Forever With You (Silver State Series)

by Renae Kelleigh

  The box is a time capsule. It contains an assortment of mementos, reminders of the better parts of my past. The light blue honor cord I wore on the day I graduated from high school. A birthday card from Ralph. A sand dollar and a conch shell from a trip to the Outer Banks. A beaded friendship bracelet from Taryn. A faded photo of Jeff…

  I lift the photo from the box. It’s faded and curled, having been exposed to heat and sunlight and moisture during the varying course of its lifetime. I rub my thumb over the time stamp in the bottom right corner – February 17, 2006. Jeff’s eighteenth birthday. He’d just been accepted to NC State, and I’d gotten him a baseball cap with the black and red logo emblazoned on the front. In the picture, he’s wearing the cap pushed far back on his head, and his left arm is wrapped around my shoulders. My arms are cinched tightly around his waist, and I’m smiling up at him, my chin resting against his chest. The grin on his face is radiantly happy, like he’s been caught mid-laugh. I remember the picture was snapped by Jeff’s mom, Sara Lennox, as we were standing in her kitchen. My memory of what we were laughing about has faded.

  Linus

  THE SOUND OF knocking is nearly inaudible over the drone of the electric clippers I use to trim my beard. I flip the off switch and shake the clippers over the sink, then watch as they rain hair into the smooth basin. When the knocking starts again, I pull my towel more snugly around my waist and cross the creaking wooden floors to the front door. A quick glance through the peephole tells me it’s Toby.

  “You’re early,” I say as I open the door and step back to let him in.

  “By like five minutes.”

  I check my watch – 10:07. “More like twenty-five.”

  “Need me to leave and come back?”

  “No, but you’ll wanna turn your head if you don’t wanna see me naked.”

  “Been there, done that,” he replies as he flops down on the sofa.

  “Help yourself to a drink.” I walk back into my bedroom and let the towel drop, then step into a clean pair of boxer briefs. “What’s the name of the group we’re seeing?” I call out into the living room.

  “Strangers With Candy. They’re supposed to be indie alt rock or some shit like that.”

  I chuckle. “Like the name. Did you say Joan knows ‘em?”

  “Knows their drummer at least. I think she used to date him.”

  I laugh. “Is there any man east of the Cascades she hasn’t dated? Besides me, of course.”

  “I think you’re the only one, man.”

  I zip my jeans and jerk a black t-shirt over my head, then carry my boots and a rolled up pair of socks out to the loveseat across from Toby. He sniffs the air. “Are you wearing cologne?”

  “Fuck no,” I reply, stuffing my foot in my left boot and yanking on the laces. “That’s just my natural musk.”

  “You naturally smell like flowers and cinnamon?”

  “Jealous?”

  He laughs and shakes his head. “Oh! Dude, guess who’s back in town.”

  “Who?” I ask.

  “I’ll give you a hint – her dad works for your dad.”

  My heart judders to a stop. I’m still bent in half, tying my right boot, but now my eyes are screwed to Toby’s. “Seriously? Jenn?” He nods slowly, like he’s second guessing his decision to tell me in the first place.

  Jennifer Teller, or Jenn as her friends call her, is the only girl I’ve ever dated for more than two consecutive months. We hooked up for the first time two and a half years ago, when she was here visiting her dad from Portland. Stan Teller is the Service Manager for Redgrave BMW, and he couldn’t wait to show off his pretty, fresh-faced daughter at the company Christmas party. She was nineteen at the time, three years younger than me. Her short red dress and feminine curves had caught my eye, and she’d been fun and quick to laugh. It was a good night.

  We didn’t officially start dating until the following summer, when Jenn decided to take a year off from school to move in with Stan and work as a receptionist for the dealership. We had four really good months together. She was vivacious and funny, not to mention good in bed.

  Then, sometime after the start of fall, something changed. She went from laidback to neurotic, from self-sufficient to clingy. By Thanksgiving I felt like I was I was drowning in her constant presence. Her relative youth, which had seemed endearing only months before, now struck me as childish.

  I stuck it out through the holidays, but when she got wasted on New Year’s Eve and fucked Marshall Greer, I decided enough was enough. I’d heard what happened from the other partygoers, but by that point I was about a million miles past caring. I heard her out the following day, when she showed up on my doorstep in tears, but I didn’t sugarcoat the fact I considered us finished.

  Jenn spent the following spring trying every trick in the book to recapture my attention. On those rare occasions when she succeeded, I was more irritated than I was flattered, and finally I mustered the nerve to tell her so. She’d retreated back to Portland, where I assumed she returned to school. I haven’t heard mention of her in close to a year.

  I heave a sigh, then double knot my laces and stand up. “Ready to go?” I ask. “Let’s go get a table. And a drink.”

  “She might be there tonight, man. You know she got to be pretty tight with Joan.”

  I dismiss him with a shrug. “Don’t know, don’t care. I’m not holding a grudge. If she’s there I’ll say hi.”

  STRANGERS WITH CANDY is midway through their first set when Toby nudges me and nods toward the bar’s front entrance. I take a long swallow of my beer before turning to look. Sure enough, there she is, dressed in the mini-est of miniskirts and the highest of high heels. She looks good, just like she always did. Her dark hair is pulled back in a ponytail, leaving her shoulders bare. As a guy, I can appreciate her feminine beauty, but I’m pleased to say I no longer feel the stirrings of any deeper attraction.

  I turn back around and wait for her to come over. It’s not a long wait. Half the people at our table stand up to greet her with hugs and enthusiastic high fives, but I can feel her eyes on me. When she works her way around to me, I reach up for an awkward one-armed hug, which she returns by pressing her tits into my shoulder and burying her face in my neck. I notice she still wears the same sickly sweet perfume she did a year and a half ago.

  “Good to see you, Linus,” she says in my ear before pulling away.

  “You, too,” I reply non-committally. “What brings you back to Brighthill?”

  “I’m just here for the summer. I leave for Rome in August – study abroad.”

  “Wow,” I say, actually somewhat impressed. I wouldn’t have guessed she had it in her to live in a different country. The darker part of me wonders how long she’ll last. “What is it you’re studying again?”

  Her forehead puckers in a frown – apparently she’s pissed I forgot. “Art history,” she replies.

  Diana calls out then, gesturing for Jenn to take the empty seat next to her. Thankfully it’s at the opposite end of the table. Jenn shoots a pointed glance at me. When I don’t argue, she skirts around the table to join Di and her deadbeat boyfriend Micah.

  A little while later, the band clears the stage for a break. I turn to ask Toby if he wants another drink and catch him staring after Jenn as she struts off in the direction of the ladies room. “Why don’t you ask her out, dude?” I say, rousing him from whatever fantasy world he’d slipped into. “She said she’s here for the whole summer.”

  He looks at me as if he thinks I might be testing him, like he’s afraid to agree too readily. “Really?” he asks. “That wouldn’t bother you?”

  “Why would it? I’m not her boyfriend.”

  “Yeah, but you were.”

  “That’s ancient history,” I reply.

  “You’re telling me you aren’t interested?” he says.

  “Not at all, no.”

  He relaxes back in his seat, mulling it over. “You think on that,” I say, clapping him on the bac
k. “I’m gonna go for a smoke.”

  When I return for the second set, Toby’s all over Jenn. She pretends to laugh at his jokes, but I can tell she isn’t really interested. Poor guy.

  Chapter 3

  Kenna

  MY SECOND ENCOUNTER with Linus the Maintenance Guy is two weeks later and happens entirely by chance. I’m staffing the surgical ICU and the census is low, making for a pretty laidback afternoon. After lunch I clear out the order queue and do a couple of med recs, then decide to indulge in a break and go for a cup of coffee. I take the stairs down to the first floor lobby and follow the corridor back to the Starbucks in the northwest corner. I pay for a tall nonfat caramel macchiato, then step to the side to wait out my order.

  Leaning back against a nearby pillar, I fish the code pager I carry on ICU days out of the deep front pocket of my white coat. Thankfully there haven’t been any code blues yet today. Instead, the pager is crammed full of text alerts about Stanley Cup playoffs and Mariners baseball scores. I roll my eyes and chuckle under my breath as I clear out the alerts, knowing most of them were sent by either Chuck, the ER pharmacist, or Dr. Riddle, the intensivist fellow.

  My name is called, and I scoop up my drink, then head back the way I came. Just as I reach the stairwell, my hospital-issued Blackberry vibrates in my pocket. “What’s up, Elaine?” I say as I hit the button to answer.

  “Do you still have that flash drive with the presentation we put together for the Joint Commission folks?”

  “Yeah, do you need it?”

  “Do you mind? I totally forgot I told Dale I’d show him in our four o’clock meeting today.”

  “No problem,” I reply. “I’m just out for coffee. I’ll stop down there and grab it for you.”

  “Thank you, Kenna.”

  I tap End Call, then take the steps down instead of up. I swipe my badge to enter the pharmacy and unlock my office door just as Elaine walks over from the IV room. She’s a petite woman with sharp green eyes and prematurely gray hair. Elaine and I became close over the year she served as my residency director; now she’s my boss and mentor. She was the one who went to bat for me when the other department leaders questioned my ability to handle this job after only one year of experience, and she’s been supporting me without fail ever since.

  “Here you go,” I say, handing over the flash drive from the top drawer of my desk. “You remember the password?”

  “I’ve got it written down in my office,” she replies. “Thank you so much. Sorry to disturb you.”

  “You’re no bother at all,” I reply. “See you later.” Elaine hurries out the door, and I exit the pharmacy to resume my post on 3 South.

  That’s when I see Linus. He rounds the corner up ahead and swaggers toward me, looking every bit as effortlessly handsome as he had in my office two weeks earlier. I can tell the moment he recognizes me, because his mouth curls into a smug grin.

  My intention is to say hello. Unfortunately, the universe has other plans for me. Before I can begin to process what’s happening, my ankle twists painfully sideways, and I lurch forward, landing in an ungainly sprawl across the floor. My hands smack against the linoleum as I put them out to catch myself, and my face misses the hard surface by only inches.

  I want. To. Die.

  Footsteps scramble toward me, and I can feel him leaning over me. “Kenna? Are you all right?” He sounds worried. Slowly I turn my face and push up on my hands, testing my weight. My wrists are tender from taking the brunt of my fall, but I’m pretty sure they aren’t sprained or broken. I straighten my skirt and twist around so I’m sitting on my butt, then look around for a foreign object I may have tripped over. Suddenly the puzzle pieces fall together: lying on the floor about six feet away is the heel from my shoe. The damn thing must’ve snapped off.

  At last I gather the courage to glance up at Linus. He looks concerned, but now that it’s obvious I’m not dead, I can tell he’s also trying hard not to laugh. Dick.

  The hilarity of the situation isn’t lost on me, but something tells me if I start laughing, he’ll be unstoppable. I’m afraid my ego is too fragile at the moment to risk it, so I simply shoot him a cold smile as I kick off both shoes. “Did you see who pushed me?” I murmur as I cross my ankles and push up to my feet.

  “Seriously, are you okay?” Linus asks. His statement is broken by barely suppressed laughter.

  “Oh please, I’ve already done this five or six times today,” I say with a wave of my hand. I glance at my watch. “One second faster than last time – I’m getting good at this.”

  His tall frame shakes with laughter, but I refuse to give in. Biting back a smile, I level a glare at him, then pivot to walk away. Continuing to stand here will only increase the likelihood of further embarrassing myself.

  “What’s your plan?” he calls after me as I start to walk away. “Go back to work barefoot?”

  I look down at my red toenails and my splintered shoe. I really need to leave an extra pair of flats in my office.

  “Come on,” he says, catching up to me. “I’ll help you fix it.”

  “You will?” I ask, caught off-guard. “How?” He doesn’t answer, so I follow him as he pulls out a heavy key ring. He inserts one of the six hundred keys in a nearby door marked EMPLOYEES ONLY.

  Flipping on a light, he points at an upended cement bucket. “Sit.” I do as I’m told. He roots around in a box and comes back with a small tube of epoxy glue. “How’s your ankle?” he asks, crouching down in front of me.

  “It’s fine,” I say quickly. My breath catches as he lifts my leg and places my ankle gently in his lap. When his bare hands cup my foot and slide up my calf, I suck in a sharp breath, causing him to look up in alarm.

  “It hurts?” he says.

  “No,” I say, abruptly jerking my ankle off his lap and returning it to the safety of the floor. “Did you say you could fix my shoe?”

  His eyes remain fastened to mine for an uncomfortable length of time. That smug smile is back, and it’s annoying as hell. I curl my fingertips, clutching the sides of the bucket to keep from slapping it off of him.

  “What do you do here, Kenna?” he asks, looking away to pick up the pieces of my shoe. “You’re a pharmacist, yeah?”

  “That’s right,” I reply warily. “Did you deduce that from the fact that I work in the pharmacy?”

  “Your name badge helped, too,” he says. I’ve only just recovered from the shock of his last touch when he reaches out to rap his knuckle against the “Pharm.D.” printed on my badge, right over my breast.

  He goes back to work. I watch as he carefully applies a thin stripe of glue to the broken heel, then fits it together with the rest of the shoe. “So how come you don’t have a boyfriend?” he asks, still concentrating on the task at hand.

  My initial reaction is another surge of self-righteous anger – but then I recall having told him I don’t have a boyfriend. Just a stupid cat. UGH, I hate him for remembering.

  “I’m hard to handle,” I spit out.

  “Oh?” he asks, undeterred. “And why is that?”

  “I think it’s this clown fetish I have. It’s challenging for some people.”

  Even with his face angled downward I can tell he’s smiling. It isn’t exactly the response I was going for. “I could see that,” he replies casually. “I guess that’s probably a pretty limited demographic.” He blows lightly on the seal, pursing his lips and hollowing his cheeks in a way that’s frighteningly alluring. This time when he lifts my foot, I don’t have it in me to resist. “Still,” he says, fitting my toes in the shoe before sliding on the heel, “my hunch is you’d be worth it.”

  He winks at me. That’s right. WINKS.

  A caustic chuckle escapes me. “You would be right about that, Maintenance Guy,” I say as I shove my other foot in the appropriate shoe. “As always, thanks for your services.” I give him a two-finger salute, then walk out the door.

  Linus

  “REDGRAVE. PHARMACY.” Big M
ike taps his desk, indicating the blueprint for the renovated pharmacy space. Apparently the hospital contracted with a construction company based out of Seattle to get started on it sometime next month. “They need your eyes down there for some wiring stuff. I told ‘em you know your way around the electrical panels.”

  “On it,” I reply.

  The pharmacy. Again. Fuck.

  Two days have passed since I rescued Kenna Aldridge from her near death experience. Everything about our encounter confirms the assumptions I formed two weeks ago. She’s an angry, conceited bitch with a superiority complex. She wears nice clothes, presumably because she feels the need to broadcast her exaggerated sense of self-importance. She probably grew up in the same type of neighborhood I did, but whereas I rejected “the finer things in life” as a result of that pretentious upbringing, she developed a dependency on them. I’ve seen it a million times.

  So then why am I kind of, sort of hoping to catch another glimpse of her while I’m down there this afternoon? Why have I spent so much time picturing the way she looked with her skirt bunched up around her hips after she fell, or the sinful smirk that touches her lips when she’s preparing another spitfire response to something I’ve said? And why have I replayed our conversation so many times in my head I could recite it from memory?

  There are no good answers to these questions, so I choose not to dwell on them. Instead, I focus on gathering everything I’ll need to head over to the main building. Flashlight, tape measure, duct tape, multi tool – that should do it. I can feel Shayna’s eyes on me as I walk out, so I hold up my hand in a wave.

  When I reach the basement, the door that’s typically shut and locked is propped open. Two men in ties stand just inside with their hands on their hips, gazing up at the ceiling. “Did somebody call maintenance?” I ask, tapping lightly on the doorframe to get their attention.

  “That’s us,” says the taller of the two. “I’m Todd Cumberbatch, and this is my partner, Greg Sweeney. What’s your name, son?”