The Other Side

Chapter 6

“Ouch!”

The nurse didn’t blink as Mark tried to jerk his head away, rolling her eyes with a sigh.

“Oh, don’t be such a baby, Mr Hildenstern.”

“He usually is when it comes to hospitals.” Stephen said.

Mark glared at him.

“Very funny. I’d like to see you deal with having a needles being threaded through your skin like a piece of cloth.”

The nurse tittered and carried on stitching up the cut on his head. The area where the wound was burned and his head hurt like hell.

Stephen was standing near the door, arms folded with a look of thunder on his face. Mark couldn’t blame him; he was fuming himself.

He couldn’t believe he had been caught out like that. After inadvertently challenging Henson to take him on, Mark had had to be on his toes during the match. Henson treated it like a grand slam final and then some, the balls going at such a speed Mark was amazed he managed to get his racket on them.

Then Henson had changed tactics and started aiming the balls at Mark himself. Mark had managed to dodge out of the way and return the ball but Henson was intent on going after him. Even the crowd were getting confused with why he was aiming at Mark instead of going for a side-line hit and winning the point.

Then Mark had completely mistimed a ball and it had hit him in the face. Pain exploded over his eye and the next thing he knew he was on his back staring at the sky while stars spun around him. The crowd had been furious at this turn of events; Mark went to this exhibition match every year and was a favorite with the crowd. As he was being taken off by the paramedics, wearing a neck brace that had been completely unnecessary, Mark had heard Henson’s disqualification over the speakers. He had a feeling the younger man would be incurring a fine for harming someone during a match.

“You should press charges on him.” Stephen growled. “What he did was assault.”

“Much as I’d love to, what good will that do?” Mark demanded. He winced and did his best to keep still as the nurse threaded another stitch. The force of the ball had opened up the skin and the wound had been enough to get stitches. “It can be said it was an accident during a tennis match. He’s being fined, as it is.”

“Mark, everyone knows Henson hates your guts and this match proves it. He’s been planning on getting you for a while now.”

Mark did want to press charges but he was still a bleeding heart. Henson was probably furious at the fine. Whenever he ended up in a rage he turned it on Charli; while he hadn’t come near her he sent her angry texts and left ranting voicemails, saying that if Mark tried anything then he was going to do something he wouldn’t regret. Charli had told Mark to be careful and not do anything to make Henson even angrier.

Because he cared about her – more than he should – Mark had agreed.

“I don’t think whacking me in the face with a tennis ball was the best way to go about it.”

“Yeah, sure.” Stephen sneered. Then he put on a poor imitation of Mark’s voice “‘It was a blind fluke, officer’.”

“Just leave it, Stephen. If he harms me in another way off the pitch, you can go for him. But on the pitch, it can be said he got over-excited with his swing.”

Stephen’s mouth twisted in displeasure.

“I don’t like this.”

“Neither do I but what choice to we have? Just let the tennis association deal with him. That would impact him more.”

Mark didn’t believe it would but he could live and dream.

The door to his private room opened and Charli came in. Mark felt his body perking up when he saw her. Suddenly his headache was gone. Dressed in a pair of boot-cut jeans, sneakers and a black sweater that didn’t hide the gentle swell of her belly, her hair held back by a simple white headband, she looked lovely.

She looked gorgeous pregnant. If this was what she looked like in the early stages, Mark knew he was in trouble in the later stages.

“Is it okay to come in?”

“Who are you, miss?” The nurse asked with a frown.

“She’s Mark’s girlfriend.” Stephen said quickly.

Girlfriend. That put a warm feeling in Mark’s stomach. Charli his girlfriend. That sounded like a really good idea. While his relationship with Charli had improved and they had got to know each other more, spending a lot of his spare evenings talking over a home-cooked meal at Charli’s apartment or on the phone, he wasn’t sure if Charli would be entirely happy with entering a relationship so soon after getting out of one.

He was doing this at Charli’s pace. And, to be quite frank, the pace was too slow for him and he was getting impatient.

The nurse relaxed a little and gave her a warm smile.

“Come on in, love. We’re just finishing up.” She put the needle and thread to one side and put a waterproof bandage over the stitches. “That should keep them dry. You’ll need to come back in a couple of weeks to have the stitches come out.”

“Yes, Mom.”

The nurse rolled her eyes.

“Don’t start that. I get enough of that from my children. I get enough attitude from toddlers without getting it from the grown-ups.” She winked at Mark and gathered her things together. “You’ll be okay to go home once I’ve fetched the paperwork. And since you’ve got a suspected concussion I want you to have someone stay with you to make sure you don’t fall into a coma and have a bleed on the brain.”

“Thanks for the imagery.” Mark shuddered.

The nurse chuckled.

“Well, you’re a big boy. You should be able to handle it.” She looked at Charli. “Are you going to be staying with your fella?”

Charli blushed and looked at Mark shyly.

“If Mark has no objections.”

Mark knew the answer to that.

“No objections at all.”

“Just be careful.” Stephen warned, giving Charli a nudge. “He gets cranky when he gets woken up at the wrong moment.”

The blush got even darker and Charli mumbled something about talking to the nurse, hurrying out of the room as the older woman left.