Chapter 4: Stitches

I put the velvet box in the junk drawer under the takeout menus and made stegosaurus pancakes.

They came out looking like pancakes.

"That's a potato," Rocco said.

"It's a stegosaurus that's lying down."

"Why is it lying down?"

"It's tired. It's its birthday."

He accepted this and ate three.

Giancarlo came down in a T-shirt with his hair sticking up and opened the junk drawer looking for a pen.

He found the box instead.

He opened it. He looked at the ring and the tab and the card for a long time.

Then he closed it and put it back exactly where it had been.

"Pen's in the cup," I said.

"Thanks," he said, and wrote "4" on Rocco's pancake in syrup.

At noon, the mezzanine playroom of the Hotel Marchese was full of four-year-olds and a rented dinosaur that roared when you poked its belly.

Nonna sat in a gold chair and fed cake to anyone who came close enough.

Giancarlo wore a paper crown that said BIRTHDAY KING because Rocco had made him.

The manager hovered at the door with a fresh carnation in his lapel. Every time I looked up, he bowed a little.

"He's going to hurt himself," I told Giancarlo.

"He's going to send you flowers every day for a year."

"Tell him not to."

"I told him to." He fixed his crown. "Doc, the box."

"I'm giving it back."

"To him."

"In person. I'm not having one of your guys drop it off and scare him. I want him to see my face when I do it."

He nodded slowly.

"In person," he said. "Somewhere with people."

"I work in an ER. There's always people."

On Sunday morning I was back on shift.

My charge nurse met me at the door with a coffee and a look.

"The whole department is talking about you," she said.

"About what?"

"You tell me. A guy in a five-thousand-dollar suit came in at seven and asked for Dr. Ames by name. Wouldn't see anyone else."

"Is he bleeding?"

"From one finger. Like a baby."

Grayson was sitting on the bed in curtain six with a paper towel wrapped around his left hand.

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