The Darkest Corner of the Heart (The Brightest Light Book 2)
The Darkest Corner of the Heart: Chapter 14

I’m drunk. Not from drinking away my sorrows at home or from club-hopping with my friends, but from last night’s conversation with James in his car.

I’m drunk on his presence, his words, his whole damn existence—and I hate every second of it.

There’s nothing, absolutely nothing, that should interest me about him. Not his reasons for becoming a PT, not his skills in the kitchen, and most certainly not his love life.

He’s still my physical therapist, and he could get in real trouble if we crossed the invisible line that seems to draw us a little closer every time we’re together outside the clinic.

Not that a man like him would ever be interested in little old sad me. Why would he? He’s a grown adult in his early thirties with his whole life figured out and probably planned to a T, and I’m twenty-one, lost, and waiting for a deity I don’t even believe in to poke me on the side and tell me, “Hey, look. This is the direction you’re meant to take.”

We don’t belong together.

Plus, what would my brother think if I got involved with a man ten years my senior? He’d have a stroke, that’s what would happen.

Luckily, I don’t have to worry about that because the most realistic, logical part of me knows once my rehabilitation treatment is over, I won’t see James ever again. I’ll have no reason to.

He seems like a prudent man who won’t jeopardize his job for a twenty-one-year-old mess, and maybe that’s what gives me the final push to leave all those thoughts behind and focus on what I truly want. What I wouldn’t mind.

I want us to be friendly. Maybe not friends friends, the way Kyle and Beth are my friends, but I want us to at least be…cordial. A little more than that, if we could. And I suppose he wouldn’t mind it, since he’s already gone out of his way to drive me home after my night shift. He wouldn’t have done that if he hated me, right?

It’s likely that I’m misreading all the very obvious neon signs telling me he does, in fact, not give a shit about me. But that doesn’t stop me from pulling out yet another mandala from my tote bag at the end of our session and handing it to him.

He looks at the piece of paper, then at me, and back at the paper. Hesitantly, he takes it. “Another one?” He doesn’t sound annoyed, not even surprised. It’s more like incredulity.

“This one is a crescent moon,” I explain like he doesn’t have two working eyes. “It’s a bit smaller than the last one I gave you, but I thought you’d like the design.”

“You didn’t have to give me anything.” He stays silent for a moment. Then he says, “I still can’t believe you draw these by hand.”

“It’s not a big deal. Making them relaxes me.”

His attentive eyes are on the paper before they dart back up to me. “Have you tried going back to ballet like I recommended?”

Right. Back to business. That’s good. That’s what we need to do.

He opens the desk drawer to his right, puts the drawing inside, and closes it, all while holding my stare.

“No,” I confess. “I don’t want to hurt my ankle again.”

“You need to return to your normal activities progressively,” he simply responds, like he doesn’t care for my concerns. “We talked about this in our last session.”

We did, and then I pretended he didn’t say anything. Oops?

“But what if I make a bad move and have to start all over again?”

I don’t think I’d have the mental strength to do physical therapy for a second time—I’m barely surviving the first—but I don’t say that. I’m pretty sure he can read between the lines, anyway.

“Don’t push yourself too hard, and you’ll be all right. You can start with some warm-up exercises and a simple routine.”

I look at him for a moment too long before drifting my eyes away, defeated. “Okay. I’ll do that this week.” Or maybe the next.

I’m hiking my tote bag up my arm when his voice startles me. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong.” The lie rolls off my tongue so easily I should probably check what’s up with that.

“Maddie.”

Hearing my name from his lips gives me tingles, and I hate myself for it. What happened to Miss Stevens?

“I’ll have another pep talk with you if I need to, but a patient is coming in five minutes, so I would appreciate some straightforwardness.”

Another pep talk. Right. His last motivational speech is forever engraved in my mind. “That won’t be necessary. I already said I’m scared of hurting myself again.”

He arches a skeptical eyebrow. “Scared. You didn’t use that word before.”

“Does it matter?”

“To me, it does.”

Stupid heart, stop beating so fast. “Why?” I dare to ask, as if his answer doesn’t hold the power to crush me.

And crush me, it does. “Because you’re my patient, and I want my patients to go back to the activities I know they still enjoy.”

A wave of unfounded disappointment crashes into me. His patient.

Of course. I never, not for one moment, forgot the real reason we know each other. The real reason we are still seeing each other almost every day. He’s my physical therapist, and our relationship is and should remain strictly professional.

Who cares if he went out of his way to drive me home after a night shift?

Who cares if we saw each other on a dating app?

Who cares if I draw him mandalas and he colors them?

I don’t.

Liar, liar, pants on fucking fire.

Fine. Maybe I expected him to have warmed up to me just like I’m starting to warm up to him, but it’s okay. One of us has to be the reasonable adult and remind the other that this…whatever this is, has an expiration date. And the faster it approaches, the better.

All this fog in my head will clear once I don’t have to see him ever again.

“You’re right.” I put on the least fake smile I can muster. “I still enjoy ballet, and I don’t want to quit because of my injury.” There’s nothing fake about that statement. “I promise I’ll go to the studio either this week or the next.”

He nods, satisfied. “Good. I’ll see you tomorrow, Miss Stevens.”

There it is. Back to normal. Just like it should always be.

✽✽✽

“We’ll go with you!”

“Oh my God, Maddie. This is such great news.”

“Aren’t you excited? I am!”

My smile wavers as I lift my fork and stuff my face with some ricotta and pine nut salad. It tastes like nothing, just like everything else I’ve eaten recently, but I don’t care. Eating is the perfect excuse for not talking. For my two best friends to not see the truth in my words now that I’ve finally learned to hide it so well with my eyes.

But I know better than to expect Beth and Kyle to call it quits so easily.

I don’t regret having agreed to grab some lunch with them. Now that I’m safe to leave the house, and my friends’ busy schedules were miraculously clear for at least an hour, I couldn’t say no. Even if I wasn’t in the mood when Kyle texted the group chat just a few minutes after I got home from this morning’s session. I wasn’t—and I suppose I’m still not—in the mood because I’m a coward who’s avoiding the inevitable, which is this conversation.

“I feel like I wouldn’t know where to start,” Kyle muses as he stabs his chicken breast. “It’s been so long since we’ve done an easy routine, you know? I don’t even remember what that was like.”

“I can give you some ideas,” Beth offers. “You could do some of the routines I’m teaching the girls.”

Going from professional ballet to kid-level dancing due to being stupidly reckless, hurting myself, and losing my dream job? Sounds great.

And this situation is all the more frustrating because ballerinas getting injured isn’t unheard of in the dance world. It happens fairly often—I just never imagined it would happen to me.

Turns out I’m not invincible.

“Thanks, Beth.” I smile, but it feels forced, even to me.

“No problem.” She takes a sip of her fizzy water. “You could rent one of the studios on Glenn Avenue. It’s less than twenty bucks an hour.”

“I will do that.” I don’t bother telling her I’ve already booked one for next Monday, because I need a change of topic more than I need my next breath. “Hey, does Polina have a new girlfriend or something? I saw something on social media, but I didn’t want to pry.”

And just like that, the conversation shifts to the latest gossip, something that always works as a distraction. I love my friends—they’re my rocks—and I know damn well my recovery process would’ve been a whole lot more miserable and lonely without their constant check-ins, video calls, gossip updates, and visits. I just can’t talk about my future—or lack thereof—right now. They would understand if I explained it to them, but I don’t want to make them feel bad, so deflection it is.

I’m not winning any friendship awards this year, that’s for sure.

A little over half an hour later, a loud alarm that startles the whole café blasts through Kyle’s phone, a sign that his break is over. He grabs his bag and rounds the table to give me a hug.

“I’ll text you guys later. And Mads, let me know how it goes, all right? I believe in you, girl. I know you can do it.”

I resist the urge to bawl into his chest. “Don’t get all sappy on me, Kyle.” I scowl, but I can’t hide a smile.

“That sexy doctor of yours would never advise you to do something that’ll hurt your ankle. If you don’t have faith in yourself, at least have some in him.”

He’s right. James would never—

Wait a minute.

I almost choke on my own saliva. “Did you just call him sexy?”

My face must be the picture of pure horror, because both of my friends start laughing. Kyle shakes his head, amused. “It was just a guess, but with the way your face is flushing right now, I’d say I’m spot on.”

This is getting out of hand. I still have time to hit the brakes before we crash.

“He’s not…” Sexy? I sure know he is. “He’s not too bad.”

Beth squeals, propping her chin on her hands as she bats her eyelids at me. “That means he’s hot as sin, Kyle. I have a master’s degree in reading between the Maddie-lines. Oh, God, you like him.” She points an accusing finger at me.

“What? No.”

I don’t. I can’t.

I…don’t.

“We’ll talk more about this later,” Kyle warns me before planting a quick kiss on my cheek, then on Beth’s, and waving at us as he walks away. “Don’t you dare gossip without me, bitches! Or you’ll regret it.”

We laugh at his dramatics, but Beth is quick to sober up again. This time, she means business.

“I’m your best friend in the entire world,” she starts, and I know this won’t end well for me. “Whatever you confess to me right now won’t leave this café. Hell, it won’t even leave this table. So, what is it? Do you have the hots for your doctor? How old is he?”

I shift uncomfortably on my chair at the reminder that, even if she isn’t aware of it, Beth knows exactly what James looks like. She knows his age and even some of his hobbies. And maybe because I’ve already had this conversation with James himself and it can’t get more embarrassing than that, I decide to tell her the truth.

“Fun fact.” I lick my lips and play with my napkin, my elbows resting on the table. “Remember that guy you swiped up on, on the dating app? Turns out he’s…” It takes everything in me not to wince. “Ah, he’s my physical therapist. James. The guy treating my ankle.”

If shock had a face, it would look exactly like Beth’s. Her lips form a perfect circle, jaw on the floor and eyebrows on the ceiling. It would look comical if I wasn’t dying inside.

She shakes her head. “No. Fucking. Way.”

I press my lips into a thin line and nod.

Beth covers her mouth with both of her hands and squeals into them, grabbing the attention of a handful of people around us. I roll my eyes and bat her hands away. “It’s not a big deal,” I shush her. “I mean, it was at first, but I talked to him and we’re cool.”

Her jaw hits the floor again. “You talked to him about swiping up on him on the dating app? The balls!”

Now that I think about it, maybe it was a bold move after all.

“What did he say?” she asks.

So, for the next ten minutes, I explain how everything went down between us and where we’re currently at. I even throw the mandalas and the car ride into the mix because why not. If I want my friend’s honest opinion, I must be fully honest myself, first.

“Wow.” She sits back on her chair once I finish, shoulders relaxing after being so on edge. Seriously, my friends take gossiping as a life-and-death matter—I kind of love it too, so I’m not judging. “That was… I need to think about this for a second.”

I gulp down what remains of my Diet Coke. “Don’t think too hard. I won’t see him again after next week.” I’ll probably have to meet with him at some point in the next few months to monitor my progress, but maybe not. Maybe another PT will do my checkups.

Beth glares at me like she doesn’t fully believe what I’m saying. “I don’t know, Mads. What kind of guy stays hours in a parking lot so he can get you home safely? Think about it. He clearly feels something for you.”

Pity is the first word that assaults my brain.

“He’s ten years older than me,” I quip.

She shrugs. “So? That’s kinda hot.”

She’s been reading too many romance books. Clearly.

“He has his whole life figured out. His adult life,” I add.

“So do you.”

“I used to.” It’s out in the open air before I can prevent it.

Beth’s eyes soften at my words, and I hate it. I loathe it with all my heart. “Oh, Maddie.”

No. Nope. I’m not doing this right now, or ever. I won’t have someone else pity me for my own mistakes. “It’s fine. I didn’t really mean it,” I lie, something that has been coming really easily for me these days. It worries me. “I’m just confused about…you know, him.”

“Well, I don’t think it would be a good idea if you guys hooked up while you’re still his patient,” she says, as if there was an actual chance of that happening. “So just wait until your treatment is over and see what happens. You say you won’t see him again, but something right here”—she taps her gut—“is telling me you’re wrong.”

Maybe. Maybe not. My head hurts just thinking about it.

I stay silent as Beth finishes her lunch, forcing my mind to stay blank. No James, no future, no “what would my brother think,” no nothing, but it proves to be a near impossible task.

I’m about to excuse myself to go to the bathroom when I feel it.

A prickle of uneasiness travels down my spine, an uncomfortable tug in my stomach, just like that day at the park.

Feeling safe now that I’m with Beth and inside a crowded place, I gather my strength and look around.

Nobody is staring back at me, but even so, there’s something inside me that would just know if I saw this person. An instinct, a feeling, something.

I feel nothing. If someone is watching me, they aren’t inside the café.

“God.” Beth chuckles, pulling me out of my momentary lapse. “Kyle is going to be so pissed he missed this.”