by Claire Adams
“It’s been years since I’ve been to the theater. Thanks for taking me, Tyler,” Kelsi said as we walked back to the restaurant.
“I have a problem. It’s not a big problem, but it is bothering me quite a bit.”
“Okay, tell me what it is, and I’ll see if I can help you.”
“I don’t want to let you go tonight. Stay with me. See that hotel right there?” I said as I pointed to the tall Marriott building just a few blocks to the south. “I’ve got a fantastic room reserved, and we could stay together. Nothing sordid if you don’t want. But come stay with me. We can talk. We can stay up all night ordering room service and watching Pay-Per-View, I don’t care, but stay with me.”
Kelsi looked up at the building and seemed to be considering my offer, but then the look on her face told me that she was going to deny it. Before she even started to talk, I remembered that look from our high school days; she was about to turn me down.
“I like you, Tyler. I like the person you are today, and I’m really glad you will be in town for a while.”
“But you don’t want to start something with me if I’m not going to be staying in town?” I said as I finished the thought I knew she was having.
“Yes, I have a lot going on here. I’ve got a life that isn’t going to disappear when you do. I’d like to concentrate on that, and I hope you understand.”
“Then we should just have a fling,” I suggested. “A hot romantic few weeks together with no strings attached.”
It was a playful idea, and for a moment I thought she might be agreeable to it. She smiled at me and then looked at the hotel like we could make this thing happen. It was about more than sleeping with Kelsi, though; I genuinely liked having her around, and the stress and tension at my own home was just too much. I would have loved to spend the evening with her in the hotel, even if all we did were G-Rated activities.
“I think I’ll have to pass,” she said with a sweet smile. “But thank you for dinner and that amazing show.”
“Am I cleared to give you a goodnight kiss?” I asked as she unlocked her car door.
“I’d like that,” she said softly as her hands pulled my coat toward her.
There was a definite mixed message when I was kissing Kelsi. She clearly wanted to go with me to my hotel room. Her body pressed against mine and her lips moved urgently against mine as we moved our soft kiss into a full on make-out session right there in the middle of the parking lot.
She wanted me; I felt the desire, I saw the longing in her. Kelsi was holding herself back from having what she wanted, perhaps out of some idea of what a good girl would do. Or maybe she didn’t want to be seen as a woman who slept around; I wasn’t sure. But what I was sure of was that she wanted me just as badly as I wanted her. It might take me a few more times, but I was still rather confident that Kelsi and I were going to get our evening alone in bed sometime soon.
“I better get going,” she said as she pushed me away softly.
Her face was flushed with excitement, and she refused to look me in the eye as she made her getaway.
“I’ll see you Monday?” I asked.
“Monday?”
“Yes, didn’t you want to come see my father? I could swing by and pick you up if you’d like.”
“Oh, yes, I really do want to visit with him. Come by before you head over there. I think that’s a perfect idea.”
She leaned up and gave me one more quick peck on the cheek and then pulled her car door closed. It acted as protection between the two of us, which I think Kelsi needed even more than I did. She smiled and blew me a kiss as she pulled away.
Chapter Twelve
Kelsi
“It was Tyler,” I said first thing when I walked into the barn on Monday morning.
“What do you mean?” Kendall asked.
Kendall had spent the weekend with Robert and hadn’t been privy to all the excitement, except a short text I had sent her Friday evening. I liked her and Robert together; they were adorable. It was sweet to see at least one of us wasn’t messing up the whole romance thing.
“You mean the blind date was Tyler?” Hannah asked.
“Yeah, I totally got to the restaurant and then Tyler comes walking in. At first, he tried to play it off like he just happened to be in the same restaurant as me, but he only lasted a minute. Tyler was always really bad at pulling off pranks.”
“Okay, so your blind date was actually Tyler. That’s weird. Did you leave? What did you say to him?” Kendall asked.
“I stayed. He seemed like he wasn’t going to give up until I at least went on one date with him, so I just stayed. Plus, he had me sitting at a table in the middle of the restaurant where everyone could see me. It would have been really embarrassing if I got up and just left.”
“Nice,” Hannah said with a big smile on her face.
“Nice?”
“Yeah, he must still be in love with you if he went to all that trouble to arrange that date. Isn’t it romantic?”
“Or he’s a stalker,” Kendall teased.
“He was genuine, and he apologized very sweetly about high school. I apologized too about overreacting and not talking to him. I think we were both just so young and relationships are hard enough without having two teenagers in charge of them.”
“So, what happened? Did you sleep with him?” Kendall asked as her eyes lit up. “I bet he’s amazing in bed.”
“Kendall!”
“What? I’m just saying with a body like that he’s got to be a lot of fun under the covers.”
“No, I didn’t sleep with him. He’s only in town for a little bit; that would be silly.”
“Didn’t we already talk about the merits of having sex with a hot guy like him even if you don’t want a relationship?” Hannah asked. “I’m pretty sure we’ve been through this. It’s not the nineteen-hundreds. You are a free woman, and you can have some fun if you want to.”
“He did invite me to stay with him at a hotel that night, but I turned him down.”
“Of course you did,” Kendall said under her breath.
“Was the date awkward or something? Did it go badly?” Hannah asked.
“No, it was great. We had perfect chemistry, and I really loved spending time with him. We even kissed a few times, and he was really excited about all that kissing,” I said as I looked away from both of them.
“So, you made out, he was hard as a rock, and then you just left him and came home?” Kendall asked.
“We left things very well. He was fine with it.”
“Right. He wasn’t fine with it; he wanted you, and you turned him down, again. How much longer do you think he’s going to chase after you?”
“Kendall, I’m not playing some game with him to see how long he will chase me. I’m not going to sleep with him because he will be leaving soon. Why is that so hard for you to understand?”
Kendall and Hannah didn’t seem to understand where I was coming from at all. If I slept with Tyler, I would become emotionally attached to him again, and then I’d feel horrible when he left. It wasn’t that I didn’t understand the concept of a casual relationship; it was that I knew myself well enough to know I wasn’t capable of such a thing. If I slept with Tyler, I would fall in love with him, and I couldn’t risk that. I wouldn’t risk my heart like that with him.
“Whatever, you can just turn into a celibate nun for all I care,” Kendall said as she stormed out of the stall and went to work on the other end of the barn.
By the time Clyde had returned from school, the three of us were nearly done with the chores for the day and had retired to the benches in front of the main barn. Clyde worked on his drawing project for school as the three of us took to talking in code about Tyler some more.
“He’s coming to get me, and we are going to visit his father at the big house you go to at the end of it all,” I said casually.
“Your friend is taking you to the big house?”
“Yes, I really wanted to vi
sit with his father who is living in the big house now.”
“What will you do when you are done at the big house?” Hannah asked. “Maybe go get some food? Because everyone needs to eat dinner; it’s an important meal.”
“Mom, are you making macaroni and cheese tonight? I really want macaroni and cheese.”
“Actually, Hannah is going to be staying with you while Nana and Papa are out. I bet she could make you macaroni and cheese, though, but only if you are a very good boy.”
“I’m always a good boy,” Clyde said with his cheesy, toothless grin.
“You are a pretty darn good son. I am so lucky to have you and Hannah is lucky to have you to babysit.”
“I’m not a baby.”
“No, you’re right. Maybe we shouldn’t call it babysitting any longer,” Hannah said. “Perhaps, I’ll just say I’m going to be hanging out with Clyde. No babysitting.”
“Yeah, we are just hanging out, Mom.”
I couldn’t help but smile at how much pride Clyde had about getting older. Only a child could be that excited about growing old. Once you started to get old, all we wanted to do was be young again.
We all froze as Tyler’s car made its way down the driveway. I had hoped to get Hannah and Clyde into the house before he showed up, but it was too late for that now.
“You are going to get to meet my friend, Tyler. That’s his car coming down the drive. He went to high school with me.”
“Oh, I bet that he’s really old,” Clyde said with a playful smile.
“Hey now!” I teased.
As Tyler got out of his vehicle, I couldn’t help but smile. Even dressed in a t-shirt and jeans, he looked handsome and sort of like he came straight from a catalog. I watched Clyde’s face to see if he was looking at all, but he seemed fixated on his art project and not at all on Tyler and I.
“So, that’s your little man?”
“Yep. He doesn’t look anything like me, I know,” I joked.
The truth was that Clyde looked almost identical to me except his hair was light brown instead of red. I was grateful he didn’t get stuck with my red hair; boys always got teased if they had red hair while girls were told it was beautiful. At least as I got older, I was told it was beautiful; when I was in elementary school, kids made fun of it, but I imagined they made fun of pretty much everyone back then.
“Should I go say hi?” Tyler asked as he looked from Clyde to me and then back again.
“I’ll introduce you two,” I said as we walked over. “Clyde, this is my friend, Tyler.”
“Hey, buddy,” Tyler said.
“Hey.”
We stood over Clyde for a minute while he worked on his project, but it was clear that he wasn’t at all interested in talking with Tyler or I. I motioned for us to go ahead and leave and Hannah waved goodbye to us. Kendall was staring at us and making weird faces, like she was trying to tell me something, but I had no idea what she was trying to say.
“You be good for Hannah,” I said as I kissed Clyde. “I’ll be home late so you should be asleep by then. Okay?”
“Okay, Mom.”
“We better get going before he starts asking questions. That’s his favorite…”
“Hey, Tyler, where do you work?” Clyde yelled after us as he stood up.
“In Alabama.”
“No, not the place. What work do you do?”
“You know the game Lego Blaster 54?” Tyler said as he walked back over toward Clyde.
“Yeah!”
“I helped that company get their television ads on during the Lego Batman cartoon on Nickelodeon.”
“Oh, wow. That’s so cool! I want to do that when I grow up,” Clyde said as he ran back to his art project.
“Now that was the best explanation I’ve ever heard for what a marketing consulting firm does.” I smiled as we climbed into his car.
“You’ve always got to meet the client where they are at. I know how to talk to the kids. I’m practically still a child myself.” He laughed.
The closer we got to the hospice house, the more anxiety I felt. Death wasn’t something I was comfortable being around. Was anyone really comfortable being around someone who was dying? As I watched the city pass by, I took in a few deep breaths and tried to calm my nerves. I didn’t want to start sobbing like a maniac when I saw Tyler’s father, but that was exactly what I felt like doing.
All I could think about was how sad I would be if it was my father in hospice care. I wouldn’t be able to work, sleep, or eat. I would be so distraught. I knew Tyler was close to his father, and I really wanted to ask him how he was dealing with it all, but it felt like I couldn’t get my words right to ask the question. Instead, I sat quietly for the ride and just enjoyed the calmness of the countryside.
“Mom says he’s having a good day today and might even be up for talking, so that’s good.”
“Will he remember who I am?”
“Of course!” Tyler said as if I was asking the silliest question in the world. “I think he loved you more than he loved me back in high school. He probably would have traded your parents in a heartbeat.”
“I just meant is he doing well enough to remember? I don’t know what someone who is dying is like or how their memory works.”
“He still has all his faculties about him, he’s just having a hard time breathing, and the pain medication makes him sleep a lot. When he does pass away, it will likely be while he is sleeping and he should not feel any pain. Do you want me to tell you more about that? I don’t want to go into the details if it’s too much for you.”
“Actually, yes, I would like to know,” I said as we pulled into the parking lot.
“When he’s awake, my father spends a lot of his energy pulling in breaths and letting them back out. Right now, while he is sleeping, his body is still using this extra energy for breathing. So, that combined with his pain medications makes him very tired. At some point, his body will just be too tired to use that extra energy to breathe. This usually happens during the sleeping cycle since that is when our respiration slows down anyways.”
“Wow, you know a lot about all of this.”
“I just asked the hospice nurse a lot of questions. I was really nervous every time I left his bedside, and I wanted to know how he would pass away. So, I’ve come to terms with the idea that he will most likely pass away when no one is there with him, but we can still make sure every day is a great day filled with lots of love and visitors.”
“I don’t know how you do it,” I said as tears started to well up in my eyes.
“There’s no choice. That’s how I do it, and that’s how anyone does it when someone they love is dying. I’m just grateful we have this chance to say our goodbyes. I couldn’t have handled it if he had passed away suddenly and I didn’t have this chance. So, for me, this feels like a gift of time.”
“I really hadn’t thought about it like that.”
Tyler had such a positive way of looking at what his father was going through. He had turned such a horrible event into something that could be good. Well, not exactly good, but better than the alternatives. Death had always been one of the things I feared most in my life.
“Should we go in?” Tyler said as he grabbed my hand.
“Yes, I think I’m ready now.”
Walking into the hospice house, I was immediately surprised by how normal it looked. I don’t know what I was expecting, but perhaps something out of a sterile hospital horror film or close to that. Instead, the main sitting room was filled with families, and even some small children who were playing and laughing together. The walls were cheerful and covered with beautiful artwork, and so was the hallway we walked down to get to Mr. Pace.
Instead of feeling overwhelmed and sad, I actually did feel relaxed as we walked into his bedroom. It was a large room painted in blue with a long dresser at the foot of Mr. Pace’s bed. On the top of the dresser were about a dozen photographs of his family and friends which he could see directly in fro
nt of him anytime he sat up in bed.
“Dad, I brought Kelsi to see you,” Tyler said sweetly as we walked in.
Mr. Pace had been sleeping, but opened his eyes when he heard us come in. He looked tired, but not as sick as I thought he was going to look. His skin was pale and he had dark circles under his eyes like he hadn’t slept in weeks.
“Kelsi Sullivan? Come over here and brighten up this room for me with your smile,” Mr. Pace said as he pressed the button on his bed and sat up so he could see us better.
“Hi, Mr. Pace, how are you doing?” I said as I came around the bed and leaned down to give him a hug.
“I’m doing great today, especially since you came to visit. I never could figure out what you saw in my son,” he teased as he motioned for Tyler to come over and sit down as well.
There was a small couch that had been pulled up near the left side of his bed. It was perfect for sitting and talking with Mr. Pace, and I imagined that Mrs. Pace had probably even slept on it a night or two. This whole thing had to be hitting her the hardest. I couldn’t imagine being married to the love of my life and then having to say goodbye to him. It was a tragedy.
“You look really good today, Dad. Maybe we should see if the nurse wants to help you get dressed and Kelsi and I could take you out to the courtyard?”
Mr. Pace looked outside and then looked at me for a moment. I imagined that getting ready and going outside was going to take a lot of his energy up, but perhaps it would make him feel a little better as well.
“Yeah, let’s see if she’s available. I know there was a young lady at the end of the hall who wasn’t doing too well last night. If the nurse is busy with her, please don’t bother her.”
“Okay, I’ll go find out while you two visit,” Tyler said as he left me there with his father.
“I’m sorry I didn’t come and visit you earlier.”
“Oh, don’t be sorry, honey. I’m just an old dying father of your distant ex-boyfriend. I couldn’t have expected you to come visit me, but I am glad you came.”