Page 13 of The Marriage Policy
True. “I’m human, D. I’m going to milk this situation when it gets me what I want but complain the rest of the time.”
He shakes his head but doesn’t reply. I can tell there’s something on his mind—and by something, I mean me—but I’m not in a place where I want to talk about it, so I pretend not to notice.
There’s no missing that Donovan is tense, though. Seeing that, it weighs me down more, my brain going back and forth between the situation I’m in and worry for him.
Del Taco isn’t far from my apartment. He goes through the drive-thru and gets me fries, a chicken burrito, and a taco—my standard order—before getting his own.
Before I know it, he’s snagging a parking spot right in front of my building, which is one stroke of good luck today.
“I’ll come around.” Again, he doesn’t wait for a response before getting out and walking around to my door. He opens it, then gets the crutches from the back. Donovan takes the food and medication off my lap, then holds his hand out for me. With a sigh, I take it, and he pulls me to my feet.
I hobble to the stairs and look up. “This sucks.” The thought of taking these things every day for the next six to eight weeks isn’t fun.
Despite whatever’s going on in Donovan’s head, he looks at me with that big, bleeding heart of his in his eyes and says, “I’m so sorry this happened to you.”
“It’s okay. I’m just being a big baby. I’ll survive.”
He leans over and kisses my temple. “Let me take this stuff upstairs, and then I’ll come back to help you.”
I nod. Not only am I not looking forward to the stairs, but Donovan is the sweetest person I’ve ever known.
He jogs up, heads inside, and a moment later he’s coming back.
“If you can just take the crutches,” I tell him, “I’ll use the wall and railing to help me up.”
“Okay, but I want to be behind you in case you lose your balance.”
I grin. “Are you going to catch me if I fall?”
“Either that or go down with you. Always, remember?”
God, I really, really love him. I know he’s being partly playful right now, but he’s serious too. “Always.”
My ankle throbs as I jump up the stairs on my good leg. I can’t imagine how much stronger it’s going to be than my injured one when this is finished.
Donovan helps me to the couch and makes me put my leg up again, propping it on pillows before getting a towel and laying it across my lap. Then he gets my food out of the bag.
“I’ll go get your gross Diet Mountain Dew.”
“It’s not gross, D. I swear, I don’t even know how we’re friends when you have such horrible taste.”
He doesn’t play along, gets me a drink, then sits in the armchair. One look at him, and I know he’s bursting at the seams with a million questions and thoughts. His head can be ahectic place sometimes. Donovan cares so much about everyone and everything that it makes him worry and stress too much. I always try hard not to be an additional source for that, but I’m the primary one right now. And the thing is, I get it. I know how irresponsible it was for me not to have insurance. But the system doesn’t make it easy either.
Instead of telling him that, I take a bite of my burrito. “God, this is good.”
Donovan nods and lets me eat, which I now realize is part of his evil plan, which really isn’t so evil at all.
“You have to eat too.” He opens his mouth to argue, but I say, “If you don’t eat, we don’t talk.” I’m not going to let Donovan not take care of himself because he’s stressed about me.
“Fine.”
I grin.
Donovan scowls.
We eat in silence, and the second I’m balling up the last wrapper, he jumps right in. “You know how important insurance is. You saw what my family and I went through with a long-term illness, and that waswithcoverage. Think about how bad things would have been without.”
“It’s just a broken ankle.” I shrug, though it feels like a whole lot more than that. Denial, denial, denial.
