Chapter 7: The Reply.
The reply from Brandon glowed on Tamika’s phone screen, bright in the dim morning light of her kitchen. She read it twice, a slow, knowing smile spreading across her face. It wasn’t smug. It was hopeful. The boy—no, the man—had heart. And he’d listened. She didn’t reply. Some bridges you just built and walked away from, letting the right people find their way across.
The pediatric ward was a universe of controlled chaos. Fluorescent lights hummed a constant, flat note overhead, battling the weak afternoon sun that strained through the blinds. The air smelled of antiseptic, of bleach-washed linens, and underneath it all, the sweet, sad scent of fear that clung to parents in the hallways.
Alysha moved through it like a steady current.
In Room 312, she calibrated an IV pump for a sleepy teenager with a broken leg, her voice a soft, reassuring melody as she explained the pain management schedule to his nervous mother. Her fingers were sure, her touch gentle.
“You’re doing great, Michael. The hard part’s over.”
In Room 308, she knelt beside the bed of a four-year-old girl, Chloe, who was fighting a nasty respiratory infection. The little girl’s breathing was a ragged, wet struggle. Alysha produced a new, glittery sticker sheet from her scrub pocket—unicorns and dragons.
“Okay, Captain Chloe,” Alysha said, her tone shifting to playful command. “I need you to do your special coughing exercises. One big cough for each unicorn we set free. Deal? The dragons are too tough, they can wait.”
The girl’s eyes, glassy with fever, lit with a feeble spark. She nodded, and with Alysha’s steadying hand on her small back, she produced a weak, productive cough.
“There it is! That’s one unicorn flying right out the window. Look at you.”
Tamika, charting at the nurses’ station, glanced up as Alysha passed. She saw the focused set of Alysha’s shoulders, the compassionate curve of her mouth as she spoke to a crying infant’s father. Tamika’s smile returned, soft and private. She said nothing.
By the time the lunch lull hit, the drain was setting in. It was a professional drain, the kind that came from absorbing a hundred tiny worries and pains, from being the calm in so many small storms. Alysha’s braids felt heavy, her feet aching in her sensible sneakers.
The hospital cafeteria was a study in muted noise. The clatter of trays, the murmur of shop talk, the low drone of a ceiling fan with one wobbly blade that thumped a tired rhythm. Tamika and Jess had already claimed a table by the foggy window. Alysha slid in beside them with a tray of limp salad and iced tea.
“I feel like I’ve been wrung out and hung up,” Alysha sighed, stabbing a piece of lettuce.
“You were a rockstar today,” Jess said. “Chloe’s mom stopped me, almost in tears, saying you were the only one who got her kid to cooperate.”
“It’s the stickers. Always the stickers.”
Tamika just sipped her drink, that same quiet smile playing on her lips. She was enjoying a secret, and it was making Alysha vaguely suspicious.
“What?” Alysha asked, pointing her fork. “You’ve had that look all day. Did you finally figure out how to beat level 347 on that candy game?”
“Something like that,” Tamika said, her eyes crinkling.
Alysha’s phone, facedown on the table, buzzed. Then buzzed again. A longer series of vibrations. A text thread.
She flipped it over with a tired hand. The name on the screen made her breath catch in her throat.
Brandon.
The fork clattered softly onto her tray. She unlocked the phone, her heart suddenly a frantic thing against her ribs.
She read.
Her eyes scanned the words, then darted back to the top to read them again, slowly, absorbing each one. Hey, pretty lady. I hope you’re doing well… The noise of the cafeteria faded, the thumping fan, the chatter, all dissolving into a dull roar. Her vision blurred at the edges. …someone came and took a piece of me with her. To be clear, I don’t want it back. A hot pressure built behind her eyes. She just left without taking the rest. And I want you to have the rest.
She swallowed hard, a lump of pure, undiluted emotion lodged in her throat. I ain’t a fortune teller so I can’t tell if I’m an idiot for taking my shot, here, but I know for a fact I’m an idiot if I don’t.
A single tear escaped, tracing a warm path down her cheek. Then another. She wiped them away hastily with the heel of her palm, a wet, shaky laugh escaping her.
“Fucking cowboys,” she muttered, the words thick but fond, a smile breaking through as she stared at the screen.
“Whoa. What? What happened?” Jess leaned in, eyes wide. Tamika’s knowing smile deepened into something triumphant and soft.
Alysha couldn’t speak. She just shook her head, placing a hand over her heart as if to steady it. She took a steadying breath, then picked up the phone.
“Listen,” she said, her voice husky. She cleared it. “Just… listen.”
She read the text aloud. Her voice started wavering at “I’d spend as much time as I got with you,” and by the time she finished, “Think about it and don’t feel rushed to come up with an answer,” she was pressing the phone to her chest again, fresh tears welling.
A stunned silence hung over the table for a beat.
“Holy shit,” Jess breathed.
Tamika reached out, putting a hand over Alysha’s. “See?”
Alysha looked between them, her expression wide open, vulnerable, all her usual composure stripped away. “You guys… tell me the truth. Is this stupid? Am I being stupid? He’s… God, he’s eighteen. I changed his diapers. The logistics are a nightmare. The distance. The… everything.”
Jess’s face turned serious. She put down her soda. “Alysha, look at me. No. It is not stupid.”
Tamika nodded, her gaze firm and unwavering. “Not even a little bit. That?” She pointed to the phone still clutched in Alysha’s hand. “That is a man who knows exactly what he wants and is brave enough to say it, plainly, without games. That’s rare. That’s real.”
“But the–”
“The ‘buts’ are just noise,” Tamika interrupted gently. “The age, the distance, the ‘how’. That’s just static. The signal is clear. He’s crazy about you. And you…” She tilted her head, seeing right through her best friend. “You haven’t been the same since that competition either. You’ve been lit up and lonely all at once.”
Alysha blinked, more tears falling. She hadn’t named it, that exact dissonant feeling.
Jess squeezed her arm. “Tamika’s right. A chance to be happy with someone who’s crazy about you? Who sees you like that? That is never, ever stupid. The rest is just details you figure out.”
Alysha looked down at her phone, the screen now dark. She saw her own reflection, tear-streaked, smiling, afraid, hopeful. She saw the woman who commanded a pediatric ward with stickers and strength, and the woman who had, for one unforgettable night, let go of everything and simply felt.
The fan thumped its uneven rhythm. A tray crashed in the distance. The world, with all its complications and rules, came rushing back in.
But it sounded different now. The noise had shifted. Beneath the din, she could hear a new, persistent frequency—the clear, resonant tone of a possibility she no longer had the will, or the desire, to ignore.
Beneath the din, she could hear a new, persistent frequency—the clear, resonant tone of a possibility she no longer had the will, or the desire, to ignore. She took a deep, shuddering breath, the antiseptic air burning clean in her lungs. Her thumb hovered over the dark screen, itching to illuminate his words again, to touch that certainty.
The scrape of a chair nearby broke the spell.
Dr. Carson, a pleasant and perpetually tidy orthopedic resident, appeared beside their table holding a coffee. He gave a friendly, professional nod. “Ladies. Just catching a breath between rounds?”
“Trying to,” Tamika said, her voice a masterclass in normalcy.
“Alysha,” Dr. Carson said, turning his focus to her. His smile was kind. “I was wondering if you might be open to having dinner sometime. Maybe this weekend?”
The question landed softly in the space between them. Alysha blinked, the last vestiges of her emotional storm clearing from her vision. She saw a good man, an easy possibility, a sensible path woven right into the fabric of her existing world.
She paused for a split second, a lifetime of politeness warring with the new truth humming in her veins.
“That’s really kind of you to ask, Ryan,” she said, her voice warmer and steadier than she expected. “Thank you. That’s a lovely compliment. But I’m currently seeing someone.”
“Ah, no problem at all,” he said, his expression remaining genuinely easy. He raised his coffee cup in a slight salute. “Had to shoot my shot. You ladies have a good day.”
He walked away, the interaction dissolving without a ripple. The table was utterly silent. Jess’s mouth had fallen open. Tamika’s eyebrows were arched so high they vanished beneath her bangs. They stared at her, wide-eyed and giddy, the question screaming in the air between them.
Alysha didn’t look at them. A slow, real smile touched her lips, freeing something tight in her chest. She had said it aloud. It was a fact now, existing outside of her phone and her heart.
She picked up her phone, her movements deliberate. She unlocked it, found his name, and tapped out a reply. Her fingers flew, no second-guessing, no careful crafting. She typed the truth that had just announced itself to the world.
You’re not an idiot for taking your shot. You’d only be an idiot if you missed. And you didn’t.
She hit send before she could breathe. The whoosh sound was a door closing, a bridge locking into place.
“So,” Jess whispered, leaning in so far she almost tipped over. “What does ‘seeing someone’ look like from several states away?”
Alysha finally looked up, meeting their rapturous gazes. The weight was gone, replaced by a thrilling, terrifying lightness. “I have no idea,” she said, a laugh bubbling up. “But I guess I’m about to find out.”
Her pager buzzed on her hip, a sharp, authoritative vibration. Room 308. Chloe’s stats needed checking. The world, with its real and immediate demands, called her back.
She stood, squaring her shoulders, the phone a live coal in her scrub pocket. She felt its potential heat against her thigh with every step she took away from the table, back into the fluorescent hallway, toward the next thing that needed her.