“I’m fine,” Bec promised, taking her hand. “The glass cut my face, but I never hit my head.”
Her sleeve slipped down from her wrist when she grasped Iris’s hand and revealed what she’d been hiding under the lab coat. Iris’s gasp was loud in the room. “You’re not fine, Bec. Why didn’t you show this to someone? What happened?”
Iris inspected her arm. It was red, blistered and covered in gashes of different depths.
“I don’t know what happened, if I’m honest. I think I threw my arm up to protect my face and it got hit with hot shrapnel. When I wrapped it earlier while waiting for you guys to arrive, it wasn’t red and blistered yet. I thought I’d let it breathe while we were sleeping.”
Iris bit her lip as she stared at the wounded flesh. “That’s probably not smart. You could get an infection, or what about tetanus or something? You should probably go to the hospital. I need to call Cal to take you to the hospital. This isn’t good. This is really not good.” Her breathing was at a fever pitch now, and her vision had gone tunnel as she stared at the damaged skin.
The next thing she knew, she was sitting on the bed, and Bec was kneeling before her. “Take some deep breaths, Iris.” She coached her by breathing with her until Iris stopped shaking and sound filtered back into her ears.
“That was embarrassing,” she said, staring at the floor. “I’m sorry for freaking out. It happens more than usual when I’m stressed out.”
Bec tipped her chin up to face her. She didn’t force her to hold her gaze and didn’t say anything when Iris couldn’t. “Don’t apologize for caring, Iris. I don’t knowwho made you feel like you have to stare at the floor rather than hold your head high, but here in my apartment, you can be unapologetically you without hanging your head in shame, okay?”
“That’s not why,” she said, staring over her shoulder at the wall. “It’s easier to talk to people when I don’t have to look at them. My brain works better that way.”
“To a degree, I believe that,” Bec said. “But I think you started doing it when you realized that your bluntness, as you put it, can embarrass you or others, so staring at the floor means you don’t have to see the judgment on others’ faces.”
Iris didn’t want to admit she was right, so she didn’t answer. “I think you should cover your arm with something before sleeping. It would be bad if you scratched it accidentally in your sleep. I know you’re like a doctor and everything, so it’s fine if you don’t want to do that. As my mama always said, I see things very literally and with too much common sense, so I’m probably wrong.”
“I am a doctor, but not a medical one. I hadn’t thought of your point about scratching it in my sleep. Getting an infection wouldn’t be convenient right now, so I’ll wrap it in gauze.”
Iris nodded just as a yawn overtook her. She covered her mouth with her hand, apologizing for being rude.
“Don’t apologize. We’ve had one hell of a day. Go ahead and get comfortable while I wrap my arm, and then we can shut down the lights for a few hours.”
“If you tell me where to find a sleeping bag or extra blankets, I’ll make my bed.”
“What do you want those for?”
Iris glanced down at the floor and back to her momentarily. “It’s no problem. I can sleep on the floor without a bag. Do you have an extra pillow?”
“You’re not sleeping on the floor,” Bec said with a chuckle as she motioned her to the head of the bed. “You have the most important job in the place now. That means you’re sleeping in the bed.”
Bec pulled the blankets around Iris and then grasped the bows of her glasses to slide them off. There was something evocative about the sensation of the metal leaving her face when it wasn’t of her own volition. She was used to doing everything for herself, and having someone care for her was a foreign sensation. “Where are you going to sleep?”
Bec turned back to her, wearing a nervous smile. “Right next to you. I’ll keep you safe, Iris.”
Then she disappeared into the bathroom, leaving Iris to decide if sharing a bed with the beautiful scientist was more dangerous to her health than the unchecked pathogens in the lab above their heads.
Chapter Seven
Iris’s fingers flew across the keyboard the second they hit the keys. She had fallen asleep before Bec had returned from the bathroom, but when she woke, to say she was disoriented was an understatement. Her anxiety was not being kind, but she’d managed to get her braces on and get out of bed without waking Bec. They had shared a bed, and while it had been entirely innocent, a large part of her wanted it to be so much more.
Bec hadn’t come out and said she was gay, but she didn’t have to for Iris to know. For her, it came down to their connection when their skin touched. The moment their eyes met, she knew. That was saying a lot for someone who struggled with connecting. When Bec was in the shower, she also noticed a magnet on her fridge for Out to Innovate, an organization for LGBTQ+ scientists and technical professionals. She recognized it because she’d been a member for years.
Since Bec didn’t know she was also a member, she’d keep it that way. Mostly because she was struggling with how kind and understanding Bec was about her TBI. Sure, everyone at Secure Inc. was kind and patient, but they worked together every day. This was different. She and Bec had barely met before Bec immediately reassured her she belonged. She accepted her and allowed her to take up space in a way that didn’t result in judgment or sarcastic comments despite her overreaction to several situations. It usually took months or years for people to get comfortable with her and how her brain worked. Sometimes, people were never comfortable with who she was despite knowing she couldn’t change it. She’d experienced that with friends and girlfriends enough times over the years that she tended to keep to herself now. That was why she enjoyed working at Secure Watch. The core team stayed the same, making it easier for her to relax and be confident there without worrying about being judged.
No one ever questioned her skills on the job, and she knew she was better at her job than many in her field, but that was because of how her brain worked. The most challenging part was proving herself to others when they couldn’t see past her diagnoses. It wasn’t an untold story for neurodivergent people. No matter how much people were educated about neurodiversity, there would always be a level of prejudice against them for something outside of their control. But then, that was a problem for marginalized communities as a whole. She couldn’t fix that by herself, unlike the code she was writing to get the lab back under her control. She was close. She could feel it in her fingers with each new line of code she wrote.
A glance at the clock told her it had been several hours since she’d left Bec’s apartment. That wasn’t a big surprise. If there was one thing she could get lost in, it was her work. Truthfully, she worried Bec would be upset that she got up and left, but she also didn’t want to wake her after so few hours of sleep. After the day Bec hadyesterday, she needed rest, especially with the injury to her arm. As soon as Iris finished the code, she planned to text Cal to ask him if he had brought Selina from Secure Inc. with him. Selina was a nurse who usually traveled with them on assignment. Iris wasn’t sure if this qualified since Cal wanted to keep as many people out of the fallout zone as possible, but she suspected Selina wouldn’t give him a choice. He needed a medical professional on-site for every case, so she hoped she was right. She wanted her to look at Bec’s arm and treat it if need be. The blisters would pop sooner rather than later, and the last thing she needed was an infection that required her to leave the facility. Without Bec here, they would have to turn this over to the police, which could get them all killed.
Not that Iris thought she was all that when it came to fixing this situation, but she knew this was not the kind of place that could be left unattended, or worse yet, have the police bring someone in to break into the labs. The very idea made her shudder, and she forced her fingers to move faster as her eyes tried to track the lines on the screen, but the hours she’d already put in were catching up to her.
“Come on, come on,” she chanted, finishing the last line and gingerly pressing the return key as the elevator door dinged.
She momentarily lifted her gaze from the keyboard and waited for something to happen, though she had no idea what to expect.
