Doctor Her: A Single Dad Virgin Romance

by Hazel Parker

  The map of wrinkles on her face told of the incredible life she’d lived. Her eye lines told of laughter, of warm smiles and affection. Her face told of late night worries and present confusion. The lines were engraved deeply. They told of a woman who’d traveled almost seven decades to that moment and she was still standing strong. To be dismissed as old would have been disrespectful. She was so much more.

  “Do you come out here often?”

  “Every day,” she said, throwing a handful more. “You have to take advantage of the sunny days when you get them. Doesn’t happen too often.”

  “I know what you mean.”

  “You don’t like the cold either?” she asked, extending the bag of stale bread to me.

  “No. I don’t mind it at all. My mom though, she hates it.”

  “Is your mom here?” she said, turning to me with concern in her eyes.

  Her eyes showed the kind of gentle concern they always had. She laid her hand on my arm, soothing as it always was, though she was extending the hand to a stranger and spoke in such a soft voice. It felt as if I were wrapped in a blanket of her caring.

  “Yeah. She is,” I said, hoping that she’d somehow wake up and realize who my mom was.

  “I’m so sorry to hear that,” she said, patting my hand. “Has she been here long?”

  “Yeah,” I said, accepting her hand.

  “Well, you don’t have a thing to worry about. This place ain’t so bad,” she said, smiling. “Honest. It may be full of people who forget, but they never forget chocolate chip Fridays and they give extra Jell-O if you ask.

  I chuckled. I saw she hadn’t forgotten her sweet tooth.

  “And the facilities are nice. They keep it clean here,” she said, nodding her head. “And we play board games after dinner.”

  “You don’t have to sell it to me,” I said with a smile. “She’s already here.”

  She laughed loudly and clapped her hands. “I guess you’re right.” She threw her last handful of bread and turned to watch me. She took in my dingy jeans and my wild hair. Her eyes lingered on my vest with the patch that said “Bandits” and the patch that said “Legacy.”

  “Where’d you get that vest?” she asked, not looking up from the patch.

  “My club gave it to me.”

  She still hadn’t taken her eyes off the patch.

  “Can I see the back?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

  I turned so she could see it in all its delicate trimming. The white thread against the black leather tracing a face with a bandana concealing any physical characteristics and a cowboy hat.

  “Do you ride?” she asked, her eyes twinkling with pleasure.

  I smiled and nodded.

  “Can I see your bike?”

  “Uh. No.” The residents were not allowed to leave under any circumstances without a whole bunch of bullshit paperwork. “It’s outside, but I can show you a picture of it,” I said, digging into my pocket for my phone.

  My bike was the background screensaver. I swiped until none of the apps covered the picture and handed her the phone.

  “It’s so shiny,” she said. “Clean.”

  “It is,” I said, nodding. “You know you can judge a man—”

  “By the quality of his bike,” she said, finishing my sentence.

  It was like a trigger, bringing her back from wherever she was lost.

  “My husband used to say that,” she said, but stated it with a slight quiver of uncertainty.

  “He did. My dad did.”

  She stared at me.

  “I think I know you,” she said, her head tilted to the side like she was trying to decide.

  “You do.”

  “You’re my… son,” she said, throwing her arms around me. We hugged tightly; I couldn’t tell who was holding onto who.

  “Ma,” I said, trying not to choke.

  “Oh, my boy,” she said, leaning back to brush the hair from my face. “My boy. Let me look at you.”

  I smiled, trying not to show the sadness that was just behind my eyes.

  “Do you know which one I am?”

  “Of course I do,” she said, smacking my thigh. “I’m your mother. I could never confuse you two. You’re Ethan,” she said, staring into my eyes. “I can tell by the sadness behind your eyes.”

  I looked away. She’d already seen it, but to know she saw was too much. It made the hurt feel heavier.

  “You’ve were never the same after your dad died,” she said, turning my head softly so she could look into my eyes again. “But this hurt – it cut deeper than that one.”

  How could a woman who could barely remember who she was suddenly remember me and my brokenness with clarity? “It’s a girl, isn’t it?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it, Ma.”

  “Well, too bad. You’re the son. I’m the mother. I’ll be deciding who does the talking. Plus, I’m the one in a home – not you. So talk before I lose myself again.”

  She had a point, and so I sighed heavily and admitted what she already knew.

  “Her name is Molly.”

  “Do you love her?” she asked, cutting me off before I could say anything else. “Don’t overthink it. Don’t think about whatever happened between the two of you or what you think you have to do. Think about her. Just her, and tell me, right now, yes or no. Do you love her?”

  “Yes but—”

  She held her hand up to stop me. “That’s all that matters. I remember how stubborn you can be, so please listen to me, love,” she said, caressing my face. “All I’ve ever wanted was for you to find someone who loved you the way your dad loved me. If you love that girl, don’t let her go. I know you think everything is so complicated and you’re afraid to let people get close. I know you’re afraid of someone seeing you for who you really are, but trust me: when it’s true love, the scars don’t matter.”

  “You know Ev’s got a girl now?”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah. I bet they’ll get married sometime soon. He really loves her.”

  “And what about you? Will marriage be in your future?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Well, I hope it is. You deserve everything he has. He’s no more deserving than you just because he got in a little less trouble than you,” she said, smiling.

  “Okay, Mom. I hear you.”

  She glanced upward, her mouth pursed but slightly open and loose. Her eyes fixed pointedly on something behind my head. I turned, and finding nothing, I turned back to see she was still entranced by something behind me. I called her name and shook her softly by the shoulders.

  “Mom! Mom?” She blinked and refocused. “Lynn, can you hear me?”

  “Yeah,” she said, focusing before frowning. “I can hear you. You don’t have to yell.” I wasn’t yelling, but now that she wasn’t unfocused, I let go of her shoulders. She looked around the garden, then paused at the pink and yellow flowers before turning back to look at me. “Where am I?”

  “Happy Hands,” I said, withdrawn and unsure. I wasn’t sure, but I was willing to bet that she was gone.

  “Where’s that?”

  “Flagstaff, Arizona. “

  “Is this my home?”

  “Yeah. You live here.”

  “Oh,” she said, looking around.

  A nurse came to the door and smiled at us. “I think it’s time for lunch,” I said, standing and offering her my arm. “Would you mind if I escort you?”

  “Sure,” she said taking my arm. She came just below my shoulders and was skinnier than I would have liked. I could barely feel the weight of her body as she held onto me as I walked her to the door.

  “What’s your name?” she said as the nurse took her from me.

  “Ethan.”

  “It was nice meeting you,” she said with a smile.

  Seeing her forget and disappear right in front of my eyes, it shook me. It hurt to
watch and was even harder to forget. I couldn’t take it. It hurt too much. Everything in me hurt. It hurt to wave goodbye to a mother who thought I was a kind man helping her inside. My chest was barely together from all the emotional beatings.

  I sighed, rubbed my chest, and climbed on my bike. My fingers were itching to call Molly. I wanted to call her, hear her voice, and hold her, anything – something. Just thinking about it quelled the ache in my chest. But I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t call her. I couldn’t trust her to take care of me when I was hurting and at my worst. She nearly took me out when I was at my best, God knows what she’d do to me if I was broken. My mind said she’d comfort me. My heart said there wasn’t anything left to break.

  Chapter 12

  Molly

  I pulled out my phone and scrolled through all the names in my contacts. I knew a lot of people, and if I wanted to, I could have a man in my bed within the hour. I was sure anybody would answer my call. I considered calling some of the guys I had turned down over the years to see if any of them was willing to give it another shot. In truth, over the years I had given up on love. So many men made it clear all they wanted from me was sex, and I was okay with that – at least that was what I told myself. But I wanted more. They say the best way to get over a man is to get under another one. But what the hell do they know anyway? Sure, any guy that wanted me before would want me again, but what was the point?

  None of their names sparked an interest. None of them would make me feel the way Ethan could. They hadn’t before. I couldn’t imagine they would now. In fact, looking at their names and thinking about them only made me want Ethan more. He wasn’t something I could replace. I didn’t want anybody else. I sighed and pushed open my car door. There wasn’t much I could do about him. He had made up his mind and if I was smart, I would agree with him. Our relationship couldn’t work. At least that was what I kept telling myself.

  “Good morning, Ms. Karin,” the receptionist said as I passed by to my desk.

  “Hey, Gemma.”

  The day had only just begun, but I was already tired. My heels clicked against the tile floor, taking me to my desk with minutes to spare. My client was coming in at eight. I had a total of fifteen minutes to sip my coffee in peace before everything went to hell. I could feel all the sleep I hadn’t gotten. I tossed and turned for hours, partly angry and partly horny, thinking about Ethan. I finally stopped trying to sleep around 2 am and worked on paperwork. So at least I was productive.

  Our desks were lined in rows, giving us about a foot of space to walk around each other. My desk sat in the middle of the floor with an old computer booting up for me to enter in the information. Papers were stacked on top of each other, oozing out of manila folders like mud between fingers. Reports for my own agency... other city human service agencies... physicians' offices... and of course, the federal government; who could forget them?

  I pulled my eight a.m.’s file out of my overstuffed portfolio too hastily and scowled as the bag dropped and everything in it fell out. Lipstick, condoms, stacks of paper, and pens littered the floor.

  “Jesus,” I hissed, bending over to pick it all up.

  Could anything else go wrong?

  Ashlyn bent to help me, gathering the papers into unorganized piles.

  “I got it,” I said, pulling the papers from her hands.

  “I know. I’m still going to help your stubborn ass.”

  “Yeah. Thanks, I guess.”

  “Jeez, somebody didn’t get laid last night.”

  I stood balancing what I could in my hands and feeding the paper back into the leather case as much as I could without bending the papers. I didn’t have time to sort them out again.

  “You want to tell me what’s got your panties in a knot?”

  I saw my client come through the door – early, of course, and sighed. “Can’t right now. Maybe later,” I said as I grabbed my cup of coffee and rushed to the lobby to meet the woman.

  “How you doing, Mrs. Abel?”

  I had been working on this case for a year. My client was woefully unprepared to be an adult, let alone handle the demands of a two-year-old child, and she was married to a man she’d fled from. I’d done what I could – provided her with a mentor, scheduled her parenting classes, which were proving to be beneficial whenever she made time to actually show up. I hadn’t heard from her for months and didn’t see any reason to convince myself I’d see different results now. Serena Abel made me want to bang my head against the wall, and I would have, but I didn’t need my headache to get any worse.

  I worked with Serena Abel for two hours and looked at my watch. I had half an hour to breathe before my next case. With my few minutes of relaxation, I ran to the girls’ restroom, inhaled more coffee, and checked my phone for messages or voicemails. I was delusional enough to let my heart lift in excitement as I listened to the messages. Part of me still held out hope that maybe he called and left a message. It was a stretch, but I was a hopeless romantic. There was a call from another social worker confirming my client from a few weeks ago relocated to Kansas, a garbled message from my stylist confirming my next hair appointment, and an automated message about buying a new telephone system. Did people still do that?

  I typed frantically, looking over the papers covering my desk, trying to catch up on paperwork and getting my file back in order. I tried to take my extra files home at the end of the day, but I couldn’t take my entire desk. My agency manager took vacation through next week and wanted me to give her all her case updates. Plus, there was some federal regulations the department wanted to talk about to comply with other regulations. There is so much red tape in trying to help people, I could drown in it.

  I finished a quick, unscheduled meeting and dialed in a lunch order to the deli across the street.

  “Thank God they deliver.”

  I frantically typed in my clients’ updates into the computer while wolfing down my sandwich and coleslaw. Sure, it didn’t follow any diet I was trying to stay on, but a girl had to eat. I managed to get a few more updates into the computer before leaving to pick up the deputy for a trip I had to a client’s home. I had my own opinion about the woman and her living habits, but overall my job required me to put my personal feelings aside.

  I brought the deputy along just to be safe. From my last encounter with the woman, she was very angry to learn that her ten-year-old daughter would be removed from the house because of its unlivable conditions. There was so much wrong with that house – trash, dog feces, moldy food, and lack of a properly working toilet. Really, the list could go on. I had been counseling the woman for months, trying to prepare her for the consequences that would inevitably occur if she didn’t improve her home’s condition. She didn’t listen. Well, at least it didn’t seem like she did, so the agency removed the child and placed her in foster care. Now the woman was angry and hurt at the outcome. I agreed to meet with her in the home and arranged the sheriff’s deputy to accompany me. I didn’t think the woman would try anything crazy, but it was better to have law enforcement around just in case.

  Thankfully, the appointment went better than I’d hoped. The woman had calmed down enough to listen to my carefully worded recommendation. The deputy’s presence probably hadn’t hurt either. We spent an hour and a half talking and she agreed to meet with me and the child welfare worker tomorrow.

  Back at my desk, I took a deep breath and tried to coach myself to stay energized.

  “Okay. Only two more appointments, then you can go home.”

  I met with a couple in their forties who were looking for home care for the father’s elderly mother. They were overwhelmed by the multitude of opinions and didn’t know which home care agency could best serve the woman’s needs. I provided an honest assessment based on several years of working with home care agencies and promised to follow up with the couple in a week.

  My last client was a veteran in his thirties who couldn’t find a job after ending his t
our of duty six months prior. He had great managerial and technical skills, but I could tell there wasn’t much opportunity for him. Since my client was computer savvy and had experience in that industry, I recommended he considered getting a certificate or an associate’s degree in one of the in-demand programs. He seemed receptive and I put him in contact with a local community college’s career counselor. We decided to meet in two weeks to discuss the results of the meeting.

  “Finally,” I said, putting my head on the desk and covering my head with my arms. “Time to go home.”

  The words were muffled against the desk and my arms.

  “That bad huh?”

  I glanced through my arms to see Ashlyn leaning against the desk. Her red hair was in a perfect bun, with tiny, spiral curls pulled out to frame her face. She was tall and her boots came to her thighs, making her legs look even longer.

  “Girl, you don’t even know.”

  She crossed her legs and picked some invisible dirt from her nails. “I know you need to go talk to him.”

  I groaned from under my pitiful position on the desk.

  “Take it from me – you ain’t looking too hot. You need to talk to him.”

  I didn’t like what she was insinuating. I sat up and crossed my arms. “I don’t need him,” I said, annoying myself with how much I sounded like a child.

  “Uh girl, you kinda do. You were better when you were getting dicked down. Now look at you – all aggravated and looking crazed.”

  “Hey!”

  “Look, love, you know I’m on your side, but you look crazy. Your hair has tangles and you look like you’re auditioning to be Dracula’s new girl with those bags under your eyes.”

  I didn’t need to look in a mirror to know she was right. Ashlyn wouldn’t lie.

  “Do you like this guy?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then go tell him.”

  “But—”

  She held up her hand, stopping me from talking. “But nothing. You go tell that man, ‘I love you, honey.’ You know you’re like a sister to me, so hear me when I say this. You like him, and the sex was explosive. Don’t throw that away because you’re full of pride.” She pushed the stray hairs away from my face and looked into my eyes. “Okay?”