by Neva Brown
“But we hate to bother you. You have more important things to do.”
His urge to give the woman a lecture on what is important nearly got the best of him, but he clamped his mouth shut.
“It’s no bother. After all, she was riding a Running S horse when she got hurt. We want to help her get well.”
Pauline sighed as if a huge load had been lifted off her shoulders. “If you’re sure, it really would be a relief.”
Two days later, Vera, a female version of her brother, settled Casey in J.D.’s RV. Sedated to ease the pain of travel, Casey remained docile and drowsy for the trip, but when Brad and Vera helped her out of the RV at the ranch, she became anxious. Tres and Mattie Lou came down the sloping driveway to greet her. Mattie Lou’s voice caught Casey’s attention. She stopped, leaning on her walker. She looked long and hard at the older woman. “Pauline told me to not be a bother to you.”
Mattie Lou smiled. “Tres didn’t put it quite that bluntly, but he said about the same about my not bothering you. Do you think we could just visit with each other when you feel like it?”
A sad shadow passed across Casey’s face. “I don’t know much. Pauline said I forgot everything she taught me.”
Mattie Lou didn’t bat an eye. “That’s all right. Maybe if we visit, you can learn new things.”
Casey’s anxiety subsided. She looked at Tres. “Is this where you said I could stay?”
Tres let out the breath he’d been holding. “It is. Come on in and see how Mattie Lou fixed your suite of rooms.”
Every step Casey took hurt Tres, but he didn’t offer to carry her. He and Mattie Lou ambled along, talking about this and that, while Vera and Brad stayed on either side of their patient holding firmly to the wide strap around her waist.
Mattie Lou looked over at Casey and grinned. “Brad won’t recognize the place. I redecorated to make it into a young lady’s suite. I found just the right colors to go with your pretty auburn hair and green eyes. Lots of greens, blues, and gold.” She talked on as if Casey understood every word she said.
Inside the French doors, Casey eased down onto a gold brocade satin Queen Anne chair. She stared in awe at her surroundings, unconsciously smoothing her hand back and forth on the chair arm. “This is like some of the pictures in a magazine at the hospital. It’s pretty. Do I get to live here?”
Mattie Lou thought her heart had suffered all the hurt it could bear while J.D. struggled for life in these rooms, but she felt it twist and bleed again as she watched the once self-sufficient Casey sitting helpless and childlike studying her with questioning eyes. “This is all yours; a sitting room, bedroom, kitchenette, and bath. Brad and Vera have an apartment through that door, so they will be close when you need them.”
Brad watched Casey’s reaction to each new stimulus and felt hopeful for his new charge. He turned to Mattie Lou and smiled. “You’ve been reading my books. Colors in all shades with sizes, textures galore, hardwood floors, no rugs to stumble on, and lots of natural light.” Turning his attention back to Casey, he said, “Right through those doors, across a patio, is the swimming pool I told you about.”
“The one where I can walk in the water and it won’t hurt?”
“Yes, Ma’am.” He grinned, pleased at her short-term memory.
“Can we do it now?”
Brad stood close as Casey struggled up from the chair and said, “We can, if you’re not too tired.”
Vera spoke as she came to Casey’s side. “We need to put on our swim suits before we get into the water.”
Casey sank back down in the chair. Big tears slipped over her dark lashes trickling down her cheeks. “I don’t have a swim suit.”
“Yes, you do. I bought you one,” Vera said in a happy singsong voice, and then added, “See the little house out by the pool?”
Casey nodded, still looking sad.
“It is a bathhouse that is sometime called a cabana where we can change our clothes. Brad can go out there with you while I run get our swim suits.”
Tres and Mattie Lou slipped away in the confusion, knowing therapy was in session as the three newcomers started building a working rapport.
Vera got into the pool and waited for Brad to put Casey in the lift-chair, so he could let her down into the water. Knowing their patient’s fear would probably resurface, Vera called to her, making mock pirouettes and dancing about, splashing the water to divert Casey’s attention until Brad got her into the water, then slipped in himself. Soon the three of them moved slowly back and forth across the pool with Casey becoming braver and less apprehensive with each step. When Brad deemed it time to get out, she insisted that she was not tired.
Sensing they were headed for a tantrum, Brad spoke in his quiet, baritone voice. “We can do this two or three times a day if you act nice. But for now, I’ll lift you out of the water in the chair, even carry you to the chaise lounge and rub good stuff on your legs to keep them from cramping. Vera’s going to swim a few laps before she gets out.”
“Want to see Vera swim,” Casey said through pouting lips.
“Okay, you can watch while I massage your legs.”
Tres observed from his office window as Brad placed Casey on the lounge, and then adjusted her neck brace so she would be comfortable. In his peripheral vision, Tres saw Vera cut capers in the water to entertain while Brad rubbed Casey’s long, thin legs. A territorial jealousy came out of nowhere, kicking up his blood pressure, as he watched the rhythmic motion of Brad’s hands on Casey. Why should that bother him?
Chapter 4
Day-after-day of intense therapy, much of it couched in games, moved Casey inch-by-inch away from helplessness, tantrums, and baby talk. She seemed to see Brad and Vera as playmates she wanted to get along with. Like a little child, she wanted to please and act like they did. They didn’t cry, act tacky, or act like a baby when things didn’t go their way, so she tried hard to be like them. One night after a particularly busy day, shadows played tag in Casey’s mind as she drifted toward sleep. The shadows became bright multi-colored sparks darting here and there, making her head hot.
They joined like the connect-the-dots puzzles they played with. Her eyes raced back and forth, trying to keep up as blue streaked off in one direction while all shades of red, green, and yellow streaked off in other directions, creating magical patterns in her brain—beautiful patterns. With such a wild game of tag, they soon tired to slow motion then faded altogether. Her head cooled. She relaxed, sighed, and slipped into a deep sleep.
In the early morning hours before dawn, she awoke. A dream with sunbeams dancing across rippling water had reminded her she needed to get to the bathroom. She remembered Pauline telling her over and over to go to the bathroom often. Feeling happy that she had remembered, Casey grimaced with pain as she stood supporting herself with the walker.
Coming back from the bathroom, she became aware of the country night sounds. She hobbled to the screen door. “I know those sounds,” she said softly. “I hear an owl, crickets, cicadas, and the breeze stirring the leaves. I know these sounds.” She eased down into the Queen Anne chair, enjoying her newfound knowledge.
A dog padded across the patio, then presented itself at the screen door and whined.
Laboriously, Casey rose and opened the door.
“Come in,” she said.
The dog did not hesitate but went to the bed and reared up on the side of it. Finding no one there, she searched all the other rooms then returned to the bed and crept under it, lying down with her head on her front paw.
“I know you,” she whispered. “You’re a Catahoula cow dog.”
Forgetting about her pain, she went back to the bed. Holding onto the edge of the bed, she eased down to the floor then lay down on her side to talk to the dog.
“You’re looking for J. D., aren’t you?” The dog whined but didn’t move. “I remember you, but not your name. What can I call you? You probably wouldn’t like Cat. I know. I’ll call you Ula.” Casey giggled at he
rself. “Why don’t you come out from there, Ula?”
She reached up and pulled a blanket and pillow off the bed. Spreading the blanket out, she lay down with her head on the pillow to accommodate her neck brace then patted the blanket trying to coax Ula to come lie beside her.
The dog whined and crept closer. Soon she lay near enough for Casey to stroke the brown-and-black spotted coat.
“If I know you, I may know lots more things. I remember the summer you got stepped on by a cow and had to have your front leg amputated. I had just started training Ginger to be a cutting horse. Do you remember her?” She was a dun with a black mane and tail, four black stocking legs, and a black stripe down her back.”
The feel of Ula’s silky hair and warm body comforted Casey. They slept. Casey woke at the touch of Ula’s cold nose to her cheek. When Casey opened her eyes, Ula went to the door and whined.
“I guess you have to go to the bathroom, too, when you wake up,” Casey muttered as she tried to get up. Not having tried to stand from being flat on the floor, she couldn’t make her body do what she told it to do.
“Just a minute, Ula,” Casey said, as she rolled over on her stomach. She instinctively rose up on her hands and knees and began to crawl. At the door, she strained up with one arm to unlatch the screen. “Come back to see me. This will be our secret for now,” she whispered as she brushed her hand across the dog’s back. Ula pushed the screen door open with her nose, squeezed through, and disappeared through an opening in the hedge between the Mansion and the barns.
Once her new friend disappeared, Casey saw she was all the way across the room from her walker. She crawled back to the bed, pulled herself up, then flopped down flat of her back. Exhausted, but feeling smug, she began to catalog all the things she had remembered.
Brad had picked up all her stirring about on the monitor connecting her room to his. He had recognized the whine of the dog that had visited J.D. often and knew Casey was safe. What had brought him wide-awake were the few words he had been able to understand. He smiled. Our Casey had a breakthrough in her speech patterns and is remembering at least some of her past! Until time to get up, he made plans for the best activities to further facilitate her recovery.
Tres’ day had started long before dawn. He had missed lunch. It was mid-afternoon when he left the barn and headed toward the house. As he approached the hedge that screened the view between the barn and house, he could hear laughter coming from the pool. Thoughts of the day’s problems receded as he entered the gate and saw Casey standing without assistance with a big ball in her hands. With a wobbly effort, she tossed it to Vera while Brad stood close enough to rescue her should she start to fall.
Seeing him, her face lit up. “Tres! Watch me.”
He smiled at her uninhibited ways. The old Casey would have never called attention to herself. He made his way closer to the pool and squatted down.
“Brad said when I can throw the ball straight lots of times and can walk in the water by myself without falling, he will teach me to swim. Can you swim?” In her eagerness to tell Tres her news, she forgot about her game and started walking toward Tres using the ball to help balance herself. Brad, who kept at a close distance behind her, did not touch her but observed her coordination intently.
“Sure, I can swim.” His mind flashed back to one hot day, that first summer when he and Casey stripped down to their underwear and swam in Cottonwood Creek.
“Will you swim with me when I learn how?”
“I certainly will.”
“You know what else I’ve done today?
As Tres shook his head, he noted Casey’s up-turned face. Though still too thin, she had fewer pain lines, and her eyes were no longer dulled, but held a hint of sparkle in them.
“I helped Vera fix lunch. I scrubbed potatoes with a brush and peeled the orange for salad.”
“You’ve been busy today.”
“I have a secret, too. Come closer, and I’ll whisper it to you.”
He dropped down onto one knee and bent his head over to her.
Her slender wet hand held onto his neck as she whispered, “J.D.’s dog came to see me this morning. I think she’ll come back.”
“Really?” he whispered.
A conspiratorial smile lit up her face as she nodded.
“Why is it a secret?”
Once again he felt her hand at the nape of his neck and wanted to reach out to touch her. Instead, he remained still and listened.
“I let her come in the house and we slept together on some covers I pulled off the bed. Dogs aren’t supposed to be in the house.”
“Would you like for me to tell everybody it’s okay for her to come in to see you?”
“Can you do that?”
He nodded.
“Then I could let her come in to play. I think she misses J.D.”
Trying not to show his surprise at her improvement, Tres shot a glance at Brad who stood quietly with a grin on his face giving Tres a slight nod.
“I’ll tell you what. If she comes again, you can let her in. We better get her a blanket of her own so she won’t get hair on your covers.”
“It needs to be big enough for me, too. Ula likes for me to sleep beside her.”
Tres wasn’t sure how Raider, one of the best cow dogs he had ever seen work, would take to being called Ula, but somehow he got the feeling it would be just fine with her. “Did you name her Ula?”
A little frown crossed Casey’s brow. “I couldn’t remember her name, so I decided since she was a Catahoula, Ula would be okay. I knew she wouldn’t want to be called Cat.”
Amazed at what she was remembering, he reached out and ruffled her short, baby-fine, russet curls. “I have to go get my work finished then clean up for Mattie Lou’s dinner party tonight. You finish your game and learn to throw that ball really hard so we can go swimming, Sorrel Top.”
A frown crossed her face. “That’s the color of a horse.”
He grinned at her. “You’re right. The prettiest color there is.”
Her frown cleared. “I know lots of things, don’t I? I just need to work on remembering them.”
Tres stood up and smiled at her. “Casey, my friend, you are doing just fine. Tell me ‘bye.”
“‘Bye, don’t forget to come swim with me.”
With teary eyes, Casey watched Tres stride toward the house. “I feel sad. Can’t play anymore.”
Brad recognized the signs of an imminent full-blown crying jag. “Remember what we decided about crying?”
Casey nodded, swallowing a watery hiccup. “Makes my eyes burn, my nose run, and my head hurt.”
“Let’s walk across to the lift-chair and if you still feel really sad, we’ll get out. But, if you feel like it, we can do some more funny walking so you’ll get strong enough to start swimming.”
Once Vera reached Casey’s other side, Brad said, “We haven’t goose-stepped. Let’s try to do it together. We have to hold on to each other. You hold my arm up close to the elbow and I’ll hold yours the same way.” Once Casey gripped his arm, he continued. “Now, hold Vera’s arm the same way. Hold tight, lift one leg straight out in front, then take a big step.”
All three marched across the pool to the beat of Brad’s “Hup, one, two, three” with Vera making fun of her brother, while Casey concentrated on doing the task at hand. Tears forgotten, the exercise continued.
Tres watched them from his office window as he talked with Dan Brown on the phone. “Do you still keep J.D.’s old dog in your yard?”
After listening, he continued, explaining the situation and making arrangements for the dog to be bathed and let out early every morning so she could visit Casey if she wanted to. He rubbed the back of his neck, remembering the cool touch of Casey’s hand. Every part of him willed her to get well. At some point, she’d stopped being the little sister-buddy he remembered and had become a naïve siren whose subtle, unspoken allure he couldn’t allow himself to acknowledge. Not yet.
Ch
apter 5
“Tres, I’m having a drink if you would like one,” Mattie Lou called out as she saw her grandson cross the hall. “The guests will arrive soon, but we have time for a short visit.”
When he entered through the door, a lump lodged in Mattie Lou’s throat. Tres was a polished image of J.D. at that age—tall, lean, muscled from hard work, and so handsome it made her ache for times long gone. “Rosalinda wanted to know why you didn’t come eat when you got in this afternoon.” Mattie Lou smiled. “She worries about you.”
“I got busy and forgot. I’ll enjoy the steak you said we were having just that much more if I’m really hungry.” He sat down and stretched his legs out full-length as his grandmother handed him a drink.
Mattie Lou feasted her eyes on her handsome grandson. “I asked Brad if he and Casey and Vera would join us, but he said Casey wasn’t ready for anything social. I told him I’d send the food to them by one of the maids so they could have a dinner party with just the three of them.”
Tres thought of Casey’s cool hand on his neck and wished he could have his dinner party with her. “I saw Casey in the pool this afternoon. Brad is right. Social events would overwhelm her. She still struggles, both physically and emotionally, to cope with her world.”
Mattie Lou frowned. “Can we do something more that might help her?”
Tres shook his head. “No, the doctors say time and therapy are all that can be done for now. Dr. Newton made it clear that nobody can be sure how much or how little a brain that badly injured will recover.” He shook his head and smiled. “She acts like a three- or four-year-old little girl who would win the heart of everyone, but she is in a grown-up woman’s body.”
“What if she never gets back to normal?” Mattie Lou asked, with a catch in her voice.
