Not to Disturb Him
Copyright© 2026 by Heel
Chapter 8
Rita was in a wheelchair when Antony finally saw her properly.
Not a bed.
Not monitors and sheets.
A chair with metal arms and large wheels.
Antony stopped in front of her as if he had hit a wall. His breath left him in a sharp, broken sound. For a long moment he couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. His eyes traveled slowly over her—her hands resting uselessly in her lap, the blanket covering her legs, the stillness where movement should have been.
“I’m here,” he said, though she hadn’t asked.
He knelt in front of her without thinking, his large body folding down awkwardly, heavily. His hands hovered, uncertain, before finally settling on her feet through the thin fabric of her socks. They were warm. Alive. That gave him hope—irrational, desperate hope.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I should’ve been there.”
Rita looked at him, her face calm in a way that frightened him more than tears would have. She did not correct him. She did not explain. She let the words pass through her like everything else now seemed to do.
Antony rubbed her feet gently, as if warmth alone could wake something inside them. His hands were clumsy, shaking, his touch reverent and pleading at the same time. He kissed them softly, again and again, pressing his lips there as though love could travel backward through skin and bone and undo what had been done.
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