The Darkest Corner of the Heart (The Brightest Light Book 2)

There’s a small chance I’ve completely lost my mind. Just a tiny one. Because who storms out of a doctor’s appointment like I did this morning? Who can be so blatantly disrespectful?

Ugh. I groan as I scrub the pot until my elbow screams in agony. This stupid grease isn’t coming off, and I’m two seconds away from bursting into tears.

So much for staying optimistic, I know. In my defense, I’ve had a terrible morning, so I think I’m allowed to cut myself some slack.

A meaty hand comes around my shoulders and takes the pot away. “You’re gonna dislocate your shoulder at this rate, kid,” Matt, our cook, teases me as he also grabs my sponge and finishes the job for me.

I let out a deep breath and reposition myself on the stool Monica gave me earlier. My back is killing me, but I’m not complaining. My paycheck will be enough to pay for groceries, and even if I’ll still have to ask Sammy for rent money, at least I’ll contribute in some way. For now, this is all I can do.

It’s not enough, and you know it.

Nope. No. Everything is fine. I’m at work, and I’m all right.

“Here you go.” Matt gives me a gentle smile as he passes me the sponge and the clean pot that is ready for use again. “What’s eatin’ at you tonight? You look like you’ll bite my arm off any second.”

I give him a sheepish smile. Matt has been the cook here for ten years, and he’s an adorable man. Although one wouldn’t necessarily use that word to describe him at first, seeing how he’s as big as a brick wall with a mean scowl that rivals Dr. Grouchy’s. We use his intimidating looks to our advantage when the drunk men around here need to get kicked out.

“This week has been…a week.” And it’s only Tuesday, so go figure.

He knows about my missed audition, so I understand the meaning behind the sad look he gives me. “You might be a small thing, but you’re stronger than all of us combined, kid. I have no doubts your future will be bright.”

With one pat on my shoulder, he goes back to making burgers and sandwiches, but his encouraging words stay with me, making me feel better about today’s fiasco.

I don’t want to recall how immature I was this morning, but it’s difficult not to when I’ve embarrassed myself in front of Dr. Simmons more times than I can count. There’s only so much my poor ego can take.

The dating app still haunts me, and then there’s the mandala too. I still can’t decipher whether he appreciated it or thought it was weird, but I make sure to think about it nonstop for the next hour. Because of course I do.

I can choose to be happy and look at life in an optimistic way as much as I want, but deep down, I know that’s not me. That’s not what I deserve to feel.

“Maddie?”

I look up, meeting Monica’s eyes. “Yes?”

Can she tell I’m on the verge of yet another mental breakdown? Probably. If she notices anything, though, she doesn’t say.

She glances behind her shoulder, her eyes full of suspicion, and my heart rate picks up.

“What’s going on?”

She comes inside the kitchen, shutting the door behind her. “A gentleman came in asking for you,” she says, and I freeze.

“Who?” I try to get a glimpse of said gentleman through the small window separating the kitchen from the bar, but I don’t see any familiar faces. “Did he give you a name?”

“He said his name was James.”

James? Who—

Oh.

Oh, no.

No way.

My boss arches a suspicious eyebrow. “Do you know a James?”

“Um, yes.” I grab a nearby cloth and dry my hands with it. “Could I…?”

“Go speak to him.” She looks back at the bar, and when her eyes find me again, there’s something in them I don’t like one bit—amusement. “Jeez, girl. That’s a fine man if I’ve ever seen one. If you don’t want him, maybe tell him I’m available?” she jokes, which makes Matt grunt.

He and Monica can hide it as much as they like, but it’s painfully obvious they’ve been…ah, involved for a while. Honestly, I’d rather not know.

“It’s not like that,” I mutter as I grab my crutches, my heart beating so damn fast I can barely concentrate.

“Sure.” She gives me a look like she doesn’t believe me, throwing me a wink before leaving the way she came.

Somehow, I manage to block all my thoughts as I make my way to the bar. Neither the bachelorette party that can’t stop squealing as they take shots nor the music around me distract me—he’s impossible to miss.

The first thing I notice is that he’s trimmed his beard. It’s not completely gone, but it’s shorter than it was this morning. Then, my eyes land on those bulging biceps not even his black sweater can hide, and my pulse rises to my throat.

I tell myself I don’t need to look at the massive hand wrapped around the can of root beer, but then I do exactly that.

He studies me as I approach, like I’m prey he can’t wait to sink his teeth into.

I must be coming down with a fever.

Once I’m standing next to his booth, which he isn’t sharing with anybody else tonight, I swallow and gather all the courage I didn’t even know I had. “What are you doing here?”

The question is simple enough, but it takes him a while to answer. He takes a sip of his drink, and this time I succeed at not zeroing in on his plump lips. Because I can have self-control. Sometimes.

He doesn’t say anything. Instead, he takes something out of the back pocket of his jeans and places it on the table.

It’s a piece of paper I’m way too familiar with.

The mandala, the one I drew for him, the one I thought had made him uncomfortable, stares back at me. And it’s colored.

He worked on it. At home. Or at the clinic. I don’t know. Does it matter?

“You colored it?” It’s beautiful, in dark tones of blue and purple. He did a meticulous job, I notice, which I find endearing for some reason.

“I did.” When I muster the courage to look at him, his eyes are already on me. “It was too beautiful not to.”

Wow. Okay. Wow.

“Th-Thank you. For saying that.” I feel my cheeks heating up by the second. “I love how it turned out.”

I really do. We’re not friends, and I’m not exactly sure why he’s showing me this, but I’ll take it. Because, as a sudden warmth spreads inside my chest, I come to the realization that I feel appreciated.

How can such a small gesture make me feel something so…complicated?

But I suppose he isn’t here only to show me the mandala.

He confirms my suspicions when he asks me to sit down across from him, and I only do it because I don’t want him to be worried about my ankle.

“Miss Stevens,” he starts again, but I cut him right off.

“It’s Maddie.” I’m surprised by the firmness of my tone. “We’re not at the clinic.”

Turns out he doesn’t drop the grouchy act when he’s off the clock. “I’m aware.”

He leans over the table, his fingers laced together, and speaks in such a low voice, it makes my legs feel a bit like goo. You’re so dumb.

“I might be breaking a rule or two by seeking out a patient outside the clinic, so this conversation never happened.”

I nod. “You were never here.”

“Good girl.”

Oh, hell.

I know I’m probably overreacting and it’s just the way he talks. He means nothing by it, and it shouldn’t mean anything to me that he’s praising me like that. I’m not that desperate to be told I’m a “good girl” or whatever.

So even if it does feel good, shame forces me to bury the feeling deep down, under thick layers of denial.

The man in front of me slides me a look I couldn’t have missed even if I tried. Under the dim lights of the bar, he looks dangerous, forbidden, and I feel like a deer caught in headlights.

He locks those icy eyes on my face and says in that husky voice I hate and love so much, “I don’t make a habit of speaking to my patients outside of work.”

For a moment, I wonder if it was his presence I felt the other day in the park, but then I remember he had another patient to see to after I left, so it couldn’t have been him. Plus, the way I felt at the park… This isn’t the same.

When Dr. Simmons looks at me, my stomach turns a little and my legs feel weaker, but I never feel threatened or endangered.

It wasn’t him that day at the park, and it only manages to make me even more anxious. I’ve learned to always trust my gut with these kinds of weird feelings, so if he didn’t follow me to the park that day, who did?

“Yet here you are.” I give him a smile that is probably too tight, but I’m too nervous to do better. “Why?”

He doesn’t say a word for a moment, but I watch his jaw twitching with tension and his shoulders squaring up as if he were about to enter a fighting ring. In his mind, maybe he is. “I wanted a drink, and I remembered you worked here.”

My arched eyebrow tells him I don’t believe any of that. “You know I can’t wait tables right now, so you came here for what? So I can wash your glass once you’re done?”

I can tell my sarcastic tone riles him up, and it makes my smile a little more real. Who knew poking the bear could be so fun?

I’m not dumb. I know he didn’t come here because he wanted a drink, and I’m not going to let him think he’s fooled me.

“You’re already here, and I’m not going to report you,” I tell him, pushing him to talk. “So you might as well be honest.”

“Honesty.” He pronounces the word as if he were making fun of it. “Fine, let’s all be honest. Why did you storm out of the clinic this morning?”

My back doesn’t tense up at his question, of course not. “I didn’t storm out. I had to leave.”

He doesn’t buy it. “Right after I told you about the not-so-good news of your progress? You didn’t seem to be in a rush before then.”

Just be honest, Maddie. For once in your life, don’t hide behind lame excuses nobody believes anyway.

I lean back and wipe the sweat off my hands on my leggings. “Trust me, Doc. You don’t want to hear about it.”

“Why am I here, then?”

I shrug. “To have a drink—you said so yourself.”

I know I’m being difficult, but what is the alternative? To open up about years of insecurities and trauma to an almost-stranger who also happens to be my physical therapist? Is it even ethical to do such a thing?

His fingers tap along the wooden surface of the table, and he lets out a frustrated sigh that is barely audible. “You told me you had plans to join a ballet company in the near future, and now you’re upset because you think you won’t be able to do it anymore. Correct me if I’m wrong.”

He’s going there.

I shift on the cushioned seat and stare past his shoulder, watching our regulars stroll in and out of the bar. I could get out of here right now if I wanted to. The choice is mine. I don’t have to talk about this. He won’t force me to stay, and if he did, it wouldn’t last long with Matt and Monica around.

But I don’t want to flee. For years I’ve tried to keep this down, to not bother anyone with my intrusive and not-so-intrusive thoughts. God knows the last time I opened up to someone, it didn’t end well. Not at all.

For one, Dr. Simmons… Well, he’s asking. I doubt he knows what he’s getting himself into, but if he gets the full Maddie nervous breakdown, it’ll be his fault.

Aside from being my physical therapist, he’s nothing to me. No one. And he could transfer me to someone else if he didn’t want to treat me anymore, so it’s not like I’d be left stranded without him.

I have quite literally nothing to lose. A bit of time, maybe, but I’m used to that.

So I swallow, but the lump in my throat doesn’t go anywhere. “You’re not wrong.”

“Okay,” he says slowly, kind of softly. “I understand how you’re feeling. Do you have a plan B?”

He understands? Why? How? One look at the discomfort on his face is enough to bury my curiosity, though. Now’s not the time. Maybe it never will be, and that’s okay too.

Since we’re already talking about this—“this” being my worst nightmare come to life—I give myself the freedom to massage my temples and look a little more on the brink of a mental breakdown than before.

“No. I have no alternative. I mean—I do. I have a few, but none that I truly feel passionate about. None that I feel…called to pursue, if you will. At least not right now.”

“There are no other options for you in the ballet industry?”

“Oh, no, there are. It’s just that…” I might as well just let it all out, right? I mean, he asked. “I’ve worked really hard to join this one ballet company for years. It’s very prestigious, and sometimes it felt more like a dream than a real possibility, but a few weeks ago, they invited me for an audition. I injured myself while rehearsing for that audition, and now…now it feels like I have no future. I-It’s fine. I’m just overreacting.”

All right. I did it. I told him without shedding a single tear. That’s a win in my book.

He asks the question of the century. “Why do you say you have no future?”

I shrug. “I’ve worked all my life toward this one goal, and now it’s gone forever. If there is a future, it doesn’t look too bright to me.”

“You can’t audition again?”

“No. Auditions are exclusive and only accessible through an invite. They barely hand out any in the first place, just a few a year. I missed my chance.”

Saying it out loud still feels surreal.

He leans over the table a little more and pins me down with one of his hardest stares yet. I swallow down the urge to squirm under it. “Your future isn’t gone. That’s bullshit. How old are you?”

I have a feeling he knows, but I tell him anyway. “Twenty-one.”

“Twenty-one,” he repeats, a strange shadow passing over his eyes. “Do you really think your future is gone at twenty-one?”

“In ballet, yes.” And that’s the problem. That’s why I was in such a rush to make it. “Ballerinas join companies at my age or even younger because they tend to retire in their mid-thirties. It’s not a long career, and I’m already wasting half of it.”

“You’re not wasting anything. You’re recovering from an injury so you can return to ballet safely in a few months. You’re not the first professional ballerina to get an injury like this, and you won’t be the last. I’ve seen athletes fully recover from worse.”

“Thank you,” I tell him honestly. “I appreciate what you’re trying to do. It’s just that I…” I shake my head. “It’s fine. Forget it.”

“Tell me.”

Shaking my head, I rub my eyes and say, “I’m just tired of life being so damn difficult, I guess. Welcome to adulthood and all that.”

I really don’t want to get into it. Opening this can of worms now, plus the other one… Boundaries, Maddie. Remember those.

He doesn’t smile at my poor attempt at lightening the mood. Oh, no, his scowl stays very much in place.

“Life is hard sometimes, but it doesn’t mean you have to live it miserably.”

“That’s easy for you to say,” I mutter under my breath before I realize what has just come out of my mouth. My eyes widen in horror as I trip over my words. “I don’t know why I’ve just said that. I’m sorry. God, I’m being such an asshole. You are just trying to help, and I—”

“Stop apologizing,” he demands in that deep, cutting voice of his. “I don’t want to hear another apology come from your mouth. I don’t need them.”

“But I said—”

“You’re having a bad day. I get that,” he assures me calmly, so calmly I want to start crying.

“Why are you being so nice to me?” I can’t help but ask, my voice not much louder than a whisper.

I need to understand why this grouchy man is going out of his way to make me feel better. Why he came here to ask me what’s wrong.

But if I expected a long and heartfelt explanation, I don’t get one. He simply leans back and says, “Because I’ve been in your shoes.”

That’s it. No further elaboration, and I don’t ask for one either. He’s done enough for me today.

I swallow. “Does it get better?”

His gaze travels lazily from my eyes to my mouth and then back up. Why that triggers an erratic response from the stupid organ in my chest, I don’t want to know.

“Some days are better than others.” I can’t help but notice he didn’t say yes. I guess I should appreciate his honesty. “Everything happens for a reason. Focus on that.”

I almost snort. Unless the universe’s reason is to kick me in the ass, I understand nothing.

“You have options,” he insists.

My only response is a long sigh.

“I know you don’t see them now, but you will. Don’t punish yourself for something you can’t change. You are talented, and you are determined. I have no doubts you’ll find your calling.”

He thinks I’m talented and determined? And he just told me to my face?

I’m not used to this version of Dr. Simmons. To this slightly less grumpy, almost kind of sweet version. But I like it. I like it a lot.

“Thank you.” I give him a smile he doesn’t return. “For everything. I have…a lot to think about.”

“Just doing my job.”

Yeah. Right. “I doubt giving words of encouragement to your patients is in your job description.”

Something that resembles a grunt escapes him. “I guess it isn’t.” Silence stretches between us for no more than two seconds, but it feels like a lifetime. And then he says, “I’d better get going.”

He’s not subtle at dismissals, I’ve noticed. It almost makes me smile.

“Sure. I’ll see you at the clinic.” I grab my crutches and stand up, but he doesn’t. I think he may be waiting for a second or third confirmation, so I look down at him and say, “This conversation never happened. No need to worry.”

He keeps his face neutral, as unreadable and cold as always. “I’m not worried about that.”

But he’s worried about something? I don’t feel like I have the right to ask, so I keep my mouth shut. When he stands up and towers over me by at least a whole foot, I tell myself he doesn’t smell good at all.

I press my lips together as he reaches for a bunch of bills to cover his tab, way more than what that root beer is worth. He slides me a look that reveals nothing and says, “Take care of that ankle, Miss Stevens.”

He’s retreating, drawing that line once more. I don’t feel embarrassed for having vented to him, but only because he asked. He’s not my therapist, and we shouldn’t turn this into a habit. Not that I’m tempted to anyway, and I’m sure he feels the same.

As I watch him leave the bar without a goodbye or a glance over his shoulder, I can’t help but ask myself what the hell is my life turning into.