“But they do.” At least that was what I was trying to convince myself.
“Again, you could sign the paperwork and then we could find out.”
“Is that the real reason that you called?” I lifted my head back up. “Is this some sort of manipulation in order to get me to let you go back to work?”
“Rita.”
“It’s Ms. Fontaine, and I will see you next week at your session.” I couldn’t believe that I had almost believed he was really interested. “Goodnight, Major Harris.” I hung up the phone and tossed it on the couch beside me.
God, I was such an idiot. I dropped my head back to the couch willing myself to forget our conversation and focus.
I was his therapist, and he was a patient. That was all we could ever be.
Chapter 5
Stewart
“Harris.” Years of training had me sitting up in bed as soon as the phone rang.
“Did I just wake you?” My younger brother Rex laughed.
“No.”
“Holy shit. Yes, I did.” His laughter got louder. “I just woke my ‘up by seven am’ brother. Has the world stopped spinning? Is it snowing in hell?”
“Keep laughing and you’ll be able to find out for yourself.” I swung my legs to the side of the mattress. “Why are you calling me anyway?”
“Can’t I check in on you?” His laughter slowly died. “You barely talk to Mom and Dad. Stella hasn’t heard from you in weeks, and when I call, you generally send me to voicemail. We’re worried.”
“I don’t generally send you to voicemail.” I argued. I just let the phone ring until the voicemail picks up.
“Whatever,” he said. “You were one voicemail away from all of us getting on a plane and tracking your ass down.”
“Why would you do that?” I’d made my way into the kitchen and was pouring a glass of orange juice.
“You’re kidding, right?”
“What?”
“Stu, you got blown up, man. You were in a military hospital for a week. You stopped answering our calls. Of course we were coming to find you.” My hand shook slightly, and I put the glass down so I didn’t spill anything.
“I didn’t get blown up.” I snapped.
“Close enough.” He replied. “You might be the big tough guy to your troupe, but we’re family. Mom still remembers every broken bone all of us had and treats us like we are still those little kids.” Considering Dad set all those bones, he does too.
“I’m fine.” I ran my hand through my hair. “I should be back to work any day now, and once everything is back to normal, it will be like nothing ever happened.”
“Are you sure?” Rex didn’t sound convinced. “If you need to come home for a few days, that would be cool. Mom and Dad would love to have you.”
“I can’t. Some of my guys are still in the hospital.”
“But if you aren’t working then you can’t treat them right?” Rex was the only one in the family who wasn’t in the medical field.
“I can still visit and make sure they are being taken care of the right way.” I finished off my juice. “And it’s only a matter of time. I have another session with the appointed therapist tomorrow, and after that I should be good.” There was no way that I wasn’t getting Rita to sign off on my going back to work. Not just because I wanted to be done with all this, but because I also wanted to be able to call her without her thinking it was some sort of manipulation.
I leaned on my counter and let out a breath. I still couldn’t believe she thought I would do something like that. Then again, she didn’t really know me. If she did, then she would know I didn’t do relationships, and I was always professional.
I’d known calling her wasn’t the smartest move, but the whole afternoon I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about her. That was why I went searching for her name. I wanted to know more about her. What I didn’t expect was to find videos of her playing basketball in college. She’d been good, and I reallywanted to know why she stopped. With the way she shot the ball yesterday, I wondered if she could have gone pro.
