No Ordinary Love Read online

  “Or pull on their fingers?”

  “Yes,” Dr. Ramsey said. “Does your patient do this?”

  “I’ve seen him do it, yes,” Trina said.

  “What calmed him down?” Dr. Ramsey asked.

  Me! “Soft words, I guess. I put my hand on his hand, too. What’s perseverating?”

  “Talking about the same thing for a long time, sometimes all day, sometimes over a number of days,” Dr. Ramsey said. “It’s a form of fixation, and attempts to change the subject often fail.”

  Tony has been fixating on Cielo Azul. Perseverating also sounds like something ES does daily and what Robert did every day for ten years. “What do I do if that happens?”

  “A change of scene sometimes works,” Dr. Ramsey said. “Remove the patient from wherever he’s perseverating, and sometimes he’ll snap out of it.”

  I don’t want to ask this, but . . . “Could he be dangerous?”

  “There’s nothing in the medical literature to suggest AS sufferers are inherently dangerous to others,” Dr. Ramsey said. “Anything else?”

  “Um, no,” Trina said. “Thank you, Dr. Ramsey.” You’ve calmed me down about my date.

  Trina worked the last ninety minutes of her shift on the fourth floor, helping with a new admittance and watching the nearest clock when she could. At four, she rushed to her locker, collected her jacket and purse, and burst out into the hallway—to be stopped by ES and ES2.

  “Where do you think you’re going, Woods?” Nurse Sprouse asked.

  On a real date! “Home. My shift’s over.” She slipped into her jacket.

  “I haven’t seen you all afternoon,” Nurse Sprouse said.

  I know. Was it good for you, too? “I’ve been here.”

  “Tina Gonzalez said you were in the bathroom for most of the afternoon,” Nurse Sprouse said. “Is that true?”

  Tina is a stalking bitch. “Yes,” Trina said. “Well, for about an hour or so.”

  “Then you should have clocked out and gone home,” Nurse Sprouse said. “This hospital is not paying you to sit on the toilet all day.”

  Just to take patients to and from the toilet when I could be flawlessly managing and charting half a dozen patients. “I know it isn’t.” And this gives me an idea. “Nurse Sprouse, I’m still not feeling that good. I should probably take the rest of the week off to be sure whatever I have is out of my system.”

  “Time-off requests must be made—”

  “I know the rule, Nurse Sprouse,” Trina interrupted. I helped rewrite that rule six years ago before your anal ass got here. “But I came down with this today, and you don’t want a sick nurse around patients, do you?”

  “Of course not, Woods,” Nurse Sprouse said.

  “I’ll be back bright and early on Monday,” Trina said, moving around Inez and Danica. “Bye.”

  “I will remember this during your evaluation,” Nurse Sprouse said. “Make a note of it, Martinez.”

  Inez wrote something down.

  Trina stopped. “Remember what? That I got sick?”

  “That you, as a nurse, didn’t take better care of your health,” Nurse Sprouse said. “Trumbo, sign Woods up for a refresher seminar in blood-borne pathogens.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Danica said with a smile.

  “That’s not necessary,” Trina said. “I just took that course—”

  “You’re right, Woods,” Nurse Sprouse interrupted. “It isn’t necessary. For a professional nurse. For you, it is.”

  Inez and Danica snickered.

  Just you wait, ES2, Trina thought as she walked out the ER entrance. In the original Cinderella, pigeons pecked out the eyes of Cinderella’s evil stepsisters.

  Trina approached the bus bench. “Tony,” she whispered.

  Tony looked up. “Hi, Trina. It is time to go.”

  “Yes,” Trina said. “It’s not a long walk. I live on O’Farrell.”

  “We will take Hyde Street then,” Tony said as he stood. “It is quickest.”

  She grasped his elbow lightly. “Is it okay if I hold on to your arm as we walk?”

  “Yes,” Tony said.

  A bus pulled up, and a crowd filed around them to get on and off.

  “I have written six songs,” Tony said as they walked through the throng at a leisurely pace. “I wrote five about you and one about the bus.”

  “You wrote a song about the bus,” Trina said.

  “A bus has music,” Tony said. “I hear music everywhere. I listened to people walking all around me today. Each person had a different rhythm.”

  “What’s my rhythm?” Trina asked.

  “Vivace,” Tony said. “You are lively and spirited.”

  “What’s your rhythm?” Trina asked.

  “I am adagio, slow,” Tony said.

  “I don’t think you’re slow at all,” Trina said. “You asked me out the first time you met me.”

  “I did not speak to you the first time I met you,” Tony said.

  “Because you were sponging me, right?” Trina said.

  “Yes,” Tony said. “I like to sponge.”

  “Did you see anything you liked while you were sponging me?” Trina asked.

  “Yes,” Tony said. “I liked everything.”

  I’d ask him to be more specific, but I just met him, Trina thought. Oh, it is so nice to be walking with a man.

  Tony’s eyes never stayed still during the short walk to Trina’s apartment. He stared at a graffiti-covered gray Dumpster and made several notes. He looked up at ancient fire escapes. He seemed to count the metal supports on some scaffolding. He mumbled rhymes as they passed “House of Fans.” He turned his head to listen to the swaying leaves of the trees sprouting from the sidewalk. He tried to step only on the darker-colored concrete squares as they turned onto O’Farrell. He counted the windows on her apartment building.

  Tony drinks in and sponges everything, from the sidewalk to the streetlights to the people walking by, as if the whole world is new to him at all times. He is like a child yet he’s quiet about it. Children say, “Look! Look!”

  Tony’s eyes do the shouting.

  I wish he would look at me.

  I wish his eyes would shout at me.

  23

  Tony trailed behind Trina as they climbed the narrow stairs to her apartment door. Once Trina opened the door, ushered him inside, and closed the door behind him, she sighed and said, “So . . . this is where I live.”

  “It is small,” Tony said.

  I’m sure he has closets larger than my apartment, Trina thought.

  Trina took off her jacket and hung it in the closet. “It’s all I can afford.” And at only $2,200 a month, which is half my take-home pay. She dropped her purse onto the couch and went into the kitchen, where she turned off the Crock-Pot. “That was my dinner.”

  “It smells good,” Tony said. He stepped into the kitchen. “Your floor is a checkerboard. Angela’s Sweet Treats and Coffee has a checkerboard floor.”

  And this kitchen has never been so crowded. Tony takes up some serious space. “Are you hungry? Would you like a bowl of my famous beef stew?”

  “Yes.”

  “Um, go sit on the couch,” Trina said. “I’ll bring you a bowl.”

  “Okay.”

  “That coffee table out there is where I eat all my meals.”

  Tony took three steps and sat on the couch. “It is purple.”

  Trina found a clean bowl in a cupboard and filled it to the top. She took a spoon from a drawer, a napkin from a plastic holder, and the bowl to the coffee table.

  “I got the couch at a deep discount,” Trina said. I actually found it on the curb on trash day and muscled it up here, where it will forever smell of Crisp Linen Lysol. “Be careful eating the stew. It’s hot.”

  Tony blew on his first spoonful before devouring it. “It is good.”

  Someone likes my cooking. Two miracles in one day. “Would you like to add some Goldfish crackers?”

  “Yes.�
�

  Trina added several Goldfish crackers.

  “They are swimming.” Tony ate another spoonful. “Golden fish. It is good. Crunchy stew. Delores does not make this.”

  Trina sat beside him. “Who’s Delores?”

  “Our cook,” Tony said.

  “I wish I had a cook,” Trina said.

  “You are a cook,” Tony said.

  “I warm things up,” Trina said. “That’s not cooking.”

  “It tastes like cooking to me.” Tony picked up the remote on the coffee table and turned on the television. A multicolored weather map appeared on the screen. “You watch the weather.”

  “Every morning,” Trina said.

  “I watch it all day,” Tony said. “San Francisco has colorful weather.”

  Trina watched him empty the bowl in four minutes with an occasional slurp. He even makes my cooking sound good! “Who do you live with in Brooklyn, Tony?”

  “Angelo and Aika,” Tony said. “Aika just moved in. She is Japanese. She does not live in Japan. She sleeps in Angelo’s bed. She is sometimes loud.”

  In bed? No, I can’t ask that. “She has a loud voice, huh?”

  “Only when she is in Angelo’s bed,” Tony said.

  I want to laugh so badly! “That’s . . . that’s interesting.”

  “Aika has a cotton-ball whisper voice,” Tony said. “Angelo will marry her. They will have children with cotton-ball voices.”

  “So it’s just the three of you living in the Castle,” Trina said.

  “Yes,” Tony said. “It is very big. It has ten rooms.” He stared at the television.

  Trina’s stomach grumbled. “I’ll go change my clothes so we can go eat.”

  “I have been eating,” Tony said.

  “Yes,” Trina said. “I meant, so we can go eat dinner at Johnny Foley’s.”

  “Yes,” Tony said. “I will play you a song.”

  She put her hand on his thigh, pushed off, and stood. This man is made of muscle. “I’ll only be a few minutes.”

  “Okay.”

  Trina skipped to her room and looked at her meager wardrobe. Whenever she moved her clothes hangers, she heard an echo. What do I wear? I hope Johnny Foley’s isn’t too crowded, though Tony didn’t seem to mind the crowds flowing around him at the bus stop. He just zoned out completely and wrote songs while all those people were jostling around him. I wish I could focus like that.

  She pushed and pulled the hangers in her closet, frowning at clothes she used to wear in a vain attempt to impress Robert. I haven’t dressed to impress a man in so long, but will Tony even notice? I have nothing in this closet that says, “Look at me!” I have plenty of clothes in this closet that say, “Meh.”

  She put on jeans that used to be tight on her legs. I am no longer sexy. I am slender. Instead of the Sanitas, she wore some ancient, scuffed hiking boots. To match his, sort of. She threw on a white cotton sweater and posed in front of the mirror attached to her closet door with plastic clips. How plain can I get? Brown and blue and white. She put on no makeup, spritzed on some citrusy perfume, and fluffed her hair. She sighed. I guess I’m ready.

  She walked out of her room and stood in front of the television. “Ready?”

  Tony looked up briefly before turning off the television.

  No comment. Shoot. I should have worn makeup.

  Tony stood. “You smell like oranges and grapefruits.”

  He has a good nose. “It’s my perfume.”

  “I like it,” Tony said. “It smells like calypso music.”

  Robert hated my perfume. He said I smelled like a fruit salad. But what about the rest of me, man? “Tony, how do I look?”

  “You look like an angel,” Tony said.

  That’s . . . that’s better. “What does an angel look like?”

  “You.”

  Trina shook her head. “I’m not an angel, Tony.”

  Tony stared at the coffee table. “I think you are.”

  “I sure don’t look like an angel,” Trina said.

  “Yes, you are,” Tony said. “Your hair is your own. It is curly and black and shiny. Your eyes are full of golden sunlight. Your ears are brown potato chips. Your nose is small and shiny. Your lips look soft and firm. They are dark brown. Your teeth are white. Your tongue is pink. Your breasts are in proportion to your buttocks. You have strong legs. I like your boots.”

  He must have a photographic memory. The breasts and buttocks line was strangely . . . comforting. “I like your boots.”

  “They are not your size,” Tony said. “I can buy you some.”

  “You already bought me shoes,” Trina said. “Let’s go eat.”

  “Okay.”

  Outside Trina’s apartment building, she asked, “May I hold on to your arm?”

  “Yes,” Tony said. “We are on a date now.”

  Trina grasped his bicep. I am holding on to an arm made of stone. “We are.”

  Tony took out his phone. “I must call Angela to tell her.”

  “Who’s Angela?” Trina asked.

  “My friend.” He pressed the number two and waited. “Angela, I am on a date with Trina. We are going to eat at an Irish pub called Johnny Foley’s. It has two pianos.... Yes, she is here.” He handed the phone to Trina. “Angela wants to talk to you.”

  This is strange. “Hello?”

  “Is this the Trina from Second Chances?”

  Strange question. “Yes.”

  “How’s he doing?” Angela asked.

  Angela sounds New York and . . . black. “Fine.”

  “Define ‘fine,’ please,” Angela said.

  “He’s actually wonderful,” Trina said.

  “Did he tell you who he is?” Angela asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Did you believe him the first time he told you?” Angela asked.

  “Honestly, no,” Trina said. “But then he shared a song he wrote for me, and . . . it was amazing.”

  “He did the same for me and my family,” Angela said.

  “And then I read some of Tony’s biography, and that cinched it,” Trina said.

  “And how do you feel about knowing who he really is?” Angela asked.

  “I feel great,” Trina said. “I have a date with greatness.”

  “I’m glad Tony called me because his brother Angelo and Angelo’s fiancée are on their way to San Francisco,” Angela said.

  “Why?”

  “Tony, kind of, well, escaped from Brooklyn with my help,” Angela said. “He didn’t tell Angelo he was coming to see you.”

  Trina gripped Tony’s arm more tightly. “So he did all this on his own?”

  “Yes, and he sounds as if he’s doing very well,” Angela said. “Where did he find you?”

  “At a park near the hospital,” Trina said.

  “How close are you to his hotel right now?” Angela asked.

  “Where is he staying?” Trina asked.

  “The Huntington,” Angela said.

  “That’s right next to the park where we met,” Trina said.

  “The better to sponge you,” Angela said. “I hope you don’t think he was stalking you. He is really the sweetest man I’ve ever known.”

  It is so weird to be talking about someone who’s walking beside you and who has to hear half the conversation. “I know he’s sweet.”

  “Could you make sure he gets back to the Huntington after your date?” Angela asked.

  “Sure,” Trina said. “It’s not very far from here.”

  “I’m warning you, though,” Angela said. “Tony may not want to go back to the hotel. He has it in his head that he’s going to stay with you. And once he has something in his head, it stays there.”

  How do I feel about that? Hmm. That thought hasn’t been in my head. It is now. “What do I do if that happens?”

  “Only you can answer that question,” Angela said. “Go with your heart.”

  My heart says . . . he should stay with me. “My heart says we go b
ack to my apartment and watch the weather together.”

  “He’s already been to your apartment?”

  Is she accusing me of something? It sounds like it. “Only so I could change out of my scrubs for our date.”

  “Well, do your best to get him back to the hotel if you can,” Angela said. “Angelo and Aika arrive tomorrow morning. They’re going straight to the hotel to collect him.”

  “Why?” And why so soon? I just met the guy!

  “He has Asperger’s, Trina.”

  “Okay. And?”

  “He needs special care,” Angela said. “This is the first time he has ever been out of New York.”

  “And he’s fine,” Trina said. “He bought me shoes. He asked me out. He’s out on a date.”

  “He’s not normal, Trina,” Angela said. “You’ve noticed that, right?”

  “I’m glad he’s not normal,” Trina said. “A normal man wouldn’t have been such a gentleman.”

  “I am hungry,” Tony said.

  “It’s just a little farther, Tony,” Trina said. “He’s hungry, Angela.”

  “Just . . . take good care of him,” Angela said.

  “Angela,” Trina said, “he’s taking care of me. And if he decides not to go back to his hotel, I will honor his decision to stay with me.”

  “I just told you that’s what he wants,” Angela said.

  “And that’s what I want, too,” Trina said. “I do have a couch he can sleep on.”

  “He has to come back to Brooklyn, Trina,” Angela said.

  She’s so overprotective! “He’s a grown man, Angela.”

  “I know that, Trina, but . . .” Angela sighed. “He’s not fully grown, if you know what I mean.”

  “I’m focusing on what he is, not what he isn’t,” Trina said. “He bought me shoes I really, really needed. He says I look like an angel. He likes my cooking.” He likes my . . . proportions.

  “But Trina, seriously,” Angela said. “He’s like a little boy.”

  “He’s not a child,” Trina said. “He is treating me with more respect than any other man I have ever been with in my life. I feel like a lady, a very lucky lady. He is polite and kind and honest, and I like him very much.”

  “There’s a lot to like, I know, but . . .”

  “He is the perfect gentleman, and I am proud to be on his arm,” Trina said.