Read Part 1 HERE, Part 2 HERE, Part 3 HERE, and Part 4 HERE

*THE NEXT MORNING*

Kris walks back into Noel’s hospital room carrying two cups of herbal tea, only to find her bed empty. He looks around nervously, and then he hears the toilet flush and the water running.

He lets out a sigh of relief.

Noel comes out fully dressed in actual clothes. 

“Hi,” she says, her smile bright and full.

“Look at you, up and about, I was literally gone for 5 minutes and you were sound asleep.”

Noel laughs, “I woke up and saw that bag sitting there of stuff Holly brought for us, and I figured I’d take the opportunity to make myself look a little more presentable. It feels so good to be in actual clothes, even if they’re just sweats.”

“Ah, you always look beautiful,” he says coming over to her and placing a sweet little kiss on her lips, as he hands her the cup of tea. 

“Well thank you,” she smiles brightly up at him, kissing him a second time as he smiles at her.

“Were you okay? I could have helped you,” he says asking as he tries to lead her back to her bed. 

“I was fine, really. And I feel like I needed to move around, I’ve been in that bed for like two days!” she says laughing. “In fact you know what I would love?”

“What’s that?” Kris asks smirking at his smiling wife. 

“I would love to take a walk around the hall,” she says smiling through clenched teeth knowing he’s not going to approve her request.

“Uh, baby…I don’t know…” Kris says uncertainly.

“Come on please…I need to get out of this room. I swear the walls are closing in Kris.”

He laughs, “Ok. ok,  let me go check with Dr. King and if she says yes then…”

Dr. King comes walking in.

“Perfect timing,” Noel says smiling and pointing.

“Ask me what?” Dr. King says with a smile coming over to them. 

“My wife here, wants to go for a walk around the hall, is that allowed?”

Noel smiles, hopefully.

“Yes, that would be a very good idea, you’ve had a few days rest to heal, and I think walking could do you some good. Go, I’ll stop by again later.”

“Ha!” Noel says throwing up her finger and pointing at Kris. “See!”

“Yea, yea, ok, let’s go, gloater,” he says taking Noel’s hand.

“I’m not a gloater,” she says protesting as she intertwines her fingers through this.

Dr. King laughs as she walks out.

“Oh yes, you are a big gloater,” he says smirking at her as they walk out of the room hand in hand. 

“So…where do we live?”

“We have a house in Brooklyn.”

“Brooklyn, cool,” she says nodding.

“Yea, we just work here in the city-Manhattan.”

“What do you do?” she asks.

“I’m an accountant.” 

“Really? I’m surprised.”

“Why?” he says looking at her with a laugh.

“I don’t know, I just got the sense that you work with your hands in some way, like with cars or plumbing or contracting or something.”

“What made you think that?” 

“Your hands,” she says pulling his hand up and showing his palm. “They’re very manly- and rugged, like you work with them a lot,” she says laughing.

“Well, I’m kind of a handy I guess you could say. I like to repair things myself, cars, leaky pipes, I used to work with my dad in his auto body shop.”

“So what happened?”

“My dad passed when I was in high school,”

“Oh I’m so sorry, I didn’t know.” Noel says feeling bad for bringing it up.

“It’s ok, I know. It took me a long time to just even walk into that shop after that. Never mind that I wasn’t old enough to run a business myself. So an uncle of mine took it over. And then rent just got expensive and they had to sell the place before I graduated college.”

“So why not just open your own shop one day?”

“I’ve thought about it, but accounting is stable, and I’m good at it, it just felt sensible.”

“Hmm, I guess I can understand that. Are you happy, with the decision you made?”

“It led me to you.”

“What?” she says smiling, confused.

“The party we met at was your best friend Rebecca’s birthday party.”

“Right I remember you saying that…”

“Well I only know Rebecca through her husband Griffin. He does Advertising for the same company I work for. So back when Griffin and Rebecca were dating, I got invited to her party, you got invited to her party and the rest is history.”

“Huh? I like the way you think.”

“Yea. That was just my round about cuter way of saying, I may not love my job, but I love you,” he says smiling at her as their eyes lock.

Noel pulls him to her as she kisses him, his hands finding her waist.

Holly walks through the hospital doors to find the two lovebirds.

She smiles and walks over to them.

“Well, well, I’m guessing, it’s been a good morning!” she says smiling brightly as the two part from each other. 

Noel’s cheeks blush slightly as she looks away with a nervous laugh, Kris laughs.

“Yes it has,” he says.

“How are you feeling? You look fabulous.” she says smiling, as she gives her sister and brother in law each a hug.

“I feel great, I’m ready to go home.”

“Are they releasing you?” Holly says happily.

“We don’t know just yet, Dr. King has to give us an update.”

“Oh ok, well can I get you anything, food? coffee?”

“Um, I would love to eat anything other than hospital food.”

“I’m on it,” she says laughing “And I will bring you something back too,” she says patting Kris on the back as she walks away.

Jack walks into the hospital just as Holly walks out, they smile politely at each other as Jack looks back after her instinctively. 

“Hey Jack,” Kris says reaching for his hand.

“Hey man,” he shakes Kris’ hand as he smiles brightly at Noel.

“Hey you, glad to see your doing ok? This guy was a mess,” he says pointing to Kris.

Kris rolls his eyes, as Noel laughs and hugs him. 

“So, baby… this is Jack, my co-worker and friend, he was the one that drove me here to the hospital that day.”

“Oh hi, thank you so much, nice to meet you,” she says smiling and then frowning quickly after, “And now I realize how stupid I sound, because obviously we’ve met before, I’m sorry.” Kris wraps his arms around her waist in an attempt to comfort her.

“Hey, no worries, I’m just glad your ok.” 

“Thank you,” she says nodding.

“So I don’t wanna be an overbearing guest, I just wanted to stop by and see how you guys were doing.”

“Thanks man,” Kris says, “I’ll touch base with you later.”

“If you can’t no worries, I understand, see you guys.” he says smiling and waving as he exits. 

“He seems nice and from what you’ve said about Griffin, it seems like you’ve made some good friends at your job.”

“Yea can’t argue with that.”

Noel smiles, Kris takes her hand as they continue to walk. 

“So what do I do? I just realized I never even asked you that?”

“You are an interior designer, you have your own little shop in SoHo.”

“Really?” she says smiling.

“Yea. It does really well. You really know what your doing. You have this incredible eye for detail and fashion.”

“That is kind of awesome,” Noel says smiling.

“Yea, you really love it.” he says smiling

“So what happened to your mom?”

“She passed away a few years after I was born, so my dad basically raised me as a single parent.”

“Oh my gosh, so I guess we both lost our parents far too soon in life.”

“Yea that’s for sure. Are you kind of getting the reason why I’m so crazy when it comes to you and your health and safety.”

“Yea I’m getting that.”

“I don’t ever wanna lose you, the way I lost them. Because I love them their my parents they shaped who I am, they made me, and they kind of got stuck with me. But you, you made a choice to be with me, you said yes to forever just because you wanted to. You know as much as I believe in destiny and fate, and the fact that we were both put at the same party at the same time, you didn’t have to pick me, you could have had any other guy you wanted, but you chose me.”

“And what makes you think I won’t keep choosing you?” Noel says as they make their way back into her hospital room.

“I guess sometimes I just worry that what we have is too good to be true. I mean take this accident for instance. We just got married. I’m talking like 3 weeks ago, we didn’t even have our honeymoon yet, and Christmas is a literally days away, and then this happens. I just worry that sometimes it won’t last. Because everyone in my life up until now has left me.”  

“Unintentionally though Kris, I mean I get that your worried. Ok, but do you honestly think that if your mom or your dad were able to choose to be here with you that they wouldn’t? Come on, I know that this isn’t you talking.”

“How could you know that,” he says sullenly as he looks at her with tears in his eyes.

“Because Holly told me that the only reason I was able to get through my parent’s death was because of you. She said I met you and you brought me back to life again. How can this cynical version of you do that.”

“I guess we’re both not exactly who we used to be,” he says looking down.

“If your so scared of losing me, why do you keep on pushing me away? I thought we were rounding some kind of corner. Do you want me to hate you? Is that it?”

“Of course not.” he says looking up at her.

“Good, because I love you.”

Kris looks at her, stunned.

“I know it doesn’t make sense right now, but I do, I love you,” she says her voice raising.

Kris walks over to her swiftly and kisses her passionately.

Dr. King knocks on the door, as the two part ways.

“Hello, it seems I have the worse possible timing,” she says laughing.

“That’s ok,” Noel says smiling.

“So I got the results back from the tests we’ve been running, and everything looks great.”

“Really?” Noel asks excitedly.

“Yes. A’s across the board. I mean I wouldn’t let you run a marathon right now. But your incision is healing nicely, your concussion is healing quicker than we ‘ve ever seen, your up and doing things for yourself, your blood work is good, your reflexes are good. Your recovery is quite outstanding.”

“That’s fantastic,” Noel says excitedly. “So can I go home?”

“I don’t see why not.”

“Ah!” Noel says happily as she hugs Kris tightly as he nervously hugs her back.

 

TO BE CONTINUED…

 

-<3-