long has it been?”
Taking a slow, deep breath and looking directly at him, she tried again to speak. “A few years.” The words emerged with no problem. No barrier.
“Years?” Ethan put his wineglass down slowly. “Then I’m doubly sorry.”
“Why?”
“Because I triggered something you had under control.”
“It’s my stammer. Not your fault.”
“We both know that’s not true. I was rude, which is inexcusable. I made you anxious.”
“I find it difficult to talk to people I don’t know. I’m not good with strangers. I’m shy—” She hated saying it. Immediately she wanted to follow up by saying that shy wasn’t the same as weak. “And I have no idea why I just told you that. The one thing I don’t do is divulge personal information to people I don’t know.”
“I’m a doctor. It’s different.”
Was that it? Maybe it was.
He sat down on one of the chairs by the kitchen island and gestured for her to do the same.
“Did you see a speech therapist?”
“For a while. Maybe I should do it again.”
“I don’t think you need that. You just need to relax and take your time. And not hang out with guys like me.” His tone was dry. “You’re not alone, you know. Aristotle had a stammer. So did Charles Darwin.”
“King George VI.”
“Marilyn Monroe.”
She raised her eyebrows. “Really? I didn’t know.”
“There’s an interview where she talks about it. So how do you manage with your job? Aren’t you constantly required to talk to strangers?”
“Yes, but my sister does that part. New business, bookings, she handles that side of things.” She slid onto the chair next to him, her fingers grasping her wineglass. She didn’t trust her own powers of speech, and it was an awful feeling. She wasn’t sure if alcohol would make it worse or better. “I live life in my comfort zone.”
“That wasn’t how it seemed the other night when I saw you in the emergency room.”
“That was me trying to leave my comfort zone. You saw how it turned out.” Oh what the heck. She took a gulp of wine and felt it slide into her veins. The words were loose and flowing again. She could almost pretend she’d imagined what had happened. Almost, but not quite. It had happened. And it could happen again. Maybe on one level she’d always known that, but she’d gotten complacent. But maybe complacency was a good thing. Worrying, anxiety, made it worse. “I think we’d both agree I’m a work in progress.”
“But you went on a date with a stranger. You didn’t stammer?”
She put her glass down. “He didn’t give me a chance to talk. But I did manage about four short sentences, which was more than I managed on the date before him.”
His eyes gleamed and he leaned forward to top up her wine. “Sounds as if you’ve had some thrilling dates.”
“The best.” She found herself smiling too. She also found herself wishing someone like Ethan had been her blind date, which made no sense at all because less than half an hour earlier she’d left the apartment and braved snow rather than stay in the same space as him. “I’m done with it now.”
“You’ve finished dating? Aren’t you a little young to give up on love?”
Why was he asking her so many questions?
He’d shown more interest in her than the three men she’d dated put together.
“I’m not giving up on love. I’m giving up on internet dating.” She hadn’t thought about it until that moment, but she realized she meant it. After the last guy, she’d never believe anything she read about anyone again. She needed to be able to look into their eyes and judge whether they seemed honest or not. “Which probably means no more dating at all. It’s not easy meeting people.”
“That’s true.”
She hadn’t expected him to agree with her. “You must meet people all the time at the hospital.”
“Not really. I don’t date patients, obviously, and most of my colleagues are too busy to even think about connecting socially, even if we could get past the awkwardness of dating someone you see every day.”
She’d always assumed that dating was easy for everyone else. That she was the only one who found the whole thing daunting and overwhelming.
Harriet wondered if she still counted as a patient, and then wondered why she was even thinking that.
She’d assumed someone like him would be married with two cute kids.
It hadn’t occurred to her he’d be single.
What was wrong with the world?
Unsettled by her own thought processes she made a joke. “Maybe you should try internet dating. Put ‘doctor’ down and you’ll be inundated. Especially when people realize you actually are a doctor.”
“I’m nobody’s idea of a dream date, Harriet.”
He would have been her dream date.
Where had that thought come from? Flustered, she took a sip of her wine, reminding herself that he didn’t like dogs. She could never be with anyone who didn’t like dogs, even if he was a good listener and had eyes that made her think of blue skies and long summer days.
“You’re too hard on yourself. Shrek would seem like a dream date compared to the last three guys I met.”
“I’ve never been compared to Shrek before. I may need therapy to get over that one.”
At least he had a sense of humor. “You said you lost a patient. How do you handle that?”
The worst thing she handled in her working day was misbehaving dogs and inclement weather.
“Tonight I handled it by losing my temper with you.” His tone was dry, his words self-deprecating. “Normally? I deal with it by filing it away as part of the job. It’s not something I usually talk about. I can’t believe I did. I assume it was a pathetic attempt on my part to induce a pity response that might lead to forgiveness.”
She loved his honesty. Her respect for him grew. “People don’t expect doctors to show their feelings. Which must make it hard. You’re supposed to be caring, but still detached. How does that even work?”
“Sometimes it doesn’t. Generally it’s easier in the emergency room. The people I see are strangers. I don’t have the connection with them that doctors in other specialties might. My father works in primary care, and there are some families he has been seeing for thirty years. When he loses a patient he grieves
