Fiction | Short Story

Pinned

“I didn’t even realize the sun had already set,” I said, turning on a light for Herrick. He awoke with a jerk. “Time to eat.”

The first time he met my mom he went right in for the hug, which is a direct line to her heart.

“This one’s a keeper,” she told me. We were mixing dried cherries into a salad, watching Herrick and my dad from the window over the sink. They were constructing a lattice of squash and zucchini slices on the grill, Herrick nodding as my father spoke.

“I think so too,” I said, and I turned away so she wouldn’t see me smile. I could feel her watching the back of my head, and it felt good to be the center of attention.

In my childhood bedroom later that night, Herrick held my wrists behind my back as we made love. We released small moans and gasps and I worried that my parents could hear us. As if reading my thoughts, he placed a hand over my mouth, his middle finger wedged between my teeth. I closed my eyes and fell into the easy rhythm of his body.

When we returned to the city, Herrick kissed me on the forehead and said he needed some time to prepare for classes the next day. I put my hand on his chest and made a sad noise; I wanted more time before we made the transformation back into student and teacher. But eventually I let him go, waving as he disappeared into the subway. Before hailing a cab I ducked into a juice bar and bought myself the first drink on the menu so I’d have something to hold on the ride home.

*

I had taken a cab to our first date, and he’d commented on it.

“If I had money, I’d take taxis too,” he said, smiling to indicate a joke. We sat at a café he’d recommended, drinking thick coffee that tasted like chocolate.

“It’s just a lot more convenient,” I said. My cheeks felt hot. I wanted to ask if they’d put sugar in the coffee but didn’t want to come off sounding stupid.

“Sure. And I bet it’s a lot nicer than the subway,” he said, still grinning. “But I’m so used to the subway now, it almost isn’t worth trying to get rich.” He laughed at his own joke, and I felt obliged to join in.

The café was far from our school, and Herrick leaned back with the confidence of someone who isn’t afraid to be caught. But his nerve was a recent development. I’d been the one to finally take the plunge just after handing in my final assignment a week earlier. I attended his office hours on the last day of the semester, shutting the door to the conference room shared by the adjunct instructors, and asked if he wanted to get a coffee sometime. There’s so much power to be gained in making those first few moves, and if you aren’t careful, you can lose it all over the course of a weekend.

In those early days, my eyes still stung from the breakdown that had spanned the previous summer. I’d quit my job and ignored my friends and deleted every dating app, staying inside my apartment with the curtains shut to bake and talk to my mom for hours each day over the phone.

“I think it’s marvelous, Ethan,” she said. I had just told her I planned to go to culinary school and I heard panic in her voice. “I think it’s marvelous that you finally know what you want to do.”

“Thank you,” I said. I was scrolling through recipe blogs on my laptop while we talked. “That means a lot to me.”

I wasn’t sure returning to school was the right fit until I met Herrick. I was uneasy in class, afraid to respond to questions I knew the answers to, but I was happiest when we cooked together, just the two of us. He spoke most freely when he was in the kitchen, and I listened most easily when he was in a good mood. He was only three years older and had graduated from culinary school just two years earlier—“thank God for financial aid,” he said one day, watching me pay full price for next semester’s credits online—but he spoke with the assurance of someone who had been born under a lectern. Once, he had me stand just inside the kitchen of his apartment, leaning against the doorway across from the stove, so he could watch me while he cooked.

“When I look at you, I think my brain autocorrects,” he said, winking at me over a sizzling pan. “It makes me want to produce food you’d enjoy, and that makes me a better chef. Stand there so I can test my hypothesis.”

I thought it was one of the nicest things anyone had ever said to me, so I told my mom about it the next day. When I finished, I could hear her touch her hand to her chest through the phone.

“That’s so sweet I could die,” she said, exhaling on both ends of the sentence. I smiled and nodded into thin air.

I told Herrick about her reaction a few days later.

He stirred his chimichurri and tasted it. “It’s nice that you have that kind of relationship with your mother,” he said.

I nodded. “It’s special. Are you and your mom close?”

He smiled weakly and looked away for a few moments. When he spoke, it sounded as if he were reading off of a notecard.

“My mother is the type of person who, when she’s hungry, thinks everyone else must be hungry, and when she’s not hungry, can’t imagine how anyone else could be hungry.”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

He shrugged. “We’re all stuck with one thing or another.”

I’d been the one brave enough to raise the topic of intimacy too. It was barely a month into our relationship, and we were lying on top of each other in my bed. He was cupping my head in his hands and staring at me, and I turned my head to the side to break eye contact.

“You can hold me tighter if you want,” I said, closing my eyes. I felt myself blush. “Or put your hands around my neck, even. If that’s something you’re into.”

I heard him laugh and my chest tightened.

“It sounds like it might be something you’re into,” he said. I laughed too, but it hurt to hear.

That first time was the best it ever was. He took off his shirt—the same one he’d worn in front of class that afternoon—and used it to tie my left wrist to the night table. With his undershirt he secured my right wrist to the back leg of the bed frame. I was facedown, my mouth and nose sandwiched between two pillows. He placed one hand on the wall over the bed to steady himself and one hand on my lower back, forcing me into a curve. I was pushed deeper and deeper into the darkness of my bed, my mouth greedy to eat the sheets.

We started to make this a routine. On his own volition he began stuffing my own socks into my mouth. I ordered eye masks with adjustable straps online. Once, a few weeks into our newfound intimacy, I suggested that we switch positions.

“Just don’t gag me,” he said, frozen in a push-up position as he spoke. “My nose is stuffed up and I’m afraid I’ll die.”

I tied his arms back and I felt his entire body tighten in response. After less than a minute, he asked that I untie him.

“This isn’t going to work for me,” he said, gulping for air. “I’m sorry. I don’t think it feels the same for me as it does for you.”

*

I asked for his feedback every time I cooked, and he offered it candidly. When I asked him to taste a lamb tajine I made from a Cook’s Illustrated recipe—the first big dinner I’d cooked for us—he made a face, his nostrils pulling upward as his eyelids came together.

“It’s fine,” he said, touching the rim of my water glass to his lips, “but it lacks heart.”

This wasn’t the first time he’d said this, so for breakfast the following morning, I tried to add heart. I offered him a slice of frittata, the red from the bell pepper bleeding onto the plate.

“It lacks oomph.” He ate it in three bites. “I want something that takes risks. You need to put some skin in the game.”

I started to ask for feedback so often that he tried to institute a rule: the shoptalk stopped when we entered our apartments.

“I get paid to answer these questions from my students all day,” he said, rubbing his brow. “And you pay tuition to learn from better teachers than me.”

But I stopped following the rule after less than a week, asking for feedback more freely and urgently than I had before. He didn’t ask for my feedback in return, but I felt it was fair for me to offer it anyway.

“This is interesting, but not necessarily something I’d want again,” I said. We were eating the leftovers of a curry he’d made the previous night, dipping our spoons straight into the Tupperware. “It’s a little overwhelming.”

“What’s overwhelming about it?” he asked, pausing halfway through uncorking a bottle of wine.

“A ton of cardamom.” I fished out a pod to show him. “I’m not a huge fan of cardamom.”

“All the more reason to use it!” He pointed at me as though he’d solved some great mystery. “That’d be a good way to push yourself—building a whole menu around ingredients you don’t like.”

The next week, when he came over for dinner after work, he brought a durian with him. He dropped it unceremoniously onto my counter and waved a hand as if to say, And away we go.

“You know I hate durians,” I said, unhappy that I was being welcomed with a surprise confrontation.

“I bought it at the market on Fulton.” I hadn’t seen him so energetic in a long time. “Isn’t it beautiful?”

“I’m not cooking with it,” I said. “They make me gag.”

“It’s good practice. And it’s delicious.”

He peeled his hand off the durian and wrapped his fingers around my wrist, pressing my arm up against the wall behind me.

“It’s good to do things that make us uncomfortable,” he said, holding the durian up to my nose. “It’s healthy.”

I let the durian slowly fester in my fridge for a week before finally getting up in the middle of the night to throw it away in recycled shopping bags.

He didn’t ask for my feedback in return, but I felt it was fair for me to offer it anyway.

We hit our six-month anniversary and he met my parents. I requested that we spend five nights a week together, at least. He began teaching a new class that consumed most of his time, so I volunteered to meet him at his apartment when he got off work, taking cabs between our neighborhoods at odd hours.

I wanted his feedback more than ever, but it was becoming less helpful. He still refused to give me the specific suggestions I craved—less of this, more of that—and instead offered abstract advice aimed at bolstering my adventurous side. He caught me once using a prepackaged spice mix on a piece of salmon and folded his arms in response.

“People like how it tastes, so I’m going to keep using it.” I blurted it out before he had a chance to comment. I was squeezing the plastic spice bottle so hard that it began to crush inward. “There’s nothing wrong with doing something that everyone else is doing.”

“Just because it’s easier doesn’t mean it’s better.” He took the tube from my hand and read the label. “In fact, it usually means the opposite. We should always strive to be better.”

“Sure. But it’s also fine as it is. It’s popular for a reason.”

“I just think you know why you’re going to culinary school, and this isn’t it.”

My mom called after finals to ask how they went. After my previous two semesters, I’d phoned her as soon as my grades came in to give her the good news. The first semester was reaffirming—my grades were stellar. The second semester was solidly above average. Now, they were teetering on bad.

“Still a culinary rock star?” she asked. I heard my dad saying something to her in a concerned voice. My mom shushed him.

“Still rocking,” I said. “Forever kicking educational ass.”

“I’m so proud of you,” she said. “I know the last couple years weren’t easy for you, but it sounds like you’re really hitting your stride.” I let her talk for as long as she wanted.

*

Herrick and I almost made it a year before we started fighting every day. I would text him “I love you” first thing in the morning, and by noon I’d have sent and received a dozen messages outlining why one of us was hurt and how the other person was refusing to acknowledge it. Most of our fights were carryovers from the previous night, when I would complain about some looming assignment or overdue errand causing me stress and Herrick would respond too matter-of-factly, often claiming that life wasn’t about to get any easier for me than it was right now.

“I need a vacation,” I said one night after a disastrous exam. I was on my back, my palms pressed up against my eyes. “I need a break. It’s been nonstop.”

“You get breaks,” Herrick said. “We’re on a semester schedule. And it’s not going to get any easier if you want to work in a kitchen one day, trust me.” I felt the mattress shift as he sat up in bed. “Maybe you just need more friends. I lean on my friends for the things I don’t want to burden you with. I try to spread out the misery.” He separated his middle and ring fingers into a V to illustrate his point.

“We should be able to be there for each other,” I said. I felt tears in my eyes. “I would do it for you.”

“I know. I would do it for you too,” he said. “I am doing it for you. But I wouldn’t ask you to do it for me. That’s the difference.”

Our one-year anniversary was at a Michelin-starred restaurant I’d wanted to visit for ages. I saw from the way he read the bill that Herrick couldn’t really afford his half, and when I offered to pay in full, he got quiet for the rest of the evening, his eyes half-closed as we walked home. In response, I let out a labored sigh.

“What’s wrong?” he said, staring forward as we walked.

“Honestly? I wish you were happier when you were with me.”

Herrick turned and put a hand to my cheek.

“How can you not know how happy I am? I’m so happy to be with you.”

He held me, and I could feel the anger from my cheeks ricochet off his neck into my eyes.

“But I also have to look out for myself,” he said, still pressing me close. At the next crosswalk, he decided we should take the night to ourselves, since he had to work early that next morning and always slept worse in a shared bed.

We saw less and less of each other over the next few weeks. At first it was torture to go half a day before receiving a text, but by the end of the second week, I found that air more fully filled my lungs. I slept with an ease I hadn’t experienced in years and spent nights catching up on TV shows I’d abandoned with careless apathy a year earlier.

Herrick, I assumed, felt similarly. He barely communicated while we were apart, and when we did meet up for quick lunches or drinks, he was distant and quiet. But before the end of the third week, he called—an action I had only ever been the one to initiate—and when I picked up the phone, I could hear concern in his voice.

“I do miss you,” he said, as though it surprised him to admit it. “I do.”

“I miss you too,” I said, staring at my muted TV and processing none of its images. “I get it.”

“I’ll be more thoughtful. I’ll think more before I speak. And I would be happy to give you feedback. I mean it. It’s not a bother.”

“It’s okay.”

“No, really. Tell me what you want to cook and we’ll cook it together. I can go out now and get the ingredients, if you want to head over.”

I paused for a moment and felt my breathing resume its familiar struggle.

“Would you come over here instead?” I asked, sure that he would not. He never wanted to make the journey to my apartment. “I don’t feel like going out.”

There was a second pause, and I knew Herrick was puzzling out a diplomatic way to say no. But against all odds, he cleared his throat and agreed.

“That’s fine.” I heard some anger and silently cursed myself. By asking him to do this favor, I had invited him to drop his apologetic persona too quickly. “I’ll pack a bag and jump on the subway in ten,” he said.

“I am doing it for you. But I wouldn’t ask you to do it for me. That’s the difference.”

I wished for one more night alone, or at least one night of temporary reconciliation. My breathing grew even harder and I sat on my kitchen counter, one hand placed over the wrist of the other to check my pulse. I resolved to use his travel time to get some of my thoughts down on paper so I would be more prepared to speak once he arrived. I started by listing how my life had improved in the past few weeks, and by the fifth item I decided that it would be best to be candid. I underlined the phrase “past the beginning of the end” twice in my notebook and then sat beside the door buzzer so I could let him in as soon as he arrived.

He was late by over an hour. I was standing in front of my bedroom mirror debating whether or not to change into pajamas when the nurse called. I left my apartment so quickly that I didn’t realize until I was at the hospital that I was wearing shoes without socks. The backs of my heels were bleeding.

“It happened coming off the Henry Hudson.” A woman in a neon-yellow jacket was talking to me outside a room I wasn’t allowed to enter. “Three cars involved. He was in a taxi hit by the first car, and they spun into the third.”

“Is anyone dead?” I asked. The door briefly opened and I tried to look inside, but I couldn’t see past the nurses.

“Oh, yes.” The woman looked at her watch. “Yes, sir.”

Herrick was in surgery for six hours, and then they moved him to a recovery room. He shared the room with an older Portuguese man who cried when his curtain was closed, and when I stood outside waiting to be ushered inside, the man begged me to open his curtain further. I stared into the middle distance, pretending I couldn’t hear him, until the nurse waved me in.

The doctor told me Herrick was very lucky. I nodded and said, “That’s good.” He explained that, in addition to some bruising and cuts, Herrick had a broken shoulder on his left side, a sprained wrist on his right, a broken leg, four broken ribs, and a jaw that had been wired shut. I followed along with my pointer finger, counting three casts, one sling, and a web of metal hugging the lower half of his head.

“Is he in pain?” I asked, my eyes on Herrick’s inflating chest.

“Yes,” he said. “I mean, he’s going to be in pain.”

When Herrick woke up, he stared at me for a long time and blinked in even, regular beats. I placed my fingertips gingerly atop the cast on his wrist, and he made a muffled noise; I couldn’t distinguish it as good or bad. I sat to the side while the doctor told him that he had been in an accident and that he was going to be alright. He spent a long time listing everything that was wrong and what was required for him to recover.

“He’ll need to be completely off his feet for several weeks until the leg heals.” The doctor was looking at me now. “Keep him elevated to avoid coughing. It’ll hurt the ribs.”

The worst of it happened to his jaw, it seemed. A long section of the surgery had been several successive attempts to set it back into place.

“He must have struck the seat in front of him with his chin. I try to avoid getting too invasive with jaws if I can help it, but it wasn’t stable enough for a compression plate. We inserted three pins on each side to help hold it in place. They have to stay in for at least six weeks—possibly longer, but we’ll check after six.”

I took notes on my phone while he spoke. When the doctor left, I placed my phone into Herrick’s good hand so he could type me messages.

“I love you,” he wrote. Then, “Call a hearse.” My phone dropped into his lap. He’d fallen back asleep.

I found his phone, miraculously undamaged, in the plastic bag containing his clothes, shoes, and wallet. I added his mother’s number to my contacts. She cried almost immediately, big wet-sounding sobs, and thanked God again and again that I was there.

“He needs you—he needs love more than anything right now,” she said. She inhaled for a very long time. “Love and time truly are the best medicines we have.”

She said she would tell Herrick’s father for me and that they would let me know when they were planning to come down. “We have to meet with the lawyer tomorrow about the foreclosure—that’s just not something that can be moved, I’m sorry. We’re basically an afternoon away from living out of our car. But mama bears always find a way. The second it’s settled, we’re heading down.” She called me back the next day to ask how he was and to thank me again but didn’t mention when they planned to visit.

My mother asked a lot more questions, particularly about the doctors.

“Are they any good? Did you look them up? Some of these hospitals have doctors who have been there for four or five decades who need to be forcibly retired. You never want to end up with one of those. Get someone young.”

“The doctor is good. He’s been very patient explaining things to us. He says Herrick is recovering well.”

“He’s going to need you to ask questions for him. He can’t talk for himself.”

“I know that. I’m doing that.”

“Do you want me to come down and ask the doctor some questions? I could come down tomorrow if you needed me to.”

“No, we’re doing okay. It’s being taken care of.”

He was released for home care five days later. We took a cab to my building; the driver helped me lift him into the wheelchair and held the front door open so I could push him inside. The elevator was a prewar construction that was just big enough to fit the chair alone, so I pushed him inside, hit the button, and then ran up the stairs to meet him on my floor.

“Good exercise,” I said, pulling him backward before the elevator doors shut.

*

The next morning, I carried home four tote bags’ worth of pureed, mashed, gelatinous, and liquid foods from the grocery store and showed him each item one by one. At first, Herrick refused to eat anything—his eyes narrowed with animus each time a meal was proposed. But eventually he succumbed to hunger, his eyes trained on the straw I held between the gap in his teeth.

The school was very understanding. I put Herrick’s department head on speakerphone and gave Herrick a thumbs-up as she told him to take as long as he needed. She asked that I leave the room, and from around the corner I listened to her explain to Herrick that instructor-student relationships are generally not condoned, and that an official note had been made on his performance file by the department, but that the larger discussion could certainly wait until he was feeling better. My own academic advisor followed up the next day with an email encouraging me to treat my next several assignments as optional, if need be.

“That’s really nice of them,” I told Herrick after showing him the message.

He turned his phone faceup with his fingers and typed out: “Afraid of lawsuit?”

“Still,” I said, rereading the email, “it’s something to be grateful for.”

Herrick spent most of the first week watching television when he was awake, making small disapproving noises each time I changed the channel. I sat on the couch, my right foot resting on the edge of his wheelchair’s left wheel, grinding pain medication in my mortar and pestle.

“Does it taste bad?” It was his sixth time pausing to drink mashed pills mixed with orange juice, his brow furrowed into a triangle.

“Ennnnnnnnrrrm,” Herrick said.

“I’m sorry,” I said. I put the straw back into position. “Let’s just power through this glass.”

On the morning of the sixth day of home care, I woke up thinking about recipes. I sat on the toilet reading from my phone for nearly an hour, ignoring texts from my mom. In the early afternoon I pushed Herrick from his spot in the living room to sit in the entrance to the kitchen. I scooted around his chair and began to gather ingredients.

“I’m going to try that branzino today.” I sounded like a television chef narrating my steps and found it oddly soothing. I opened drawers and cupboards with gusto. “Let’s see if I can get this cast-iron pan to work for me this time.”

Herrick didn’t appreciate the change of scenery and let me know it. I ignored the grunts and foot tapping; when my phone buzzed, it was a text from Herrick that simply read, “I’m not interested.” I brought him back to the living room to watch the street from the window. I could tell from the slump in his shoulders that he’d dozed off.

“I’ll see you at dinner,” I said, turning my phone on silent.

Alone in the kitchen, I kept up my narration and found it no less soothing without an audience. Directions instantly felt easier when vocalized, and time slipped by so quickly that I briefly wondered if the electricity had gone out when I finally returned to the living room.

“I didn’t even realize the sun had already set,” I said, turning on a light for Herrick. He awoke with a jerk. “Time to eat.”

Herrick watched as I prepared a plate for myself, taking time to wipe the edges clean and snap a picture, before spooning the remaining fish and vegetables straight from the pans into a blender. I heard him whine over the noise of the machine but didn’t turn to face him until the mixture was poured into a glass with a straw.

Like a good chef, I tasted it first. It was vile; everything good about the meal had been stripped clean by the blades, leaving a seawater-and-calcium slurry in its wake. Nevertheless, I knew Herrick’s palate was more nuanced than my own. He could often find something to celebrate about dishes I found revolting.

“Now be honest,” I said, bending over and placing the straw in his mouth. He tried to spit it out, but I held it in place. He waited a long time before finally taking a taste. I watched, mesmerized, as a thick cylinder of beige moved slowly up the straw and past his lips. He made a noise and shook in his chair.

“Missing something?” I asked.

The remaining store-bought purée and pastes sat unused in my pantry. In the mornings we ate yogurt or Cream of Wheat before I pushed Herrick to his spot by the window or the TV. My afternoons were filled with trips to markets, trips to cookware stores, hours in the kitchen. I worked hard on new dishes to present to Herrick for dinner each night after a minute in the blender, when I would kneel by his wheelchair and ask for this feedback.

“I’m embarrassed to say I’ve never tried a flambé,” I said one evening, a thin line of gruel running down his cheek. Moments earlier it had been a beautiful meal. Tenderloin, sherry, artichokes. My first go at roasted fennel. A delight! Now it was simply gray with black spots.

“Errrnnnnn.”

I grinned, mouth open, as the glass slowly grew lighter in my hand.

But eventually he succumbed to hunger, his eyes trained on the straw I held between the gap in his teeth.

Sometimes his friends or coworkers would come over to visit, and I’d update them on his progress, my hand on his shoulder. But as soon as they left, I would be back in the kitchen. By the fourth week I was returning to early morning classes as well. Instructors noted my improvement, and at first I thought they were being kind out of pity. But eventually I came to recognize the truth in their words—I was improving. My food had never tasted better. I was attempting dishes I had always been afraid to try wholeheartedly: poached fish, puff pastries, char siu. Herrick was tasked with trying them all once they’d been pulverized, hungry enough for a taste of any dinner by the time I was ready for his participation. For the first few nights, I would dutifully hand him his phone so he could type notes. But I found messages like “This is torture” as unhelpful as “It lacks heart,” and within a couple days I stored his phone on top of the fridge for safekeeping.

Herrick could hardly stay up past eight, so I had nights to myself. I settled him onto my bed, a mound of pillows keeping him elevated, and then retreated to the couch, which doubled at night as my temporary mattress. Glass of wine in hand, I read from the box of notebooks and binders I’d brought over from his apartment. I pored over his lesson plans, homemade recipes, restaurant reviews, administrative paperwork, even class notes from his own days as a culinary student. I searched for and found his lesson plan from the first day of the class where we met. In the margins of the paper, I found a reminder scrawled in his brutish longhand: “Smile. Don’t forget to give compliments.”

*

I cooked as much as I could before six weeks passed, but on the morning that Herrick was due to return to the hospital for his follow-up, I rose from the couch wishing I had accomplished more. I didn’t have time to prepare him a proper meal before we left, so I broke the seal on a jar of store-brand applesauce I’d bought that first week and watched him slurp it up without stopping to breathe.

“I guess they can’t all be gourmet,” I said. He emptied the cup, and I opened a second jar of sauce and dumped it in. “I can’t even imagine how excited you must be to get those pins removed.” Herrick’s fingers pumped open and close as he drank, turning his palms red.

I sat in a waiting room with no windows and a vending machine that sold shoelaces and toothpaste next to gum and candy. I scrolled slowly on my phone, words washing together; in my jeans pockets, Herrick’s phone lay dormant. When a nurse called me in to join the doctor, my body tensed with the anticipation of a confrontation. But a miracle happened: I walked into the room and found Herrick flat on his back in the bed, his casts and braces untouched, his jaw still wired shut.

“We’re keeping the pins in his jaw for two more weeks,” the doctor said. I was so happy I couldn’t find the words to respond, and without realizing it I must have teared up, because the doctor put a hand on my shoulder.

“You should be proud,” he said, attempting to smile but failing to maintain eye contact. “You’re taking great care of him. I’m sure he appreciates it.” I looked over at Herrick to gauge his reaction. He was still, eyes closed, fingers clenched around the seams of his hospital gown.

Back home at my apartment, I parked Herrick in front of the TV and got to work in the kitchen preparing that night’s meal. I pulled the neck of my apron over my head but froze as the straps settled over my shoulders. The sensation of the doctor’s hand lingered from earlier in the day; I pulled down harder on the strings, digging the cloth into my skin. I stood like that for a long time, eyes closed, listening to the sounds of a reality show echoing from the other end of the apartment.

“This isn’t the first time we’ve seen a display like this,” the host said. A crowd laughed in response, a lone audience member hollering some unintelligible interjection. “But is it good enough to get you to the finals? That’s the question.”

I held that position for so long that I left parallel marks in my shoulders, red darkening to maroon in the center. By the next commercial break, I had resolved to cook something new. I returned to the living room and sat on the couch with my laptop, my hand periodically rubbing Herrick’s back. I looked up purées and mashes that feature prominently in different cuisines and thought about ways to reverse engineer a complete meal that could maintain its integrity through a straw. Occasionally, I leaned forward and showed Herrick what was on my screen, asking for his thoughts. He stared forward, letting television noise and glare wash over him.

The first attempt was rough, but in solidarity I ate it right alongside Herrick, wielding a spoon in place of a straw.

“Not the greatest work I’ve ever done,” I said, taking turns eating and offering him tastes from his cup. He offered no indication that he noticed any difference. “I’m seeing obvious areas for improvement.”

The next night’s meal was better, and the meal after that, and the meal after that. I came home at lunchtime on a Tuesday and walked into the bedroom holding a durian in a clear plastic bag. Herrick woke up from his nap and stared, confused, trying to decipher the shape I was presenting him.

“We’re having a special dessert tonight,” I said, laughing. “And yes, I’m eating it too.”

Herrick stayed up a little later than usual, the two of us sharing durian mousse in the living room. He had almost finished his full serving of dinner, and I watched with satisfaction as he pulled mousse up the straw with determination. When we were stuffed, I pulled out one of his notebooks and flipped through it, asking him questions as I read out loud. He rarely answered, but he followed along with his eyes. In one lesson plan, there was a note made in red pen on top of prepared remarks written in blue.

“Is this my name?” I asked, holding the notebook out for him to see. Herrick looked and nodded.

“‘Ethan—talk to afterward.’” I stared at it for a few moments. “Were you trying to work up the nerve to ask me out or something?”

Herrick sat motionless for a while, eyes open, breath held. Finally, he nodded twice in quick succession. I leaned over and kissed his forehead.

“I can’t believe you waited so long,” I said, then laughed. “Waited for me to ask you, in fact!”

If the first six weeks went quickly, these two flew by. I returned to the windowless waiting room, able to breathe much easier than last time. When the nurse called me in, I walked with urgency. It was exactly as I’d pictured it: Herrick was on his back, leaning forward. His eyes moved excitedly, his newly-freed hand touching the side of his cheeks. He was moving his jaw slowly up and down as the doctor reviewed X-rays and gave instructions.

“The wrist is healing well—just a brace for the next few weeks, the cast can stay off—but the shoulder will take a while. Shoulders are always tricky. Definitely minimize any movement there for the time being. Ribs are healing; keep icing them. Be gentle. I was just telling Herrick that the jaw is looking much better. I was right to keep the pins in a little longer after all. Still no heavy chewing for at least two weeks, but he can start with something soft tonight. I’m leaving him with some exercises to do. This means daily. This is going to help prevent it from locking up, so stick with them.”

There was much more, but this time I didn’t take notes on my phone. I watched Herrick acknowledge the doctor’s advice and allow himself to be poked and probed, plastic strips yanked between his teeth to test his bite. I watched him, timid at first, test his abilities, his tongue just barely poking out beyond his lips before retreating inside. He raised it to touch the bottom of his top teeth and then the top of his bottom teeth. He tried to open his mouth as wide as he could and winced three-fourths of the way through, slowly lowering it back into position.

“We’ll see you back in another two weeks. Oh, let me see about the brace before you leave. One sec.” The doctor left the room to follow after his nurse, and Herrick and I were left alone. I turned to face him, hands held in front of me. He continued to test his face, but his eyes were on me. I stared back, a genuine smile stuck on my face, unsure of what to say. He ended up going first.

“Hello, Ethan,” he said, his voice cracking from nonuse.

“Hi, hon,” I said. “How are you feeling?”

He cleared his throat for a long time and then leaned his head back to rest against the top of the hospital bed.

“Did you enjoy it?” he asked, each word exiting more forcefully than the last. He gave a short cough and winced, gently bracing his ribs.

The room suddenly felt very cold, and I shivered. I thought I heard the doctor walking back down the hall; I considered using his return as an excuse to back up from the bedside. But the footsteps disappeared after a moment.

I turned back to Herrick. “Did I enjoy what?”

He cleared his throat once more into his fist and then smiled, letting his fingers splay out to enjoy their first unencumbered stretch in weeks. I realized I was tensing my jaw.

“Did you enjoy your time off?” he asked.