Chapter 33Steve is awake when I arrive the next morning with a bunch of white lilies.
“You need to stop spoiling me,” he says, fighting to keep sadness out of his voice.
I set the flowers in a vase on a side table.
Steve asks me to turn the volume up on the TV. He tells me it is awkward to use the remote control with a bandaged hand. “Between the gauze and IV lines, I’ve never been so clumsy.”
“Do you want to sit and talk instead?”
He points up at the mounted flatscreen TV. “I want to hear the news.”
I sigh loud enough, but my frustration does not deter Steve from tearing his gaze away from the screen. I sit next to him and steal a glance between commercials. I ask him how he feels, and he shrugs and grunts.
I reach over the bed rail to mute the volume and stare at him until he answ
