Saving the Doctor Pt. 06

"But... I understand, like you said, one incredible night of love-making isn't necessarily going to suddenly reconcile all our differences, and make you come back to me. Even though I had a moment of weakness last night, I'm not that naive, I assure you."

"...Good," he said, in cautious satisfaction.

"It wasn't exactly a step back though," she said, with a mischievous glance before turning back to finish her food.

He did the same. Deciding that less talking was better.

She finished her coffee and stood up with a graceful stretch of her tall slender body.

"Well, I suppose I should be off, and leave you to your...dwelling," she said, looking around his condo again.

"O-Okay..." he said, suddenly off-put that she was leaving this easily.

"What? Unless you want me to stay..." she squinted at him and curled her mouth up in amusement.

"No, no that's fine. We both have things to do I'm sure," he said, trying to read her.

"Of course....do you have plans?" she said raising her eyebrow over her shoulder.

"You know what, never mind it's none of my business," she continued before he could respond. "So... feel free to move back into the house. It's all yours for now. If you find yourself in the city don't hesitate to call, and otherwise I'm hoping we can start to show the house to a few buyers within a few weeks, so keep in touch," she said pleasantly.

She put her shoes and coat on and then turned around to face him. She suddenly had a much more sincere and serious look on her face.

"Jonathon... Thank you. I mean it. Thank you for taking me in last night. It was such a stupid thing for me to do, and I'm really sorry. I think I was in real trouble when you came out to get me, and I don't know what might have happened otherwise. I know I don't like to admit it, but I can feel really vulnerable sometimes, and I can end up acting... childish, and I know that's hard to deal with sometimes but... Last night I really needed you, and I'm glad you were there for me."

He simply nodded with a flat face. She placed a hand on his neck and gave him a quick peck on the cheek before he could stop her. Tingles shot up into his scalp.

"Goodbye Jonathon," she said with a soft beautiful smile, then opened the door and was gone.

He stood there feeling the dwindling sensation of her lips on his cheek, telling himself not to dwell on how warm and sincere she looked. That it was an anomaly. She was playing games, but she had left without a fight. He could at least be relieved about that.

He finally turned back to the dining room and started to clean up breakfast. He suddenly remembered the package she had mentioned.

He opened the door to see a medium sized cardboard box, but it had nothing on it to indicate it had been mailed or couriered. The snow had drifted around it, so it was probably dropped off last night. He turned it around and realized it was a record player. He brought it inside and found a note stuffed inside the handle.

They had a buy one get one half-off sale.

Thought you might like a housewarming gift.

-C

He smiled briefly, then quickly became concerned. When had she come over? Why didn't she knock... He looked up at the window. The blinds had never been drawn.

"Fuck," he said out loud to himself.

Maybe she hadn't seen anything. Maybe she just was in a hurry and wanted to surprise me and left it without knocking. He thought to himself in desperation.

He pulled out his phone and texted Carly.

- Hey thanks so much for the record player!

He stared at it for a few minutes before deciding to distract himself and kept cleaning up.

20 minutes later his phone buzzed and he rushed over.

- You're welcome. I was going to stop in and say hi, but you seemed... preoccupied.

"Fuck!" he shouted and turned away running his hand through his hair and trying not to panic.

- Can I call you? Please?

- I don't think I'm in the mood to talk to you right now.

He winced in despair.

- Carly I swear she was sitting outside my door in the snow almost hypothermic, it was take her inside or let her die out there.

- I didn't know treatment for that included spooning on the couch watching a movie.

- And things got out of hand because I'm an idiot and I let her get under my skin, but I swear it's still over with her.

- Jon I really like you and I want to believe you, but I'm just not so sure...

He typed furiously

- I'm through with her I promise, I made sure of that this morning.

- Oh! She was still there this morning. Thanks. That's great to know.

"Fuck!" he facepalmed and threw the phone on the counter, backing away almost afraid to touch it again. He sat down with his head in his hands.

He heard his phone buzz again.

- Look I get it, you were together for what 2 or 3 years? It's not easy to just cut and run suddenly. And I wasn't thinking you and I were anything official yet. But obviously you need some time to figure things out.

- No, I know what I want, and it's not her. I took pity on her and I let her in and she ended up staying and it was a mistake. I'm sorry.

- Jon I'm starting to wonder if everything that's happened is because you're just a guy who can't say no to anyone. That I wasn't anything special. That I was just, there. At the right time.

- No! I know I have my issues like anyone else, but that's not what you are. I'm crazy about you. I don't think I ever felt this way about Elaina or about anyone else before. Please, I don't want to lose you.

- Let's just take some time Jon. I don't hate you, but I don't think we're ready. I think we just need some more time. Alone.

He was lying on the couch now, trying to stop tears from filling his eyes.

- Okay. If that's what you need, I'll respect that. But at this point I know I'm not going to stop feeling this way about you.

- Just try not to text too much okay?

He wanted to type 'I love you' but he simply dropped the phone and closed his eyes in defeat.

***

On Sunday night he was looking forward to starting clinic again in the morning. It would feel good to actually do something useful, rather than trying to distract himself from wallowing in self-pity like he had been doing since Carly's texts. He just hoped he was able to get more than a few hours of sleep tonight. The last two nights had not gone well.

Suddenly his phone rang and he saw Jeff's name on the screen.

"Hey man! What's up?" Jon said, happy to have someone to talk to.

"Hey Jon. How are um... How are you doing tonight?" Jeff sounded bad. Serious and choked up.

"It's actually been a weird few days to say the least, but what's wrong? You don't sound good."

"Yeah, well I'm fine but um... I've got some kinda shocking news."

There was an awkward silence.

Jeff finally continued, "Brent... committed suicide."

"Oh shit..." Jon said, sitting down with his hand over his mouth.

"Yeah. I didn't want you to get blindsided by it tomorrow at the start of clinic so I figured I'd call now."

"What... what happened?"

"Well, the details are kinda vague, but Carly found his body in their kitchen when she went home yesterday."

"Oh my God, how is she?"

"Well, not good. She was already really upset the day before that, but wouldn't tell Grace why. I don't know, maybe she suspected he was going downhill, if she had talked to him, it's hard to say".

Jon closed his eyes and winced, being fairly sure of the reason.

"Anyway, she never came back to our place last night and we were getting concerned." Jeff explained. "We almost went to the cops when she wouldn't respond but finally this afternoon she answered her phone. Anyway she's obviously got a lot of guilt going on, and blaming herself, and... unfortunately she's sorta lumping all of us in on the blame too. Grace is still in tears since they talked. She said some pretty... hurtful things. It's sounding like she doesn't want anything to do with us now. She left town for her parents place a few hours away and she'll be taking a bunch of time off work. Hopefully she comes around eventually, but for now... I don't know. Honestly, I kinda can't blame her, with the way everything happened."

"Yeah no kidding. Jesus Christ." Jon's head was spinning.

"Anyway, I don't really know what else to say right now. I just wanted to let you know."

"Yeah, thanks Jeff, I appreciate it."

There was a long, painful silence.

"...I guess I'll see you tomorrow."

"Yeah... Yeah, you bet. Take care."

Jon hung up the phone and hung his head down in disbelief.

He finally looked back up at his phone. He felt like he had to text her. He knew it was probably futile and ill-advised, but he had to try.

So he typed.

- I heard the horrible news. I'm so sorry and I can't imagine what you're going through, but if there's anything you need, I'm here for you.

He sighed and put the phone down and started getting ready for bed. 10 minutes later his phone buzzed and he looked to the nightstand to read it. His eyes filled with tears and he collapsed hopelessly on the bed.

- I need you to fuck off and never speak to me again.