Epilogue
"The fact that you were even able to hold a gun again, especially in a situation nearly identical to your trigger...it's unprecedented," Mark Conrad told Jaime when they began their session that evening. "I've never known anyone else who would've had the raw courage to pull that off."
"She's one of a kind," Steve added, from his bed across the room.
"You're resting, Austin," Jaime reminded him. "As in 'under the covers, eyes - and mouth - closed'." She giggled, and both Mark and Steve grinned at the unexpected sound. Jaime smiled, too, then turned serious. "It was really hard, but there was no decision to make. I just...did it."
"How did it feel," the doctor probed, "holding a gun again?"
"I was shaking...wanted to cry, but it wouldn't have helped."
"You must've been terrified."
"Wasn't time," Jaime answered in a matter-of-fact voice.
"How did you know to kick the window, instead of the door?" Mark asked.
Jaime shrugged. "Same way I knew Steve was in trouble in the first place: instinct, I guess."
"If I ever decide to study precognition and ESP, you'll be the first two people I call."
"I wouldn't be a good study patient for that, either."
"Why would you say that?" Conrad wondered. "You're living proof that ESP is real."
"She's too stubborn to be a research subject," Steve added, chuckling.
"He needs a sedative," Jaime told the doctor.
"Actually, Sweetheart, all I need...is you."
Jaime smiled. "There's your answer," she said to Conrad. "I don't have ESP. There's one thing stronger than medicine, science and research, all put together."
"A hard-headed woman?" Steve tossed back.
"You are so asking for it...!"
Steve shot her a wicked grin. "We're both in hospital beds right now, but maybe when we get home..."
"Steve!" Her face turned beet-red, but her eyes glowed happily. "Mark's gonna think we're some kind of over-sexed -"
"Maybe...if he was here."
Neither of them had noticed when the doctor had slipped quietly from the room, leaving them alone with their loving banter as he shared a laugh with Rudy, out in the hallway. "So that's what true love looks like - and sounds like?" Mark mused.
"The real deal," Rudy confirmed. "You could study those two for a lifetime, though, and never completely understand the bond they share."
Back in the hospital room, Jaime and Steve were both sitting up in their beds, enjoying and deepening that bond, without needing to say a word.
END
