Hit&Run

by Freya Barker

  It would kill her.

  Just then Jake calls and it is too much. When he wants to know what he can do for me, I find myself tempted to ask him to take over. To just step in and make the difficult decisions I don’t want to make. But I don’t. Of course I don’t. This is not something you hand over to someone else, especially someone you barely know.

  I’m alone—no family left, other than an estranged uncle on my father’s side who lives somewhere in Alaska, who I’ve never met—I’m facing this alone. Jake has offered up as savior a few times already in the disaster that is my life, and I don’t even know if that is the root of my draw to him. But it also makes me vulnerable to him, and that is something I cannot go through again. Especially not now, another blow like that would end me. He makes me hope, and hope is a dangerously soft spot when you need a spine of steel.

  Jake is a temptation I can do without.

  “Yeah, later,” I say when he finally gives up on me, and I quickly hang up, dropping my head on my arms.

  I allow myself two minutes of mourning for what might have been, before I resolutely wipe my tears and get back to solving my problems. Not letting myself think about it too much, I look up the number of a well-known real estate agent, Caroline Bullock, and call her to set up an appointment.

  “HOW IS SHE DOING?”

  I made a beeline for the nurses’ station when I saw Kim’s familiar face. She smiles up at me from the computer screen.

  “Hi, Ms. Perkins...”

  “Rosie, please.”

  “Of course...Rosie. Well, we managed to get a few tests done, but it was taxing on your mother, so we ended up giving her something to help her sleep.”

  “Do we know anything more?” I want to know.

  “The doctor will be able to tell you, he asked to be notified when you arrive. I’ll give him a call now.”

  “Can I see her?”

  “Of course, go right ahead, she’s in the same place. The doctor will come and find you.”

  “Thanks,” I mumble, already on my way down the hall to the ICU.

  Mom looks comfortable, still hooked up, but her face is nice and relaxed and her color is a lot better than it was last night. I pull the stool up beside her bed, take her hand in mine, and rest my cheek on the mattress beside her. I try to clear my head and just breathe, focusing on my mother’s scent. Talcum powder. For as long as I can remember, that is the smell I’ve always associated with her. From my very first memories of her.

  “Ms. Perkins?”

  I startle awake, shooting up straight on the stool, and frantically wiping at the drool on the corner of my mouth.

  “Sorry,” I mutter. “I must’ve dozed off.”

  “Understandable.” The older man in the crisp white coat is not the same doctor who performed surgery on her. He must’ve spotted my confusion because he holds his hand out in greeting. “I’m sorry, we haven’t met. I’m Dr. Kleber, I’m the neurologist looking after your mother. If you wouldn’t mind following me?”

  I nod and follow the man down the hall and into a small office where he shows me a chair.

  “I try to be careful what to discuss in front of patients, even when we think they can’t hear us.”

  “Of course,” I agree, and listen as he goes on to explain his preliminary findings from this morning’s testing.

  “Your mother had to be resuscitated twice while on the operating table. Surgery in elderly patients, especially those who already have health issues, holds risks. I’m afraid as a result of those complications; your mother has sustained some brain damage. Her speech is affected; she appears to have trouble forming words. It’s difficult at this point to assess what other centers in the brain have been damaged—only time will tell.” He leans forward and kindly pats my knee. “I don’t want to subject your mother to any further prodding or probing at this point, Ms. Perkins. By shift change this afternoon, if her vitals have remained stable, we will move her to a semi-private room. We’ll keep her there for at least a few days to monitor her surgical recovery, and after that she will need to be moved to a nursing care facility. If you need any help, I can—”

  “No need,” I quickly interject, jumping up from my seat. “I’m working on finding her a spot.”

  “Very well then,” he says, standing up as well. “If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to get one of the nurses to get in touch with me.”

  I leave his office, and instead of going back to sit beside my sleeping mother, I walk straight out the door. I need to stay busy on this or the weight of it will bring me to my knees.

  Once in the car, I dial Hillary. I haven’t seen her since yesterday morning, but she’s been in touch a few times since.

  “What are you doing tonight?” I ask her when she answers.

  “Nothing important, why? What do you need?”

  “I need help cleaning up and cleaning out the trailer.”

  It’s quiet on the other side of the line for a moment before she speaks.

  “So it’s like that?”

  “It’s like that,” I confirm, hanging up the phone. I don’t need to go into details, Hillary knows the deal; she’s practically lived with us for almost eight months.

  On the way home, I stop at the grocery store and pick up a frozen lasagna, some salad in a bag, ice cream, and I splurge on a six-pack of beer, trying not to think of the pitiful condition my bank account is in. If I’m going to be packing up a lifetime of memories, I deserve beer and ice cream.

  “WHERE DO YOU WANT THIS?” Hillary asks, holding up one of the knicknacks Mom has cluttering up her room. It’s disheartening to see how much junk has been packed into this double-wide over the span of a lifetime. And how little time there is to sort through it all.

  Even with possible coverage or temporary coverage for a nursing home for Mom, the reality is care will have to be paid out of pocket first, so speed is of the essence in selling the house.

  “Toss it in a storage box. I don’t know where Mom is going to end up, so I don’t know what she’s allowed to have in her room. I can’t focus on those things right now, so unless something is clearly garbage, just box it up, mark up the boxes so I can find it easily. When sometime down the road, things have settled a bit, I can go through all of it and take my time.”

  “Fair enough. Do you have a place in mind you want to store all this?”

  “That’s on the list of things to do for tomorrow,” I confess. “There are a couple of places I’ve looked at, but they’re all so damn expensive.”

  “What about you?” she asks carefully. “You’re welcome to my couch any time.”

  “Thanks.” I smile, trying to keep my chin from wobbling. “I may have to take you up on that, at some point. I’ve been so focused on getting Mom’s stuff in order, I haven’t really put that much thought into it.”

  Before she has a chance to say anything else, and break my fragile hold on my sanity, I turn and go back to my own room, where I’ve been radically purging. I’m tying up the third industrial-sized garbage bag I’ve hauled out of there, when a knock sounds at the door and my heart skips a beat.

  All afternoon I’ve ignored the niggles of doubt and pangs of self-recrimination, but all that effort is gone with one knock on my door. I swing around and jerk it open, only to be met with Grant’s big smile as he pushes his way inside with two large pizza boxes in his hand. I rest my forehead against the door, slowly letting it fall shut.

  “Who were you expecting?” Grant asks from the kitchen, where he’s already pulling down plates and finding napkins.

  “No one.” I plaster a smile on my face and join him at the counter.

  “Liar,” he growls, leaning down with his nose almost touching mine. “And just so you know, he called me this afternoon on his way to the airport. He’s out of town for some kind of assignment.” Suddenly straightening up, he opens the fridge and pulls out the beers I was saving for dinner. “Ah, you got booze! It has to be serious then.” He easily pops off the top a
nd takes a deep swig. “Yeah, your man is off doing his GI Joe thing. I’ve gotta tell you, girl, that man is so scrumptious, I’d drop pretty Olaf like a hot potato if there was any chance I could have your dude swing my way. Hm...hm...mmm.”

  “He’s not mine,” I protest, to which Grant lifts one gracefully plucked eyebrow high.

  “Really? Cause that’s not the vibe I’m getting.”

  “Pizza? Damn I’m so hungry,” Hillary exclaims as she walk into the kitchen and dives right into one of the boxes. “Ahhh...meat lover’s! Do you have any beer?”

  “Kitchen full of meat lovers, honey,” Grant teases with a wink at me, before he turns back to the fridge and pulls out two more beers, handing one to Hillary and one to me.

  I try glaring at him, but he just shrugs his shoulders and opens the second pizza box.

  I give up.

  Sipping on my beer and nibbling on a slice of pie, I sit back quietly, as those two chatter on about their dating lives. Both pretty active, at least in comparison to mine. Apparently Hillary’s Dr. McSteamy has lost his shine quickly, canceling their dinner and a movie date this past weekend because of work. Except his idea of work was getting hammered with his buddies at Fever, a strip club at the edge of town, and getting into a brawl, as she found out yesterday from an EMT friend who was called to the scene for cuts and bruises.

  Grant seems to be faring just a little better with Olaf, but he’s in McInnis with the film crew for a few weeks.

  “So why not take a few days, grab a tent and a sleeping bag, and head into the park for a couple of nights? It’ll be romantic,” Hillary suggests and I can barely stifle a snicker. Grant in a tent—I would give good money to see that.

  “Sweetheart,” he starts in complete diva mode, waving his hand up and down the front of his body. “See this six foot six frame of carefully honed muscle, coated in a rich coat of cocoa, polished and waxed to a perfect shine? This here body will not stuff itself in any sleeping bag, it does not fit in any tent, it is not intended for rough terrain, and it does not find the idea of peeing in a bush at all romantic.” He takes a deep drink of his beer, slams his empty bottle on the counter, and belches loudly, only adding to our hilarity, before he finishes. “This is a body designed for feather beds and the soft slide of twelve hundred thread-count, Egyptian cotton sheets. I’ll sleep in the wild when I’m dead.”

  “I stand corrected,” Hillary hiccups, wiping tears from her eyes. “No offense.”

  “S’all good, girl.” Grant claps her on the shoulder. “None taken.”

  I’m still chuckling when I collect the bottles; Grant in full diva mode is a sight to behold. I start washing the few dishes and clearing things away, and don’t notice both sets of eyes following me around. Not until Grant plucks the dishrag from my hand, tosses it in the sink, and hugs me hard against his chest. It’s then I feel the wetness on my face.

  “Let it all out, Rosebud,” his deep baritone vibrates in his chess. “Give it all to Grant.”

  My tears of laughter at some point had turned into just tears. A carefully controlled physical expression of emotion, inadvertently triggered by something as innocent as laughing.

  “My life really sucks,” I mumble in his shirt.

  “Sure seems that way,” Hillary says, putting a comforting hand on my back.

  My life may suck right now, I may be homeless soon, and I’ve blown off the first decent man who’s looked at me in decades, but I’m not alone. Not with friends like these.

  CHAPTER 12

  ROSIE

  Many hands make light work.

  I remember Dad saying that, but I’ve never really felt its full meaning until these last few days.

  “Last box,” Grant says, jumping down from the back of the U-Haul truck we rented to move my stuff to his garage.

  Yeah, that had been his idea, when I had my post-pizza, post-beer, and post-laughing fit meltdown and literally spilled my guts all over my kitchen floor. With astonishing ease, both my friends relieved me of some of the massive weight resting on my shoulders.

  Hillary offered to use her connections to help find a suitable spot for Mom, and even is quite knowledgeable about what to expect in terms of insurance coverage. She’s already narrowed it down to two homes and is working to get Mom to the top of the list.

  Grant alleviated any concern around temporary storage and a place for me to stay. Both his garage and the small studio above it are empty. He lives close to downtown, actually just four or five blocks up from the hotel, on Chipata Avenue. It’s actually the house he grew up in, an older bungalow sitting on a large treed lot. He inherited it after his parents died. He’d been living in the small apartment over the detached garage at the time, which has sat empty since.

  “I really appreciate you taking a day off to help me do this,” I tell him, handing him a bottle of cold water when he steps back outside. It’s a hot Friday in late summer and probably not a good day for this kind of physical exertion, but as Grant pointed out earlier when I mentioned it, it’s gonna have to get done.

  It does. I met with the realtor on Wednesday and she seems to think we can get a quick sale if we stage the trailer with minimal furniture to play up the space, maybe give it a lick of paint. I have that planned for tomorrow and Sunday, but first I needed the place as empty as possible. Much less time wasted moving shit from one end to another while trying to paint around it that way.

  Grant’s offer of his garage was a godsend. The cheapest storage space I could find would still run me almost a hundred bucks a month for the size I’d need, and that would be pushing it. The garage on Chipata Avenue is twice the size and wouldn’t cost me any extra. I balked when he refused to consider any compensation, but we ended up compromising. Once Mom’s house is sold and she is settled in a home, and I have a good handle on what needs to go out every month, we’ll sit down and hammer out a rental amount that suits us both. The only reason I agreed—other than I can’t afford any other solution—is I’m not going to be in anyone’s way. The place has a stairway to the apartment on the other side of garage from the house, offering some privacy for both of us.

  The plan is for me to move in after I’m done painting the trailer.

  “I had some leave days saved up. I rarely have a chance to use those and end up loosing them at the end of the year,” he says after taking a drink of the cool water. “Anything else you want brought over here now? Otherwise, I suggest we bring this truck back so you only get charged half instead of a full day.”

  “I think we’re good. My bed comes apart pretty easily and should fit in the back of my PT, and any furniture I want to keep is already here. The only thing, other than my bed, left at the house is either going with Mom to whatever home she ends up in, or to the dump. Besides,” I point out to him, “if worse comes to worst, I can always rent a truck for a couple of hours again, but I don’t think I’ll need to.”

  Sweaty, dusty, and tired, I hop in my car, take one more pleased look at my new home, and follow the truck back to U-Haul.

  “MORNING, ROSIE.”

  I turn to find Les Shipman, Mom’s neighbor, waving from his driveway. I’ve just come back from the hardware store down the road and am unloading paint supplies.

  “Morning, Les,” I return, watching him approach. “I was going to come by to thank you again for helping me find Mom earlier this week and to give you an update.”

  “Of course,” he answers, pushing his glasses back up his nose as he smiles sweetly. “You know we’ve always tried to keep an eye on Connie, ever since your dad passed away.”

  “I know, and I so appreciate that.”

  “How is she doing?”

  “I’m afraid she won’t be coming back home, Les. The broken hip alone would have been enough, but the surgery set her back some too, so we’re moving her into a full-care facility.”

  “We figured,” he says, putting a hand on my arm. “Dora sent me out to check with you on that.” I look over his shoulder and see his wife
in the window, waving. I smile and lift my hand before turning my attention back to Les. “She’s wanted me to put a bug in your ear ever since she saw you moving boxes and furniture out. She was worried you may have already sold the place and yelled at me last night, but I guess you wouldn’t be painting if that were the case, right?”

  “Right?” I echo, a little confused. “Actually, I am afraid I am selling. I have no choice, unfortunately. I am just getting it ready so it can be listed by the agent next week.”

  “Before you do that, I think maybe we should have a talk before you do anything else.”

  As it turns out, the Shipmans have been looking at something a little larger than their own trailer to fit the growing number of grandkids they boast. Preferably a bungalow, something without stairs, because of Dora’s arthritis, but with a nice big kitchen and living space so they can have the family over all at once. They haven’t had much luck so far; mostly because they don’t really want to leave the neighborhood they’ve lived in most their lives.

  “If we could combine your lot and ours, we could build a house right here and still have a nice yard left over for the grandkids to play,” Dora informs me over the cup of coffee the Shipmans lured me in for.

  “You’d tear down the trailers?” I blurt out.

  “Well, actually,” Les interjects. “That’s the beauty of it, we wouldn’t have to. We have a friend who is a contractor and works with Habitat For Humanity. He buys old trailers and moves them to his yard where he fixes them up. Habitat For Humanity then places them on one of their project properties, and uses them for affordable housing.”

  I smile, because this is a much better plan than destroying the house I grew up in. The idea it would provide another family, a struggling family, with a roof over their heads, hits just the right spot with me. Having just received kindness myself, it feels good I get to pay it forward somehow.