Chapter 7: Clinical Touch Only

I ran the infusion until the window turned gray.

The aide got him back into the bed, and I sat on the edge of it with my fingers on the pump and my eyes on his legs.

At five his left foot twitched under the sheet.

At six the right one did.

"There," I said. "That's the second night's worth. It'll hold."

"You've been up since Thursday," Ansel said.

"Doctors don't sleep."

"They do when they're told."

I laughed, and it came out wrong, and I put the back of my hand against my mouth.

His hand came out from under the blanket and caught my wrist.

He didn't pull.

He only held on.

"Lie down," he said. "Ten minutes. On top of the covers. Nothing happens."

"That's against the terms."

"I'm the one who agreed to them." His thumb moved on my wrist. "I'll sign a waiver."

I should have gotten up.

I was twenty-eight, and I had been awake for forty-one hours, and his hand was warm.

I lay down on top of the quilt in my clothes, with a pillow between us and my back to the wall of his chest.

I thought I would last a minute.

I woke to sunlight and a heavy arm.

He had pulled the pillow away at some point in the night, or I had.

His arm lay across my ribs and his face was in my hair.

One of his legs was thrown over mine, the left, the bad one, and it was warm and heavy, and I could feel it.

I knew exactly where every part of me was touching every part of him.

I lay still and took inventory.

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