City Kitty and Country Mouse

by Alyssa Linn Palmer

  We maneuver the tray over Michelle’s bed. Lucy perches on the edge of the bed, carefully avoiding jostling her mother. I perch on the edge of the chair, sliding it as close as I can. We lay out the containers on the tray, and I hand Lucy a plate and a pair of chopsticks.

  “Serve yourself. I’m not sure we can eat all this.”

  Lucy gives a low chuckle. “Probably not, but it looks delicious.”

  I try not to overload my plate; the paper is flimsier than I expected. We eat slowly, trying to stay quiet and let Michelle sleep without interruption. When we finally finish all we can manage, I package everything back up in the bag and find a garbage can for our plates and chopsticks.

  “Do you want to come home with me and rest for a while?” I ask quietly. “I can have you back here first thing in the morning.”

  Lucy shakes her head. “I’d like to, but I should stay. I don’t want to leave Mama alone.”

  Michelle shifts on the bed, opening her eyes. “You should go home with Kitty,” she says. “You need your rest. They aren’t going to do anything bad to me.” She smiles tiredly.

  “It could be anytime,” Lucy objects. Michelle shakes her head.

  “Go ask the nurse,” she says. “If they don’t know about surgery yet, then you should go and rest. It’s getting late.”

  Lucy rises and leaves. The curtain falls back into place.

  “Thank you for coming,” Michelle says to me. “And for taking care of my girl. She works too hard sometimes.”

  “Don’t we all.” I shake my head. As if on cue, my phone buzzes. I check it and see a new email from a client.

  “You work too hard too,” Michelle observes. “You’d be better working at the restaurant, or even the farm.” She smiles. “You look happier there than looking at your phone.”

  “I’m close to making partner,” I tell her. “So close. But I have some work to do to make up for a big error.”

  “Partner,” Michelle echoes. “Isn’t that just another way to get you to work even harder?” She pats my hand. “I know it’s hard to establish yourself. Even when you’re close to forty. Younger than Lucy, though.”

  “Not by much,” I say.

  Michelle smiles again. “It’s like having a second daughter,” she says. “I couldn’t have more than one. But Lucy’s father never minded.” She shakes her head. “I’m getting old, though. Never would have fallen like that if I’d been younger.”

  “It could happen to anyone,” I say. “A friend of mine fell and broke hers, and she was in her early twenties then.”

  “Bad luck,” Michelle agrees.

  Lucy comes back around the curtain. “It won’t be until morning at the very earliest,” she says. “They’ll keep you here until then, though, because there aren’t any beds available in the ward yet.”

  “So you go home with Kitty and come back tomorrow,” Michelle says. “I will sleep and the nurses can keep an eye on me.”

  Lucy glances at me, then back at her mother. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.” Michelle’s tone is final, yet kind.

  “All right.” Lucy sounds uncertain, but she gathers up her hoodie, then bends to kiss her mother. After, Michelle waves me over and I come close. She tugs me down and gives me a kiss on the cheek.

  “See you two tomorrow,” she says.

  “See you then,” I reply.

  “Bye, Mama,” Lucy says. We slip out from the curtained alcove and into the hallway.

  “It’s a bit of a drive to my place from here,” I say, “but not too bad. Are you tired?”

  Lucy nods. “It’s been a long day.”

  I lead her out of the hospital to where I’ve parked in the underground parkade. I pay, and then we’re off, driving back down the freeway toward the inner city. When I pull in to my space at my condo, Lucy is dozing in the passenger seat. She wakes when I lay my hand over hers.

  “We’re home,” I say. We head upstairs, Lucy leaning against the wall in the elevator. I’m feeling tired too, and I know that I can’t go to bed yet. That email still needs to be read and possibly answered. And I’ll have to make sure to set my alarm bright and early, earlier than usual. Driving Lucy to and from the hospital will eat up a good hour or more of my morning. I’m calculating it in my head as the elevator makes its way up to my floor. I should text Cindy, let her know what’s going on.

  We reach my floor, and I lead Lucy down the hallway. Once inside, she settles on a chair at the breakfast bar.

  “Heimei looks just right here,” she says.

  “She scolds me for working too hard,” I say.

  Lucy turns to me. “You have been working a lot more lately. How come?”

  I sigh. I didn’t tell her yet about Jack, about the client, about what happened. I’m embarrassed that I made such a mistake, but I know I shouldn’t be hiding it, not from Lucy. I give her the rundown, though I step into the kitchen and put the kettle on for tea just to keep myself doing something, trying not to feel as utterly useless as I did when Jack reprimanded me.

  “Oh, Kitty, I wish you’d said something to me,” Lucy says. I take down two mugs from the cupboard as the kettle heats.

  “Green tea or something else?”

  “Earl Grey,” Lucy says. “Or whatever you’re having.”

  “Earl Grey too,” I reply.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about work?” Lucy asks.

  I shake my head. “Felt like an idiot. I should have known better. And now I have so much work that there’s nothing I can do but work my ass off. And what I really want to be doing is making Ming Kitty awesome.” I pause. Did I really just say that?

  Lucy pauses. “We all have to do what we have to do.” She sounds a bit resigned. “With Mama and her broken ankle, I won’t be able to do much for the next while. I know I have Alice, but with the farmers’ markets and all that entails, along with Mama out of commission, I’m not going to have much time either.”

  I pour the boiling water over the tea bags in our cups and then bring the cups over and sit in the chair next to Lucy. It’s hard not to sigh.

  “We’re going to have to talk to Beatrice about backing out. And it’ll cost us some money to do that,” Lucy says.

  “I can cover it,” I say immediately. It’ll help with the guilt I feel for not being there for Lucy, for the pop-up.

  “We should split it,” Lucy says. “It’s both of ours, after all.”

  “But it’s my fault,” I argue.

  “Things happen. Life happens,” Lucy replies.

  I know she’s making sense, yet I still think that it is my fault. I totally screwed up at work. Lucy’s mom didn’t purposely break her ankle. There’s a major difference. I absolutely could have kept this mess from happening.

  Lucy nudges me. “Don’t get so down,” she says. “I can tell from your expression, you know.”

  I shake my head. “I hope my boss can’t tell.”

  “I doubt it,” Lucy says. “It’s subtle, but it’s there, at least for me. I know you, remember?”

  She does. She knows me better than anyone.

  “You don’t have to be perfect at everything,” Lucy says. “No one is.”

  “I know I’m not perfect, but I could have done a lot better.”

  Lucy picks up her mug, and mine, now empty, and takes them around to the sink, rinsing them out. Then she comes back to my side. “We both need to rest,” she says. “Things will seem better in the morning.”

  “My grandmother used to say that,” I say as I follow Lucy down the hall to the bedrooms.

  “So did my grandmother,” she says. “And Mama says it now and again too.”

  “Do you want pj’s?” I ask.

  Lucy nods. “I probably should. I guess I should be in your spare room, shouldn’t I?”

  I waver. I want her in bed with me, wish she could be next to me, but it wouldn’t be fair to either of us to pretend that we’re together. I nod. “There’s clean sheets on the bed. And I have an extra toothbrush,
a new one, in the bathroom that you can use.”

  We get ready for bed, and there’s something comforting about having Lucy here, even if she’s in the spare room. Too many things to worry about, too much to do. I try not to toss and turn, but it’s midnight before I finally manage to fall asleep.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Kitty lends me her car in the morning, since Alice is taking the van into the farmers’ market today. I drop her at work before I head to the hospital. She looks exhausted, definitely not fit for a full day’s work, but I know she can’t stay at home and rest.

  “Text me when you know what’s happening with your mom,” Kitty says before she gets out of the car. “We can figure out what to do next after that. I can take a taxi home tonight if you need the car longer, so don’t worry about it.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Positive. And if your mom’s stuck here overnight again, come back to my place.”

  “I will.” She slides out of the car and shuts the door. I take a moment to breathe, and then I carefully signal and move the car into traffic.

  I get to the hospital in record time, since my trip is against the flow of rush hour traffic, heading away from the downtown core. It’s a blessing, and I don’t have to white-knuckle it through gridlock after all. When I get to the hospital, I find that Mama has just gone in to be prepped for surgery. The nurse leads me to a waiting room.

  “It’ll be a few hours,” she says. “You can stay here, or there are coffee shops and such downstairs. But make sure you’re back here by ten, and I’ll come find you when your mother is in recovery.”

  “Thanks.” I wander over to the window, looking out over the stretch of prairie as far as the eye can see, except for the new low-rise condominiums going in a couple of streets over. This used to be bald prairie only a few years ago, yet now it’s not even the outermost edge of the city. I feel a pang of sadness for all that wildlife displaced. Then I turn, look around the bare, quiet room, and decide to go downstairs for a coffee. I check my watch. I’ll have time to call Betty, let her know we can’t be there for the Saturday market, and then to call Beatrice. They’ll both be disappointed, but hopefully they’ll understand. I have no doubt that the entire area knows of Mama’s fall by now, and word will get around about Ming Kitty. It’s a blessing and a curse of living in a rural area.

  I get my coffee and a muffin, find a seat, and make my calls. Then I text Kitty. Afterward, I put down my phone and focus on my muffin, letting my gaze wander out the window once more, though this time my view isn’t as pleasant. It’s cars and a parking lot.

  After a couple of hours, I am completely and utterly bored. Even the dog-eared magazines and a copy of the local paper haven’t been enough to keep me interested. It’s a bit early yet, but I head back up to the waiting room, hoping the nurse will have some news for me.

  I’m not waiting long before the nurse pops in. “Your mother is out of surgery and doing well,” she says. “The doctor will want to keep her overnight just to make sure, and then you can take her home. If you’ll come with me, I’ll take you to her room.”

  I follow the nurse out and down the corridor, passing a dozen or more doors. She takes me into a ward of four beds, and I see Mama tucked in a bed at the far end near the window. Her eyes are closed and her chest rises and falls regularly. Her expression is relaxed.

  “She’s still pretty dozy from the anesthetic,” the nurse says, “but she should come round fairly soon. If you need anything, use the buzzer here.” She places her hand on the bed rail, where there is a set of glowing buttons.

  “Thank you.” I take the chair next to Mama’s bed and settle in to wait.

  * * *

  I take a taxi home from work, and a little after that, Lucy arrives from the hospital. Between the two of us, I’m not sure who is more tired. I meet her at the door, and she yawns, which triggers my yawn. We both chuckle. The anxiety from my day begins to finally ebb. I’m not sure if Lucy feels the same, but she seems to relax a bit. For the first time all day, I feel content, right.

  “It’s been a long day. You too?” she asks.

  “Has it ever. How’s your mom doing?”

  “All right. She should be able to go home tomorrow.”

  Lucy toes off her shoes and I kick off my low heels and move into the kitchen. I pull a bottle of wine from the fridge. “Want a glass?” I ask.

  “That would be amazing,” Lucy says, taking her seat at the bar. “At least tonight I can rest and not have to worry. It’ll just be getting Mama home tomorrow that’ll be the trouble. Alice will have to drive in from the farm to pick us up.”

  “Tomorrow’s Saturday, at least,” I remark. “Finally. I could drive you two home.”

  “You don’t have work?”

  I do, but the urge to be at the farm and away from here is intense.

  “I can skip it until Sunday,” I say.

  “Only if you’re sure,” Lucy says. “I know you’ve been so busy, and if you need to work, we’ll manage.”

  I bring two glasses of wine and slide into my seat next to Lucy, placing a glass in front of her. “I’ll work on Sunday. And Saturday night if I have to.”

  “You’re the best,” Lucy says. She lifts her glass and we clink the rims. It’s a light pinot grigio, and it goes down way too easily.

  “I still care about you,” I say, “and your mom. So of course I would do it.”

  Lucy is quiet for a long moment. “That means a lot to me,” she says finally. “That you do.” She takes a sip of her wine, looking thoughtful. “And since I’m feeling a bit emotional”—she lifts the wineglass—“I will say that even though we’re not together, I’ve always appreciated that you’ve always liked me as I am. It means a lot.”

  I hadn’t even thought of that. Lucy is perfect exactly as she is, and I tell her as much.

  “You’ve never asked me to move, or to stop doing what I’m doing,” she explains. “Others have. It’s a relief.”

  “And you’ve never asked that of me, either,” I realize.

  “You’re you,” Lucy says. “All I want is for you to be happy.”

  I don’t know what to say to that, but my sense of contentment grows. My stomach growls, breaking the moment. Lucy chuckles.

  “I think we need takeout,” she says.

  “Delivery,” I agree. “I don’t want to go anywhere. Pajamas, wine, and takeout.”

  “Pizza?” Lucy suggests.

  “Sushi?” I add.

  “Both?”

  Conveniently there are both sushi restaurants and pizza joints nearby, and all of them deliver. We decide on a medium pepperoni with mushrooms, and a variety of rolls and nigiri sushi. I know we’re going to have food for days, but it doesn’t matter. It’s me and Lucy, and I’ve missed being with her.

  * * *

  We pick up Mama from the hospital midmorning, after a fuss and confusion over discharge papers. She’s wobbly on her rented crutches, so they give us a wheelchair to get her out to the car. Kitty helps me lift Mama, and we get her comfortably situated in the back seat, her leg propped up along the length of the bench seat.

  “You all right?” Kitty asks as she slips into the driver’s seat.

  I carefully close the passenger side back door, making sure not to jostle Mama’s ankle in its boot.

  “Just fine,” Mama says. “They gave me something for the pain. I might just sleep all the way home.” She chuckles as I settle into the passenger seat. “Thank you for driving us.”

  “It’s the least I can do for my two favorite women,” Kitty says, smiling. She glances at me before she turns her focus to the road. “It’s going to be a bit of a drive.”

  Mama wasn’t joking. It only takes a few minutes before she’s dozing in the back seat. Kitty turns the radio down low, quieting the voices on CBC’s Day 6 program. Once we’re on the highway, we drive in a comfortable silence until we get to the turnoff to the range road that leads to the farm. Kitty’s phone rings, the dis
play on her car flashing the number. It’s Cindy.

  Kitty declines the call.

  “You should answer that,” I say. “It might be important.”

  Kitty shakes her head. “I don’t want to wake your mom. I’ll call her back once we’re stopped and we have your mom in the house and settled.”

  We take the short drive up the range road. Kitty seems tense, her brow furrowed, but I don’t mention it. I don’t want to add to her concern over work. She doesn’t need more stress. Once we get home, it’s awkward to help Mama up the stairs with her crutches, but we manage, getting her settled on the couch in the living room. I go to put on some tea, and Kitty checks her messages, walking back down the hallway to the front door. In a few minutes, she’s back, just as I pour the hot water over the tea bags in the pot.

  “I can’t stay,” she says. Her shoulders are slumped, her voice flat. “There’s an emergency of some sort at the office, and I’m expected to be there to assist.” She shakes her head. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be sorry,” Mama says. She gestures to Kitty to come over to her. Kitty does, perching on the couch next to her. Mama puts a hand on her shoulder. “You drove us, and you took care of my girl. Now go take care of you. We’ll be here when you are done working.” Kitty smiles and squeezes Mama’s hand as she rises. I’m glad that they have become close.

  “Thank you,” she says, then sighs. “It didn’t sound good.” I walk her back outside to her car.

  “Will you always have to work weekends?” I ask. I’ve worked weekends too, but this seems more intense than farm life. At least I get breaks, and the stress isn’t anywhere near what Kitty seems to be facing on a daily basis.

  “I don’t know,” she says. “After my fuckup with that client, and this lawsuit I have to win, I feel like Jack has it in for me, or at the very least he’s going to make sure I learn from my mistakes.”

  “You made a mistake—you didn’t kill someone.” It’s hard not to bristle, even though I’ve never met her boss. “And you’re working to fix it.”