Chapter 4: Cafeteria

I didn't answer Slade's text.

I did what Minnie said and kept my thumbs off the screen.

On Saturday I went to work, because the ICU doesn't care who walked out on you.

I took the lunch break at noon and carried a tray of soup to the cafeteria.

Twenty of my coworkers were already in there, nurses and techs and two respiratory therapists.

Delaney was standing at the entrance with her hands clasped in front of her.

She wore the black dress I had bought her for her birthday.

I stopped walking.

"Nolan," she said, and her voice cracked right on cue.

"You can't be in here."

"I had to see you. Please."

The room had gone quiet.

A tech near the soda machine lifted her phone and held it at chest height.

Delaney's eyes filled, and a tear rolled down to her jaw.

"I made the worst mistake of my life," she said. "I know you saw everything."

"I saw it."

"It wasn't me, Nol. Slade pushed and pushed. He said you'd never notice. He said I'd be nothing without him."

My head nurse put down her fork.

The respiratory therapist next to her made a small noise through her nose.

"He pressured you into a hotel," I said.

"He pressured me into everything."

"Fourteen months."

"I was weak." She stepped closer and put her palm on my chest. "You know how I get when someone leans on me."

I did know.

I knew she had never once been pushed into something she didn't want.

I remembered what Minnie had told me, and I kept my face blank.

"I don't know what to say," I said.

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