Your Trauma is Showing

Crash

Standing in Dan's room, it's a little too much. I wonder when Kelly will come back.

Then Dan claps his hands once, loud enough to make my sore head ring, then returns to being Mr. Chuckles. "Well, that's just great! Kelly will be happy to have friends to work for. She's wanted another job. But I want her focused on school."

You wanted her home to cook dinner for you and do every menial task you could think up to make her life impossible, and keep her anxiety levels at nuclear, I think to myself.

I crack a yawn that isn't entirely faked and stretch my arms, wincing when it makes my jaw throb. "Well, I'm getting pretty tired, Dan. I'll head back to my room and take a nap."

Dan's face falls a little, but he rallies well. "Sure, sure. You go ahead and sleep. I'll send Kelly over when she gets over her shit."

"That sounds great," I say through my teeth. "Thanks for your help, sir."

"My pleasure, Crash. Anything I can do, anytime, it's yours. You remember that, okay? When you're in town, I'm your guy." The words are innocent, but the razor edge in his gaze makes me cold. I've seen it before. Too many times.

"Sweet," I say, heading for the door.

He calls me back twice but I finally get back to my own bed. My hangover is brutal. But that just means I want an Advil and my guitar. I don't need the hospital. This is ridiculous.

I place a quick call to Amber with an idea the conversation with Dan sparked, and she agrees, says it probably would have happened anyway. Then I try to go back to the app on my phone, but the screen's making my headache worse. By the time a nurse comes in, I've texted Tommy to get Kelly back here so I can fill them in, and I'm staring at the ceiling, stewing in my own juice, wondering what's taking so long.

"Time for your blood-pressure Mr. Moretti." The nurse is in her thirties, pretty the way Kelly will be pretty when she's old.

"Call me Crash."

"Well, okay, Crash. Is there anything else I can get for you? Anything at all?"

She says it with no discernible tone. No suggestive wink or smile. And yet, the way she's looking at me, my blood runs cold.

I stare, and she stares right back, waiting.

Houston, we have a problem.

She's a trim woman, this side of forty, polished, though there's a smudge on her scrubs.

"Crash? How can I help? Is there anything you want?"

Did I imagine the emphasis on "want?"

Then, in my mind's eye, she becomes a woman a few years older, with a power-suit and a throaty laugh. She carries a touch too much weight to be fashionable, but it gives her amazing cleavage which is why, she once told me, she decided never to diet. "Most men can be controlled with a dirty tongue and a nice rack."

My palms begin to sweat. I rub them on the blanket.

". . . You're looking so good since you started working out with Robert, Crash. It's like you aged ten years—in the best way . . . "

I'm flattered. Pretty sure she's flirting with me—or at least wants me to think so. So I grin and flirt right back.

Because flirting was harmless. And I needed to keep her on my side.

"Crash?" The nurse is at my shoulder, reaching for my arm.

"Get your hands off me!" I throw the blankets off and leap out of bed on the opposite side. My feet hit the linoleum, but slide out from under me and before I can grab anything to break my fall, my temple bounces on the railing of the bed.

My head sings, and not in the good way.

Nausea roils in my stomach. I sink to the floor, arms over my head.

"Crash!" She races to me. Her arm's behind my shoulders, trying to maneuver my head on to a pillow. I try to squirm away from her. My head's hurting so bad, and my stomach feels like the more I move, the more of my breakfast it'll decide to revisit. But all I can feel is the way my skin crawls at her touch.

"Just breathe, Crash. I'm sorry I startled you. Let's lay you down. Careful. Careful."

"Let me go!"

"I will. But we need to get you lying down so there's no chance of another fall. So you help me out and lay down on your back, that's right."

". . . On your back, Crash. I want to look at you. That's right . . ."

In the hallway, multiple sets of feet pound towards my room. The nurse gets me flat on the floor, then pats my shoulder. "You stay there while we get a doctor to assess you, then get you back in that bed, okay?"

I put my hands over my face and curl onto my side, shivering.

No one will touch me if I don't want them to, I remind myself.

I'm famous and rich. I can tell anyone in this hospital to leave me alone, and they will. They'll lose their jobs if they don't.

Three people—a male doctor and two nurses, one male, one female—arrive to stand near my feet, casting glances at me as they listen to the nurse describe what happened.

"Not sure if he blacked out, or what. But I was speaking to him and he didn't answer. So I reached out to touch his arm. It startled him."

I'm trembling. Can feel my fingers twitching. My knee, bent awkwardly because of the hard floor, is shaking.

"What happened?" It's Tommy, somewhere on the other side of the bed where I can't see him.

"Crash? Are you okay?" My name on Kelly's tongue warms me—then renders me ice-cold when I realize I'm collapsed on the floor in a backless gown. I roll onto my back, hands over my face, mortified.