Warrick returned from the bathroom where he’d taken care of the condom to find Sara sitting up in her bed, an oversized T-shirt covering her body. He could see from the look on her face, he wasn’t going to like where the conversation was headed. She chewed her bottom lip as she looked at him.
Okay. He grabbed his pants and pulled them on, then sat next to her on the bed. “Want to tell me what’s going on?”
“Is it okay if I’m not ready for an overnight?” She looked at his chest as she asked, but he tilted her face up to meet his.
“I’m not going to push you for anything you’re not ready for, Sara,” he said. He had a feeling sleeping overnight in the same bed might be too much emotional connection for her. That it might be putting a little too much on the line.
In all fairness, he knew in his heart if he spent the night here, he’d hold her and love her through the night. With his body, that is.
But there would still be part of him he just didn’t have to give her. It wouldn’t be fair. He shoved the thought aside and kissed her, not wanting to face his own shortcomings.
“It’s no problem, Sara. We’ll move at whatever pace you need to.” And we’ll stop all this before we get too close.
Sara controlled the shaking until she walked Warrick to the door and kissed him goodnight. Then she went to the bedroom and stood, staring, at the bed. That’s when she let herself fall apart. Her hand trembled as she removed her prosthesis and stared down at the ugly stump at the end of her wrist. It was sore and a little swollen.
He’d made her forget. In the restaurant, and even once they’d come back here. That in itself was incredible. She never thought she’d be with a man again.
But, the truth was, she wasn’t ready to let him in completely. Doing that would mean so much more. Letting him between her legs was one thing. But there was no way she could let him into her heart.
If she let him in, he’d eventually need to see her. All of her. After all, she couldn’t live in her prosthesis twenty-four-seven. The skin would break down and she’d end up with open sores in a matter of days.
If he spent any amount of time at her place, he’d see that she needed a lot more modifications to her world than the robotic hand he saw her in each day. When she was home, she often had to go without her prosthesis, to let her arm have a break from the strain of having the machinery on. So, she required other tools in many parts of her world.
She had a special fork that had a cutting edge on one side so she could cut her food one-handed. There was a cutting board with prongs that held onto a piece of bread or a vegetable so she could cut it. She had a clamp that held her toothbrush in place so she could put toothpaste on and another one to hold her hair dryer in place while she brushed her hair.
He would catch on very quickly that she dealt with phantom pain more than anyone realized. She used mirror therapy to address a lot of it, but by the end of the day she’d feel sharp pains going up fingertips that weren’t there.
That had begun shortly after they’d made love. He’d left the bed, and almost immediately, at a time when most people would be relaxed and weak from pleasure, she’d been edgy and tense, knowing she needed to address the pain before it got any worse.
She sat at her vanity and pulled out the mirror she used for her therapy. She set it on the table, leaning it against her chest with an arm on either side of it. She focused on the mirror as her right hand went through stretching exercises and practiced movements. As she did it, her brain perceived her left hand making the same movements. It tricked the brain, somehow, and the pain began to ease.
She had a feeling, though, that she would still need to take a sleeping pill to sleep. On nights like this, the tension in her body never seemed to subside, even when the pain went away. She’d let herself get too tired, and for her, overtired led to worse sleep.
Sara felt a large tear fall and watched where it landed on the desk as she leaned over it, working her arm. It pissed her off even more. She hated feeling sorry for herself. It wasn’t who she was. But there were times she was almost too tired to fight it and she gave in and let herself throw a pity party. Now seemed like a good time. The first time she’d been with a man in years and she was going to need to knock herself out with a pill instead of falling asleep in his arms.
She bit down on the inside of her cheek and twisted her wrists, moving the muscles of both her complete arm and her stump in tandem, feeling the fingers of both hands stretch as she flexed and wiggled them. For just a moment, in Warrick’s arms, she’d felt whole again.
It was incredible the tricks the mind could play.