Food was probably a good idea. Nathan would need fuel to be able to think well enough to come up with his last chapter. He went to go toast himself a bagel but Sierra stopped him.
"I've got it," she insisted as she took the bagel from him and cut it in half before sticking it in the toaster.
When it came out she spread the cream cheese for him too, which he appreciated. That would have been difficult to do with only his left hand. He truly regretted losing the use of his dominant hand. Life had been hard trying to do everything with the hand he used less.
"What is your book about, anyway?" Sierra asked curiously as he ate some of his bagel.
Nathan swallowed and took a sip of coffee before answering her. "You can't tell anybody about it. I should probably get you to sign something saying you won't talk about my manuscript but I'm lazy and I trust you so I'm not going to bother. You do have to promise me though."
She nodded with the most serious expression he had ever seen on her face. "I won't."
"It's about a detective with multiple personality disorder. His other personality is a serial killer that he happens to be tracking. With all of his experience with crime scenes and evidence, he instinctively knows exactly what to do to avoid being caught."
Sierra's eyes widened. "Wow. That's interesting. How are you going to end it?"
"Well, the part I already wrote consists of the detective/serial killer going up against his detective partner, who has been suspicious of him for a while. She gets shot and nearly dies but he does get caught," Nathan explained.
"What I still need to write is the wind down where the partner is recovering physically and trying to recover mentally from having one of the people she trusted most turn on her like this. I'm going to have the detective/serial killer be charged not guilty by reason of insanity and end up in a mental hospital."
"Huh. I don't know much about crime stories—that's always been Scarlett's thing—but that sounds pretty cool. I might have to read it when it comes out," Sierra mused.
Nathan laughed. "Even though you already know the ending?"
"I don't know the beginning. Maybe I should just read your other stuff instead. She's going to be so jealous when she finds out I got early access to one of your manuscripts. I won't tell her anything about it though! Don't worry."
He wasn't worried about that since she already promised. She seemed like a trustworthy person even if she was a total danger magnet. It had been a long time since he trusted anyone new but here he was, sharing his craft with someone that wasn't legally obligated to keep it a secret.
Nathan wasn't sure what exactly it was about her that made him trust her. It might be because there was something different about her too.
He couldn't be positive that the fact that she was so forgettable was a power somewhat similar to his but he was fairly certain. He had never met anyone else who plain disappeared from his memories even if they weren't all that memorable as a person.
He realized belatedly that she probably included that contact photo as a way to get him to remember her when she called. That meant she had to have some degree of awareness about the strange phenomenon surrounding her.
Nathan wasn't about to call her out on it though. She might not think it was anything too weird; simply something she had to deal with. She probably wouldn't believe him if he said she disappeared from his memories anyway.
To do that properly, he would have to explain that the only reason he kind of remembered her was because of his visions and the physical evidence in his other memories that he had acted on them with someone even if he couldn't recall who. He would not be telling anyone else about his visions ever again. That hadn't ended well for him last time.
"I trust you," he said simply.
Sierra seemed relieved and went back to sipping her coffee quietly. Once they were both done with their drinks and he was done with his bagel they got to work.
She sat down at his desk as instructed and began taking down everything he said word for word. It was weird dictating it instead of writing it himself. He frequently caught himself being too casual in his word choice because he was speaking and had to tell her to change things.
Nathan didn't like this. It felt wrong not to be doing this himself but he had to admit it would take for-ev-er if he tried typing with only his left hand. That only easily covered about half of the keyboard, after all.
It took a few hours but after rechecking it many times and making sure his word count was long enough, he was satisfied. That hadn't been as terrible as he thought it would be…but it was still pretty bad. He never wanted to dictate what someone else wrote for him ever again.
He desperately hoped his arm was better before he had to do any major revisions or get started on his next novel. At least he had time to outline things first. Though that would still be difficult with his non-dominant hand.
Sierra was very patient with him and his constant need to change things he said or she wrote. Nathan was actually impressed. He knew he was a bit on the nitpicky side and people often didn't like him for it.
"You're an incredibly thorough person, do you know that?" she asked once they finished and the draft was sent off to Jordan.
"Is that a bad thing?" Maybe she wasn't as patient as he thought.
"No. I think being thorough definitely has its uses. Making sure there aren't any typos and that words flow correctly is a good use for it. Do you need me to do anything else for you while I'm here or can I go?"
"You can go," Nathan told her. "Thanks for helping me. I really appreciate it."
"No problem! I mean, you are only in this situation because of me so it's the least I could do," Sierra said guiltily.
There really wasn't a need to feel guilty. He would have jumped in front of that bus no matter who it was there because he was a self-sacrificing idiot. The accident had nothing to do with her when you really thought about it.
"Well, I appreciate it anyway. See you, Sierra."
"See you. Feel better and text me if you need anything!" she insisted when she headed out the door.