We take our place at the center of the room while the rest of the class gathers around the perimeter. I don’t have my best dance shoes on so I’m praying that I make it through this dance without falling on my face. The music starts and I immediately feel good. The beat and the music just start to move through me and a feeling of being invincible takes over.
Marco takes my hand and spins me once before I dip down and let him spin me several times. I pop up and we move together, hips shaking, legs kicking. We even work in one of those moves where I lean back and Marco catches me by the back of my neck. When we’re done the room erupts in applause and cheers, and Sam’s jaw is on the floor. I look at Landon and he’s got the sexiest smirk on his face.
I grab my stuff from the back dressing room and come out to the studio and do my best not to make it completely obvious that I’m looking for Landon. When I find Carina she tells me that he had to leave for a work commitment.
“He was definitely interested in you, though. I didn’t have to say anything. He asked about you first,” Carina say. She likes to put on her sexy Latina voice whenever she talks to me about men.
“It’ll be later next week before I’m back, but not on Saturday. So…if he asks, and only if he asks, I guess you can give him my number,” I tell her. “I’ve gotta run. I really do need to go home and sleep. It’s Mercy’s birthday and I’ve got a night of celebrating ahead of me. Thanks for the dance, Marco!” I say as I push the door to the studio open. “I’ll see you next week!”
I walk back to my apartment both exhilarated and exhausted. I don’t think I’ll have any trouble falling asleep. My roommate Spring will still be asleep so it’ll be perfectly quiet. She’ll be gone with her boyfriend Matt by the time I wake, too. Between my third shift work schedule, and Spring's time with Matt, I have the apartment all to myself a lot.
I take a quick shower just to wash the grime of a long shift and an hour of dancing off me before I climb in bed and tune the rest of the world out completely. When I wake up at 3:00, I think that maybe I should dance first thing off my shift every time. I slept so solidly and feel amazingly rested.
I wash my hair during shower number two and actually take the time to
straighten it. It’s a long mane of soft curls, brown now. It lives in a bun or braid between the hours of 7:00 pm and 7:00 am for work three to four days a week. Thank God I had it cut a couple of weeks ago. The last time I straightened my hair it was all the way down to the small of my back. Now it’s just past my shoulder blades. It still takes me almost an hour to do, but it’s worth it. I love the sleek look, and Mercy asked if I would please straighten it for her birthday. How could I say no?
With jeans, wedge sandals, and my favorite pink top with the fluttering sleeves on I’m ready to leave. I would normally walk the four blocks to Duke’s, but I’m running a tad later than I planned so decide to catch a cab.
I pull the heavy, solid wood door open and walk inside, heading straight to the tables in the back corner closest to the bar. As promised, Jerry held our favorite spot for us. And as expected, Mercy isn’t here yet. Our best friends, Jack and Demi are already here, along with Mercy’s sister, so I give Jerry a wave as I pass the bar and approach the table with open arms.
“Hey!” I shout as hugs go around. “Of course your sister is not here!” I say to Mercy’s sister, Grace. I laugh every time I think about the first time Mercy introduced me to her sister. They said their mom named them thinking they might offer a little bit of each, but was left sorely disappointed.
“You expected her to be on time? You know she wants to make a grand entrance!” Grace says above the noise the growing crowd is causing.
Before I know it, Grace’s declaration has become a reality. Mercy has stormed through the door, waving a pink feather boa. “I’m here and I’m ready to get my birthday on, bitches!”
Lots of laughter and more hugs all around. I offer to get the first round so I leave Mercy to her personal parade and head to the bar.
“Hey Jerry! Thanks for holding the table for us.” I step up on the brass foot rest and reach across the bar to hug him. Jerry is a Chicago boy through and through. He loves this city and looks every bit like he belongs here. A buff guy, he’s shaved his head rather than pretend he’s not balding, and he truly has one of the greatest smiles I’ve ever seen. He reminds me a lot of Oz, which is one of the reasons why I think I love him so much.
“Anything for you!” he says in his gruff voice. “First round is on me.”
“No! Jerry I can’t let you do that!” I protest.
“You guys are family. It’s Mercy’s birthday…I want to buy the first round so be quiet and go sit down. I’ll bring the usual pitcher over in a minute.”
“This is why we love you so much! You’re the best, Jerry!” I pop over the bar like I did before and give him a quick kiss on the cheek before heading back to our table.
Jerry runs Duke’s Bar. His dad was the Duke and opened this place before Jerry was even born. When Duke died ten years ago, Jerry swore he’d never let anything happen to the place. He’s done some things to keep it up and running that his dad would never have done, like adding some better items to the menu and opening early on the weekdays. He opens two hours earlier Monday through Thursday and added free Wi-Fi for all the executives who would find that 3:00 report a little more tolerable with a beer in their hand. He also brings in local bands on Saturday nights. That’s why we had to have him save our table. Band night has become crazy popular and if he didn’t save it, or we got here too late, we’d never get a table.
“Alright ladies and gentlemen! Jerry is bringing over the first round as a birthday gift to our birthday girl. Perhaps you can thank him later?” I tease. Jerry has asked Mercy out countless times, but for some weird reason she keeps turning him down.
“Back off, Jenna! It’s my birthday. I get one day of you not hounding me about going out with Jerry,” she says rolling her eyes.
“I don’t get why you don’t go out with him either,” Jack tells her. “I mean, I know he’s not as awesome as me, but…” Jack and Mercy went out a couple of times and had one heated night when they realized them dating was a bad idea. They both have a tendency to thrive on drama and there was too much competition to see which one of them could be the bigger drama queen…or king.
“Enough!” she shouts playfully.
“Ok, guys, here you go,” Jerry says with a smile as he brings us a pitcher of Bud and frosted glasses. “And these are for you.” Jerry hands Mercy a small bouquet of tulips and from what I can see in the dimmed lights, her cheeks actually blush.
“Oh, wow…that’s really sweet of you, Jerry. Thank you.” Mercy pauses for a moment before she leans up on her toes and gives Jerry a long kiss on the cheek.
“It was worth it just for that,” he says before walking away.
“Don’t say it!” she says to me.
We mill around the table drinking, talking, and eating for a while before the band comes up to play. Mercy thinks that Sharper Image just happens to be playing tonight, but the truth is that I got Jerry to book them special for Mercy’s birthday. They’re her favorite local band because they hardly do any covers and their original stuff is really good.
“Holy smokes! You didn’t tell me Sharper Image was playing!” Demi shouts. “Their bass player is ridiculously cute!” They’re Demi’s favorite band, too, and she has a hard time not salivating over the bass player. He is pretty hot.
“Hello! Sitting right here,” Jack whines. He and Demi have been an item for a few months now. I’m wondering how long it’ll last. They seem pretty happy most of the time, so I guess I’m optimistic.
Hours go by and this literally is the best night I’ve had in a really long time. I’ve been working my regular hours and working a little bit of overtime covering for the short staff in the ER on occasion, so while my wallet is happy, my social life has taken a hit. We dance and sing along with the band and Jerry continues to provide us w
ith free food. He argues with me, but I insist on keeping a tab open for the beer. I’ve lost count on how many pitchers we’ve had, and somehow I doubt Jerry is going to give me the accurate total when we finally settle up.
“Hey! I heard you went to your dance thing today after work!” Demi
shouts to me above the noise. “Are you crazy?”
“I’m not crazy, I just love to dance!” I spin around in my festive mood and that’s when I see him. He’s standing by the bar, holding a beer in one hand, and looking in my direction.
Landon. Oh my God! He’s here! What is he doing here?
“You know him? If not, I suggest you get to…he’s hot,” Demi says, catching me staring at Landon. She yells right into my ear since I think Jack is done hearing Demi’s opinion of other guys.
“I met him, well, I didn’t meet him, today at dance. We didn’t talk, but I guess we know who each other are,” I tell her into her ear without taking my eyes off Landon. “You know what? I’m gonna go talk to him!”
I turn and put my beer on the table, straighten myself out, and begin the walk to the other side of the bar where Landon is standing. I’m about five feet away when some assholes next to Landon start pushing each other and break into a fight. I move back and to the side to get out of the way of the onlookers and make room for Jerry who’s jumping the bar to break them up. Clearly these guys are new here because no one gets in a fight in Jerry’s bar. It takes Jerry and some of the regulars to wrestle the guys off each other and hustle them outside.
After all the commotion, I pull myself together again and take one step in Landon’s direction, my eyes searching for him among the crowd milling back into the bar.
“Shit! He’s gone.”
Chapter 3
I walk back to the table completely deflated. I had pulled together those 20 seconds of courage everyone talks about and attempted making the first move with Landon. I thought for sure he had seen me, but I guess not. I can’t imagine he would just walk away if he had, especially after Carina said he had been asking about me. Oh, well. I guess tonight wasn’t the night for me.
“So, where’s hottie guy?” Demi shouts at me above the music.
“I don’t know. He left in the scuffle,” I tell her with equal volume.
“His loss!” she smiles.
I grab the beer I put down before I went after Landon and finish it in a few gulps. It’s almost one and even though I slept this afternoon, I’m pretty wiped.
“I’m gonna head out,” I tell Mercy in the lull between Sharper Image’s songs.
“Do you have to?” Mercy whines. “The bar doesn’t close for another hour, and Jerry said we could hang out until he leaves.”
“I think he really just wants you to hang out until he leaves,” I smirk. I wish she would just give him a chance. He’s been nothing but awesome to us for the last three years, and I’ve never seen him with or heard about him dating anyone else. He’s had eyes for Mercy from day one.
“Goodbye!” Mercy is totally avoiding the Jerry issue again. I’ll have to keep on her about it at work when she’s more lucid. I think I’m finally beginning to wear her down.
“Alright! Alright! Happy birthday! I’ll see you guys later. I’ll settle up with Jerry but you’re on your own for the next hour,” I tell them with hugs and kisses. I pay Jerry for the pitchers and, as I suspected he would, he totally jips himself. I’m sure we had at least eight pitchers, but he only charges me for five.
I step out onto the sidewalk and begin the four block walk home. The
city is still bustling with Saturday night activity. There are a few other bars on this block and some around the corner the other way, along with three or four great restaurants. I excuse me my way through a group of guys as I’ve done countless times on the walk home from Duke’s and keep walking until I reach my building.
I can’t get Landon out of my head. I keep seeing him dancing with Carina. It was definitely not his first time taking lessons. He was way too good. She said he asked about me and the thought of that makes me blush for some reason, which, I realize, has never happened. I have never thought about a guy like this. Maybe this is what happens when you’re ready to stop messing around and look for an actual relationship, not just someone to date.
Ok. Enough of this. He’s just a guy. A really, super-hot guy who can dance and who asked about me, but just a guy nonetheless. Pull it together!
I approach my building and, as usual, am struck with just how awesome it is. It’s everything I dreamed living in Chicago would be like. I was so lucky to find this place right after I started nursing school. Had I not met Spring when I did, I’m sure I would have been living out of a hotel for months. Her roommate had just gotten married and moved to Ohio when we met in an anatomy and physiology class. It’s a great two-bedroom, two bath apartment with an incredible view of the city. There’s a grocery store, bakery, and coffee shop all next to each other on the ground level, so it really doesn’t get much better than that.
It took a lot of courage on my part to even engage Spring in conversation those first days of class. I was still really unsure of myself and scared about the new life and lie I was beginning to live. She made it easy, though. She’s the kind of girl who, when she wants to get to know you, you pretty much have to surrender to it and let her become your new best friend. I’m glad I did. Between Spring, Mercy, Grace, Demi, and Jack, I’ve been able to create a new little family for myself here in Chicago. It’s the best I could have ever hoped for. I don’t know what I’d do if anything ever happened to any of them.
I’m extra quiet when I enter the apartment. Spring isn’t as much of a night owl as I am even though she has normal hours at an Ob/Gyn office. I pull my shoes off and feel the comfort of my bare feet on the carpet before falling onto my bed. I lay there for a minute knowing I can’t fall asleep in my clothes, but enjoying the soothing coolness of my quilt against my skin and through my clothes.
When I get up, I do something I haven’t done in long time. Opening the bottom drawer to my dresser, I remove the false bottom and take out the box I have hidden there. I leave the gun in the box but pull out the rest of the contents and set them on the bed.
“Hi Dad,” I say with a sigh, brushing my thumb against his face on the picture in my hand. “I miss you a lot.” I pick up another picture, this time of both my parents, and turn it over. Me and Bob on our 5th anniversary. Veronica on the way! “I miss you, too, Mom.” I open the gold locket hanging from an extra-long chain and smile at the pictures of my dad and me. She wore this around her neck until the moment she died. Stupid cancer.
I put everything back in the box and hide it again in the bottom of my dresser drawer. I try not to visit too often because I can’t have the walk down memory lane cloud the mind of my life now, but…a girl needs to see the face of her mommy and daddy every once in a while.
*****
I have two patients, both of which were here during my last several shifts. Patient one is a 300 pound woman in her 40′s with multiple medical problems. She’s on a ventilator and in a coma so I wasn’t expecting her to have gone anywhere unless she died. She has a history of spiking temps to 107 and is on 70% oxygen. We’re basically keeping her alive until her mother can get here in the morning.
Patient two is a man in his 50′s with an infected toe. He came to us in the Critical Care Unit because his blood pressure in the ER went to 70 one time, which made the doctors worry about sepsis. Every vital sign that he had taken in Critical Care Unit was normal and stable. We’re monitoring him, but I suspect he’ll be gone soon.
“I have six meds due for my coma patient at 9:00 pm. I had problems getting one of those meds from the pharmacy and it looks like the other staff nurse did, too! Geez! What is going on down there,” I rant to Mercy. “Tonight, I checked as soon as I got here and it’s not there! I’m going to have to re-order it now! I wish those pharmacy techs would get their heads out of their asses!”
“Whoa! Did you
run out of Nutella or something because you are seriously on edge tonight!” Mercy has a look of shock mixed with you better calm the hell down on her face.
“Sorry…I’m just distracted and I’m pretty sure the med situation, at least during my last shift, is my fault,” I tell her apologetically.
“What’s on your mind?” Mercy rolls a chair next to me at the nurse’s station and slaps the charts in her hands down. “Spill it!”
“I don’t know…” I begin. “It’s so dumb, but…I’ve been thinking about that guy Landon.”
“That’s not dumb. From what Grace said, he was totally hot. And if you know him from the dance studio, it sounds like you’ve already got something in common,” she says.
“It’s not really about him, although, I wouldn’t say no to him if he asked. I’m distracted by being distracted by him,” I tell her with some trepidation. She’s only a few steps below Carina when it comes to matchmaking.
“Finally! Maybe you’ll stop going out on one or two dates before you
find something terribly wrong with the guy,” she says with a glowering eye.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say wryly, pretending to go back to my paperwork.
“Oh really? Mark?”
“His feet were ridiculously small for a man that tall.”
“Steven?”
“He had matching tattoos with his mom.”
“Paul?”
“He always smelled like baby powder. What man smells like baby powder?”
“Andrew?”
“He wanted to wear his ex-girlfriend’s yoga pants out to dinner on our second date because, and I quote, my package looks really huge in them.” I raise my eyebrows at her as if this should be obvious to everyone.
“Ok. I’ll give you Andrew,” Mercy concedes.
“Look, don’t go reading anything into it. Landon is just a guy with the most amazing smile who dances really well. I’ve never met a guy who had those things wrapped up into one, super-hot package. He caught me off guard. That’s all.”
Next to Me Page 3
