by Ava Miles
“Well, after having my aunt hem and haw about how it wasn’t polite to discuss anyone’s health, she finally shared that she had coronary heart disease. And of course my daddy died of a heart attack, but I always attributed that to him being with that gold digger of a woman half his age. He died in her bed, but I covered it up. The scandal would have rocked Nashville—although I think some people suspected.”
Mr. Hardcrew had died in someone’s bed? Good heavens! Shelby tried to school her features.
Gail waved her handkerchief in the air. “The doctors tell me I have this family disorder, which no one ever knew about because no one talks about their health. Well, I’m done with that provincial way of thinking, not that I’m going to pass my bad genes on to any children. I think that ship sailed when I divorced my cheating asshole second husband two years ago and took back my maiden name.”
Calvin Henderson had cheated on Gail? Shelby had always disliked him, but even though she and Gail were close in their way, her boss usually didn’t get this personal.
“My doctor wants to put me on Lipitor and suggested I eat more kale and sprouts,” Gail moaned, throwing her handkerchief on the desk. “I suppose I should be grateful he caught it, but the news was like a splash of cold water in the face. I’ve been carrying this genetic thing inside me my whole life and no one knew.” Then she shot up straighter in her chair. “Shelby McGuiness. I know your daddy left you when you were a baby, but what do you know about his family’s medical history?”
Suddenly Shelby found it hard to breath. Every time she went in for her annual gynecology exam and filled in her medical history, her daddy’s information and that of his kin amounted to a bunch of white space on the paper.
“Nothing really.”
Now Shelby was more than nervous. Didn’t people inherit genes for cancer from their parents? Like Angelina Jolie? Everyone knew the actress had gotten a double mastectomy for cancer prevention.
Shelby put her hand on her stomach—her body. What if she had something inside her from her daddy that could hurt her?
“Shelby,” Gail said in that tough-as-nails voice she was known for. “You listen to me. Don’t make the same stupid mistake I did. I was ignorant, and I’m not proud of it. You don’t need to be. Can your mama tell you anything about his family’s medical history?”
“We…ah…don’t discuss my daddy.” Mama didn’t like to talk about the past, and Shelby had never felt the need to ask her about family diseases. She was only twenty-eight, after all.
“It may be none of my business,” Gail continued, “and you can ignore me if you want, but I highly encourage you to find out as much as you can about your father’s family’s medical history from your mama. My doctor said they can prevent many conditions if they’re armed with knowledge upfront. He’s doing a full work-up on me now that we know I have this disorder. I’m praying they don’t find anything else.”
Shelby thought back to her last doctor’s visit. It had been for a pap smear, and they hadn’t talked about much beyond the fact that she was healthy, ate well, and exercised. But what if Gail was right?
“The same is true with cancer,” Gail said, echoing Shelby’s earlier thoughts. “My doctor couldn’t scare me enough about all the new tests they possess that can detect a family propensity for breast cancer.”
She handed Shelby the flask, which she took without hesitation this time. Cancer? Who wasn’t scared of that? Her mama’s sister had died of breast cancer. She took a deep draw of bourbon and coughed at its potency.
Gail leaned her elbows on her desk and stared at her. “I can’t imagine how difficult it might be to talk about this with your mama, but you should bite the bullet and get it done. Your health is important, Shelby. Trust me when I say I will no longer be ignorant about mine. I’m calling all my kin this coming week and asking them enough personal questions to send the women into vapors and the men off to their bourbon, mistresses, or both.”
Her head was pounding now. “All I know about my daddy’s people is that they were from Memphis, not close, and didn’t have much in the way of money.”
“Hmm…” Gail said and held her hand out for her flask, which Shelby passed to her. She took a deep drink and extended it back. “How did your daddy come to be in Nashville?”
Talking about her daddy was stirring Shelby up something fierce. She took another drink of the bourbon, hoping it would burn away the lump in her throat. “He came to Nashville in the hopes of becoming the next country music star. Instead, he became a washed-out musician who couldn’t land a gig anywhere in town. He ended up volunteering for the church choir to keep his music alive, and that’s where he met my mama.” For a time, they’d been happy, and that’s all Shelby knew.
“Why did he up and leave y’all?” Gail asked, her eyes intent.
“No one seems to know,” Shelby said, fighting the urge to cry suddenly. “Mama never talks about it. She won’t welcome me asking these questions. I haven’t asked about daddy’s medical history before, but I’ve asked plenty of other questions. She always tells me to leave the past in the past.”
“Sounds like my family,” Gail murmured, taking a hold of the framed photo of her daddy and mama on her desk and showing it to Shelby. “One thing I learned from the school of hard knocks is that there’s always more than one way to get an answer to a question. Hell, when I suspected my ex-husband was cheating on me, I up and asked him. That son of a bitch lied to my face. Do you know what I did? Hell, I hired a private investigator and had his ass followed. You can bet I had photos of him with some blond-haired slut half his age to toss in his face the next time I confronted him.”
Shelby couldn’t imagine what a scene that must have been. “Good for you.”
Gail’s nod was crisp. “You’ll figure out something, honey. No one is more enterprising than you. Why else would I hire some fresh-faced kid with a one-page resume? You have fire and wit, girl. Like me. Use them.”
Awash in fear and hurtful memories of the past, Shelby didn’t feel very fiery or witty. In fact, she felt all too human.
“I’ll see what I can find out,” she assured Gail, but mostly she was assuring herself.
“I know you will,” Gail said, reaching for the flask and draining its contents. “Well, that conversation was very Yankee of us, wasn’t it? How about I have Jeffries make us a proper drink to drive that foul taste from our mouths?”
Another drink sounded like heaven about now, even if it was just shy of eleven o’clock. “Jeffries does make the best drinks.”
Gail waggled her brows. “The doctor told me to watch my alcohol consumption, and I probably should, but right now, I just don’t give a damn.”
Shelby didn’t really give a damn either. She decided then and there that she was entitled to something as important as her daddy’s medical history.
Somehow she was going to get it.
Chapter 11
Jake had already sweated through two shirts by the time he showed up for his counseling appointment with Reverend Louisa the following Tuesday. All the motivation he needed to get well was his near-daily work with Susannah getting his house in order. Nothing was going to stop him from being the man who could take her out for a date and kiss her goodnight.
Nothing.
Not even himself.
Louisa stood up from her desk when the church’s receptionist showed him into her office. The room was a cheery yellow, and there were pictures of her family and inspirational sayings scattered around as decoration. The Reverend was wearing a pink blouse paired with a gray skirt. Stepping forward, she gave him a hug.
“Congratulations on showing up,” she said, shooting him an encouraging smile. “That’s sometimes the biggest step.”
“What’s the other one?” he asked, trying to balance his nerves.
“Coming back,” she quipped, reminding him of Susannah. “What would you like to drink?”
Joking about wanting a bourbon would be in bad taste, what with her be
ing a preacher lady and it being only one o’clock in the afternoon. “How about some water?”
“Water we can do,” she said, crossing the room to a small tray table that held glasses. She opened the mini-fridge below it and drew out a bottle of water.
“I don’t need a glass,” he added quickly, wanting to wet his whistle. He could taste the dust and sand already, and they hadn’t even started talking yet.
“Humor me,” she said, pouring the water out slowly.
A picture on the far wall caught his eye. A rainbow stretched across a storm-clad valley. “The promise of rainbows,” he said aloud.
The Reverend looked up. “I see one of my children has told you one of my favorite sayings. Was it J.P. or Susannah?” Then she laughed. “Of course it was Susannah. You like my daughter quite a bit, don’t you?”
“Yes, ma’am,” he answered truthfully, gazing back at her steadily.
“It’s Louisa, and it’s a hang-onto-her-every-word kind of like, right?”
Goodness, this woman was either going to cure him or kill him. “That would be correct.”
“Correct? No need to stand on formalities here, Jake.” She brought over his water. “Not when you’re about to pour out your heart and soul.”
His hand clutched the glass to keep from dropping it. “Only my heart and soul? I should have brought my guitar.”
Her eyes scanned him again, and he felt like a lab rat headed off for tests. “Maybe you should bring your guitar next time. When we spoke at Sunday dinner, you said music is the way you’re able to communicate what’s inside. I’ve been listening to your music lately. There’s a lot you’re communicating.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he answered, taking a hasty sip of the water and spilling some down his chin. “I mean Louisa.”
She handed him a tissue, and he wiped his mouth, shuffling his feet a little. He’d worn his best cowboy boots today, not just because he was going to church—well, sort of—but also to make a good impression. She was Susannah’s mama, after all. Then he realized making a favorable impression was pointless. The ugly truths of his past would crack any smooth terrain between them.
“Let’s sit down,” she said gently, gesturing to the tan couch.
For a moment, he wondered if Susannah had decorated her office, but he refrained from asking. Louisa would see through his small talk. She sat in the matching arm chair perpendicular to him. He hoped she wasn’t expecting him to lie down like he was in a shrink’s office.
“Where…ah…do you want me to start?” he asked, thinking back to the other therapy sessions he’d endured. “Do you want to hear about my military background?”
She shook her head. “There’s no need, really. I expect you’ve already done that with the specialists you’ve seen.”
If she didn’t want his military background, he felt compelled to share his treatment background. He didn’t want her to think he hadn’t been trying to overcome his PTSD.
“When I left the Army, I had a severe case of PTSD, although the symptoms started while I was serving.”
“Anxiety,” she said, crossing her hands in her lap. “Depression. Insomnia. Paranoia.”
He nodded. At the time, his inability to do normal things without fear had made him feel like a coward. “I wasn’t myself. Sometimes…it was like I was a different person. Going to a bar or talking with my buddies was beyond me at first. Simple conversations made me feel like I was walled off in glass and couldn’t get out. I…God…sorry. I won’t swear again.”
“Don’t worry about swearing around me,” she said with a soft smile. “I don’t mind it, and it’s important for you to voice how you really feel, curse words and all. Please finish what you were saying about feeling like you were in glass.”
A preacher lady who allowed curse words? Well, well. Maybe this would work after all. “I couldn’t function, and I knew something was wrong. I immersed myself in my music since I needed gigs to pay the rent when I first came to Nashville, and it made me feel a little better to play my music for people.”
“But the symptoms didn’t go away.”
“No,” he said. A memory swept over him—stumbling into an alley for a break during a set and falling apart. Dry heaves. Heart pounding so hard he feared he was having a heart attack. Pure primal fear. Looking side to side for an enemy even though he knew logically he was in Nashville.
“I had meds at first to get me over the hump, but I didn’t see them as a cure,” he explained, not knowing how she felt about the use of medication.
“Isn’t it interesting that in this day and age no one has discovered a medicine to treat PTSD?” she asked with a wry incline of her head.
“Yes,” he answered. “Ah…from there I tried Cognitive Processing Therapy, which was supposed to desensitize me to events, but only seemed to re-traumatize me. I completed all twelve weeks prescribed. I even did the homework they gave me.” He gave a hollow laugh. The doctors had asked him not only to describe the events that had traumatized him, but also to write about his issues with safety, trust, control, self-esteem, and intimacy. Seeing all his problems scrawled on paper had only depressed him. He’d never felt more broken.
“That’s a hefty amount of treatment,” Louisa said, picking up his water glass and handing it to him. “Why don’t you take a drink?”
His mouth was bone dry even though sweat was dotting his brow. The water felt cool in his mouth, and he drank the whole thing before realizing it. She simply took the glass from him and refilled it. When she handed it back to him, she also gave him a tissue.
“Think I’m going to cry?” he asked, his solar plexus tight. He’d cried before, but the thought of crying in front of her made him queasy.
“I thought you might want to wipe your brow,” she said, compassion filling her eyes. “But if you need to cry, go right ahead. Many have. What you’ve experienced deserves its day. Tears are God’s way of helping the body get rid of painful feelings.”
He still hated crying. “Yes, ma’am,” he answered immediately. “Sorry. Louisa.”
“You’ll get the hang of it,” she said gently. “And after Cognitive Processing Therapy?”
“I tried some Prolonged Exposure Therapy, and I have to admit, the homework was a life saver. The doctors asked me to go to busy concerts to face the loud crowd noise. My career was just starting to take off, but I hadn’t played for a big arena yet. By the time I did, I was mostly prepared. I don’t think I would have succeeded as a country music singer if I hadn’t undergone that therapy.”
“Then some of it was a blessing for you,” she said. “That’s good to hear.”
“Yes. I tried to focus on that, but when you’re in the grip...”
“It’s hard to do,” she answered. “I know.”
For a moment, a flash of sadness crossed her face, and he remembered that this woman had grappled with her own demons. What must it have been like for her to raise four children on her own after being abandoned by the man who’d pledged to love and care for her? He couldn’t imagine.
“Everyone seems to have at least one hardship in life, don’t they?” he said.
This time her smile was but a trace on her face. “I keep waiting to meet someone who’s never experienced one. I’m going to dance on that day to celebrate their providence.”
“I’d like to hear about that too,” he told her, giving her an answering smile before clearing his throat to continue. “From there, I did some EMDR, but again, reliving my trauma didn’t work for me. I know the therapy is supposed to replace traumatic memories with positive ones, but mine seemed to stick like black tar.”
“That’s a good way to describe it,” she told him. “You certainly have a way with words.”
“Thank you,” he said, crossing his ankles, trying to get more comfortable even though he knew that wasn’t going to happen. He always got shifty when he talked about the past.
“Would you like to change seats with me? Some people are more comfortable in the c
hair.”
“It’s…ah…not the furniture,” he said, ducking his head. “There’s another therapy I should mention.”
Her eyes never left him, and she didn’t take notes like other therapists and doctors he’d seen.
“When I started touring, it was harder for me to meet with my psychiatrist, so he recommended a service dog for me.”
“Those aren’t easy to come by,” she said. “I wish more of the men I see could receive one.”
“I was lucky,” he added, remembering how thrilled he’d been. Not just to have an animal trained for emotional support and companionship, but a real dog. He’d always wanted one. To this day, he still supported the organizations that provided them: America’s VetDogs, Canine Companions for Independence, K9s for warriors, and New Horizons Service Dogs, Inc.
“What happened to your dog, Jake?” she asked quietly.
He pressed his fingers to his brows. “I…ah…had a concert in Jackson, Mississippi. There was a lot of activity in the parking lot. TV crews. Fans. It’s still not clear what happened. My manager was supposed to be watching him. One of the TV crew’s buses ran him over.”
Losing that dog had darn near broke him, and he’d almost cried in front of everyone.
“What was your dog’s name?”
“Hercules,” he said in a hoarse voice. “No dog was better named. He was a…hero.”
“I’m sorry you lost him,” she said in that same gentle voice, causing tears to burn his eyes.
“Me too,” he said with a catch in his throat.
That black Labrador had even learned to bark and whine in accompaniment to his songs, which had made Jake laugh. Until then, there hadn’t been much laughter in his life. “I wrote some of my best songs with Hercules by my side.”
She was quiet for a moment. “You didn’t think about finding another dog?”
“No,” he simply answered, remembering how Annabelle had suggested it. He didn’t think his heart could take the pain of losing another, but a part of him longed to try. A dog would be happy at Redemption Ridge.
