“She said that you needed to watch for it to be hot to the touch, that could indicate infection,” I murmured as I felt around the wound with the palm of my hand. “It feels good, though.”
He grunted out something that didn’t sound happy.
I kept my smile under wraps and went about cleaning it, first the front side, then moving to the back where the exit was.
Once it was all the way clean, I rebandaged it and then went to wash my hands.
“Do you have anything to do today?” he asked curiously.
I looked over my shoulder at him. “No, but yes. At some point I have to go get Danger. I have to go home and shower because I still stink from last night, and I have to go get your other prescriptions from the pharmacy for you.”
He looked at me hopefully. “Any way I can tag along with you and get you to run me by my office for my computer? I thought that I would get to go back today and get it, so I left it there.”
“Of course,” I replied instantly. “As long as you don’t mind me running by to get Danger, that is.”
“I don’t mind,” he admitted.
“Are you up to running by the gym, too?” I asked. “I left all my crap there last night. And I got off for today through Friday for school, but come Monday, I have to go back to my troublemakers.”
He grimaced. “I don’t understand why you continue to stay with that class.”
I went to the fridge and glanced inside, seeing nothing but healthy meals.
“I guess because I don’t want to be that teacher who thinks that they’re irredeemable,” I admitted. “I don’t want them to think that I can be pushed away easily, either.”
“What are you looking so hard for in there?” he asked curiously.
I turned around and looked at him after closing the fridge door.
“I’m looking for something that’s not healthy,” I admitted. “After yesterday, I need something that has carbs in it.”
He grinned.
“I have a stash of candy bars above the stove.” He paused. “But they’re dark chocolate, so not as bad as they could be.”
I grimaced. “I don’t have any at my house. We started that eight hundred gram challenge a couple of days ago, and it was my stupid idea. I need to be eating the veggies and fruits, but I’d rather carve out my own eyeball with a spoon.”
“Gruesome,” he chuckled. “And the eight hundred gram challenge is a good idea. It went over well last time we did it at the gym.”
The eight hundred gram challenge was simple. Every day, you tried to get eight hundred grams of fruits and veggies. That simple.
Well, simple in thought, not so simple in execution.
“Do you ever get eight hundred grams?” I asked curiously.
He shook his head. “Nope. I’ve tried, but I don’t eat enough. When I do have time to eat, it’s enough to get my protein and carbs in to fuel my workouts and my day. I get about five hundred, though, if I put my mind to it.”
I was the same.
I looked at my watch. “I need to get a shower before we go. Do you need anything before I leave?”
“You’re going home to eat, aren’t you?” he asked.
My lips tipped up at the corners.
“Maybe,” I admitted.
“Can I go with you?” he requested. “For some reason, nothing healthy sounds all that good to me, either.”
I looked at him for a second and realized that he was one hundred percent serious. “Fine, but no judging me, okay?”
He winked and came out of his lean against the counter to walk slowly toward the door. “Come on, Lion.”
Lion dutifully gave up her food bowl to follow her master.
I watched as he started to walk toward the door, slow and steady. He didn’t even look like he’d been shot.
He looked like he was just sore from a workout. As long as you didn’t look behind the bandage, that was.
“You coming or what?” he called over his shoulder.
I jumped and hurried toward the door and him, grabbing my keys as I went.
I’d at least been smart enough to grab those as I was leaving in a hurry yesterday from the gym. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be able to get into my house.
As we exited his place, I found it very weird being at home when I would normally already have been at school for over an hour.
When I’d started this job at the school as a substitute, it’d been on a temporary basis.
When it’d turned into full time, I had no clue how much I would enjoy it. And hate it.
It was stressful, rewarding, time consuming, and fun. What it was not was boring.
But right now, not being there, I definitely wasn’t bored.
I was excited.
When I closed Croft’s door, he was already halfway down his front walk, heading straight for mine.
I hurried to catch up, then passed him about halfway up my walk to open my front door.
He looked around curiously once we got inside.
He’d seen it the night of the almost-break-in, I was sure, but he was studying it as if he hadn’t.
“It looks exactly like mine,” he admitted. “Only opposite.”
That was true. Where my house was in a backward L shape, his was in a right ways L. The only thing different was the fact that I only had a carport and he had a garage.
“I know,” I said. “It was weird being in yours last night, too. It’s even painted the same colors as mine. Obviously, they got a two-for-one deal on the paint when they were building these.”
The houses themselves were all owned by the same person. The entire cul-de-sac we lived on, in fact.
Though the other four houses on the block had the same overall design, they didn’t have the same interior and exterior floor plans. Nor did they have the same paint colors.
He walked/shuffled behind me into the kitchen.
His eyes missed nothing.
Not the pots in the sink from my dinner two nights ago. Not
