Rachel's Accident (7 page)

He gave me a pleading look I just couldn't resist. I sat down on the edge of the bed, but he had entirely different plans. He tugged me onto the bed and against him. I lay there spooned by him and he cuddled up to me.

After a while he started snoring and I tried to pull away, but even in his sleep he held me tight and wouldn't let go. I resigned myself to a night of sleeping in his bed and relaxed into his arms, drifting off to sleep.

In the morning I woke up when he started steering. A very prominent and very hard thing was pleasing into my lower back. He snuggled closer to me rubbing said member more into my backside. I couldn't hold back my groan. This wasn't good.

I pulled out of his arms, wrestling a little to get out of his tight hold. He was still half asleep and didn’t wake up fully until I was standing a few feet away from him. He blinked up at me with a confused frown.

“How is the pain in your hands right now?” I asked him, trying to distract myself as well as him from the obvious erection in his lower regions.

“My hands are fine, but it hurts lower.”

I was not going there. “If you don’t have pain in your hands then everything is fine so far.” I looked around. “
I’ll
quickly go put on my clothes and be right back, okay?”

He only grunted in response. Well, so far so good. I rushed back to my room and
quickly
jumped into
the shower, and then put on
my clothes from the day before.
Yes, it
was gross, but I didn’t have any other choice. Then I took the whole pharmacy bag over to him and started changing the bandages. He complained now and then about a little pain when I applied the lotion and new bandages, but all in all it didn’t seem too severe.

Then I helped him shower. This was no easy feat to accomplish. Showering him without staring was damn near impossible, so I rushed through the procedure as quickly as possible and then helped him dry off and put on fresh clothes from his closet.

He was still a little delirious from the pain meds and it looked like he would stay that way for as long as his hands needed to heal. This could take weeks. When I helped him down the stairs I heard my phone start ringing in my room. Having no other option I sat Ethan down on the stairs and
hurried to the room to pick up the phone.

With the phone in hand I went back to him. I clamped the phone between my shoulder and ear, talking to Jess, while I helped Ethan down the re
st of the stairs to the kitchen and sat him down in a chair.

“Hey, Rachel.
What’s going on?”

I told her about what happened yesterday in great detail. “He isn’t able to use his hands at all and it’s entirely my fault. Right now he’s so delirious from the pain meds that he’s acting like a little boy most of the time. He barely gives me any coherent answers. Yesterday he swallowed some pills out of the
trash that were long expired. I don’t know what to do. He needs to be watched 24/7, but I don’t think I could
hire anyone to look after him. Please, tell me what to do. I don’t know anymore.”

“How about you stay there for the next couple weeks, or as long as it takes for him to get better, and nurse him back to health? You know enough to treat his wounds and the stupid cleaning can wait. It will still be there when he’s back on his feet. You can do this.” She paused for a second. “I need to get going now my
shift starts in twenty minutes.
Good luck. Love you.” She made a kissing noise into the phone and hung up.

Great.
So, no help at all from my best friend, which left me exactly where I had been earlier.
Completely overwhelmed.
I wasn’t trained for this. I was studying architecture not medicine. God damn it. I plunked down in the chair next to Ethan and hung my head in my hands. I had a huge lump in my throat and my eyes were starting to water, but I couldn’t lose it now. I had to keep it together and take care of Ethan.

Out of nowhere arms enveloped in a warm hug. Big hands stroked over my hair in a comforting motion.

“Everything’s going to be okay,” he murmured in my ear.

I choked out a shaky laugh. “Thank you. I really needed that.”

He mumbled something I didn’t understand, but it didn’t matter. He had made me feel so much better. I could do this.

“
Do you want breakfast?” I asked him.

“Yes, please,” he answered eagerly. He pulled away and sat back down looking at me expectantly. He seemed very lucid right now. Maybe the pain meds had worn off.

So I asked cautiously, “Are your hands still okay?”

He only nodded, still waiting for me to make him breakfast. I got up and searched around the fridge for some ingredients and started to prepare him my best breakfast á la Rachel. He didn’t seem bored just watching move around the kitchen. The look on his face bordered more on fascinated than anything else.

I fed him the breakfast he found utterly delicious and asked him what he would like to do today.

“I want to work on my new project.”

I was confused. “What kind of project is that?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“Well, since you can’t use your hands I would have to help you and you said you don’t want anyone near your office and workplace.”

“It’s okay, if it’s you,” he
said confidently.

“Are you really sure?”

He nodded once, looking completely serious. Gone was the delirious boy from before and the businessman had emerged through the pain meds. I didn’t want him to regret this later on, but I also didn’t know what else to do.

“Okay,
I’ll
just do the dishes real quick and then we can go up to your office.”

“Okay,” he answered me with a quick nod. He seemed really eager to work again.

I rushed through the dishes and then took him to his office. It took him a little while to remember where he had hidden the key, but we found it eventually and stepped into the stuffy room. Papers were strewn over every available surface. They looked like building plans.

I sat him down at his office chair and took another look around. Was he a building constructor?

He jerked me out of my exploration when he told me,
“You need to power it up
.”

He gestured at his laptop with one bandaged hand and looked at me expectantly.

“Oh, of course.”
I walked over to him and pushed the power button.

The laptop hummed to life and
immediately
requested a password.

“What’s your password?”

He leaned in and whispered it into my ear as if anyone else could possibly overhear it. I typed it in and was directed to the desktop. Then I waited, sure he would instruct me what to do.

“Double-click on that icon,” he directed me, again gesturing with a bandaged hand.

I clicked and a program opened. This couldn’t be right. I knew this program by heart. We used it in class every day. It was a design program for architecture. He was an architect? I couldn’t believe it. That’s what he had been hiding?

Perplexed I didn’t react as he said a few more instructions. I didn’t stop staring at the computer screen until he waved one of his white hands in front of my face and broke my line of vision. I looked over at him.

“You need to pull up the plans,” he said impatiently.

“Yes, sorry.
Uhm
…which plans?”

“
Blackberry.”

I pulled up the right building plans and gaped at what I saw there. It was an amazingly beautiful and at the same time dynamic building. It was in one word breathtaking.
Apparently it was supposed to be the new headquarters of ‘Blackberry’, the company that produced cell phones.

“I think I need to start again with this,” he commented as he practically glowered at the screen. “It’s just not the way I want it.”

“Are you kidding me? This is beautiful.” I couldn’t believe what he was saying. Was this man crazy? Then again maybe he was. Maybe you had to be crazy to create such beautiful art. And this was definitely art.

“No, something is missing, but I can’t figure out what. Trash it.
I’ll
start again.”

“No, wait. Let me take a look,” I pleaded with him.

His response was a low grumble. “Fine, have at it.”

I studied the
3D building plans, turning it this way and that.

“It’s unstable,” I concluded. “The balconies on this side have ten
millimeter too much overhang and on the other side there are columns missing.
”

He frowned at the screen, commanding me to turn it again, this way and that. Finally, he looked up at me with wide, surprised eyes.

“How did you know that?”

“I’m studying architecture,” I told him matter-of-factly.

He narrowed his eyes at me. “Don’t you dare steal my designs
,” he growled at me.

At that I had to laugh. “Why would I want to steal your designs? Everyone would know it was from you. I sure as hell want to be known for my own designs not someone else’s.”

He visibly relaxed at my words, and then continued to give me instruction about how he wanted this and that. I learned a lot just by following those instructions to the letter. In fact, I learned much more and faster than any professor would have been able to teach me. And it was fun, which was a huge bonus.

When we finished with the project it was late afternoon. We had completely lost
track of time and had missed lunch. On top of that I had forgotten to feed myself when I fed Ethan his breakfast and was now positively starving. As if on cue my stomach grumbled angrily.

“You need to eat,” Ethan said matter-of-factly and his own stomach grumbled in accord to mine.

I couldn’t suppress my laugh
. “Yes, I do, but so do you. Come on.
I’ll
make us something good.”

He was more than eager to have one of my cooked meals again. No matter how much I cooked for him he never seemed to lose his enthusiasm for it. It made me beyond happy.

I saved our work and shut the laptop down. When I tried to help him up, though, he groaned in pain and couldn’t even stand on his own. I eased him back down in the chair and rushed to get him his pain meds and a glass of water.

He took them quickly and I helped him to his bedroom since he would fall asleep at any minute now. It was a side effect of his meds.

While he slept off the effects I busied myself in the kitchen and created a delicious meal for the both of us. My stomach continued to grumble so I appeased it with a few bites here and there. Now and then I would check on Ethan to make sure he didn’t need my help.

As I was on the finishing touches I heard something clatter from upstairs. I turned off the stove and ran up to his room. He was lying on the floor, looking dazed and confused as to where he was. When he saw me enter his eyes lit up and he
stretched his arms out to me.

“Are you alright?” I asked him as I hurried over and helped him to his feet.

“Fine,” he mumbled. Instead of stepping away he pulled me closer to him and buried his face in my neck. “You smell wonderful.”

It was becoming more and more difficult to keep this gorgeous man at arms
’
length. I had to fight my body’s response to his closeness. He was just too good-looking for his own good. I had to remind myself that he was injured.

As guilt overtook me again my libido was extinguished more effectively than if I had taken a cold shower.

“Food’s ready,” I told him as I pulled away. “Are you hungry?”

His stomach grumbled in agreement and he seemed to be completely distracted
by
the prospect of food. He smiled and nodded. We went downstairs together and I had to help
him only a little bit this time to keep him upright.

His face lit up as he saw the set table and smelled the food.
He kissed me on the cheek, which made me blush profusely. I was no virgin. Why was I reacting this way to a simple thank you kiss on the cheek? What was wrong with me?

I
shook my head and
guided him over to his chair and got over to the stove to get the food. I set it down on the table and served
us both a
portion.
I was starving, but I wouldn’t be the one to eat first when he was incapable to feed himself at all. So I was patient and fed him first and while he was still chewing I took a bite for myself. And so on it went until
he was finished with his second helping and I with my first and both our plates were empty
.

After our late lunch
I quickly washed the dirty dishes, and then
we worked some more in his office on a different project. It was a fascinating process to watch his imagination come to life on the small screen of his laptop computer.

In the evening I made us a light dinner to snack on
. I had to set myself an alarm on my phone as not to forget the time again.

When it was time for bed I helped him brush his teeth and get out of his clothes. In his boxers I laid him down in his bed and started to change his bandages again
. He moaned and protested.

“It’ll
be
over in a second,” I assured him.
I hurried to finish up as not to cause him more pain. “There, all done.” But before I gave him his pain meds for the night I had to ask him something. “I don’t have any clothes here. Would it be okay if I borrowed some of yours?”