, and she lay down on the couch and passed out in the mere minutes it took for me to usher out the final round of patrons. Since she’d done so much cleaning earlier in the day, I took care of the rest and then gently pried her off the couch and out the door to her ownbed.
We had to do something about the hotel situation, though. Once I made it through the door, I laid her down, took her shoes and jeans off, curled up behind her, and marveled at the way her ribcage expanded under my hands with each dreamyexhale.
I had to keep telling myself I didn’t dream her. Some imagined specter sent to pry me apart at the seams she’d ripped open years before which were barely sewn upafter.
Despite her coming to find me after all this time, she held herself back. She didn’t realize she did, as far as I could tell. But all the machinations of her mind were tucked away tight, and she kept pushing me. Not in the way she used to do. What she did now felt darker, rooted in something besides pride or whatever reason she and I fought so muchbefore.
I realized she suffered from PTSD on the fateful night everything started five years ago. I wondered if she sought treatment for it, or if it grew worse over the years. Combined with the aftermath of her head wound: anxiety or depression, possibly both. I didn’t think I’d ever really get to have her while she didn’t accept it. Not to mention the fact she disassociated herself from the old her on a regularbasis.
Sleep eluded me tonight. I sat up, slid my boots on, scribbled my number on the pad by the bed, and slipped out into the cold night. I spent more time at the bar than at home. When I got to my office, all I could see was her. I could even smell her in theair.
I needed to do something to help her, and yet, in this, I felt powerless. None of my medical training revolved around the type of mental illness she dealt with. And I wasn’t stupid enough to think I could force her into getting help. I tapped a pencil on the desk thinking about the few times I’d seen the obvious signs of at least PTSD, and there were more than Iwished.
Helping her would take time. Something I could give her, but right now, it wouldn’t help me to keep rolling it all around in myhead.
I turned on my laptop and started putting in the last week’sreceipts….
When I woke up, the light streamed in my office window, and my face lay flat on the desk in front of my keyboard. My back kinked awkwardly, and pain beat from my neck to my ass. I really needed to stop falling asleep at mydesk.
I checked the clock 10 a.m. Mara would probably be awake by now. The sound of steel hitting steel came from the hallway, and I ducked out, rubbing my neck while I searched for the source of thenoise.
Mara stood at the stove with a frying pan. “Sorry I woke youup.”
“How did you get inhere?”
She put some eggs in the pan and answered without turning. “You left the doorunlocked.”
“You should have woken me up when you came over. My back is killingme.”
She flashed a cheeky smile over her shoulder. “I could give you a massage if youwant.”
Damn, her touching me in anyway would be wonderful. But going too far felt like taking advantage of her current state of vulnerability. Even if she didn’t realize thedanger.
Saint FuckingMurphy.
I backed out the door and went back to my office. It was the name they gave me in school because of all the time I spent volunteering at the local rehab center, and then the name they continued pressing on me when I graduated from nursing school. And even after I quit working for the nursing homes and took over the bar, they still taunted me with the nickname. Too noble for my owngood.
I lay down on the couch, and she followed me in. “What’swrong?”
“You mean besides the fact that both our lives are completely upside down?Nothing.”
She shook her head and braced her hips against the side of my desk. “Not sure what you mean by upside down. I didn’t have much of a life; I guess I stilldon’t.”
I sat up and scrubbed my hands through my hair. “That’s exactly what I mean. You didn’t have a life before because you were always moving. Then you were gone and disappeared for so long. You say you didn’t have anything then either. Now you’re here, and you are living out of a hotelroom.”
“It’s not something I think about.” The look on her face said get to thepoint.
“You don’t think about the future or what you want todo.”
“I wanted to come here, meet you in person, and I didthat.”
“But what’s next, what do you want for yourself? You have to have a dream, an ambition you aspire toreach?”
She shook her head and dropped her gaze from mine. I assumed she did it so I couldn’t read her. “I’ve sort of felt in between. Waiting for my memories to come back I guess. I thought maybe coming here mighthelp.”
