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Lincoln had a phone now, so Kali could call him. That was the plan, the agreement, for Kali to go to her appointment then call Lincoln to come get her when she was done.
But he waited. In a spot with a view to the door. She'd called a cab this morning, and he didn't trust she wouldn't again. But she didn't need a cab company right now, she needed someone she could rely on.
An hour and three minutes after he dropped her off, Kali emerged from the clinic doors, sunglasses on before she even stepped outside. More bad news. She stared into the street then up and down it. She stepped out from the shadow of the building, adjusted her satchel, and looked to the sky. If he could freeze time, right in that instant, he would. Her standing in all her unearthly glory, unearthly beauty. It seemed cruel and wasteful that someone this beautiful wouldn't be able to see the beauty around her.
Kali reached into her pocket and punched in a number. Him? A cab? She was near a bus stop; she could be calling to see when the next one would arrive.
Lincoln waited for the vibration. Waited. Waited. She was talking to someone. He wanted to see her eyes, to know if the smile that coated her lips was real. He doubted it.
The call was too long to be a cab company. Shelley, perhaps, the friend he'd met at the ER? Maybe she'd be someone Kali could rely on. Or Mrs. Martin, Kali calling to ask about babysitting?
She pulled the phone from her ear and stared at it. She raised it again and his buzzed.
“Hey.”
“Hi.” Her voice was resolved. Firm. “I'm ready now. Can you—”
“I'm already here.” He honked. She looked up, waved, and slid the phone into her satchel. When she stepped up into the cab of his truck her expression was grim.
He looked over, offered a smile, and started the engine. What did you say when someone came from an appointment with a neurologist, or ophthalmologist, or whoever she'd seen?
Could an appointment to check the progress of a rapidly growing brain tumour ever be good? He could ask her how it went but what could she say? Awful. Devastating. Horrid.
While stopped at the third light in a row, Lincoln looked to Kali again. All he could see was her profile, the lines that defined the face that captivated his dreams. “Still have your licence?”
She didn't look at him. Her chest rose then fell. “Yes.”
“Well, that's good.”
“She didn't take it, but strongly recommended I don't drive. Just in case.”
“Oh.”
“Sometimes, as happened with the truck, people like me lose parts of their vision before they realize it. I could be driving, think I've checked my blind spot, when really ...” Her voice trailed off. “You get the picture.”
“Yeah.” Lincoln positioned both hands on the wheel—perfect ten and two. “So, you'll just have to be extra cautious then? Extra aware?”
She shifted her satchel higher on her lap. “I'll drive if it's an emergency. A necessity. And yes, I'll be extra aware. I have another appointment in a week. Each time she’ll reassess.” Kali turned away from him, her gaze out the window. “As the doctor stressed several times, I'm lucky. I live in a city with public transportation. Not everyone is as lucky.”
Lincoln pulled through the intersection and made his way to the bridge. “Well, I guess that's true. Small blessings.” Damn. Why did he say that? A trite expression of the church ladies, he'd heard it countless times growing up, and he'd always hated it.
Kali let out a bitter laugh. “Yeah. For sure. It's only been two years since I could afford a car. I don't use it a ton, so there were times I wondered if it was worth it. Then I'd remember Theo as a baby. Lugging him everywhere. Lugging that stroller everywhere. To appointments, to get groceries. It's not easy—getting all that onto a bus. And the good times—taking him to the beach, going for a drive in the country and stopping at vegetable stands.” She shook her head. “At least he doesn't have a stroller anymore.”
Lincoln almost said it again, small blessings. He caught himself before the words slipped out. His gaze caught on her, the way her slim-fingered hands clasped her bag, how she looked straight ahead, to the side, but not at him. Never at him. “As much as I can, I'll help out. I can take you to get groceries. To appointments.”
“From your cabin in the woods? Oh,” she glanced at him and rolled her eyes, “I mean tree house. You're going to drive up here every time I have an appointment or need some food, right? Become my chauffeur?”
Now it was him who looked ahead. Would he do that? Should he? He wanted her in his life, wanted them, but did that mean he wanted his life to revolve around her?
“I said as much as I can. It may take a bit of planning, but I'd need groceries too. Supplies. We could plan it on a day you have an appointment. I pick you up, take you to it, we do a grocery run after.”
She scoffed. “What do you think you're doing?”
He tried to smile. “Driving you.”
“Why?” She yelled. Her voice settled, her arms wrapped tight around her. “Why are you here? I don't line up with your plan. Your stupid little plan. A tree house in the woods.” She shook her head. “Do you have any idea how naive that is? How childish? I get why you're doing it. I don't know how or what exactly, but I know why—someone or something hurt you. And now you think you can escape it. Now you think you can live this idyllic little life where no one will hurt you and nothing bad will happen. But that's shit. Go as far as you want, never see another person again but it won't change anything. You can't escape. There's no escape, Lincoln. None.”
He glanced over. Her gaze was ahead again.
“Life sucks.” Kali let out a harsh laugh. “Do what you want. Go where you want. But you can't escape.”
Lincoln drove through three intersections. At the fourth, he eased the car to a stop in time for the red light. “You're right.”
She looked at him. For the first time on the drive, their eyes met.
“I thought I could escape. I wanted to escape. But life's there too. You're there too.”
She raised an eyebrow.
“I mean thoughts of you. Of Theo. You reminded me that life is more than ... I don't know ... than escaping. Than trying to live entirely for myself. You brought me back into the world, to wanting to be in it.”
She swallowed—that little convulse of her beautiful throat.
“I've changed in the few months since we met, in the past weeks since you left. In the past years, too.” Lincoln drove through the green light. “When I saw you and Theo outside that dump of an apartment I wanted the woods, craved it with everything in me.” He looked back over. “Needed my castle in the air.”
Her brow furrowed.
“I still want to finish it, still want to live there, but it doesn't have to be to the exclusion of everything and everyone else.”
Kali sat silent a moment. “And what about next week, next month, when you change again?”
“We can change, but not backwards. At least I don't think so.” Lincoln glanced over again before turning his gaze to the road. She was staring at him. “I'm just asking you to let me help you. Maybe we found each other for a reason.” After two more turns, he pulled into the Westwood roundabout.
Kali didn't move to unbuckle her seat. She shifted toward him. “If you want to help, if you're determined to help, then fine, help. But don't expect more than that. Don't expect more from me than ... than thank you.”
“Okay.”
“You helped us out during a time when we needed it. But it wasn't charity. I'm paying you. Soon. And you'll take the money. It's better if we leave it at that.”
“Why?”
“You're not going to help your way into my bed. If you think I'm some charity case who'll throw herself all over you because you take me to get groceries, because who else would want a single mom with a brain tumour, a blind single mom with a brain tumour, think again. Because it doesn't matter who else would want me. I don't want anyone or need anyone.”
“Understood.”
“You say that.”
“Yes.”
“But you'll get bored. You'll walk away. You'll realize being the hero isn't all it's cracked up to be.”
Lincoln held in a laugh. “I'm not anyone's hero. I'm not trying to be a hero.”
“Well—”
“And if you recall, I wanted you and Theo in my life before I had any idea about your,” he paused, “health condition.”
“Brain tumour. You can say it.”
Lincoln gritted his teeth. “Brain tumour.”
“And now that you know?”
“I'm terrified.”
The swallow again. And a softening ... maybe. She looked to her lap. “Me too.”
“I might not be able to handle it, whatever you're going to go through, as well as I'd like. I ... I've been a bit broken.”
Her gaze stayed lowered. “I could tell.”
Lincoln's heart pounded. “I can promise I won't walk out on Theo. I won't stop calling or visiting out of nowhere. Nor you. I can promise, for now at least, if you call me and you need me, I'll come. Until things get settled. Until you figure out how to make things work.”
Still, her gaze stayed lowered.
“Kali?”
“And then?”
“I don't know. If you tell me to go, I will?”
She nodded.
“So how about until then, until you figure things out, you stop,” he grinned, “or at least try to stop treating me like some criminal who's trying to worm his way into your life?”
The smallest of grins. Another nod. “You heading back to the tree house tonight?”
“Haven't decided.”
She looked up. “You can come for dinner if you like. While I can still see to cook.”
A tremor of warmth spread through Lincoln. “Sure. Want me to pick you up after work?”
“I'm not going to let you become my chauffeur. I can take the bus.”
“Yeah. But tonight, since I'll be in town, heading to your place.”
She unbuckled her seatbelt. “I'm working late, to make up for a bit of the time away. Six o'clock?”
“Six o'clock.”
She opened the cab door and stepped out, but her hand stayed on the handle. “And Lincoln?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks.” She slammed the door, and this time it was Lincoln who swallowed.