She let out a long sigh. “Do I have to?”
“Yes. Morning, noon, and night. I’m supposed to note if anything is changing for the worse over time.”
She wasn’t happy about it, but came closer.
“Have you farted yet this morning?”
She laughed, a real belly laugh. “That’s not one of the tests.”
It was great to see her smile for a moment after all she’d been through. “You weren’t paying attention at the hospital, so how would you know?”
“I know because I’m a—” She stopped short.
After a few seconds of silence, I gave up on getting more of her backstory. “Have you farted yet? It speaks to gut motility.”
“No, but I haven’t eaten anything. How about when I feel the urge, I come over to your desk so you can verify it?”
I made a show of fake writing her response on my palm. “No farts.” I looked up. “I’d be better able to verify your first post-concussion fart if you sat in my lap. You know, you’d be closer.”
She put her hands on her hips defiantly. “I’d rather sit on a porcupine.”
I wrote on my palm again. “Shows signs of mental deterioration.”
She rolled her eyes.
“Fine. If you’re ready for the boring stuff, place one foot in front of the other. You know the drill.”
She completed that and the backwards alphabet perfectly. “Can I get my paper now?”
“I’ll go with you.” I followed her. Was it because I couldn’t resist watching that ass of hers? A little. Okay, more than a little.
“No need. The most dangerous thing around here is Mrs. Peterson tripping you while walking her pug on one of those extendo-leashes, and she doesn’t go out this early.”
“I’m responsible for you, remember? What would happen to my reputation if some dog walker tripped you, and you hit your head and had to go to the hospital again, and the second CT came out bad, and they had to operate, and that evil Dr. Holland found out, and?—”
She put up a hand. “It’s no big deal. I’m just picking up the paper before the kids steal it.”
“You get a physical paper?”
“The Hartfords do. They’re the owners here, and they told me it’s a matter of pride that they’ve been continuous subscribers for four decades, so they didn’t stop it.”
She turned, and yes, I followed, deciding that her legs were as nice as her ass.
When she opened the building’s front door, a breeze blew in, and the sunlight lit up her flowing hair. In that moment, I decided on a nickname for her.
Neither of us had shoes on, and the concrete of the walkway was wet from the lawn sprinklers that had run overnight.
A dark-haired man with a thin mustache leaned against a car a dozen yards down the street with the newspaper open in front of him. He had longish hair in need of a wash, and a blue Dodgers jersey.
She stopped just outside. “Since it’s cold and you don’t have a shirt on, you can wait here. I wouldn’t want my neighbors to get the wrong idea.”
“Angel, cold doesn’t bother me.” If you had a problem being cold, you’d never make it through BUD/S training.
She stopped, her face scrunched up in disgust. “Angel? Really? You promised to stop hitting on me, March.”
“Get used to it. That only applied to yesterday.” I could be determined, orstubborn, if she preferred that term.
Peyton bounced on her toes to the sidewalk and toward the paper by the curb.
