It doesn’t look beautiful. Old brownstone and a stoop that needs work. The windows look like they’ve seen better days.
“Come on,” I say to her.
“Are we walking into a crack house?” she asks.
I laugh and unlock the front door. It pushes open easily enough. The hallway has linoleum floors and the lights work as I flip all the switches on.
It’s actually not bad on the inside. The walls are in good condition, the floors not beaten to hell. It smells a little musty from disuse, but that’ll change.
“We’re going to do a lot of work,” I tell Ruby as we walk through the space, “but it’ll be great when it’s done.”
“What used to be in here?” she asks.
“I think it was an office for social workers,” he says. “At least, that’s what my, uh, friend told me.”
She gives me a look but doesn’t correct me this time. “I honestly thought it was going to be gross in here.”
“I know. We’ll do some work to the outside, too.”
We head through the space, from office to office, until we end up in the back.
It’s mostly open back here. There are still cubicle marks in the carpet, and it’s easy to tell where people’s desks used to be.
Now though, the space is empty. Whatever used to be here is long gone, abandoned years ago, the lease never picked up since.
Until now. Spring Garden isn’t exactly a thriving neighborhood, but that’s what I like about it.
I can hold open clinic hours for local residents. I can see people that otherwise might never be able to afford a doctor like me. And the patients that can afford me will travel out here to see me.
Or they won’t. I honestly don’t care, although every single one of my current patients, along with many of my past ones, have said they’ll follow me here.
It’s not a hospital. It’s just office space. I’ll be affiliated with Temple Health from now on, which will be a slightly longer commute, but that doesn’t matter.
I’ll have a career. I’ll help people again.
“What do you think?” I ask her.
She looks around, inspecting every little thing. I follow her, wondering what she’s thinking.
My little gem. My beautiful gem.
“Perfect,” he says, nodding. “Very perfect.”
I grin and kiss her. “I thought so.”
“You’re going to love it here.”
“We’re going to love it here,” I correct her. “I’m going to need help, you know.”
“I’ll help if you’re willing to take one more elderly patient.”
“Dot is going to be my very first priority,” I say, grinning.
“Good.”
We kiss again, slower this time. I love her taste and it takes all my damn willpower not to push her down and fuck her right here on the carpet.
But I know Dot’s waiting for us back at her home. After she left the hospital, I’ve been checking in on her once a week, just to make sure her progress is going okay.
She’s a strong woman. She’s going to be just fine, like I predicted, but I know it helps having me look after her. It makes Ruby happy, at least, and I love making Ruby happy.
We wander around the space for a while. I tell her my vision for it and she listens, smiling and nodding along. When we’re done, we end up back in the front toward the door, leaning against the wall.
“You’re really doing it,” she says softly. “It’s amazing.”
“Thanks. I hope it works.”
“It will.”
I take her hand, squeeze it. “You know, I never knew… I never knew I needed you.”
She looks up at me. I meet her gaze. “I never knew I needed you, either.”
“Until you came into my life, I was happy being alone. Or at least I thought I could keep living that way. Now, though, I can’t see myself without you.”
“I feel the same way,” She says softly.
“I love you, Ruby. I need you.”
“I love you, too.”
We kiss, my whole body tingling with the thrill of saying those words for the first time.
I haven’t loved someone like this ever in my life. I haven’t said those words in a very long time.
Now it feels right, and I need this more than she knows.
I feel like my life is finally starting. Working those long hours, living at that hospital more or less, that was just a holding pattern. This right here, with Ruby in my future office, this is real life.
This is what I worked so hard for.
I can finally have it. All because I stumbled into her life, and she changed mine for the better.
“Come on,” I say softly. “I know a place near here, a little Asian diner called Kenshin. Interested?”
“Very.” She takes my hand and we leave the building together.
Out on the sidewalk, I look either way. I can see our life together stretching all over this city. We have so much to do together.