Jenkins and the Naughty Nurse: A Beyond Series Off-shoot

by Ashley Logan

"I know. Doesn't stop me from wanting it though," I say with a ready smile as I watch Ry concentrating on his work. "Looks like Ry's enjoying himself. Did you think some more on me giving him some lessons?"

  Wringing her hands a little, Stace looks at them in her lap and stops. Sitting on her hands, she swings her feet instead. "I just think Mom would see it as you coming to see me. That it was me who lured you in, and nothing to do with Ry."

  "So I'll do it when you're at work. That way I'll be able to concentrate better on what Ry's doing. You're too sexy and I'd probably end up painting you nude or something. It'd be inappropriate."

  Scoffing at me, Stace shakes her head. "You're such a gutter-brain."

  "Not always," I argue, tearing my eyes away from her smile to watch Ry. "I could handle your mom while we painted. I think if you weren't there, it'd probably be quite different. She certainly seems to target you."

  Sighing, Stace's shoulders relax a bit. "It's kind of nice to know I'm not just imagining it."

  "Why do you think she does it?"

  She shrugs. "Maybe I remind her too much of my father. Or maybe she blames me for his leaving. Maybe it was the only way she was able to raise me on her own. It's quite hard you know; parenting. And doing it on your own adds a whole different set of strains. That's why I've hung in there with Mom for so long. That and the guilt. Hard as it is to live with her, it's still easier than it would be on our own. I'm almost scared to leave in some ways. I need to though. One day soon I'll put on my big girl panties and march right out that door."

  After a moment, she turns to me. "You've gone quiet. Say something."

  Smiling, I point to my head. "Gutter-brain. I was just thinking about you in your big girl panties. So that's a yes to me doing art with Ry?" Swatting the air, I shake my head. "You know what? Don't even worry about it. I'll set it up with your mom directly so you're not even involved. What are you two up to after this? Park? Ice cream? Am I allowed to come?"

  "You want to come to the park?" she asks, her brows rising in disbelief.

  "Why wouldn't I? Parks are fun. You guys are fun." Pausing a moment, I lean back in my chair. "Have I not made it clear that I enjoy both fun and you? Where did I go wrong?"

  Cocking her head sideways as she rolls her eyes at me, Stace sighs. "I suppose you could come to the park with us."

  "Brad! What does this do?" Ry asks from over by the scissor lift.

  "It's my own personal elevator. Takes me up and down so I can paint up high like Bruno can. Only he has to climb a ladder like a sucker."

  I can see Bruno's lips twitch into a smile, but he otherwise ignores me and continues with his work.

  "You want to go for a ride?" I ask, starting to roll over as Ry jumps for joy at the proposition. Pulled backwards sharply, I frown and turn to face Stacey.

  Chewing her lip, she glances over at the scissor lift. "Is it safe? How high does it go?"

  "It's fine. I'll go with him and we won't go through the roof. Relax."

  Her jaw compresses and decompresses as her eyes dance between the hoist and me. Eventually, she gives me a brief nod.

  Wheeling over to Ry, I pass him my paint brush. "If we're going up, we might as well do some work. See that tree that looks out of place?"

  Ry looks up, studies the picture and then nods.

  "We want to fix it so it doesn't stand out. We want to blend it in like the others and to do that, we need to give it some shadows. What do shadows look like?"

  Again, Ry looks up at the painting, squinting with concentration. Looking confused, he looks at the shiny tiles and moves his arms around watching his reflection.

  "Shadows look like the same thing but darker?"

  Grinning, I nod. "Yeah they do, smarty-pants. We need some darker colors up there on that tree. And if we put them in the right place, we can make its trunk look rounder, or older, or rotten and twisted. We can make its leaves look more lush, or as if the sun shining on them is really strong. Shall we go up for a better look?"

  "Yes!"

  "Please hold on Ry," Stace pleads from right behind us.

  "Mom's scared of heights," Ry whispers to me, even though Stace can hear him.

  "How about you?"

  "Nah. I climb stuff when she's not looking."

  Trying not to laugh, I usher him onto the enclosed platform. "Maybe your mom finds it lonely being scared of heights and wants you to be afraid of them too," I say, trying to will Stace to relax with my eyes. "For company."

  "I know what you're saying and no, I don't want him to be scared of heights," she says, taking a conscious step back. "I'm okay. Go."

  Ryan and I wave to her as we travel up, and after a few minutes of admiring the view, Ryan sorts out the troublesome tree under my instruction and we travel down again to see the difference.

  "Mom, look! I fixed it!"

  "You sure did, baby. Great job."

  As soon as he turns away, Stace looks at me and her face melts my heart completely. Blinking back tears, she adjusts her glasses and presses her lips together, but the act of suppression still doesn't hide her smile.

  Rolling up next to her, I lean to one side and rest my head against her hip. It's not the huge hug that I want to give her. If I could walk, I might have picked her up and spun her around, but as we stay still, watching Ry, with my temple pressed against the soft fabric of her dress and her hand warm on my back, I feel whole. It's enough.

  It's more than enough.

  I don't need the legs. They'd be handy, sure. But life is good without them in a way I never knew about when I had them.

  "So I can paint with him?" I ask softly.

  "Whenever you want."

  AS SOON AS WE GET TO the park, Ry makes a break for the playground.

  "He's pretty good at running," I observe as Stace and I follow at a more leisurely pace.

  "Hmm," Stace says, lost in thought as she scans the playground.

  "Looking for someone?"

  Shaking her head, she crouches to meet Ry as he runs back to us. "Can I climb up to the top?" he asks, pointing to the fort thing with monkey bars and swings attached.

  "Course you can. Will you wave to me when you get there?"

  "Okay!" he calls back, already running.

  "He doesn't usually go up to the top," she says, looking down at me with a mixed expression. "I guess now that you've shown him, he's in love with heights. I feel like I'll regret this whole 'learning to be a man' thing."

  Squinting at her for a bit, I gesture to where Ry is happily playing with some other kids. "You know your kid's a dude, right? He's going to be a man someday."

  "I know. I just want him to be a good one. There don't seem to be a lot of them, and I worry he might not be, what with how his dad is, and how my dad was..." Her voice trails off as she looks me over. "It's that whole Nature vs. Nurture thing you know? What if..."

  "What if you never let him do anything fun? What if he needs to learn how to take sensibly sized risks as a kid so that when he learns to drive he doesn't speed straight into a tree? What if you give him a chance to learn how to make good choices?"

  Pushing her glasses up, Stace refuses to look at me.

  "You know, I already worry every day that I'm fucking the kid up. Do you really have to tell me I'm doing it too?"

  "Hey." Rolling in front of her, I hold up my hands in protest. "I never said you were fucking him up. The kid's a superstar. That's all you. Any kid would be lucky to have you as his mom. I was just saying what if? Just like you. But obviously I was doing it in a dick way, and I'm sorry. I was just wanting you to relax a little," I explain. "It's a playground made for kids. What's the worst that could happen?"

  "Says the guy in a wheelchair to the nurse who specializes in head injuries."

  "Okay. I understand that you probably see some traumatic shit, but a broken arm, or grazed knee never killed anyone."

  Arms still folded, Stace continues her stubborn argument. "Obviously you've never heard of fatty embolisms or septicemi
a."

  "Actually I've heard of both; I just forgot for a second who I was arguing with. I was merely trying to say that a guy needs to feel strong and tough and brave. It's stupid and meat-headed and all the rest of it, I know, but it's fundamentally important to our masculinity. To a girl's femininity too, as I see it. But the thing is, it's hard to test yourself if someone puts limits on you." Holding up my hand as Stace opens her mouth to retaliate, I slip in first. "Obviously safety considerations should be made in any situation, if you were about to suggest I'd strap a parachute on your kid and toss him out of a plane or something."

  "But-"

  "I don't care what your mom, or fuck-face 'I'll-punch-him-again-if-I-have-to' Sodermann says. They can't take your kid from your loving fucking arms and if I hear he's tried to threaten you into his bed again, I will not be letting it slide."

  "You can't just punch people when you don't get your own way," she says, kicking at a tuft of grass.

  "I know. These days I just punch people for annoying me."

  Laughing at her wide-eyed expression, I wave her away. "I'm talking about Bruno and Damon. They love it. They ask for it, actually. I've only ever really punched one guy because he pissed me off, and since you informed me of his linen closet affair with my fiancée, I feel as comfortable with it now as I did at the time, when he told me I'd never walk again, but not to fuss, because I had a fine looking woman who looked well-ready for a good time if my dick ever started working again."

  "He said that to you?"

  "To be honest I don't remember his exact phrasing, but yeah. I remember him being an unprofessional douche about it. He probably didn't know that Mandy had been to see me about an hour earlier to dump my crippled ass. Not that it mattered. Still would've floored him. On principle."

  "They sedated the shit out of you for that."

  "Totally worth it."

  Stace snorts, laughing quietly. "Fine to say when you weren't the one wiping the drool from your chin."

  Frowning at the playground, Stace takes a few steps closer. "Why is Ry sitting on top of the monkey bars?"

  "Having a look around? Scouting out new territory? Testing if the air is thinner there? He's a kid."

  Shooting me an annoyed look, Stace continues to watch him. "He's not moving. You think he's stuck?"

  Studying her a moment, I try to imagine if I'd worry that much about my own kid. Kind of impossible when you've never had one. She always seems to need to be right there for the kid whether he needs her or not. I can see the distress building inside her that she's trying to keep under wraps, because I've just been suggesting she should back off and give the kid some space.

  "We can always ask him," I say, moving slightly in Ry's direction. "If he's fine you can tell me what else you used to do to me when I was too medicated to stop you."

  Stace hasn't heard me. She already on her way to Ryan, so I follow. I watch her try to talk with him, but the kid's frozen. Frowning, I wheel next to Stace, looking up through the bars.

  Ry's knuckles are white; his hands clamped around the bars. Halfway across the span of them, he's been seized by fear and is now barely able to register Stace pleading for him to look at her.

  "You'll have to go and help him down," I say calmly as she becomes more panicked.

  Looking at me blankly, Stace blinks several times before her eyes travel the course she will need to take. Now completely pale, she looks as though she may throw up.

  "Stace? You okay? Is this that fear of heights thing?" I ask, reaching out to touch her. "It's not that high. Even for a short-stack like you."

  Her bottom lip trembles and she looks back up to Ry. Gingerly walking to the end to use the ladder, she appears to steel herself with each step upward. At the top where she needs to go across the bars to get to Ry, she glances down and freezes.

  "Shit."

  Now both of them are stuck.

  "Ry," I call up to him. "Just hold on buddy. I'll come and get you."

  Wheeling to the ladder, I reach up and tap Stace's foot. Visibly shaking as she looks down at me, she clings to the metal framework.

  "Come on down, sweetheart. I'll get him."

  With a little more coaxing, Stace regains her equilibrium, and moves down. Before she can start freaking out about abandoning Ryan at the top, I use the ladder to haul myself up and out of my chair.

  I'm a huge fan of monkey bars. My trainer friend Jake had them installed in his gym specifically to help me workout. I do all sorts of shit on them because I don't need my legs. It makes for a great strength building and cardio workout, but I've never thought of this practical application until now.

  Once I reach the top of the ladder, I swing along to where Ry is stuck and pull myself up and onto the top next to him.

  I have to say his name several times before he looks at me and actually sees me. The sheer terror in his eyes is enough to break my heart.

  "It's okay Ry. I'm here." Holding on with one hand, I reach out to him with the other. "Come on. I'll help you down."

  He doesn't move.

  Shifting myself as close as possible, I talk softly as I literally peel his fingers from the bars. As soon as his hand is loose, it grabs me and I half pull him in as he wraps his arms around my neck tight enough to almost choke me. My gut grows tight as if his fear is leaching into me, but it's not our proximity to the ground that's bothering me; it's something else. He's attached to me as if his life depends upon it, and instantly more protective, I grip him back. He's so vulnerable and innocent, and I never want to see him hurting or afraid. I wonder if this is similar to how Stace feels when she has to let him go.

  As a teenager, I once saved a kid from drowning at the local pool. The kid had clung to my arm as I dragged him back to the shallow end, but once he could touch the bottom again, it was as though it had never happened.

  This feels nothing like that. Ry is holding me with everything he has. No longer gripping the security of the bar, he's put all of his faith in me. If I drop him, he'll fall.

  Fuck. I could totally drop him.

  My legs don't work and I'm holding us both in place, several feet above the ground, with one arm.

  Granted it's a strong arm, but still.

  Taking a moment to just hold him, I try to keep calm, thankful that I have the strength to keep him safe when he's trusting me to do so.

  Half rubbing his back as I hold him, I wait for him to stop shaking.

  "I've got you. You're safe. I can't believe you got half way across this thing! You did a great job. Your mom only made it to the top of the ladder," I say, giving Stace the 'okay' signal behind his back.

  Tightening his arms around my neck, Ry looks down at his mom, and bless her if she's not doing her best to put on a brave face. If she says anything, she's going to give herself away though. I signal to her that I've got this, hoping she'll leave me to it. The last thing Ry needs is his mommy fussing and hyperventilating about him being up so high.

  "I thought we had a good time up high?" I say, bringing his attention back to me.

  "We did," he admits quietly.

  "You weren't having a great time just now though. What happened?"

  "It got bigger."

  "I think it stayed the same size, dude." Keeping my tone light and my smile ever-present, I try to get him more comfortable. "I think it only got bigger in your head. All those smarty-pants brains you have in there are trying to mess with you. You made it this far just fine. You want to try to get to the end?"

  Shaking his head, Ry hugs me even tighter.

  Twisting my neck a few times, I loosen his arms enough to speak. "What if I'm right there with you? Nothing bad will happen."

  Ry looks down at his mom and then over his shoulder at the end of the row of bars.

  "I'm not going to make you do anything," I reassure him. "I can take you down if you want me to. It makes me look like a hero to your mom, which I like. But you can be a hero too if you want. Her hero and yours. There's nothing to stop you from f
inishing, if you want to keep going. I won't let you fall."

  Ry looks at the bars and then back to me.

  "Promise I won't let you fall. If you want to show your mom how it's done, we can go real slow."

  "What if I can't?"

  "What if you can?" I reply with a shrug. "You made it this far and it's the same this way as it was that way. I think we already know that you can do it. Now we need to know if you want to."

  Looking back at Stace for a moment, Ry nods. "I'll do it."

  "Great."

  We stay where we are for another long moment.

  "Whenever you're ready, you can let go of me and take hold of the bars again," I prompt, nodding to where he should start. "You'll want to get in a good position for moving. I think hanging your legs over each and sliding along to the end will be the easiest and most comfortable. That way you hardly even need to look down either. What do you think?"

  Staring at the bars a moment, Ry nods again.

  A minute later, I can breathe a little easier as Ry's hold around my neck begins to loosen.

  "That's it buddy. I'll keep a hold of you while you're getting set up, so just relax and get it sorted."

  At one stage during the transition, Ry begins to teeter sideways, but I keep a firm hold on him until he's planted safely on his ass next to me. "There. See? Safe as houses."

  "I almost fell," he argues.

  "Nah. I had ya. Come on then. Get a wriggle on. I'll be shuffling right along behind you until we get to the ladder. Then I'll help you turn so you're backwards to climb down. That's the best way to go down, because you can comfortably hold on while your feet find the steps to go down."

  Nodding as he starts to pull himself along the top of the bars, Ry stops suddenly.

  "Why are you stopping?" I ask pulling up close behind him. "You're doing great."

  "How will you get down?" he asks, looking over his shoulder at me.

  "Same way I got up," I answer with a shrug. "It's easier going down than up for sure. I'll need your help once you get to the bottom though."

  "You will?"

  "Yeah. I left my wheels at the other end. You could wheel them over for me? My leg is still broken and I'm too tall to swing back across without dragging it."