The Way to Never (The Never Trilogy Book 2), page 14
“No, you don’t.”
“I do. In fact, I remember exactly when I told you.”
I smiled. “It was in the library storage unit, the first time we went together and you asked me how long I’d been waiting for you.”
“And you lied, and told me you’d been waiting for two hours.”
“You still remember,” I said, quietly amazed.
“Of course I do. Why wouldn’t I?”
“But I wasn’t lying then.”
He gave me a bored looked. “Really, Nora? You’re still lying about it thirteen years later?”
I laughed softly, and so did he. The sound of his laughter seemed to shoot into my heart and drive the darkness away.
He took a step closer to me and subtly slipped his fingers into mine. It surprised me. “Talk to me,” he said softly.
“It’s nothing,” I replied. “It’s just that for a moment there I felt, lonely. It’s been a while since I felt that way. I’m mostly always alone but, never lonely.” He took another step closer and put his arms around me, then he rested his chin on top of my head. I successfully resisted the urge to wrap my arms around him too so I just stepped even closer and shut my eyes to briefly revel in his warmth.
“Does this have anything to do with your mum?” He leaned away to look into my eyes. “Because I can be your mum.”
Another bout of laughter escaped me. “Why do you think it’s about her?”
“Because it’s your engagement, and mothers are usually all over these kinds of things. I just thought it might have made you feel a bit down. I hear Wendy is like a mum to you though, do you want me to go get her?”
“No, I’m fine. I’m strong now,” I bragged jokingly. “I can take care of myself.”
“You are, Nora. You really are. Sometimes I can’t contain how proud I am of you at how extravagantly well you’ve turned out.”
“Well, you did have a little part to play in it.”
“Of course I did,” he said, but then leaned in a bit to ask. “How exactly?”
I just shook my head at him, and then a question that I wanted the answer to popped into my head.
“I have a question for you.”
“Go ahead.”
“I’m sure I already know the answer to it but, I just want to confirm. A few years ago, I came to New York and then I went to a bar called um … Shrine? Have you ever been there before?”
“I have,” he said.
“Were you the one who sent me the note?”
He stared at me for a while but just before he was about to give his answer, the door swung open and someone came in. We both immediately turned to see who it was. I sighed with relief when I saw that it was Wendy.
“Why are you hiding in here?” she asked, as she strutted happily towards us in a bright yellow crinoline skirt. She had on a tie-up jean shirt and a curly blonde wing. She looked fabulous.
“Oh, hello,” she said flirtatiously as she glanced up at Nathan. I used the opportunity to step away from him.
When he gently lifted her hand to plant a soft kiss on it, she threw her face to the side in a smile so bright, it overshadowed the color of her skirt.
“I saw you talking to Elisa earlier and wanted to come say hello, but then I lost sight of you.” She said. “I’m sure Lenora has told you that I’m a big fan.”
“Actually, she hasn’t,” he replied, “but I’ve heard about you from Elisa. Thank you.” He drew her in for a hug.
When the hug ended there were tears in her eyes. “Oh don’t worry about it,” she said, and it made me roll my eyes. Wendy was the definition of an emotional mess. She cried about everything. Whether she was happy or overwhelmed or stressed, the tears always came rolling down her cheeks.
I turned to him. “What are you thanking her for?”
“It’s between the both of us,” she said, and slung her arms around his waist. My eyes widened slightly.
“Oh-kay,” I said, and turned around to pour myself another glass of wine.
“Nora, I have to go now,” he said to me. I turned around with the drink in my hand, intending to just send him off with a sweet smile but then he surprised me and slid his arm around my waist. Drawing me closer to him, he bent down to plant a kiss on my cheek, but it was so close to the corner of my lips that it may as well have been a kiss on the lips.
“I’ll see you when I get back,” he said, and walked out of the kitchen. Wendy and I watched him leave and then turned to face each other. She narrowed her eyes at me.
“Come consult me when it all gets too complicated,” she said, and poured herself a glass of wine too before she turned around, and left the room.
*
I left the party early, and from what I’d heard from Carlie, it didn’t seem like my absence made much of a difference anyway. I’d left because of the slight ache in my back that had been plaguing me all day. Damian had insisted that I go down to his bedroom to rest but I’d declined. I needed the solitude and serenity of my own house to be able to properly relax.
I got into bed when I arrived home with the intention of just laying down for a bit to relieve the ache, but I ended up falling asleep fully clothed.
Hours later, I awoke with a scream stuck in my throat.
Pain … there was so much pain … everywhere.
Jesus, I gasped inwardly as my eyes shot open, bright-eyed in the abject darkness. Something was very wrong with me. The ache in my lower back from earlier had moved and now poisoned my entire upper body.
I reached for my phone by my bedside and had to bite my lip to stomach the pain as my arm slithered slowly towards it. Tears welled up in my eyes just from the effort, but the moment I picked it up I didn’t know who to call. For as long as I could remember I’d never gotten sick enough to become personally acquainted with any doctors so I had no medical contacts. Calling 911 was also out of the question because it would be splashed all over the news before I even got to the hospital.
Friends … Elisa and Peter would be asleep and it would be unfair to wake her up. Carlie lived in Brooklyn, it would take her at least half an hour or more to get here, and moreover it was 3:27 in the morning. She would be too exhausted to even hear or much less pick up her phone as the party had ended barely two hours ago.
Damian too would be exhausted and … Nathan was probably already out of the country.
The more I made excuses on who and who not to call, the more the pain intensified until the phone left my hand and fell to the floor.
Slowly, I turned from my side until I was able to lie flat on my back, and for a moment, it felt like the pain was evening out. I remained like that with my eyes closed for what seemed to be about ten minutes but I was sure that it was less. Apart from the pain, another reason why I’d gotten up was because I needed to use the bathroom, urgently, and unless I found a way to get myself out of this bed soon, the seconds were going to move from feeling like minutes, to heartbreakingly distressful hours.
I tried lifting my legs up so that I could get up but when a wave of pain hit my body like a blow to my back, I fell back down with a shout. I covered my mouth with my hands and clenched my eyes closed, feeling the warm outpour of tears as they wetted my hands.
But I couldn’t remain on that bed. It felt like something was pressing violently on my bladder so at that point I made a decision. Grabbing the sheets on either side of my body, I started to pull myself towards the foot of the bed, each move more painful than the last. It felt like I had been run over and crushed by a truck. What the hell was happening?
Eventually I was a considerable distance away from the headboard and was thinking of what to do next to get myself off the bed. But I had gotten too close to the edge, so as I writhed in anguish, my body suddenly rolled off and fell with a thud on the carpeted floor. I let out a gut-deep scream and felt like pounding my fist into the floor, but that would have probably just killed me so I wallowed in it for a bit and waited.
After quite a while, I started crawling as slowly as I could. It felt as if I was being attacked by a shoal of sharks that were eating past my flesh and into my nerves all the way to the core of my very bones, causing a pain so deep that I stopped about midway through and begged to pass out. I started wailing and yelling for help as much as the pain would let me but the walls were probably the best soundproofed walls in the entire city. Sometimes money was a bigger bitch than poverty.
Now I regretted leaving my phone behind, and I couldn’t even turn back or go forward. I was stuck in the middle. I wondered what the time was. Surely someone was bound to need me soon and become bothered that I wasn’t answering the phone. But then again, I sometimes ignored phone calls when I was stressed from writing and had told Dorothy, who was the only one that was allowed to directly contact me from the office, not to bother disturbing me whenever she couldn’t reach me and that a message would suffice.
Another wave of pain came at me but this time, it was emotional and it gripped my heart. I had always been alone, and right now in the moment that I needed help the most, I was once again alone. I had given all the excuses under the sun to stop me from calling the people that I considered family because I wasn’t brave enough to let them see me this way – weak and helpless. I couldn’t cry out anymore because it hurt to even open my mouth, so, hoping that the pain would reduce a little bit so that I could find a way to help myself, I focused on taking deep breaths, laid my cheeks against the floor, and shut my eyes.
Nathan
All through my flight to London, I hadn’t been able to get Nora out of my head and how truly alone she’d looked during that party. It was meant to be her party but she’d hidden in the kitchen practically throughout the entire event. I’d thought that Damian would make her happy yet so far all I could see was that he seemed to be failing woefully at it, and I wanted to talk to her about it but from everyone’s point of view it would seem inappropriate and self-serving.
Yes, I wanted her, possibly more than anything else in the entire world, but one thing that surpassed my desire for her was my need for her to be happy. I’d seen first-hand what she’d been like back in school and for someone who’d been able to go through all that and emerge the way she had, she deserved every drop of happiness that was present in the world. My discussion with her wouldn’t be because I wanted to take his place, no, but from what I knew of Nora, she was able to make herself happy. She didn’t need anyone to do that for her and had learned long ago the consequences of wanting that to happen. So when I got into my room and was able to charge my phone, I called her.
She wasn’t unreasonable, and I’d like to believe that to an extent she knew me so she wouldn’t think that my motives were with the intention of sabotaging her relationship. However, her phone rang and rang to disconnection but she never picked up. It was about 7am in New York so she should have been awake by now or at least rested enough for the ringing to penetrate her sleep.
After a few more minutes of trying with still no response, I called Elisa, but her house seemed to be in chaos. Her baby was screaming in the background and she was running up and down, trying to get ready for work so she told me that she’d contact Nora when she got to the office or was on her way.
So I called Carlie, and she told me that she hadn’t seen Nora leave the party, but Wendy who had been the last person to see her, had told her that Nora had left to tell Damian that she had to go home because she wasn’t feeling well. So I put my pride aside and called Damian. It was obvious as he answered the call that I had woken him.
“Have you heard from Lenora?” I asked. “She’s not picking up her phone.”
“Who’s this?” he asked in a groggy voice.
“It’s Nathan Roque,” I answered impatiently.
“What do you want?”
“Call Lenora to make sure she’s okay. She’s not picking up her phone.”
“And how does that concern you?” he asked, still sounding sleepy but sharp enough to be rude.
“My team needs to meet with her this morning but if we don’t get to her that can’t happen, can it?”
He cut the call on me but I didn’t care. I’d delivered my message. I only hoped that he would be bothered enough to actually call her and ensure that she was okay, because for some reason I was beginning to feel really worried.
I gave him an hour, and if I couldn’t reach her by then, then I was going to call her assistant and send her over to the house.
Lenora
The constant ringing of the doorbell pulled me from a dreamless sleep. My eyes remained closed but as my mind readjusted to my environment, I was instantly reminded of where I was and why I was on the floor. Another thing that immediately registered was that the pain had reduced to the point where I could breathe smoothly, but it was still excruciating. My legs and arms had turned numb.
When it dawned on me that someone could be entering the apartment soon, strength came from nowhere and assisted me as I tried to crawl back towards the bed so that I could use it to lift myself up.
However there was a knock on the bedroom door just as I had begun to move. Startled, I raised my head towards it, and watched as Carlie pushed it open and walked in.
Her eyes widened the moment she saw me. “Lennie!” she yelled and hurried over.
“What’s going on?” she asked, and let her purse fall to the floor. She dropped to her knees and was about to put her hands on me to help when I told her not to.
“Don’t touch me,” I said to her. “It’ll hurt.”
“What’s going on? Are you alright?” she asked her eyes searching all over my body looking for any signs of injury or blood.
“I woke up and … pain … everywhere.” I couldn’t even form coherent sentences. “Call Dorothy so that she can get the doctor.”
“Let’s try getting you up first. Can you stand?”
“I don’t know.”
“Let’s try.”
“I don’t think I can. My back hurts … too much.” I gave up trying and just allowed myself to lie on the floor. “It’s better here.”
She dragged her purse towards her and haphazardly went through it to find her phone. I shut my eyes as she pulled it out and called Dorothy.
*
By noon, everyone was in my house. Peter, Craig, Elisa, Carlie and Dorothy, but only Damian was in my room. He was seated bedside my bed and watching with a deep frown as the doctor examined my arms and legs. He was a spine surgeon with a private practice in Manhattan, whom Damian had been acquainted with for a few years. I refused to look at the doctor’s face as he worked, preferring to keep my eyes on the television and whatever was on, but for the life of me I couldn’t hear or tell what I was watching. All I could feel was the pain.
Finally he straightened and looked at us.
“So, what is it?” Damian asked. “What’s wrong with her?”
He quickly held his forefinger up for Damian to be patient as he scribbled something down on the chart in his hand before turning to him. “It appears to be a back muscle strain,” he said and then turned to me.
“What is that?” I asked.
“There are some highly sensitive muscles and nerves that travel from your lower back to your legs and sometimes they can become strained or damaged. And this can happen in a variety of ways. Um, a sudden fall, or lifting heavy objects, or like in your case, the accident you were involved in last week. It might not have been severe then but maybe in the course of the week you worked too hard or lifted something heavy that could have caused it. Have there been any instances like that in the past week?”
I sighed. “We had a party last night so I carried um …” It still hurt so much to talk. I took a deep breath and continued, “I carried, cartons of wine, and uh, some of the furniture that needed to be moved around for the space.”
“Well, that could have triggered it and as you said, you did experience a bit of a backache last night and earlier in the week. So right now, although I can’t medically tell how severe it is, from your reaction it seems to be pretty intense. What has happened now is, since the muscle has become strained or torn, the area around it is now inflamed. And this is what has led to the back spasms that cause your pain, difficulty moving, and weakness in your legs.”
“What treatment is there for it?” Damian asked.
“Well, that’s the good news. It’ll heal with time, and this can range from a few days to a week or so. But right now what we have to do is manage your pain and get you rested enough to the point where you can begin some exercises that will help prevent atrophy.”
“What’s atrophy?” I asked.
“Degeneration from disuse, meaning we have to get you to use your back muscles. So right now, you’re going to rest for a couple of days, and then we’ll begin.”
“Can I remain here? Do I have to move?”
“No, you don’t have to. So for now, we’ll start you with Acetanumophen, which will help relieve your pain and Diazepham which is a muscle relaxant. Your nurse will explain and administer your doses. Are you okay to handle the details of your care now?”
“I’ll handle it,” Damian immediately said and rose to his feet.
The doctor looked to me to confirm if I was okay with that. I nodded that I was so they turned, and walked out together.
Finally, I had a few minutes to myself. Ever since Carlie had come in and alerted everyone else, the whole place had felt so damn crowded to me. Initially they’d all refused to leave the room but then the doctor had arrived, and driven them all out. The diagnosis was lightening to an extent since I would now only be in hell for a few days, instead of the infinity that it’d felt like the previous night. I couldn’t wait to pump myself with whatever drugs they were going to give to me because this pain brought me close to wishing that I could just rip those stupid muscles out with my hands and stomp on them with all my frustration. For a moment there I had even been slipping into depression but the news was good, really good. I would be out of this in no time.
My phone rang and as I stretched out my hand to retrieve it from beside me, I was so grateful that it didn’t cause as much pain as it had last night. Maybe I was even already healing. I didn’t even bother looking at the ID, I just picked it up.
