Chapter Two
She looked up in surprise when her telephone rang, reaching for the remote to pause the movie that she was watching. "Hello?' she asked after she had pressed the talk button, reaching for the glass of water in front of her.
"I was hoping that you would be at home," Alexx said in a warm voice on the other end. "I need a favor. You know that lasagna that you made when my daughter had her appendix taken out?"
Calleigh smiled. "You mean, the infamous Duquense lasagna receipe. I remember it well. I make it every month or so, and before you ask, no."
"No?"
"No. It's a secret family receipe. I can't give it to you. I'm sworn to secrecy." She paused. "Why do you need it?"
"I've been cooking for Tim. He can't do much with only one hand, and whenever he comes back from his physical therapy sessions, he doesn't have the energy to do anything but throw something in the oven. I've kept his fridge and freezer stocked up pretty good, but I bring him something new every weekend, and I'm all out of ideas. That's why I wanted your lasagna receipe. I figured that he would enjoy it. But, if you don't want to..."
She sat up a little straighter, wondering why she took that as such an insult. "Don't you dare. It's just...for one thing, I don't even have the receipe written down. No one does. We just make it. And for another, I would be offending my mother and my grandmother if I gave it to you. It's not that I don't care."
"Fine. You make the lasagna and take it over there for him, then. I'm sure he'd like to see a friendly face besides me for once. He needs something to eat, and he needs someone to visit him every now and then. Now, don't get me wrong, honey, I know that everyone's busy at the lab, but do you know that you're the only one that hasn't phoned him or dropped by for a visit?"
Calleigh blanched slightly when she realized that her friend was telling the truth. She hadn't seen him since the day that he had woken up in the hospital. It had been only an hour into their shift when they had gotten the call from one of the nurses in the Intensive Care Unit, no doubt pleased that she wouldn't have to deal with the group for awhile. They had gone down, as a group, later that afternoon. After spending so much time at his bedside, waiting for him to wake up, it became an awfully awkward moment for her. She had smiled and welcomed him back to the land of the living, before stepping back. Her reaction hadn't been like everyone else's. Alexx had given him a kiss on the cheek and had tried to smooth his unruly hair. Horatio had given him a friendly cuff on his right shoulder, and Eric had been so relieved that a simple handshake just wouldn't do. They had all chatted happily with him, all except for her. They had moved him down to a regular room the next day, and then discharged him later that night. Everyone had gone to see him at one point or another, visiting him at home, but she had feigned a busy schedule to stop from going.
"I...I know. I've just had a lot to do. You know what it's like, Alexx. I have to catch up on everything on the weekends, and more often than not, I'm waiting for the drier to be finished with my clothes."
"Will you do it, honey?" Alexx asked, her voice compassionate.
"I don't even know where he lives," she told her weakly, admitting defeat. It looked like she didn't have any more excuses.
Squeeze and release. Lift her arm up two inches, hold, and then let it down. Those words were beginning to irritate him. It wasn't just the fact that the movements caused him pain. He was getting used to the pain. It had been a week since he had started physical therapy, and he had to admit, it was no fun. And it was frustrating. He couldn't lift his arm more than a few inches, and whenever he wiggled his fingers, he felt pain shoot up his arm, making him grimace. The throbbing never left. There were many times that he popped some ibuprofin before bed, and woke up a few hours later, only to find out that he had rolled over onto his injured shoulder.
He was angry with himself, he knew that. It was some sort of arrogance that he had carried with him his whole life, that he could do anything that he set his mind to. It had helped him make his way through school with excellent grades, it had brought him to where he was at the moment, but now, there were things that he couldn't do. He had attempted, the night before, to hold something in his left hand. Just a spoon, nothing too heavy. He had been able to hold it for a moment, but then his arm began to shake with the strain, and it clattered back to the table, leaving him angrier than ever. He was glad that no one had been there to see. That would have been too much to handle.
There had been a steady stream of visitors in his condo, most noticably Alexx Woods. She stopped by once a week with enough food to last him until her next visit, simple things that he could pop in the oven or throw on the stove. He had been upset at first that someone had to care for him, independant as he had always been, but he had slowly come to understand that it was her way of showing that she cared. Whenever she commented that he looked like he lost weight, or whenever she brought over what had become his favorite dish of hers, homemade turkey soup, he fought a smile and allowed her to fuss over him. Everyone else had a different approach. Eric had come over one night with a case of beer and enough junk food to last a month to watch a series of football games with him. Horatio called him at least twice a week and caught him up on what was happening, stopping over long enough to barbecue a few steaks and have a few beer. Calleigh, on the other hand...
She had disappeared from the face of the Earth, as far as he was concerned. No calls, no visits...she was the only one that was acting like nothing had happened. Even he couldn't ignore that something had happened, that he had been shot and almost died, but she obviously could. He couldn't fault her for that. They were colleagues, not friends. They had just never had that connection between them. In fact, she made him uncomfortable most of the time. He wasn't sure how to act around her. It was easy to figure out for everyone else. Eric expected the two of them to do the macho "I'm better than you" routines, which was fine with him. Horatio expected him to be the scientific expert, which was fine with him. Calleigh didn't expect anything from him, and he didn't know how to show that. She either wanted him to be nothing, or wanted him to be everything. He could never figure her out.
He raised himself up off the couch when he heard the knock on the front door and groaned as he got to his bare feet, walking on the hardwood floors to answer the timid knock. When he swung the door open, he was surprised to see the slight, short figure of Calleigh Duquense in front of him. "Hi," he said, staring back at her.
As usual, she smiled brightly, shifting the casserole dish that she was holding. "Hey, there. Alexx sent me down here with this for you," she said, lifting the dish as explanation. He moved aside so that she could walk in, and waiting until she was finished kicking off her shoes to follow him to the kitchen. "It's my infamous lasagna. I thinkshe was upset that I wouldn't give her the receipe, so I made it instead. There's plastic wrap under the tin foil, just in case you wanted to freeze it rather than eat it right away," she rattled on, putting the dish down on the counter. "Oh, I see the maid hasn't been here for awhile."
He gave her a one shouldered shrug at her teasing. "I...uh...haven't got around to washing everything up yet," he lied.
He didn't do all that great of a job, because she immediately opened the cabinet under the sink and removed the liquid soap, turning on the hot water. "It won't take me more than ten minutes," she said over the sound of the running water, squeezing in a liberal amount of water. "So...how have you been doing?"
There was that damned half-shrug again. "Okay. I could do without the physical therapy sessions, but I'm managing."
Calleigh turned off the water and began to lay the dirty plates in the sink. "Does it...I know that I shouldn't be asking this, and it's probably the most inappropriate question, but...does it hurt?" She laughed suddenly before she started talking again, not allowing him to answer. "Stupid question, I know. I mean, you were shot, you had surgery...of course it hurts. I don't know what I meant by that."
She was off and running, he thought to himself. Calleigh sounded as if she had drank a lot of coffee in the morning, running off at the mouth like that. "Yeah, it hurts," he finally said, watching her plunge her hands in the hot water without so much as a wince. He turned away and peeled off the foil on the lasagna with one hand, laying it on the counter as he removed the plastic wrap she had put under it. "I can't move it all that much yet, and it hurts when I do. It's almost like having a sprain. That's the closest thing that I can think of." Without asking what temperature, he turned on the light in the oven and then the oven itself, allowing it to preheat. "You don't have to do that, you know."
She looked over her shoulder at him as she was scrubbing out a glass. "It's all right. It's not like I was doing anything special today. I just hope that I wasn't interupting you."
"There's not much you can do when you only have one arm. I've played enough computer solitaire to last me a lifetime, and there's nothing on television."
"In other words, I'm saving you."
"If you want to believe that."
He had convinced her to stay for dinner. How he had done it, she would never know, but she was pretty sure that it went along the lines of him asking her to stay and her agreeing. He had managed, with some difficulty, to make oven-toasted garlic bread one handed when she had made a simple salad to go with their meal. They were both drinking nothing stronger than distilled water as they sat down at the small table in the corner of his kitchen. "Thank you, by the way."
She looked up, blue eyes startled. "What for? I didn't do anything."
"You made me dinner. That's more than I can do at the moment."
A slight smile went across Calleigh's face. "I can't imagine what that's like," she said, using her fork to toy with a piece of lettuce. "It must be so difficult for you, used to do everything with two hands."
Speedle smirked, putting down his fork so that he could pick up his water glass for a sip. "You'd be surprised," he deadpanned, before shaking his head. Even that pulled on his shoulder. "It's not as easy as I thought it would be. I forget sometimes, and reach for something with my left hand. That's when it really hurts. That's when I take the pills."
"What are you taking? Prescription or over the counter?"
He reached for his napkin, mindful to use his right hand. "They gave me some sort of painkillers when I checked out of the hospital, but I try not to take them unless it gets really bad. They can screw with your mind pretty well. Besides, they gave me enough painkillers there to last me a year. I try to stick with aspirin or something similar." He paused when a strange question crossed his mind. "I never thought to ask you before, but...have you ever...you know."
"Been shot?" Her head shook, painfully blonde hair shimmering in the overhead light. "Nope. I shoot the bullets, I don't want to try and dodge them. I've had the usual gun-related injuries. Slide bite and all, but I've never been shot."
The injured criminalist nodded. "Trust me, it's not fun."
Chapter Three
