Wood Worked

A nurse came in. “Nice to see you awake.”

“Hi.” My voice was raspy, and my throat felt dry. She poured me a glass of water and behind her, I saw Spencer get to his feet. He stretched, showcasing his impressive height—and also proving that he had some pretty solid muscles under that dress shirt. I sipped some water and then tried to speak again. “C-can you tell me about my leg?”

“You have a patella fracture,” she said, her attention on the IV bag that hung above my head. “That’s your kneecap. And you broke your tibia and fibula.”

“She didn’t break them,” Spencer said in his deep, rich voice.

“That’s right, you’re a hero.” She gave my arm a pat.

What? That was something I’d never been called in my twenty-three years. Before I could dwell on that too much, she continued on.

“Your left wrist has a sprain, but it should heal quickly enough. Your ribs are bruised—they said that’s going to hurt for a while.” Spencer winced. “Guess everything will. You also have quite a collection of scrapes and bruises, but those shouldn’t bother you much.”

My hand flew up, but there weren’t any bandages wrapped around my head like I’d seen in the movies. Guess that meant that my head was the only part of me that wasn’t injured. For the first time, I wondered about my appearance. My hair was straight and shoulder-length normally, but it felt frizzy and disordered at the moment. Hopefully there weren’t bits of gravel in it from the road.

The nurse was still talking, but I couldn’t quite bring myself to home in on the details. Medical talk of any sort made me feel squeamish. Besides, I wasn’t ready to deal with the reality of what kind of recovery time I was looking at. My head still ached a bit, and I didn’t want to make it worse.

“Do you think you can eat something?” the nurse asked. “Maybe soup?”

“I guess so.” Truthfully, I didn’t feel hungry at all, but it was probably important to take in some nutrients.

“Would anything else taste good?” Spencer asked, looking prepared to go to the other side of the world if I craved something exotic.

I thought about it. “Maybe lemonade? With crushed ice?”

They both smiled. “I’ll have some sent up,” the nurse said.

Once she left, Spencer’s smile faded. “How do you feel?”

I paused, taking an assessment. “Better than yesterday.”

“You look better.”

His words made me blush. I very much doubted that any part of me looked good now.

“Your color’s better,” Spencer added.

The word color reminded me of the riot of flowers behind him. “Um, where did all these come from?”

He glanced at them and then gave me a wry grin. “Pretty much everyone in town.”

That made no sense. “But how—?”

“You’re in the paper today.” He plucked a thin newspaper off a nearby table and put it on my lap. I raised the bed higher so that I was almost in a regular sitting position.

Blinking, I peered at the paper. My face looked back at me. I was on the front page? And they’d used my driver’s license photo?

I groaned, and Spencer looked alarmed. “What hurts? Should I get the nurse back here?”

“No, I … it’s just that picture.”

Understanding crossed his face, and he studied the paper on my lap. “I think it looks great.”

I folded the paper in half so that I wouldn’t have to look at that photo. “It must’ve been a slow news day yesterday.”

Spencer didn’t smile at that. “I think it’s pretty big news when someone risks her life to save a child she doesn’t even know.”

Oh. My cheeks reddened, and I searched for something to say. “Who are the lilies from?” They were some of the only flowers I could name, plus the arrangement was the prettiest of the bunch.

“Me.”

My blush deepened. “Thank you.”

“No, thank you. I can’t thank you enough.” His voice caught, and then he looked at the card in the next arrangement. “These are from the mayor’s office.”

“The mayor’s office?”

He smiled at my disbelief. “It’s a small town. This one with the peonies is from the hospital. And this last one is from the staff at Delaune Elementary School.”

“Is that where Lucas goes?”

Spencer nodded. “And it’s where I work. I’m the principal.”

His revelation shocked me. He seemed like such a nice, normal guy. Then again, I was an adult now. I didn’t have to worry about being reprimanded by a principal. But I’d been a student since I was five up until a month ago, and apparently old attitudes die hard.

Spencer was watching me when I looked up. From the amusement on his face, I guessed he was used to my reaction. “I don’t have the power to give you detention, you know.”

A young man in scrubs brought in my lemonade, and Spencer took it from him and placed it on the rolling cart near my bed. “I almost forgot these,” he said, nodding at the rather modern-looking arrangement on the tray. Instead of a vase, the flowers were arranged on top of a little green platform. “Those are from your work. It’s that tech startup over on Philippe Avenue, right?”