Page 73 of The Goalie in Room 1

“Now that I have your attention…when do you decorate for Christmas? Are you one of those day-before peeps?”

“I don’t.”

“Excuse me? What do you mean, ‘I don’t?’”

“Exactly that. I don’t decorate.”

“You don’t have a Christmas tree?” Cash asked, now standing at the end of the sectional, his crutches tucked beneath his arms. He stared at me before his gaze moved to the wall of glass, like a tree might materialize in front of the Pacific if he looked hard enough.

“No.”

“Where is it?”

“I don’t have one.”

His head whipped around. “At all?”

“That’s generally what ‘I don’t have one’ means,” I said, laughter huffing out my nose.

If his eyes got any bigger, I didn’t know that they would remain in his head. He paced away, so I picked up the tablet, swiping the screen to reopen the MRI I’d been studying. A few minutes later, the sound of his crutches returned, growing louder as he approached.

“What about decorations?”

“No.”

“Lights?”

“No,” I repeated, emphasizing the negative.

“Stockings?”

I lowered the tablet.

“Are you taking inventory?”

“I’m trying to figure out what the fuck is wrong with you.”

I laughed and went back to the patient notes on my screen. “I work,” I said with a shrug.

He threw his arms in the air, his left crutch dropping to the floor. “So does everybody else!” he cried.

“Not my hours.” I got up and made my way toward him, snatching the crutch from the floor.

Cash grabbed the crutch from me and made a sound that told me exactly what he thought of that answer.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“That definitely wasn’t nothing.”

“That was me deciding that calling your life depressing would hurt your feelings.”

“My feelings are remarkably resilient.”

“Oh good. I’m glad to hear it. Your. Life. Is. Depressing.”

I smiled.