Chapter 25: Redo

Saturday, 6:48 p.m.

I have been standing in front of my closet for fifteen minutes, which is six minutes longer than is reasonable, and one minute less than I stood in front of my closet the first time I went on a date with Aiden Black, which means I have either learned a small amount of restraint, or I have decided that a sweater and jeans is the appropriate uniform for a man who has, in the last forty-eight hours, fallen asleep in a break room and been found by me with two coffees and a hurt voice.

I am going with the sweater and jeans.

I am going with the wine.

I have also, in a moment of clear weakness, put on the small silver necklace Sophie lent me. I am not going to think about why. I am not going to think about the fact that Sophie lent it to me for the first date, and that I am wearing it now, on the second date, on a Saturday, because it has become the small, specific thing I wear when I am a person who is going to see Aiden Black.

I take a Lyft to Silverlake. I get there at 7:02 p.m., which is two minutes late, which is the most reckless I have been for the entire duration of this entire situation.

He opens the door.

He is in sweatpants. Grey. Soft-looking. A white apron, slightly ridiculous, the kind of apron that says "kiss the cook" in small, faded letters, which I am going to think about for the rest of my life. No badge. No pager. No scrubs. No white coat. He is in a t-shirt under the apron, and he is in his socks, He is in his apartment, and he is a man who is making dinner for me on a Saturday night.

"Hi," he says.

"Hi. I brought wine."

"You are early."

"I am late."

"You are two minutes late. That is the most reckless thing you have done since I have known you."

I look at him. He is smiling. The small smile. The real one. The one I have seen exactly three times in six weeks, in a hallway, in a kitchen, and in a small PT room.

"Redo," he says. He takes the wine. He opens the door wider. He gestures me in. "That is what tonight is. A redo. A new one. I do not want to be the man who fell asleep in a break room. I want to be the man who is here, in socks, making pasta, with an apron I have owned for eight years and never used."

"Eight years?"

"I bought it the week I moved in. I have not used it. I am using it tonight."

I go inside.

The apartment is clean. The kitchen is clean. There is no burned garlic bread. There is no sauce on the counter. There is a small pot on the stove, with pasta water that is, against all odds, not boiling over. There is a small pan with garlic in it. There is a wooden spoon. There is a small piece of bread on a cutting board, unburned, golden, the right colour, and the right size.

There are two plates on the small table. There are two glasses. There is a small candle in the middle of the table. Lit.

The candle is making me want to cry, which is a thing I am going to have to deal with, but not now, because now I am a person who is having dinner with a man on a Saturday.

"Tell me if I am doing this right," he says, looking at the pan. "I have a recipe. It is from the internet. I have been following it for thirty minutes. I have not deviated."

"You have not deviated."

"I have considered deviating. I have not."

Lincoln is on the couch. Lincoln is asleep. Lincoln is on his back, paws in the air, the most relaxed creature in the apartment. The apartment has the small smell of garlic and the small smell of the candle and the small smell of a man who has been home for two hours, which is the smell of a man who is not at the hospital, which is the smell I have been missing for two days.

We sit at the table. He serves the pasta. It is not burned. The garlic is not black. The bread is golden. The wine is opened. We eat.

We talk.

We do not talk about the hospital. We do not talk about the break room. We do not talk about the two weeks, or the three days, or the part of Aiden Black that is the part that disappears. We talk about the small things, the kind of small things that a person talks about on a third date, except we are not on a third date, we are on a redo, which is its own small category, the category of people who have already done the small things and are now doing them on purpose.

I tell him about the candle. He tells me he has not lit a candle since he moved in. I tell him this is the most tragic thing I have ever heard. He says it is the truth. I tell him the cello neighbour plays at three a.m. He says Lincoln does not care because Lincoln is the kind of dog that sleeps through everything.

We are halfway through the pasta, which is, against all odds, very good when he puts his fork down.

"I want to talk about Wednesday," he says.

"Okay."

"I disappeared. I do that. I have done it my whole life. When things get loud, I shut down. I close the door. I go quiet. I do it at the hospital. I do it with people. I did it with"

He stops. He does not say her name. He has not said her name. I do not need him to.

"I did it with everyone. I do not know how to be a person who is in the room when the room is hard. So I leave. I leave the room. I leave the conversation. I leave the text. I leave the small, normal things that a person is supposed to do because the small, normal things are the things I do not know how to do."

He looks at the candle.

"I grew up thinking if I was not useful, people left. So when work gets crazy, I shut down. I do the work. I am useful. I am the man who is in the room. I am the man who is awake at three a.m. and who is in the OR at six a.m. I am the man who is in scrubs and who is fine. And the rest of me goes quiet. The rest of me disappears. I do not know how to make the rest of me be a person who is in a room with a person who is not a patient."

I look at him. He is not looking at me. He is looking at the candle. He is looking at the candle the way a man looks at a thing when the thing is easier to look at than the face of the woman across the table.

"I am not going anywhere," I say. "But you have to text me. Even if it is one word. Even if it is just 'alive.'' I can survive 'alive.' I can not survive the silence."

"Deal," he says.

"Deal?"

"Deal."

We eat the rest of the pasta. We finish the wine. Lincoln wakes up. Lincoln comes to the table. He puts his head on Aiden's foot. Aiden puts his hand on the dog's head. We do not talk about the rest of the things. We do not need to. We have done the part of the conversation that needed doing.

After dinner, we wash the dishes together.

It is, of all the things that have happened in the last six weeks, the most disorienting. We are standing at his small kitchen sink, side by side, with our shoulders touching. He washes. I dry. He hands me a plate. I dry the plate. He hands me a pan. I dry the pan. He hands me a fork. I dry the fork. We are not talking. We are doing the small, normal thing, the small thing that is not a hospital, the small thing that is not a break room, the small thing that is a man and a woman, in a kitchen, on a Saturday, washing dishes.

His shoulder is touching mine. The place where his shoulder is touching mine is the most specific part of my entire body right now. The place where his shoulder is touching mine is the entire thing.

He dries a plate. He sets it on the counter. He is looking at me.

"I like this," he says. "Normal."

"Me too."

He walks me to the door. He does not kiss me. He does not press his forehead to mine. He does not do any of the things he has done in the last six weeks, the things that have been the entire world. He tucks a piece of my hair behind my ear. Just that. His hand, the surgeon's hand, the hand that has been in ten thousand chests, comes up, and tucks a piece of hair behind my ear and comes back down.

"Text me when you get home," he says. "And tomorrow. And the next day."

"I will."

I get in the elevator. The doors close. I am in the small elevator, going down, alone. The candle I lit on my counter at home is going to be lit when I get there. The small silver necklace Sophie lent me is still on. The fact that Aiden Black, in sweatpants, in an apron, in socks, in a small Silverlake apartment, just tucked a piece of hair behind my ear, is the entire thing.

I get in the Lyft. I get home. I open my door. I light the candle. I sit on the couch.

I text him.

Home safe.

Two seconds.

Good. Sleep well.

I put the phone on the couch. I pick it up. I put it back down. I smile at the ceiling. I think: maybe hard is worth it if the good feels like this.

I think: I am going to be okay.

To be continued...