The Roommate Arrangement

by Jae

  Rae slid a little higher so she could rest her head against the arm of the couch and stared up at the ceiling. “More…everything. Loyal. Brave. Compassionate.”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Rae asked.

  “Nothing. I’m just so happy for you.”

  Rae sat up. “Hey, I think you’re misunderstanding what I’m saying. We’re not a couple or anything.”

  “I know. But you making a friend…letting someone in… That’s big.”

  Had she let Steph in? She considered everything they had shared over the past two months. Yeah, I think I did. God, that was scary as hell. Rae sank back onto the couch. “She saw me.” Again, the words slipped out without conscious thought. “Without my eye in. Not out of choice. I don’t think I’d be ready for that, but… She took it well. I mean, she was surprised, but she didn’t flinch or look repulsed.”

  “Oh Rae. How could anyone be repulsed by it?”

  How could anyone not be? Rae had needed several months before she could look at herself in the mirror and accept the empty place where her left eye was supposed to be as part of herself. Some days, it was still hard.

  “Do you think I’d be repulsed if Mike…if he’d made it home with a missing eye?” Kim asked in a whisper. “I wouldn’t have cared, as long as he made it home.”

  Rae laid her arm across her face. Her eyes were burning, and this time, it had nothing to do with the uncomfortable prosthesis. “I know,” was all she got out.

  “Please be kind to yourself, okay? And to Steph. Don’t push her away just because you get scared.”

  Rae let out a grunt. “I don’t get scared.”

  “No, of course not.” Amusement colored Kim’s tone. “Listen, I have to go. I arranged for Goodwill to pick up the boxes so I won’t chicken out, and they’ll be here any moment. I’ll see you the day after Christmas.”

  “Um, what’s going on the day after Christmas?” Had she forgotten a previously arranged get-together?

  “You’ll come over and help me eat all the leftovers my in-laws will send home with me,” Kim said. “And you’ll tell me all about your Christmas dinner with Steph and her folks.”

  Shit. Now she had maneuvered herself into a dilemma. She had to either lie to Kim and make up a detailed story about Christmas with the Renshaws or admit that she’d lied about having dinner with Steph’s family—or actually do what she’d said she would do and go home with Steph for Christmas.

  It was like the choice between smallpox, Ebola, and the bubonic plague. Once they had ended the call, she thumped her fist against the back of the couch. “Son of a slug!”

  “What’s wrong?” Steph asked from the door of her room. She rushed over. “Is your eye still bothering you?”

  “No. Yes, but that’s not…” Rae slid both hands under her neck and massaged it roughly. It didn’t help with her tension. Time to choose the best of the three bad choices…even though she wasn’t sure which one that was. Probably not lying to Kim again. “So that leaves Ebola and the bubonic plague.”

  “Um, what?”

  Had she said that out loud? God, she was exhausted from everything that had happened today. All she wanted was to crawl into bed and forget about the kiss, her eye slipping, the episode in the restroom stall, and the raw feelings Kim’s call had caused to bubble up.

  Steph pushed the coffee table out of the way and squeezed sideways onto the edge of the sofa. Her thigh rested along Rae’s leg, soft and warm, and her expression was worried as she gazed down at Rae. “What’s wrong? And don’t try to tell me it’s nothing.”

  “I…I’m wondering…” Rae picked at some loose threads on her cut-off sweatpants. “Does your offer still stand?” There. She couldn’t believe she had really said it.

  Steph tilted her head to the side. “Which offer is that? The offer to have my way with you?” She lowered her voice to a seductive burr. “Sure. Anytime, darlin’.”

  Rae gave her a little shove with her knee. “Keep dreaming.”

  Laughing, Steph took hold of Rae’s leg to keep her balance. Even once she had regained it, she kept her hand where it was, probably not even aware of it.

  The warmth that touch sent up Rae’s thigh and straight to her core was no longer a surprise, but the fact that she didn’t mind the casual closeness was. The discovery startled her so much that she needed a minute to realize Steph was looking down at her with a quizzical gaze. “Um, I…I was talking about the offer to have Christmas dinner with your family.”

  The teasing grin instantly disappeared from Steph’s face and was replaced with a genuine smile. “Wow, that… Yes, of course the offer still stands.” She bobbed up and down on the couch, jostling Rae. “Great! At least now it’ll be three normal people having dinner with three rabbit-food-eating psychologists. That equals things out.”

  Normal? Rae wasn’t sure that description fit her nowadays.

  “Hey, don’t chicken out now just because I mentioned psychologists, okay?” Steph pointed her finger at her. Apparently, she had misinterpreted the reason for Rae’s doubts.

  “I won’t. You said we can leave anytime and give work as an excuse, right?”

  “Anytime. If you’re uncomfortable, let me know, and we’ll be out of there faster than a greased eel. We can also time it so that we arrive right before dinner, so we’ll only be there for a few hours. And don’t worry because we might not be back before sunset. I’ll drive, so you can have some of my parents’ fake vegan eggnog.”

  Rae shuddered. “No, thanks.” Then her mind latched on to what else Steph had offered. Should she ask her if she’d mind driving her to the appointment with the ocularist later today? Steph had offered to be her driver before. But the appointment with Mr. Kamali wasn’t a trip to In-N-Out. Maybe she should take an Uber. Sure, it would cost more, but there was something to be said for the relative anonymity of having a stranger drop her off.

  Steph tapped Rae’s knee, then pulled back her hand as if only now realizing where her fingers rested. “There’s something else, isn’t there?”

  Damn. What had happened to the poker face she had always been able to rely on? Rae wrestled with her mental list of pros and cons for another minute.

  “Whatever it is, just tell me,” Steph said softly. Amazing how warm and inviting gray eyes could be. “You know I’m on your side.”

  On my side. Team Rae. Those two simple words tipped the scales in Steph’s favor. “I called my ocularist.”

  “Your…what?”

  “My ocularist. The guy who made my eye.” Rae pointed at it.

  “Right. So could he help with whatever the problem is?”

  “He can’t say what’s wrong without taking a look, so he wants me to come in.” Rae swallowed. God, why was this so hard? “Today at five.” She let the words hang there, hoping Steph would understand on her own, without her having to ask.

  “Great. So he’s squeezing you in before the holidays?”

  Rae nodded. Okay, looks like I’ll take an Uber after all. But then another voice piped up, sounding a little like Mike: Oh for fuck’s sake, be an adult and just ask, Coleman! It was exactly what her partner would have said. And he would have been right. “Steph, um, would you…? Do you by any chance…? The appointment is after sunset. I know you’re probably working tonight, but on the off chance that you aren’t…”

  “I’m not. Working, I mean.” Steph moved her hand again but this time stopped and withdrew it before she could make contact with Rae’s knee. “Of course I’ll drive you.”

  “Are you sure? Mr. Kamali’s office is all the way in Tarzana. It’s a horrible drive, without a direct route. I can totally take an Uber if you’d rather not deal with that.”

  “What, and miss a road trip to Tarzana?” Steph pressed her hand to her chest and put on a horrified expression. “No way!”

/>   “Thank you.” Rae hoped Steph would understand that she wasn’t only thanking her for driving but also for making it easy for her to ask.

  This time, Steph did put her hand on Rae’s knee for a second. “No, Rae. Thank you. Thank you for not just taking an Uber so you didn’t have to ask for my help.”

  Rae looked away and decided not to mention how close she had come to doing exactly that.

  Steph took her hand away and got up. “So what time are we leaving for the eyeball store?”

  The irreverent term was so typically Steph that Rae had to chuckle. It made her feel better that Steph didn’t make a big deal out of it but made it sound as if they were going to the supermarket to pick up a carton of milk. “Last time I went to his office, it took me an hour.”

  “Let’s leave at three thirty,” Steph said. “That way, you’re not worried about being late, and if we’re early, we can get a coffee or some ice cream.”

  Rae nodded, still not over how easy this was. If only the same could be said for her appointment with Mr. Kamali.

  Steph kept glancing over at Rae while she drove.

  Rae was practically vibrating in the passenger seat. Maybe it was a good thing that traffic had been heavy, so they wouldn’t have time to get coffee before the appointment. The last thing Rae needed was caffeine that would make her even more jittery.

  Now Steph was glad she had called Gabe and asked him to take over her spot in a comedy show in a laundromat so she could drive Rae. A few times, she caught herself taking one hand off the wheel and nearly reaching over to give Rae’s knee a reassuring squeeze or to take her hand. What the hell? She had never been the hand-holding type, and she was pretty sure Rae wasn’t either.

  With five minutes to spare, Steph parked in front of the ocularist’s office. “Perfect timing.”

  “Yeah.” Rae didn’t smile or look relieved.

  Steph turned off the engine but didn’t get out of the car. “It won’t hurt, will it?”

  “I doubt it. The last time I was here, he had to take the eye out and put it back in about a thousand times, so it became a little irritated, but that’s all.”

  “Then what has you so worried?”

  “I… Nothing.”

  Steph didn’t believe that for a second. She continued to look at her, but Rae hadn’t turned her head, and Steph had a feeling Rae kept her in her blind spot on purpose so she wouldn’t have to look at her.

  But now wasn’t the time to force it. Rae was too tense to let down her guard and talk about what worried her.

  “Let’s go in.” Steph got out and pointed at the sign to the side of the door. “Aww, Window to the Soul. That’s kind of cute.”

  “Guess so.”

  With Rae in the lead and Steph a step behind, they entered the ocularist’s office.

  Steph looked around while Rae gave her name to the woman behind the reception desk. It looked like a typical doctor’s office, with one difference: photos of people covered the walls. When Steph looked more closely, she thought they might be patients who had received an artificial eye. With some of them, she could tell that one eye wasn’t real, mostly because the lid was drooping a little, but with others, it was impossible to say which eye was the prosthetic one.

  When Rae waved at her, Steph tore herself away from the photos and followed her to the waiting room.

  They had just taken a seat when the door opened and a thin man in his fifties entered. “Hi, Rae. I’d say it’s good to see you, but I bet you’d rather be elsewhere.” His white lab coat swished as he crossed the room and shook Rae’s hand, then turned to Steph with a questioning look.

  “This is Stephanie Renshaw,” Rae said. After a slight hesitation, she added, “My…friend.”

  Warmth suffused Steph, and she couldn’t help beaming. Friend. She doubted Rae introduced many people that way.

  “Pleasure to meet you. I’m David Kamali.” The ocularist took her hand in an enthusiastic grip.

  “Nice to meet you too, Dr. Kamali.”

  He laughed and held up his hand in protest. “Oh, no, I’m not a doctor.”

  “But clearly, you’re an artist.” Steph gestured at Rae’s prosthetic eye.

  With his olive complexion, it was hard to tell, but he seemed to be blushing a little. “Well, yes, it is an art—but an art I don’t want people to notice. If I do my job right, my work blends in with its companion eye.” He cocked his head at Rae. “Shall we?”

  Rae nodded, her expression grim.

  Mr. Kamali started to turn, then paused and looked at Steph. “Oh, if you want to come in with her, that’s fine with me.”

  Oh wow. Steph hadn’t expected that. Maybe he had taken Rae’s slight hesitation when introducing her as a sign that she was really Rae’s girlfriend, or he thought Rae could use some support.

  Rae had frozen. Her gaze darted back and forth between Steph and Mr. Kamali.

  Very likely, whatever Mr. Kamali would do included removing Rae’s eye, and that would mean letting Steph see her without the prosthesis. Steph knew Rae wasn’t ready for that. She lightly put her hand on Rae’s arm. “It’s okay. I’ll be fine here in the waiting room. I need to catch up on the celebrity gossip in the tabloids anyway.”

  Rae breathed in and out twice in fast succession, like a diver preparing to dip beneath the ocean’s surface. “No. Come in with me.”

  Steph stared at her. “Are you sure? You don’t have to.”

  “I know.”

  They looked at each other for several seconds. Steph tried to read Rae’s expression. Did she really want her to come in, or was she only trying to avoid hurting her feelings? Emotions flickered across Rae’s face too fast for her to read, but she decided to trust her word—just as Rae had shown her trust by inviting her to come in with them. “Okay.” Her voice trembled. As she followed Mr. Kamali and Rae down the hall, her heart pounded a rapid beat against her ribcage. Get a grip. You’re here to help Rae calm down, not to freak out.

  She tried to distract herself by glancing around Mr. Kamali’s office. It looked like a doctor’s office too…or maybe more like a dentist’s office, including a chair that resembled a dental chair. The only thing that didn’t fit the doctor’s office look were the little bottles of paint lined up on one side of an L-shaped, white desk.

  Mr. Kamali took a seat behind his desk while Rae sat across from him.

  Steph dragged a visitor’s chair over so she could sit to Rae’s right. She glanced at the huge magnifying glass and a round mirror mounted to the desk.

  “So,” Mr. Kamali steepled his fingers, “what seems to be the problem?”

  “My eye has been really irritated for a while, and on Saturday, it slipped toward my nose.” Rae spoke so fast that her words nearly ran into each other. “I guess I rubbed it the wrong way, but still that never happened before, not even when I had a cold. I don’t know. It just feels…off.”

  “Hmm. All right. Let’s take a look. Can you lean forward please?” He had her look up, down, left, and right and close her eyes while he followed each movement of the prosthesis. Finally, he reached across the desk and pulled down Rae’s lower lid, then—as if it were the most normal thing in the world—let her artificial eye slide out.

  Steph wanted to be polite and put Rae at ease by not looking, but the big mirror to Rae’s left was angled in a way that it gave Steph a perfect view of her.

  For a second or two, the sight of the bare socket took her breath away. Before, when she had walked in on Rae in the bathroom, she had caught only the briefest of glimpses—partly because Rae’s very naked body had distracted her. As Mr. Kamali pulled apart Rae’s lids to inspect the socket, Steph couldn’t help staring at the empty space where her left eye should have been. It didn’t look horrible. It would just take some getting used to—provided Rae would let her see the socket with the prosthesis out again—but there
was nothing that made her shudder and want to avert her gaze. The pink flesh looked healthy. The color reminded her of the inside of her cheek.

  She met the gaze of Rae’s remaining eye in the mirror.

  Rae looked so serious. Was she even breathing?

  To hell with not being the hand-holding type. Steph reached over and took Rae’s hand.

  Rae’s fingers flexed around hers as if she’d been startled, but then she latched on to Steph’s hand as if she needed to hold on to keep Steph from fleeing the room.

  Steph gave her a reassuring smile. Don’t worry. That won’t happen, she tried to tell her without words.

  Mr. Kamali cleared his throat and gave them an amused grin.

  Yeah, he definitely thought they were a couple.

  “Has your eye been tearing more than usual?” he asked. “Any discharge?”

  Rae nodded.

  “It might sound like a strange question, but what color was the discharge?” Mr. Kamali asked.

  Rae’s gaze flicked to Steph, who squeezed her hand to let her know there was nothing to be embarrassed about. “Um, white, I think,” Rae said.

  “Then it’s clearly not an infection. Here’s what I think is going on: When they took out your eye, they put in an orbital implant.” He looked at Steph and added, “Basically, it’s a Ping-Pong-sized ball that they insert to replace some of the lost volume. They attach the muscles of the eye to it and cover it with tissue. The prosthesis sits on top of the Ping-Pong ball so the muscles move it along with its companion eye.” He held up Rae’s artificial eye.

  It was the first time Steph saw it out of its socket. The prosthesis wasn’t shaped like an eyeball but more like a curved shell. A black dot graced the white close to the edge of it, maybe to show which side was up or down.

  “But the problem is that the tissues surrounding the prosthesis change over time,” Mr. Kamali continued, and now he was speaking more to Rae. “The fat in the eye atrophies, and then the shape of your socket no longer fits the back of the prosthesis. Little pockets form, where tears collect, and the salts irritate the eye. The prosthesis also begins to rub on the tissues, adding to the irritation. You might even start to have problems with the eye staying in place because there’s now too much room in the socket.”