Read Online Surface by Stacy Robinson - Free Book Online Page A

will.”
    “Oh my God,” Claire shrieked, jumping out of the chair. “I completely forgot about the guest room. It’s a mess, and Michael—”
    Jackie eased her back down. “I’ll handle it.”
     
    Claire washed her face with cold water and pulled her hair into a ponytail with a rubber band from the nurses’ station, and resumed her vigil at Nick’s bedside. It was late afternoon when she finally saw Michael walk into the ICU. His blazer and starched shirt divulged nothing of his long trip; his hair was gelled into place, but his haggard, bloodshot eyes told her all she needed to know. Claire walked toward him and buried her face into his chest, feeling only slightly less brittle. He squeezed her tightly.
    “I’m glad you’re home,” Claire said in a whisper. She could feel pounding in Michael’s chest and she looked up to see him gazing at Nicholas, saw the tears in her husband’s eyes. They pressed closer, twining together as if to insulate their hearts from everything around them.
    Finally Michael released her and placed an unsteady hand onto Nicholas’s wrist. “What’s happening here?” he asked. “Why hasn’t he regained consciousness?”
    “There’s been no change since my last message. No more hemorrhaging,” she said, forcing a hopeful smile. “But they’re not sure about the coma.” She couldn’t believe that she was speaking about their son. The words seemed to echo in the small room.
    “They’re not sure?”
    “They just can’t predict when he’ll wake up.” She moved toward Michael, feeling an awkward need to fill the silence around them. “Dr. Sheldon can explain everything better. He’s supposed to be here soon. But they’re doing everything they can. Bruce has been great.”
    Michael ran both hands over his hair, leaving a molded cowlick in their wake. He walked around her to the other side of the bed. His skin had gone ashen, the color of old clay. “Tell me again,” he said, looking directly into her eyes and speaking slowly, “how this happened. It doesn’t make sense.”
    The saliva dissolved from Claire’s mouth and her weedy composure vanished. She looked at Nicky’s face, at his closed eyes. “I don’t know exactly. I never thought, I mean I could never have—”
    Visibly shaking, Michael grasped the bedrail. “ Why was Bricker at our house?”
    “I told you. He came by to drop off some paperwork for you.” Claire fumbled for the paper towel totem in her pocket, which had worn thin like the knees of Nick’s favorite blue jeans. “And to discuss the deal.”
    “He called you to discuss his deal?”
    “No. I mean, I’d been interested and I wanted to hear more. So I invited him in.”
    With each word, Claire felt more helpless in her ability to keep things from collapsing. He studied her. She was like a child hoping she wouldn’t be discovered, and wondering what the judgment would be if she were.
    “So you asked him in and he just whipped out some coke?”
    “No!” Claire tried to hold the muscles of her jaw and mouth in a calm line. “We just spent some time talking about the software he mentioned at dinner,” she said, focusing on the gold buttons of his blazer as she spoke. “You know, the diabetes connection, and—”
    “And what? He suddenly wanted to do drugs over your shared interest in software?”
    Claire looked up and searched Michael’s face, trying to read his thoughts, desperate to find some evidence of empathy, of a we’ll-get-through-this-together spirit. But she couldn’t meet his eyes.
    “Help me out here, Claire. Help me understand this. Tell me something to make me feel crazy for jumping to the conclusions I’ve been jumping to. Please.”
    The knot in her stomach tightened. She watched him pace, hugging the edge of the bed like a cat, his neck obscured by his arched shoulders. When he stopped and turned toward her, his eyes darted back and forth somewhere above her ponytail. And she was certain the truth she’d hoped