Mrs. Matched | Complete

Chapter Twenty-Eight

At some point down the mountain, we stopped our banter about cooking shows and who the best Spice Girl was -- it was Ginger, duh! -- and began to walk in silence. Probably because I was gasping for air, though it was easier to hike down than it had been going up.

The trees around me created a curtain of darkness, fooling me into thinking for a moment that it must be night. It was in that low light that I noticed Chris as my husband for perhaps the first time. Walking down that mountain, his footing sure and posture at ease, his strength became apparent. He carried three times what I did and still navigated the path with ease. The arms which had held me once or twice since this marriage began, were visible even under his sweater. How had I not noticed before?

Or maybe I had and I'd finally let myself see it.

I wasn't sure which option was worse.

And it was with that thought that I completely lost my footing, tripping over the unsteady ground and sliding down the damp path until my foot caught on a root, twisting at an unnatural angle. I let out a yelp as I fell, my knee hitting the ground and my face fast approaching. My eyes squeezed shut at the thought of impact, and my arms flailed behind me, unable to protect me from the impending ground.

I was saved from the faceplant at the last moment by the strong arms I'd admired mere moments before.

"You okay?" Chris gently lowered me to the ground and I rolled onto my back as well as I could with my backpack still on. Tears stung my eyes and a deep throbbing pain radiated from my ankle and my knee.

"No," I answered as the tears started to fall. "No, I think I hurt my ankle when I twisted it and then my knee when I fell. I don't know what happened."

That last part is a lie. You know what happened, you just don't want him to know his shoulders were distracting you.

"Can I feel the bone to make sure you didn't break it?" He eased me into a sitting position and waited for my response, hand hovering above my ankle.

I couldn't speak through the pain, fearing even the slightest parting of my lips might result in a scream no one wanted to hear. So I nod, holding my lips between my teeth to stop the whimpering. Sure feels like I broke it.

I winced when he pressed on my ankle, the swelling already starting to protect the fragile bones of my foot.

"I don't think it's broken," he said after he had removed my shoe and pressed on every part of my ankle. "I also don't think you should walk on it."

"I guess you're going to have to carry me after all." My attempt at a joke falls flat when my voice breaks along with my tears.

"I don't know..." He looks around as though calculating our odds of survival. I would be the person to put us at risk in the middle of a forest. See, accident prone. "We aren't far actually. I think you'll have to use me like a crutch until we get to the flat ground and then I can go get the car for you or--"

"I don't really want you to leave me alone." I tried to move my foot and almost cried out in pain again. "But you're right, I definitely can't walk."

"Yeah, I was thinking that, too. We'll figure it out when we get there." He dug around in his backpack. "For now, let's just get you some painkillers and make sure your ankle is wrapped as best we can. We have to move quickly to get your shoe back on before your ankle really starts to swell and you get stuck with no shoe at all."

I tried not to think about how much worse it would have been if he didn't know what he was doing. But he did know. He knew exactly what I needed and somehow he was prepared for it all. 'Stable' is what Melody would have called him, if she were here.