Page 42 of You First
The dogs had followed her out, and he soon heard the clink of their leashes and their excited prancing as they prepared for an outing.
“Keys are on the hook by the garage door,” he hollered, cringing as the sound rattled through his head.
“I know. Relax, Gray,” she called back. “I’ve got it under control. Be back in a bit.”
Even as his head throbbed, he smiled at Meredith’s words. Of course, she had it under control. In addition to being unfailingly kind and thoughtful, she was also efficient, hard-working, and thorough. One day, he felt sure, she’d run a whole floor of nurses.
Gray closed his eyes and pictured her in blue scrubs with her loose ponytail draped over her shoulder.
Yeah,he thought as he heard the distant sounds of the garage door,she’d rock that.
A WET NOSEand a warm lick across his cheek woke him sometime later. Gray squinted through his eyes to find Vulcan wagging in front of him.
He reached out and petted him. “Hey, buddy. Y’all are back?” He drew the now-drying compress off his head. His vision had returned to normal, and the pain in his head was now the equivalent of background noise.
Sitting up and scanning the room, he found Juno lying down in the hallway, facing the kitchen, watching something, and that’s when he heard it.
Singing. Soft, sweet singing.
“And I said, ‘I know it well.’
That secret that you know that you don’t know how to tell
It fucks with your honor and it teases your head
But you know that it’s good, girl
‘Cause it’s running you with red.”
As he listened, Gray pushed himself off the couch and walked as quietly as possible into the hall. He peered into the kitchen. Wearing ear buds that snaked into the back pocket of her jeans, Meredith mopped his kitchen floor and sang along to a song he couldn’t hear, one, he was sure, he’d never heard.
“Then the snow started falling
We were stuck out in your car
You were rubbing both of my hands
Chewing on a candy bar…”
By the sound of it, she sang a love song — a strange and wonderful love song — and he listened, transfixed. How sweet would it be to sit with Meredith in his car and watch a rare snowfall, rub her hands to warm them, and share a candy bar? The thought had him grinning from ear to ear. That, and the adorable sight of her moving the mop across his floor as she sang.
It was so Meredith. Couldn’t she sit still for five minutes? Put her feet up and relax?
“You said, ‘Ain’t this just like the present
To be showing up like this?’”
Her voice rose slightly with the line, and in profile, he caught her serene smile. Whatever she pictured as she sang, it made her happy.
“As a moon waned to crescent
We started to kiss.”
At this line, Gray’s heart started racing. Was there a chance she pictured him?
He didn’t have time to wonder because she turned and caught him staring.
“Oh, Jesus!” she shrieked, jumping back. Meredith yanked at the ear buds. “What the hell are you doing?”
