Read Online After the Fall by Kylie Ladd - Free Book Online Page A

is Cary. We got to talking about it once when we were meant to be discussing my research. He told me that he’d fallen off a tractor when he was eight, then been taken to the local base hospital for X-rays.
    “The minute I was wheeled through the sliding glass doors, I was hooked,” he told me, smiling bashfully and fiddling with his cuffs rather than meeting my eyes. “Everyone was rushing around, but they all knew exactly what they were doing and where they were going. It was so busy. Not like the farm, where you might sit on the harvester all day, or spend hours fixing the fence in the front paddock.” He finally looked up. “It was kind of thrilling, you know?”
    I did know, and for a moment I felt a sharp pull toward this self-effacing man. He wasn’t dazzling, like Luke, but he was kind and patient, an involved and encouraging supervisor. He was gentle too. If my ideas were off track, or I hadn’t thought something through properly, he’d never scold, or even correct. “Maybe,” he’d say, where other supervisors might have stifled laughter or sighed to themselves, “but have you thought about it like this?” He’d guide, not push; suggest rather than tell. I knew he was married. I’d never met his wife, but I often thought she was a lucky woman.
    Yet when I did finally see them together, it was Cary who acted as if he were the lucky one. Oh, Kate clearly cared for him; she was always touching him or teasing him, rumpling his hair or placing a hand on his thigh. But then she’d be off again, jumping up to call out to someone across the bar, or bent laughing with a girlfriend in a corner, never noticing the way his eyes followed her around the room. I mentioned it to Luke once.
    “Did you see Kate tonight? She was everywhere.” We were lying in bed, dissecting an evening out, as couples often do.
    “She’s certainly sociable,” he mumbled against my shoulder, arms warm across my abdomen. “Particularly when she’s had a few drinks.”
    “When hasn’t she had a few drinks? But she’s like that regardless. Sometimes I wonder if I should talk to Cary about putting her on Ritalin.”
    Luke laughed, though more in surprise at my criticism than anything else. “That’s not like you, Cress,” he said.
    “Well, she is kind of … flighty, isn’t she?” I tried to explain myself. “You wouldn’t want her as your heart surgeon, for example. I’d be worried that if something more interesting came up she’d be straight out the door, the retractors still in your chest.”
    Luke laughed again. “True. She’d look good in a nurse’s uniform, though.”
    I stiffened and he stopped. I’d seen him flirt with her and I was used to that, but there was no reason to be doing so mentally in our bed.
    Yet, I did like Kate. Those days we had at Cary’s house on the lake I actually got to know her a bit, we were left together so often when skiing, or while the boys fished. I’d never had the whole focus of her company before, and I enjoyed it more than I expected. She was genuinely funny, genuinely interested and interesting. I found myself opening up to her, knowing she wasn’t going to suddenly abandon me midsentence; to be honest, I think she paid more attention to me, knowing I wasn’t going to get paged away.
    One day, while we lay on the beach, Kate asked if she could do my hair. I never usually bothered with it much—it was either down over my shoulders or up in a bun, with few variations. Not seeming to notice my hesitation, Kate rolled over and began stroking it, remarking on its color and texture. I think I flinched, but Kate can be persuasive. She went and got her brush and some gear, and for the next half hour I surprised myself by luxuriating in the experience. Her small hands were cool and sure, as deft and careful with my hair as with any artifact. While she weaved my locks into a complicated French braid she hummed and talked … gossip, something about the book she was reading, a few