“Absolutely not,” I grind out.
She looks pissed. There’s a decent chance she’s chewing out her grandparents right now. If her jaw wasn’t still wired shut, I’m certain she’d be yelling.
I push off from my doorjamb and move toward her grandfather’s car. The trunk pops open as I move past them and to it, to pull out her wheelchair. Then, I unfold it, flip down the footrests, and push it toward Sydney’s door. Her face is turned away from me, still probably arguing with her grandparents.
I open her door and swing it wide so I can reach in to unbuckle her belt. Her right hand covers mine, trying to stop me.
“Don’t, Heath.”
I ignore her. Sydney Fairlane is stubborn as hell but she’s about to learn she’s met her match.
Once her belt is off, I bend down and slide her right arm around my shoulders. Then I reach under her and lift her.
“Put me back down,” she hisses through her teeth.
She’s in my arms again, for that I’ll deal with her anger.
I breathe her in before lightly setting her into the wheelchair.
Gigi and Mr. Fairlane are out of the car, Gigi walks beside me, and Mr. Fairlane moves to get the rest of Sydney’s things from his trunk.
“I can’t believe this is happening,” Sydney murmurs, crossing her good arm over her cast.
I say nothing and push her toward my apartment and right through the open door.
“Do you need to lie down?” I ask, moving around her chair to crouch in front of her.
“I’m not staying here,” is her reply.
“Honey,” Gigi coos.
Sydney turns her head to glare up at her. “I can’t understand why you would do this to me.”
That’s a hit. She has every right to be angry with me but I had hoped her hatred had cooled over the past two weeks. Yes, she didn’t talk to me during my daily visits but she didn’t have security remove me either.
“It’s only for the next month Sydney,” Gigi explains.
“What happens in a month?” Sydney asks.
“Hopefully your casts come off,” I answer.
She ignores me, her eyes on her grandmother. “Why can’t I go to your house? I thought that’s what we planned.”
Stubborn, stubborn woman.
“They have six steps to their front door and four steps up the back deck to the back door.” I gesture toward my front door, the one her grandfather is pulling a suitcase through. “No steps. And, if there were, I could carry you, your grandparents cannot.”
Her eyes move right before landing back on mine. “Why can’t you carry me up their steps?”
I was expecting this question. “And carry you back down them for your physical therapy appointments and the couple orthopedic appointments you have between now and when your casts come off?”
She squints at me, annoyance at my response written all over her face.
Then she says, “Cecil offered to come down. He can carry me for the next few weeks.”
Gigi shakes her head. “He could come the week after next but this week he wasn’t able to take off of his job.”
“What about Gina or Molly?”
Before Gigi has a chance to reply, I do. “You’d want us to ask one of them even though neither one of them bothered to come and see you this whole time?”
“Well—” she starts but I cut her off.
“No way. I don’t know what is up with either of them but there’s no chance. Besides, you aren’t heavy but both of them have stairs and I’m not sure either of them could carry you up them.”
“Gina’s husband could,” she argues.
Normally her being stubborn is cute. Now it’s getting annoying. “Call her and ask.”
Her eyes slide to the right again and I feel like a dick for calling her bluff. Those two, her supposed friends are two of the fakest people I’ve ever met. Gina, even though she’s married, still hits on me when she doesn’t think Molly is watching.
As for Molly, I’ve watched her act nice to anyone she thinks she can get something out of. I don’t get why neither of them came to visit Sydney but, if they’re ditching her for some reason, she’s better off for it.
Her eyes move to Mr. Fairlane. “Please, can I stay at your house?”
Her tone, her plea, fuck. I stand and look at him and know right away her words have hit their mark.
He looks at Gigi. “Maybe with help we could manage.”
She shakes her head and looks down at Sydney. “It’s not that long, honey. Try and consider how thoughtful it was for Heath to offer.”
She then bends down to kiss her cheek. “Pops and I are going to get you and Heath something to eat and we’ll be right back.”
Pops pauses to kiss the top of her head before he lets Gigi pull him out of my apartment. Her face is turned away from me and onto my door like if she stares at it hard enough, they’ll come back and change their minds.
Her eyes not moving, she says, “You can’t force me to stay here.”
I move, stepping between her and the door and crouch in front of her again. “Why won’t you let me take care of you?”
“I just can’t,” she whispers, her eyes closing.
“Baby,” I start but stop when her eyes pop open, pinning me.
There’s an entire story playing across them: hurt, anger, longing, want, embarrassment, fear, and desire. Her soul stripped bare for me to fall into. Only, it isn’t an invitation, it’s an answer to what I said, but a refusal.
Dropping my knees to the floor, I straighten my back and reach up to hold her neck. There is nothing aggressive in my movement. I lean into her, one hand gripping the arm of her chair, my face in her hair.
“Please let me do this.”
Her entire body is tight, still stubbornly fighting my help.
“Please,” I repeat.
Her body relaxes, “Can I take it day by day?”
I lift my head, her profile right in front of me and ask, “How do you mean?”
She keeps her eyes forward. “I won’t fight staying here tonight but I reserve the right to change my mind about tomorrow or any other day going forward.”
That’s about the best I can hope for so I give her neck a gentle squeeze and stand and move in front of her. “Are you tired? Do you want to go lie down?”
She shakes her head. “Gigi and Pops will be back with food soon.”
“I could make you a smoothie now,” I offer.
She squints at me but does not reply.
“Gigi told me the ingredients for all the ones you like best so I stocked up.” I gesture behind me to my kitchen.
She studies me. “You got stuff to make me smoothies?”
I grin. I scored a point with that. “And milkshakes in case you’d rather have one of those instead.”
A short while later, there’s a knock at the door. Before I have a chance to answer it, Gigi opens it and walks in. I have a small table to the left of my front door. She heads there, and sets a takeout bag from Lola’s on it. I move behind Sydney and push her over to the table as well.
Before they got here, I prepared my place the best I could for her wheelchair. The fourth chair from that table is now in my bedroom. My coffee table is now pushed right up to the TV stand.
My spare room is clear of all of the junk I’ve been storing in there. Stuff that didn’t bother me if anyone else stayed in that room, but I got rid of and put away for Sydney. I also moved the TV from my bedroom and hooked it up in hers.
Gigi is unloading food from the bag while Mr. Fairlane passes a drink to Sydney.
“It’s a coffee frappe,” he explains.
She eagerly accepts it.
“I brought you a roast beef with muenster.” Gigi passes a wrapped sandwich my way.
Sydney’s chair fits easily in the spot the fourth chair was.
Once everyone is seated and eating, Gigi asks Sydney, “Are you still angry with us?”
She sips her drink before answeri
ng. “Yes, but I still love you so I’ll get over it.”
I’m sitting to her right and under the table I reach out and rest my hand on her knee. She sets her drink down and drops her hand to push mine away.
I let her but she doesn’t know how much her words to Gigi hit me. It goes to show she’s easy to forgive the people she cares about. At one point in time, I was pretty sure she cared about me. All I need to do is get back in there, prove that she can trust me again.
I finish my sandwich and excuse myself from the table. “Are you guys okay here for the next hour or so? I’m going to head over to my parents’ place to see my mom.”
On the day of the mudslide, the day I tore out of town in Jake’s truck like I had hell licking at my heels, two very different things happened to the two women in my life. Sydney was living bright and full of life and almost died, and my mom was at death’s door and started doing better.
This isn’t a TV show; she wasn’t miraculously and inexplicably healed. Her condition only changed from shit to crap. At this point, there’s no getting better than crap. Crap sucks but it has also meant that I’ve gotten these extra weeks with her.
While Sydney was up the canyon at Memorial, I spent each and every one of my lunch breaks with my mom. Then, I’d make the drive to Memorial to see Sydney and drive home once visitor’s hours were over.
It’s been two weeks of working, sitting by a bedside and driving. That, on top of the shit sleep I’ve gotten has made me a walking zombie. At night, when I try to sleep, I can’t get the image of her slumped over in her car, out of my head. It invades my dreams and night after night I’ve tossed and turned.
My hope is, with her under my roof, I’ll be able to sleep again. It’s a relief that I can cut out all that driving now Sydney is home. When she was first discharged from the main hospital to the rehabilitation side, I argued with Gigi and Mr. Fairlane to have her physical therapy done someplace closer to Ferncliff.
They held firm though on wanting her at Memorial since it is the best rehab facility in southern California. They were right and I was selfishly trying to make things easier for me. All that driving those weeks sucked but considering how much Sydney has improved it was well worth it.
Sydney pauses, lowering her drink before asking, “How is your mom?”
I shrug. People ask but they don’t really want to know unless it’s good news. There are probably people who wonder why she hasn’t died already, not that they’d ever admit it.
Her condition has taught me to worry about the things that I can control and let go of the ones I can’t.
“Not good.”
“I’m sorry,” she murmurs.
I don’t allow myself to celebrate her concern. I’m not going to use my mom to get sympathy from her, but it’s nice to see a sign that she might still care about me. Or, she could just be being polite.
I bend down and kiss the top of her head before looking over at Gigi and Mr. Fairlane. “I’ll be back soon. If any of you need anything, I have my cell.”
“Give your parents our love,” Gigi says and I nod.
Crossing the room to my TV, I nab my keys and leave. It’s not until I’m in my car and halfway to my parents’ house that it sinks in that Sydney, at least for tonight, will be staying at my place. If she leaves tomorrow, I don’t want her sleeping in the spare room. I want her in my bed.
Pressing the button to roll down my window, I let all that goodness stay with me. Life is a series of choices. I made the wrong one when I turned away from Sydney. It’s my choice now to right that wrong.
My dad’s car isn’t in the drive when I pull up. My eyes shift to the time display on my consol. This isn’t normal for him.
That has me getting out of my car with more urgency than I would usually have. My key is in the lock and I’m turning the knob when I hear a car parking behind me. Hand still mid-twist, I look over my shoulder toward the drive and watch my dad rise out of his car.
He holds up a prescription bag as explanation. “I had to run to the pharmacy.”
I open the door but wait for him to get to me before stepping through it. “The prescription for you or Mom?”
He frowns. “Me, they stopped making the blood pressure pill I used to take and I had a reaction to the new one. This one will hopefully work.”
“A reaction? Everything okay?” I was here yesterday and he hadn’t said a word.
He has the grace to look embarrassed. “I got lightheaded on the other stuff. Took a fall but before you jump all over me, I didn’t get hurt.”
“Dad,” I argue.
“Heathcliff,” he returns, lifting his brows.
I move further into the foyer and he closes the door behind us. “When did they stop making your last medication?”
He looks at the ceiling. “It’s not that they stopped making it, it’s that our insurance no longer covers it.”
My parents aren’t hurting for money, even with Mom’s prolonged health issues. “How much is it without insurance?”
He drops the pharmacy bag on a table in the hallway. “Don’t ask, it’ll only get me angry about healthcare in this country and the rackets these insurance and pharmaceutical companies are pulling.”
“Okay, Dad, forget I asked,” I reply.
That gets a laugh out of him and he reaches up to squeeze my shoulder. “Let’s go see Mom.”
My mom is awake and sitting up against the sea of pillows behind her. As we walk in, she presses a button on her tablet, pausing whatever audiobook she is listening to.
She doesn’t wait; she launches right in. “How’d it go? Is Sydney at your place right now?”
While originally my dad had cautioned me against telling my mom about Sydney, that all went out the window after the mudslide. I wasn’t going to lie to her about where I was spending all of my time after work.
That, and racing through the forest that day had left a physical mark on me. Branches whipped my face, my hands were scraped up the couple of times I tripped and fell, and I could not hide the stiffness in my legs from running full out that day.
My mom loves Gigi Fairlane and while she didn’t remember Sydney right away, she eventually did. Her making me pull up Sydney’s online profile helped.
I fight the smile her question brings. “Yes, she’s there with her grandparents right now.”
“And you’ve convinced her to stay while she recuperates?” she presses.
I bend over to kiss her cheek before sinking into the chair next to her bed. “For tonight at least.”
She folds her hands in her lap and studies me. “What does that mean?”
Her expression is too much like the ones I remember from her lectures when I was growing up. I can’t help it. I grin and pull my phone out to snap a physical picture to go along with my mental one.
“Heathcliff,” she snaps.
My mother has an impatient streak.
“She said she’s willing to take it day by day.”
She lifts a hand to press to her chest. “Getting back together?”
Shit. That’s not how I meant it and I hate the thought of dashing her hopes. The whole mess with Kacey taught me once and for all it’s better to be brutally honest even when the truth hurts.
I shake my head. “No, we’re nowhere near that yet, Mom. I meant she’s willing to stay tonight and will decide tomorrow if she’ll stay another.”
Her hopeful expression falls as her hand does. “Oh, of course. When is her next X-ray for her jaw? Not being able to open her mouth must be driving her crazy.”
I avoid telling her it’s probably in my favor that she can’t open her mouth. If she did, she’d probably do it to yell at me.
“Fifteen days,” I reply.
“Will they X-ray everywhere else as well?” she asks.
There’s a serious possibility that my mom wants Sydney out of all of her casts more than Sydney does. For some reason, my mom is certain Sydney will take me back, even after hearing what a mess I made.
“Not sure, Mom.”
“What are you going to do when you get back to your place?” she asks.
A chuckle has me lifting my gaze to look over at my dad. He’s sitting on the loveseat on the other side of the room, watching us and loving every minute of it.
I drag my hand over my face before saying, “How about we talk about you? How was your day? It’s sunny out. Do you want to move to the deck?”
“That’s my cue to stop bugging you, isn’t it?” she replies.
Stretching out my hand, I rest it above her elbow. “You’ll never bug me, Mom, no matter how hard you try.”
Her mouth gets tight in the way it does when she’s trying not to cry. “All I want is for you to be happy.”
My throat starts to clog. “I know that.”
She pats my hand with hers and smiles at me. “So, think you can talk her into coming to visit me?”
My dad doesn’t chuckle this time, he full on laughs.
Her head turns in his direction and she jokes, “I’m happy I’m amusing you over there.”
Then, she looks back at me. “Well?”
Now what?
My staring at Heath’s door isn’t going to bring my grandparents back. They aren’t going to suddenly rethink abandoning me with him, no matter how hard I wish they would.
At least Gigi had the decency to help me wash my hair while Heath went to see his mom. I’m ashamed to admit I had forgotten about how sick she was.
When Gigi told me he still visited her every day, in addition to driving all the way to see me, I felt something not unlike guilt at ignoring him. Here he was dealing with colossal crap and I was holding a grudge. Out of everyone I knew, other than Gigi and Pops, he was the only person who had visited me every single day. Even my parents only flew out and stayed for just over a week.
In their defense, it wasn’t like there was much they could do. My mom offered to fly back out to take care of me, but I told her not to. She’s a worrier and would have driven me crazy. Plus, she’d likely try to put weird crap like seaweed or bone broth in my smoothies. Last thing I want to do is feel like I have to vomit with my mouth wired shut.
Why Lie? (Love Riddles #2) Page 8