Quinton, page 13
He nodded. “And I’m slowly adapting to the idea that I’m going to lose her.”
“Do you have to?”
“No, not necessarily,” he replied, “but our paths diverged a long time ago. It was me, hanging on to the tentacles of what I thought was an enduring friendship, but I don’t think it was. I think I liked her for who she was in my mind but not necessarily for who she really was.”
“Were you invited to the wedding?”
“Nope. I saw it on social media. That was kind of another blow.”
“So maybe she wasn’t so much of a friend as an acquaintance?”
“I guess,” he said, “but it was the one that I always kept in the back of my mind that, you know, should my circumstances change then …”
“I’m sorry,” Quinton said. “You always did take abandonment hard.”
He winced. “Yeah, don’t worry. I had that out with a shrink session too.”
“Good, sounds like it was a very necessary talk.”
“Well, it was a productive one,” he noted. “I was feeling pretty rough for a couple days, but I have to admit. Today I feel like I’m going to live.”
“Yeah, some of that emotional stuff is by far the worst,” she shared.
“One of the things that came out,” he shared carefully, “was the fact that some people in my life kept coming back and that—even though at times I felt like I had been isolated and abandoned—in fact, I hadn’t been.”
“Good,” she stated encouragingly. “We need some stability in our world, some routine, some faces that are the same over and over again.”
He nodded. “Have you been to dinner yet?”
“Not yet, it’s actually early.”
He nodded. “It is, indeed. I just wondered if Stan was going to be there for dinner.”
“No, he’s in town.”
“Ah, so sorry,” he teased in a mocking voice.
Not sure how great her brother was if this was the mood he was in, still she laughed. “I guess the heart grows fonder the more we’re apart.”
“Is it serious?”
Her lips tilted. “Yes, I think so, although I haven’t told him that.”
Ryatt stared at her, shaking his head. “Well, from somebody who hung on to something that wasn’t serious at all, but in my mind I thought maybe could be, do him a favor and tell him.”
“We haven’t come to that kind of a talk yet,” she said.
“No, but you should also be aware whether it’s happening or not. Lord knows, you guys spend enough time together.”
“We actually don’t,” she stated. “We spend a couple evenings out on the deck, and we’ve had a few breakfasts or lunches together, and he pops in when he can, but he’s had a really crazy-busy couple weeks.”
“It’s his own business too, isn’t it?”
“Yes, it is. And, of course, a lot of animals and staff depend on him.”
“No, I get that,” Ryatt added. “I still think it’s important for you to make it clear to him where he stands.”
And she thought about his words for a while and then nodded. “Yeah, you’re probably right. I need to do something in that direction. I just haven’t yet.”
He smiled. “You do have a week still,” he reminded her, “but I would certainly not want to see you leaving here with him in limbo.”
“I wouldn’t do that,” she automatically said. But, of course, she had been. She hadn’t given him an update on how she felt at all. But then it seemed like time was going by so quickly that she didn’t even know quite what to do. She looked at her brother. “What about you? You settling in better?”
“I am now,” he said, looking over at her. “It’s going to take a bit, but I think I’ve turned a corner. And I mean that with all honesty.”
“I’m delighted to hear that.” She nodded, then pointed at the door. “Anyway I’m going to head back and maybe do some journaling before dinner.”
“You didn’t ask who it was who was the constant in my life,” he stated.
She stopped, as she headed to the door. “No, I didn’t. Why?”
“Don’t you want to know?”
She shrugged. “You’ll tell me if you want to.”
He laughed. “You’re the only constant,” he said, with a smile. “You’re the only one who—even when I’m an absolute ass to you—keeps coming back. And I understand what that is, and it’s called love. I just wanted to let you know that I appreciate it. From the bottom of my heart. I know I haven’t been very good to anybody around here and especially not to you lately,” he added, “but I’m determined to improve on that.”
She felt the tears choking the back of her throat. “Thank you.” And then she remembered what she had talked about with Stan, and she added, “You really are one of the best brothers I could have. You’ve hit a bad patch, a couple of them, same as me, but that doesn’t mean you’re rotten all the way through. We had a lot of good times before, and we’ll have a lot of good times together in the future too. The constant between us is the fact that it’s us,” she said, with a smile. “Let’s not keep complaining about us. Let’s just rebuild stronger and better because, bro, I love you.”
And, with that, she lifted a hand and pushed her way out of the room. Her heart full and her soul beaming, she headed to her room, hopeful for whatever came next.
Stan walked through the upstairs patient lounge. He had an unusual pet for them to visit with. He had a ferret in his arms. It was on a leash and a harness but wasn’t feeling 100 percent up to snuff, having just recovered from surgery, gone home, and was now back again for some therapy. He was certainly friendly enough but he was tired and didn’t walk well.
Stan was carrying him, holding him up on his shoulder so he could see the sights. And a happy camper he was. As Stan stopped to visit with several people in a group by a foosball table, one of them noticed the animal on his shoulder and chortled.
“Oh, now look at that. My granny had one of those as a pet.”
“Yeah?” Stan said. “They’re quite the lively characters. I wouldn’t mind having one myself.”
“Hey, you could have any kind of pet you wanted,” the guy said. “At least you get a lot of exposure to them here.”
“I do,” he agreed, with a smile. The guy reached up, and Stan obligingly bent over a little bit more. The ferret, whose name was Fuzz, jumped onto the other man’s shoulder, both startling and delighting them. “Well, would you look at that,” Stan said.
Almost immediately his group of friends gathered around. Loving caresses were exchanged as the ferret soaked, basked even, in the sweet attention he was getting.
Stan chuckled. “I always think these guys don’t really care about people, and then I bring them around, and look at that? They become needy almost instantly.”
“Everybody’s needy,” one of the guys replied. “We all need love and attention, even little ones like this.”
“Isn’t that the truth,” Stan said, with feeling.
“I hear you’ve got quite a mighty fine-looking woman,” one of them noted.
And that let Stan know that the gossip machine was working just fine here as always. “She is, indeed,” he replied.
As soon as the ferret appeared to be getting a little bit bored with this set of company, Stan told him, “Come on, Fuzz. Let’s move on.” And Fuzz obligingly jumped onto his shoulder, and they carried on down to the next group. By the time Stan had worked his way up to the hallway on the other side and knocked on a couple doors to see if anybody wanted to visit, he found himself at Ryatt’s door. Stan hesitated and then shrugged, knocked on the door anyway.
When the call came to come in, he pushed open the door, stuck his head around, and asked, “Did you want to see this guy?”
Ryatt looked at him in surprise and then saw Fuzz on his shoulder. “Wow, you really do have assorted animals down there, don’t you?”
“Yeah, sure do,” he agreed. “This guy had surgery and went home, had rehab, didn’t do so well, so he’s back here for some more intensive rehab.”
Ryatt noted, “Oh, sounds like my sister.” When Stan raised his eyebrows, Ryatt shrugged. “She’s back again, isn’t she?”
“Yeah, hopefully she doesn’t have to stay very long though, just like this guy.”
“Is he not here for long?” he asked.
“Nope, not for long, a couple days. We’re giving him quite a run-through and a set of testing, so we can set up a home program for him.”
“You set up rehab programs for animals?” Ryatt looked as if the entire concept had struck him dumb.
“Well, it makes sense, doesn’t it?” Stan asked, studying Ryatt. “When you think about it, somebody’s got to.”
“I just hadn’t considered it,” he admitted, “and yet it makes total sense. I would have never thought of it, so I’m glad somebody else did, especially for this guy if it makes him feel better.”
“That’s what it’s all about, making them feel better,” Stan noted. “Come on. Let’s go, Fuzz.”
“Fuzz.” Ryatt chuckled. “You had to give him a name like that, huh?”
“I didn’t give him the name,” Stan explained. “He earned the moniker all on his own. Apparently he sticks to things like fuzz.”
“Interesting,” he murmured. “I heard they were quite the collectors.”
“Precisely, things stick to him like fuzz, put it that way,” Stan added, with a grin.
As he went to leave, Ryatt called out, “How serious is it with my sister?”
Stan wasn’t offended. He stopped, looked at her brother, and told him truthfully, “I hope it’s serious, but it’s early days yet.”
Ryatt nodded. “I appreciate the fact that she has you. I know she’s had a rough time of it.”
“I think at some point in time we all have rough patches,” Stan admitted. “Those of us who are lucky have a friend or family member who can help us see beyond the tunnel of our pain.”
Again Ryatt looked at him in surprise. “That’s very true—for those of us who are lucky enough.”
“And it doesn’t always happen the way we think it does,” Stan added. “Some people think that that kind of help is just there automatically, and it’s often not. Sometimes it’s something that you have to work at. Sometimes it’s something that you really have to take another look at the people around you and realize that they really are there for you, even if you didn’t think so.”
Ryatt nodded again. “No, I hear you. Just not really what I expected from the veterinarian here.”
“Everybody here is a philosopher, and everybody here’s a shrink,” Stan said, laughing. “Best not to ask any of us questions like that.” And, with that, and a wave of his hand, he stepped out.
He had no idea if he’d passed muster with Quinton’s brother or not. After all, he was her family. And Stan wanted to make a good impression, but he’d known Quinton a little bit beforehand, but not as much as now. And it remained to be seen whether Quinton passed judgment on Stan or not.
And it really wasn’t for Ryatt to do either, but that didn’t stop any family member from stepping up and saying something. Stan hoped he’d get a decent rating from Ryatt for today’s visit, but, if not, well, Stan would deal with it the same as he dealt with everything else in life. Stan hadn’t been joking when he had said to his staff at the clinic that he wasn’t any good with this relationship stuff because he was really a plain-talking kind of guy.
He called a spade a spade, and, if it wasn’t a spade, and he didn’t know what it was, then he would say that he didn’t know what it was. He wasn’t one to bluff and to lie and to find some kind of an answer that might make him look or sound better. Wasn’t his style. Then again that’s probably why he hadn’t done all that well in that whole relationship cycle in school. Most people succeeded with some suave polish that Stan couldn’t even hope to imitate, so he hadn’t bothered. He’d always figured that, if he had to imitate something, that it wouldn’t come from the heart anyway.
Not sure it had done him any good to follow that path, but it’s what he’d done. Meanwhile he had yet to be married. Still he could easily see himself spending his life with Quinton, and he hoped she would come to that decision too. He wasn’t all that old, although he knew that, if he looked in the mirror, it seemed like he was older.
Some days in the clinic were just that much harder than others too, which made him age as well. Some days were just deadly. Particularly days when he lost lives. Anytime something was heartbreakingly wrong, it affected everybody. But, like anything, you had to pick up your feet and get on with life. The next day would only be as good as you could make it. Other than that, you would just wallow, and life never, ever changed.
For Stan, that wasn’t acceptable. He was always looking to improve, always looking to change and to do something more. He just hoped that Quinton was on the same page. Because, if she wasn’t, it would be one heartbreak that he might not recover from.
Chapter 13
It took Quinton a few more days of getting through Shane’s heavy workouts to understand what she was doing wrong all the time and how to fix it. Good thing she’d taken Stan’s advice to take three months leave. But slowly and steadily Quinton was pulling her body back into alignment, and everything was starting to feel a whole lot more in sync. It was almost as if she’d been disjointed before, and things were slipping out of place, but, with Shane’s careful training, she felt more normal again.
When she tried to explain that to him, he just nodded. “When you’re out of alignment, everything goes out of whack. It’s so important to get that, to have everything just staying where it needs to be. And don’t feel bad that it happened,” he told her. “It happens to the best of us, including me. It’s very easy to forget what you’re doing and to let things slide. In your case, letting things slide is going to be a bigger issue because of the existing physical issues you have,” he noted. “It’s not something that you’ll have to do every day for the rest of your life, but it is something that you’ll have to keep an eye on every day.”
She nodded. “That’s fine. I might need a reminder of that every once in a while.”
“I agree. Set yourself a reminder, set yourself a wellness check, send yourself to a spa for a day or two,” he murmured. “Whatever it is you need to do, take time out and just reevaluate where your body’s at and what it’s doing, how it’s feeling, then do what you need to do. There is no greater gift that you can give to yourself than the gift of health.”
When he left at the end of that rehab session, she still sat here in the workout room, pondering his words. When she finally looked up, Stan stood there, with a smile on his face.
“You okay?” he asked.
She heard the worry in the back of his voice. “I’m fine. I think one of the things that always gets me when I’m here is that inherent wisdom that keeps coming out of everybody’s mouth.”
He burst out laughing. “Right? Hathaway House is the place for it,” he murmured. “And sometimes they say the darndest things.”
“You do too.” She smiled and gave a wave of her hand. “I’m including you in this whole mess too.”
“I don’t know about that. I’m just the dumb klutz down in the basement with the animals. In the olden days I’d have been living in the barn with them.”
She smiled. “In the olden days I probably would have been there with you,” she murmured.
He smiled ever-so-gently. “Then there’s no place I’d rather be.”
She looked up at him and chuckled. “I presume it’s dinnertime.”
“Not yet, but we’re getting there.”
She nodded. “I need a shower. Today’s physio session was a little rough.”
“I think all the sessions with Shane are a little rough,” he noted. “At least I keep hearing that from a lot of people.”
“He knows what he’s doing, and he asks a lot from us. Yet it’s never more than he would do himself, so you don’t mind doing it. At the same time, when he’s done, so are you.”
Stan burst out laughing at that. “And that’s probably a fair way to look at it.” He gave her a wide smile. “So how about dinner in, what, an hour?”
She nodded, but then frowned and looked around. “You know something? I think I really need to go to the pool.”
“Okay, so dinner in an hour and a half?” he asked.
She smiled. “Are you off work now?” He nodded. “So join me,” she said. “Let’s meet at the pool.” He pondered it, and she added, “There’s no better way to release that stress from a long day.”
“It has been a long day,” he muttered. “And you’re right. I could really use it. Fine, I’ll … I’ll meet you down there in a little bit.”
“Good. We don’t want to leave too late, but we also can’t intrude on somebody having a rehab session going on right now.”
“Right,” he murmured. “I can also take a look as I go down.”
“Sure, why not, and you can always send me a message.” And then she added, “Don’t worry about it. I’m going to go regardless. If nothing else, I can sit in the hot tub and relax that way.”
“Okay. I’ll meet you there in ten. I have to go find my suit.”
She smiled as he took off. It would be wonderful to live someplace where she could meet in ten minutes and be at the hot tub and the pool. She might have to seriously rethink her living accommodations. Like, wow, what a place to work and to live. She knew a lot of the staff lived and worked here. And a lot of them liked it, while some preferred to be in town, where they had other family members and spouses.
But for Quinton? She would enjoy this scenario while she had it available. She changed, not quickly, but she managed to get into her suit, back into the wheelchair, and, with every push of the wheelchair, she felt herself draining further and further.
She’d forgotten to ask Shane again about her prosthetic. Whether they could try it now. She hadn’t been using it the entire time she had been here, so all the sores could heal up. She was rather desperate to get back on two legs again. She had such a different feeling when she stood upright, like homo sapiens were meant to. And yet she hadn’t pushed it. She pondered that, as she shifted toward the pool area.
