For Lucy

“Ha ha …” Lucy rolls her eyes, but she can’t help but relinquish a tiny grin.

As we glance over our menus, I nudge Lucy’s foot with mine. She keeps her focus on the menu, but she grins because she knows I’m making a silent point.

She can feel me nudge her foot, which means she has feeling in her legs, which means she will not spend the rest of her life in this wheelchair.

“I guess we experience things for different reasons, right?” she asks while setting down her menu.

Tatum, Josh, and I give her our full attention.

“There are a lot of people who will never walk again. They will always experience pity glances and prolonged stares when they navigate in public. My time is short. Before long, I’ll forget I was ever in a wheelchair.”

Tatum’s gaze cuts to mine. We’re thinking the same thing … this girl is life. She’s the best of us.

“Yes. But you still have a long road ahead of you.” Josh throws a bucket of cold water on the moment.

I’m sure his big doctor brain can’t help it.

Tatum elbows him, and he gives her a what-was-that-for look. Brainy Josh figures it out after a few seconds and clears his throat. “What I meant, Lucy, is that you are doing great. We are so proud of you. And while you do have a lot of work ahead of you, I know you’ll surprise us every step of the way.”

“Thanks, Josh,” she says with half-ass sincerity, which sparks a little pride in me.

We eat until our bellies just can’t hold another bite. When the waiter delivers the check to our table, Josh grabs it before I can get to it.

“My treat.”

I’m not stupid. It has to be close to a four-hundred-dollar bill with tip. If Dr. Josh wants to pay, I don’t feel like less of a man for simply saying, “Thank you.” When Tatum and I took our pre-marriage RV trip, we prided ourselves on finding free food, using coupons and BOGOs: basically any means to save a buck. Frugality is such an under-appreciated trait in this materialistic world.

“I’m going to use the ladies’ room. Lucy do you need to use it too?”

“I’m good until we get home,” Lucy says.

“I’ll follow you.” I stand and wait for Tatum to head toward the restrooms.

When we turn the corner, I press my hand to her lower back.

She stiffens. “Emmett …”

“Tatum …” I mock her.

She turns, eyes narrowed. “Have you been talking to Lucy? I feel like she was a bit standoffish with Josh tonight.”

“I talk to Lucy, but we don’t discuss Josh. If she seemed a little standoffish tonight, it’s because he said all the wrong things.”

“He had one misstep, and he corrected it.” She folds her arms over her chest.

“He went into great detail about a routine appendectomy that took a bad turn, and he followed it up with the unsavory details of a miracle bowel resection he performed this morning. Just what I love to discuss while I’m eating. I think every word that came out of his mouth tonight was a misstep.”

“You don’t like him.”

“I like him fine.”

“You just don’t like him with me.”

Bingo!

“Doesn’t matter what I like. The only thing that matters is what you like. If surgical stories are your foreplay, who am I to judge?”

She deflates with exasperation. “He saves lives.”

“I saved a raccoon the other day when we were clearing an area for development. Ron wanted to toss it, and the whole family, into the grinder, and I said no. Three babies. Both parents. That’s five lives in one day. Has Dr. Josh saved five lives in one day?”

She pinches the bridge of her nose like she’s done for years when she doesn’t want to laugh at something I say, but she can barely keep from losing it. “Emmett …” Shaking her head, her lips part into a full smile.

“I’m going to use the restroom, but I just want you to think about that every time you’re tempted to put Dr. Josh up on a pedestal like he’s the only savior upon this earth. And it should be worth noting that I could have shared this heroic incident during dinner, or I could have talked about the sludge from the overturned sewer truck that we cleaned up this morning, but I didn’t.”

Keeping her head bowed, bridge of her nose pinched, and grin completely unharnessed, she says, “Noted,” before I brush past her to the men’s room.

Chapter Twenty

I haven’t run into Tatum on my jogs since the day it rained. I’ve felt certain it’s because of the s’more incident, and she’s probably chosen a different route and time just to avoid me. But this morning proves me wrong.

When I reach my open field, she’s there, hands on her hips, breathing heavily, head tipped to the sky. What is she doing at my field? Does she know it’s where I came when I had nowhere else to go to grieve Austin?