Chapter 3
Her alarm went off at seven o'clock the next morning, just like it did every day, and she immediately sat up in bed, all too aware that if she didn't, the chances of her drifting back off to sleep were sky high. It wasn't until she'd blindly swung her feet over the side of the bed, connecting with the plush carpet of her hotel bedroom, that her brain caught up and she remembered that she didn't need to be up as urgently today. She couldn't visit Ranger until nine, after he'd seen the doctors, so there was no rush to get up and out the door just yet.
Unfortunately, the change in orientation did not agree with her stomach, and rather than simply laying back down to get another hour or so of sleep, Steph found herself dashing through the door to the ensuite bathroom and bowing to the porcelain gods. The delicious meatball sub Lester and Bobby had procured for her dinner the previous evening made a reappearance as she heaved. It was not as delicious the second time around.
She waited a few minutes to be sure she was done before dragging herself up on the counter to rinse her mouth and brush her teeth. It was just her luck that she would get sick during one of the most important weeks of her life. Now that she'd spent that hour with Ranger the previous day, she had an unquenchable thirst to be in his presence. It was a familiar urge, one she'd been harnessing to her advantage for years, but knowing that he was lost in some memoryless fog, fighting against formless opponents to recover his memories, it was stronger than ever.
Seizing on that sense of purpose, Steph pushed down the roiling nausea and set about getting ready for the day, using her long, uninterrupted shower time to devise a plan for her time with her husband today. Once dressed and completely put together with her usual hair and makeup, she stepped out of her room and into the common area of the suite she shared with Lester and Bobby just in time for Bobby to carry a tray of breakfast in from the hall.
"Morning, Beautiful," Lester greeted brightly, passing her a mug of coffee as she settled into a chair at the small dining table. "I thought you'd take the opportunity to sleep in."
"I was going to," she confirmed, inhaling the heavenly scent of caffeine preparing to enter her body. "But forgot to turn my alarm off, and once I was awake, I was awake."
He nodded his understanding, even as he sent her a bemused smile. She knew why. There was a time when she could have easily slept through the alarm, six phone calls and an earthquake in the name of a few extra minutes of sleep, but those days were in the past. As her relationship with Ranger had developed, habits had been changed to make the most of the moments they could steal alone together, and now she was so accustomed to it that sleeping in now seemed just as foreign a concept as getting up before nine once had.
"Have you got a game plan for your time with Ranger?" Bobby asked, setting the tray on the table and passing out the plates of eggs and bacon that room service had just delivered. Steph wasn't especially hungry after bathroom activities, but she nibbled on the bacon so as not to attract the men's undue concern.
"I'd like to get him out of his hotel room," she mentioned, sipping on the coffee and finding it exacerbated the lingering nausea. She set it down gently, lifting Bobby's glass of orange to her lips instead, relief washing over her as her stomach didn't immediately baulk at it. "It's so dark and gloomy, I think he'd benefit from being outside in nature for a while. Let him soak up some sun on his skin, maybe get that warm glow back."
Lester and Bobby shared a look that Steph didn't like. They were going to poke holes in her plan, she just knew it.
"Ranger's eyes are overly sensitive to light at the moment," Bobby explained gently, seeing the glare she was directing his way. "His room is dark and gloomy because too much light hurts his eyes and gives him a headache."
That certainly put a damper on her plans to get him outside in the sunshine, but it definitely wasn't going to stop her from achieving her goals. Already, her mind was racing to figure out a work around. She needed to get him out of the hospital room and into an environment that made him feel stronger. "Okay," she said, returning to nibbling on her bacon. "Can we stop at a drugstore on the way in? I need to pick up some Berocca or something."
Lester's eyes narrowed, sweeping over her and the plate in front of her, noting what she was and wasn't touching, along with her general appearance. She was greatly improved from the moment she'd woken up and immediately needed to vomit, but there were still visible signs of her illness if you knew what to look for. And by now all the Merry Men knew what to look for. "You're not feeling well?" he asked, concern creeping into his voice.
"A little under the weather, yeah," she admitted, stealing another sip of Bobby's orange juice. When she set it back down in front of him, he shook his head, pushing it across the table so it was next to her plate.
"Symptoms?" he requested, taking in the dark circles under her eyes and her slight pallor, adding them both to a mental list to aid in a tentative diagnosis.
There was no point in lying to the medic. It wouldn't help her case, and he'd just continue to worry and monitor far too closely for comfort. Steph had learned early on to be upfront with him. If she was open about her ailments he could ensure, eight times out of ten, that she didn't need to see a doctor. "Just nausea mostly," she said, accepting the extra bacon bits that Lester offered off his plate when hers were gone. "I don't think the sub you got me last night agreed with me, because it came back up this morning."
Bobby made some contemplative noises and looked like he was going to suggest she stay in the hotel room to rest. Lester's expression seemed to agree with the idea. They exchanged a silent conversation, the optimistic vibe they'd been giving off all breakfast dwindling with every passing moment. Steph couldn't let them bench her this early in the game.
"I swear, guys. I'm feeling a lot better now than I was," she assured them. "The Berocca will do wonders in getting me over the line. And Ranger needs me!"
Lester sighed and leaned back in his seat, crossing his arms over his chest with a shrug and tilt of his head, silently deferring to Bobby's professional judgement. He knew better than to try to take point in a situation like this.
Bobby's lips thinned as he looked from Lester to Steph, clearly weighing the merits of rest for Steph over the importance of getting Ranger's memories back. "You're sure you can handle the trip?" he checked, waiting for her nod before offering her the terms of his agreement. "If you start to feel worse, you need to let me know. The last thing I want is for you to be seriously ill and covering it up just to be there for Ranger. And you'll come back here and rest this afternoon regardless."
"Deal," she nodded.
*o*
Steph managed to convince Bobby and Lester to let her take the trip into the drugstore by herself while they waited in the car, and in so doing found both a solution to the problem that had been on her mind since breakfast, and managed to have a minor bout of existential dread. She walked in for some Berocca to ease her stomach and perk her up a bit but walked out with so much more.
"That looks like more than just a Berocca," Lester quipped as she slid into the back seat of the hired SUV with her bag of supplies. "I didn't know you could impulse buy in a pharmacy."
Squashing down her swirling thoughts, she sent him one of her best Burg eye roll in the rear view mirror. "I can impulse buy anywhere," she pointed out. "You know that." She set the bag and her purse down on the seat beside her, but probably should have just passed it forward for Bobby to inspect for all the good it did. She'd just taken her hand off the plastic to buckle herself in when Bobby – turned all the way around in his seat – snatched it up and dragged it into the front with him. "I didn't bring you a treat," Steph told him exasperatedly as he dug through it. "Just essentials for the day."
He pulled out one of the ready to drink Beroccas and passed it back to her, casting a pointed look over his shoulder that she interpreted as You better get started on that if you want to convince me that you're fine, and promptly delved back into the bag. A moment later he emerged with a pair of oversized, extremely unfashionable wrap-around sunglasses on his face and just stared silently at the side of Lester's head until he took his eyes off the road for a moment to see what the hell he was doing.
The result was a bark of laughter and a near miss as he pulled up short behind the car in front of them at a red light. Steph had made the right decision to tuck the third item she'd bought into her handbag instead of the shopping bag. "What the hell are those?" Lester shot at me.
"Sunglasses," Steph replied coolly.
Bobby turned his ridiculous face toward her then, presumably spearing her with a questioning look in his eyes, but she could tell through the impenetrably dark lenses of the glasses. "You said 'just the essentials.' How are these," he gestured dramatically to his face, "essential?"
If she could have quirked an eyebrow at him, she would have. This was the perfect opportunity for such a subtle show of ridicule, but alas, she'd never mastered the skill. "Well, you said that Ranger's eyes are overly sensitive to light at the moment, and I really do want to get him out of that hospital room, so I found the darkest pair of sunglasses the store had to counteract the harmful light of day."
"He's never gonna agree to put them on his face, Beautiful," Lester chuckled, shaking his head. "He's too vain for that."
He had a point.
"If I know my husband," Steph said imperiously, pausing to take a sip of my yet untouched Berocca. "And I do. He's dying to break free of his pseudo-prison. This is his ticket to a little bit of freedom. And sure, it may make him look a little-"
"Repugnant?" Bobby cut in, eyebrows jutting up above the top of the glasses just enough to show he was joking.
She crossed her arms over her chest. "I was going to say a little like a dork," she said evenly. "But he'll do it for me."
A loaded silence filled the vehicle as they all acknowledged to themselves that while it was true the Ricardo Carlos Manoso, under normal circumstances, would do anything for his wife, that these were not normal circumstances. If their short visit yesterday hadn't shaken loose his memories overnight, then Steph would still be as good as a stranger to him when she walked into his room this morning. Ranger didn't do anything for just anyone, especially if it messed with his reputation. And there was no doubt about it, these glasses could definitely cause some damage.
"I bought a pair that was more his style as well," she finally said, feeling the need to fill the air so that it didn't feel quite so heavy as it settled on her skin. "They're not as dark, though."
Lester modelled the second pair of sunglasses on the short walk from the parking complex to the hospital, Bobby still wearing the clunkier shades. They acted like they were arrogant celebrities, pointing finger guns and clicking their tongues at passers-by. Even when they'd entered the building, they refused to remove them, instead striding confidently into Ranger's room with them still on their faces.
Steph paused in the hall to collect herself before entering, sudden nerves gripping her as she remembered that, although this was her husband she was about to see, he likely didn't know she was his wife. In fact, from the reports Bobby and the doctors had given yesterday, he wasn't even aware that he had a wife. The thought caused a wave of grief to wash over her, but it evaporated the second Ranger's booming laughter erupted through the doorway. That sound could scare away all her fear and doubts in an instant. It poured hope into her soul and gave her the courage to enter and face his unrecognising gaze.
"What the hell have you got on your face?" Ranger was demanding, sitting up in bed with a half-eaten tray of breakfast beside him. "Did you hit your head overnight and lose your fashion sense?"
Lester and Bobby beamed and struck a pose.
"They're actually for you," Steph said, announcing her presence, though even in his compromised state she doubted her entry had gone unnoticed by Ranger. He'd always been able to sense when she was near, just as she had with him. The thought made her wonder, as she took in the fresh bandage wrapped around Ranger's head, and catalogued the same cuts and bruises she'd counted up the previous day, if he felt the tingle now. "I thought we'd take a little excursion, but I'm told your eyes can't handle what most consider adequate lighting levels, so I brought you a shield to aid in your defence."
Ranger's lips quirked just a little. "You expect me to wear those?" he questioned, pointing at the black box obscuring half of Bobby's face. "In public?"
Steph shrugged, expanding her examination of his body to note that he was dressed in proper clothes today. Yesterday, he'd been in a pair of ratty, cut-off sweats and an old army tee that had definitely see better days but was probably super soft and comfortable. Today, he was in a clean and tidy charcoal v-neck, a pair of jeans that were apparently loose enough in the leg to fit over the cast encasing his left foot and roll up to the knee, and a sneaker covering the other foot. It wouldn't take much convincing to get him to go out, even with the butt-ugly glasses.
"I don't expect you to wear them," she said easily, holding out her hand to Lester and Bobby so they could hand over the glasses. Her gaze remained locked on Ranger's, watching for any signs of recognition. "But we're going outside, so you might be more comfortable with them on."
Lester leaned on the end of Ranger bed and sent him the kind of goofy grin he'd been sending his cousin since they were kids. "They might cause comfort to be completely cancelled out, actually," he said contemplatively. "Sure, they'll make your eyes hurt less, but are you gonna be comfortable going out in them?"
"A paradox!" Bobby added gleefully.
Ranger looked like he wanted to whack the pair over their respective heads with the crutches propped against his bedside table, but he chose to exercise restraint. Instead, he swung his bad foot off the bed to join the good one that was already hanging there, and reached for the glasses in Steph's hand. "Where to, Doc?" he questioned, sliding the frames onto his face and obscuring those deep chocolate eyes from her view. It was a loss, so much of his expression came from the eyes, especially when the rest of his face was blank, but she'd deal with it if it meant he was playing along with her plan and allowing her to spend time with him.
And honestly, he kind of pulled them off, the bastard. How did he always manage to look good no matter what he had on? It wasn't fair. This just harkened back to the days when he'd be right beside her when she got pummelled by garbage, but would walk away clean as a whistle, not a scrap on him. It was like his aura repelled anything that looked bad.
"There's a cute little café just down the street," she said, passing him his crutches as he started to stand without them. "And it's just Steph."