The Good Patient by Alex Stone

Author:Alex Stone [Stone, Alex]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Boldwood Books
Published: 2023-03-21T16:00:00+00:00

‘That lasagne was amazing,’ Josh said as I cleared the plates.

‘I’m glad you enjoyed it,’ I grinned at him. Cooking with a broken wrist hadn’t been easy, but it was worth it. ‘I hope you saved room for dessert.’

‘Absolutely!’ Josh replied, cranking his neck to watch as I pulled a tray from the oven and cut two generous sized pieces of brownie. I slid them onto plates and added a scoop of vanilla ice cream to each.

‘Is that your homemade chocolate brownie?’ Josh asked, licking his lips.

‘Sadly no, I couldn’t manage it with my wrist, but next time I’ll make it myself.’ I set the plates down on the table as I sat back down opposite Josh.

He grinned at me. ‘That would be awesome, Lauren. You haven’t baked in ages.’ He grabbed his spoon and shoved a piece of brownie into his mouth. ‘Hmm,’ he murmured closing his eyes. ‘Not quite as good as yours, but still delicious.’

I beamed with pride as I scooped a piece of brownie onto my spoon. I was right. This is what we needed. We could be like we used to be. I just had to remind Josh what that was like.

‘See what you can do when you’re not wasting your time playing around with all that social media rubbish.’

I froze.

Social media rubbish.

That’s all it was to him. Even now. Even when I had proved what it could be.

‘But I’m doing well with it, Josh.’

Josh scoffed as he took another bite of brownie. ‘It’s a fad. You’ve been lucky so far. That’s all.’

I set my spoon back on my plate, no longer hungry.

‘I could get a proper job,’ I said quietly. I loved what I did. Running my own business. Building something from nothing. But Josh was right; it was risk. There was no certainty in it for the long term. My clients could easily decide to replace me with an in-house team, or the smaller ones might just learn from watching what I had been doing and replicate it themselves.

There was no pension. No holiday pay or sick leave. I was out on my own with no safety net.

And yet, there was a reason why I had started it.

‘Y-yeah, maybe,’ Josh said. But there was a hesitancy to it.

‘That didn’t sound very convincing.’

Josh lowered his gaze and studied the remainder of his brownie intently.

I drew back. ‘You don’t think I could find a job.’

‘It’s not like you’ve ever actually worked before.’

‘I work every day.’

He arched an eyebrow. ‘It’s not really the same thing though, is it?’

‘I told you I should have got a job straight after uni.’

Josh shook his head. ‘And I told you, you didn’t need to.’ He reached across the table and rested his hand on top of mine. ‘You still don’t.’ My eyes met his and he smiled. ‘Like I told you back then, I want to take care of you, Lauren. That hasn’t changed.’

I squeezed his hand. ‘It hasn’t?’

Josh shook his head. ‘You just need to let me.’

I nodded slowly. Perhaps he was right.

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