Chapter 7: Almost

At nine o'clock that night Eli knocked on the cabin door with a bag of ice and a grocery sack.

I was lying on the bed with my foot on a pillow, pretending to read a paperback about birds.

"It's open," I called.

He ducked under the door frame and filled the room at once.

He looked at the stove first, frowned at the low flame, and fed it two split logs before he looked at me.

He had changed into a gray sweater.

His hair was wet from a shower, and he had not shaved.

"You brought groceries," I said.

"You've eaten pretzels for two days. A person can't heal on pretzels."

He set out bread, eggs, a can of soup and a jar of peaches on the table.

Then he knelt by the bed and unwrapped the tape from my ankle without asking.

The skin underneath was swollen and a deep, ugly purple.

"Hold still."

He laid the ice pack over the bruise and held it there with both hands.

The cold made me gasp.

He looked up at me through his lashes.

"Too much?"

"No. Keep going."

His mouth did something at the corner.

The stove popped.

For a while we did not speak.

His thumbs moved over the arch of my foot, slow, to keep the blood moving.

Then one hand slid up behind my calf to hold the pack steady.

His fingers rested in the hollow behind my knee.

That was a part of me nobody had ever touched on purpose.

A hot line went straight up my leg.

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