“Job well done.” She edged away from him and started down the sidewalk.

“Come on, let me make it up to you.”

“Stop following me.”

“Did you get fired for real? I’ll go back, talk to your boss.”

“I don’t need anything from you.”

“I’m sorry. Now you’re freaked out.”

“It would help if you weren’t tailing me.”

He stopped. For a second she thought he’d finally gotten the hint, but then he was back at her side, this time holding out a couple of dandelions he’d picked from the sidewalk.

“Here.”

“Yeah, this is a lot less creepy. Stalking and random gifts.”

“I promise not to leave a boiling pet bunny on your stove.”

She recoiled. “Uh … good?”

“Oh, shit. That’s from a movie. You know, Sharon Stone? Hatin’ on her man’s wife, kills the family pet?”

“Seriously, get the hell away from me.” She let her backpack drop down into her hand, so she was swinging it by the strap. A couple of textbooks upside the head would drop the motherfucker.

His face went hangdog, so filled with misery that she almost laughed.

“I have really screwed this up, haven’t I? I’ll leave you be.” He tipped his baseball hat at her, turned around, and started to walk away. But then, midstride, he stopped. “Oh, I meant to ask, how is that boy? He okay?”

She narrowed her eyes. “Are you talking about Jose?”

“Maybe … The kid having a hard time breathing yesterday?”

“He’s fine.”

“That’s good.” He turned back around with a wave and started in the opposite direction.

Without thinking, she called after him, “That was nice, what you did with him in the waiting room. Talking to him, keeping him calm.”

“I had asthma as a kid. It can be real scary. I hope his mama got his back.”

Angel did a double take. “Of course I do,” she yelled.

“What?” Twenty feet away, he paused, turned, and sized her up. “I thought you was the nurse.”

“You can say it.” She felt her blood pressure rise. “I’m too young to have a kid his age.”

“Whoa, I ain’t nobody’s judge. You workin’ two jobs, taking care of your boy, then you doin’ right.”

“I’d be working a whole lot more if it weren’t for you.”

“Lord, woman, we back on that?” He came closer. “I swear, I am sorry. But you were pretty outrageous yourself, am I right?”

“You thought I was a stripper!”

“I promise you, I did not. I knew you were the nurse from the clinic. I was drunk and trying to be funny.”