Page 8 of Marcus-stiltskin
He shakes his head. “Don’t be. I’m over it. Mostly.”
“Mostly, huh?”
He nods. “Mostly. I spent a lot of years in therapy. So many years…” He sighs and looks away for a moment. I wait, worried I’ve pushed too far. “The doctors went around and around for quite a while about whether I’d be able to keep my leg. I got lucky that I ended up with a below the knee amputation, but it didn’t feel like it at the time. When they finally decided I had to have the amputation, I was stuck in this stupid army medical limbo.Couldn’t do much because I was in physical therapy. I was pissed off all the time and just not a good person to be around.”
He closes his eyes as if he’s trying to picture it. “There was this dude at the physical therapy clinic who seemed to be on the same exact schedule as me. That asshole had a leg joke every fucking time I came in. If I tried to get past him really quickly, he’d just yell it as I rolled past.”
“I was so pissed off at the world. I didn’t want to deal with anyone trying to be positive or optimistic. But that fucker, I swear to God, he had a fucking sixth sense about when I was the angriest. I was so close to calling him out, just fucking telling him off once and for all. Then I see him walking out one day. Come to find out this asshole is almost completely blind, missing a leg and an arm, all because he went back for a friend who ended up dying in the end. I felt like an asshole being so angry about just this,” he says, motioning toward the prosthetic.
I shake my head. “Suffering isn’t a competition. You’re still allowed to be pissed off about it. Just because other people have it worse–”
“True,” he cuts me off, “but I wasn’t doing myself or anyone else any favors. I pushed a lot of good people away. I lost Catrina, my ex, that way. I just kept pushing everyone away, refusing to accept help. It took me a long time to realize how messed up I’d become.” He lapses into silence and we sit for a moment, staring at our cups. “On that cheery note, interested in another cup?”
“Yes, but it’s my turn to get the refills,” I say, standing up.
“But you’re my guest.”
“And you just said you’re bad at accepting help. Let me at least take turns with you. Besides, I’d like to learn your coffee order. You know mine, after all.”
“So, you want to learn my coffee order?” he says, a smile on his lips.
“Yes. Isn’t that what friends do?”
He chuckles, his voice deep and rich, the sound sending a shiver down my spine. “Friends do. Two sugars.”
The plug to the coffee pot sparks and I close my eyes, stirring a little too long to work on controlling the excitement brewing in my belly. When I open my eyes, the pot seems to be back to normal. There’s not even the smell of burned plastic. I look around quickly for any other possible tiny fires, and finding none, pick up our cups and head back to the couch.
“So tell me what’s been up with you,” Marcus says as I sit on the couch.
“That’s the thing,” I tell him as I take a sip. “If I had anything going on other than a dead-end job, Lugh wouldn’t be on my ass. But life is… really crazy lately.”
“And college?”
I shake my head. “I never finished. I went from pre-med to education to accounting to counseling to beauty school and then decided I was wasting everyone’s time and money.”
“Did you ever consider the military?”
I laugh. “Are you recruiting?”
He shakes his head. “Absolutely not, just seeing how far along you are on the desperation scale.”
I tilt my head. “Desperation scale?”
“Yes, you know, we’d see them every year in the Army. There’s that first round of kids that hits basic right off of graduation. They’re the ones that have been planning to go into the military for a while and then a few months later…September, October, November rolls around and you’ll see the ‘oh shit’ kids who are high up on the desperation scale.”
“Oh,” I smile, catching on. “They get to the end of the summer and realize they need to do something, so the military is their last choice.”
He points at me and smiles. “Exactly. Was that ever you?”
I shake my head. “Never. Lugh would never allow it, even if I had been desperate. Besides, I’m too restless. I don’t think I could ever sit still long enough back then, and now…”
“Now?” he echoes.
“Now, if I sleep with the wrong pillow, I wake up in pain for a week.”
“Young lady, do not even come here and try to tell me about old age.”
“Admit it, Marcus. I’m old now, too.”