LITMIR.BIZ

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in the darkness, feeling the hell of that night again.

      He sat up and gulped water and then reached for his laptop. He blew his nose as he made the call on his computer and waited for the comfort of a familiar face.

      ‘Juan!’ Eduard smiled as he came into focus.

      ‘Does it make me gay if I call you in the middle of the night to tell you I love you?’ Juan asked.

      ‘Bad night?’ Eduard asked, and Juan nodded as he wiped the tears from his face. Their friendship was worth more than gold, silver and platinum combined. It was Juan’s most treasured possession. André struggled with Juan, jealous at his recovery, but they were trying to work through it. José was doing well and had movement in his arms and they kept in regular touch. But it was Eduard and Juan who were closest. The bond they had made back then was unbreakable and Juan smiled to see Eduard’s cheeky grin. ‘Bad luck for you if you are gay,’ Eduard said. ‘Felicia and I are getting married.’

      ‘Eduard…’ Juan was smiling and crying and then just smiling. Eduard was quadriplegic, with some small movement in his left hand and wrist. How he treasured that movement, how grateful he was for the exercises the nurses had performed over and over so that meant, with special equipment, he could type, could raise a beaker and drink from it. ‘She is so beautiful,’ Juan said. ‘She is amazing…’

      ‘I know.’ Eduard was serious. ‘Juan, will you be my best man?’

      ‘We don’t have best men in Argentina,’ Juan teased lightly, but then he was serious. ‘Except, for all that has happened, we do. I would be so proud to be your best man.’

      ‘I don’t want you to come home if you are not ready. I understand why you had to get away…’

      ‘You tell me the date and I will be there. Nothing would keep me from being there to share in your day.’

      ‘We are sorting the date out. Juan?’ Eduard’s tone changed to being tentative. ‘There is something I wish to discuss with you. We’re so grateful, but you don’t have to keep paying for my pills.’

      ‘Are the pills working?’ Juan asked, and grinned as Eduard gave a shy smile back. This was no crude conversation, there was nothing they did not discuss, and Juan, loaded with survivor guilt, refused to leave anything out of bounds.

      ‘Yes,’ Eduard said. ‘We have sex and it is getting better. She enjoys it, I think, and I love her pleasure.’

      ‘Then that money is there,’ Juan said. He knew the tablets were expensive and the young couple could not afford many, knew what must sometimes be on Eduard’s mind, so he said, ‘If I kill myself doing all this crazy stuff I have left money for you in my will. You will be pleasing your beautiful Felicia all your life, my friend.’

      ‘Thank you.’

      ‘No need,’ Juan said, and he meant it.

      ‘I tried what you said with my mouth,’ Eduard said, ‘and she was not faking!’

      ‘I’ll teach you more tricks another time,’ Juan said. No, it was no crude conversation—younger, far less experienced, Eduard had cried and cried to Juan about losing his ability to make love to Felicia, had doubted that he might ever please her again. But even as Juan smiled, it faltered. His tears were coming again, and he felt guilty because he was the one walking and yet he was the one crying. ‘Sorry, Eduard, you don’t need this today…’

      ‘Hey!’ Eduard said. ‘It’s me.’

      ‘I know.’ Juan looked at his friend and nodded, because they had agreed it went both ways. For it to work, Eduard had to be there for him too. How different Juan was from how he had once been—how much his priorities had changed since that day.

      ‘I was going to call you on Sunday,’ Eduard said. ‘I know it will be a difficult day.’

      It would have been Juan’s first wedding anniversary.

      ‘It’s not just the wedding anniversary,’ Juan admitted. ‘I like someone, Eduard. For the first time in what feels like for ever there is someone that I cannot get out of my mind and yet I cannot get her into bed.’

      ‘You can.’

      ‘I leave a week on Tuesday.’

      ‘You have to leave?’

      ‘Yes,’ Juan said. ‘My visa expires and anyway I don’t want to get too involved.’ He trusted so few now, had sworn never to let go of his heart—to just love them and leave them. ‘She reminds me a bit of your Felicia, she is loyal, she is so serious…’ He smiled as he spoke. ‘She is so sensible and cautious but I am sure she is wild too…’

      ‘You’ve got it bad,’ Eduard said. ‘Have you told her about the accident?’

      ‘No.’

      ‘Will you?’

      Juan shook his head. ‘No, I don’t want her sympathy.’ He shared it with no one apart from the people who already knew. ‘I don’t want to even try to explain what happened, what it was like.’ Juan thought for a long moment and Eduard patiently sat through his silence. ‘I don’t want to get involved or anything. Really, I just want it to be a week on Tuesday and to be gone…I think.’ Juan honestly didn’t know how he felt. ‘Perhaps it is just that she has said no. Perhaps that is the reason I can’t forget her. If I could sleep with her, maybe I’d get her out of my mind.’

      ‘Have you cooked for her?’ Eduard said, and Juan grinned. ‘Has she had the full Juan treatment?’

      ‘No.’

      ‘Go!’ Eduard said. ‘Sort it now.’

      Juan laughed.

      They chatted a little while longer then said goodbye and Juan found himself naked in the kitchen at three a.m. He lit the gas under the frying pan then he went and put a towel around his hips to save the precious bits from any oil splashes.

      Hopefully he’d be needing them tomorrow night!

       CHAPTER TEN

      CATE WOKE TO the heat of summer and the scald of her own thoughts about Juan, insisting she should be proud of herself.

      Imagine how much worse you’d be feeling if you’d slept with him, Cate tried to tell herself as she took her uniform off the line and quickly ironed it. Imagine how much worse you would be feeling if you’d gone and got involved with him, Cate told herself as she drove to work.

      She had almost convinced herself she was proud for resisting, but it actually felt horrible, walking into the department and knowing she wouldn’t see Juan.

      That she probably wasn’t ever going to see him again.

      These last few weeks, when she should have been missing Paul, when she should have been trying to get over a two-year relationship, when she should have been sorting out what she wanted from her career, instead her thoughts and emotions had all been taken up with Juan.

      Funny that a heart could be so raw and bruised by a man she barely knew when it was not damaged by the man she had spent two years with.

      It surely just showed how right she had been to end things with Paul.

      Cate looked at the roster, devoid of Juan’s name, and thought of the sky jump next Sunday.

      Her last chance to see him.

      A farewell shag before he flew? Oh, God, she was actually thinking about it, Cate realised. That was how much she regretted saying no last night!

      ‘How was Christine’s leaving do?’ Harry yawned. He had been working all night and was now about to go off duty until Monday.

      ‘Good,’ Cate said. ‘Who looked after

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