Chapter 13
When Keisha finally caught her breath, she looked up at him. “I am so sorry,” she whispered.
“Hey, it’s okay,” he told her, a smile on his face. “You’ve probably been holding those tears for a very long time.”
She looked at him and then slowly nodded. “But I’m also so sorry about your family. I somehow didn’t register any of that, which was so insensitive.”
“And that just shows you how crazy your life has been. Something like that would have never gotten by you normally, or you would have figured it out.”
She just blinked and nodded. “I didn’t figure it out, didn’t hear it, and honestly … I’m not so sure Kelly even told me.”
“And I don’t know that she did either,” he shared. “I did mention it to her a couple times too.”
“And I remember you saying something, and me being a little confused. At the time, I didn’t think he had just died. I think when you mentioned it, I was already so far out of the loop that I assumed he had passed on a long time ago.”
“He didn’t.” Jaxon shrugged. “Now it was a while ago.”
She shook her head. “It’s a while ago for you, but apparently I am just hearing about it now.”
His lips twitched. “Apparently, and it just goes to show how stressed and overwhelmed you’ve been.”
“And that is absolutely no excuse,” she declared, staring at him. “I went through so much when my parents passed, and I am horrified that I just ignored your trauma.”
“And maybe it was a coping mechanism,” he suggested. “I wasn’t terribly close to him, but it certainly hurt in ways that I don’t even want to go into now.”
“Of course, and I remember you saying you weren’t close,” she added, frowning as she stared off in the distance. “But that’s not the same thing as being okay to lose them.”
“No, it sure isn’t,” he confirmed and still smiled.
“Anyway, I did fly home for a couple days, went through the arrangements and all, and took care of clearing out my dad’s apartment.
I did actually hire a company to clear it out, and that was about it.
He didn’t want a big service. He just wanted to be cremated and to have his ashes scattered over the land,” he shared.
“So I went to my grandmother’s farm and did just that. ”
She smiled and nodded. “That’s not a bad idea.”
“It’s not allowed in every state though,” he pointed out. “Thankfully it worked out the way he wanted.”
“Of course,” she murmured. “My parents didn’t want funerals either, but everybody kept telling me that, if I didn’t, I wasn’t honoring them.”
“I don’t know about that,” he argued. “I think their wishes should have some meaning, but you have to make it work for the living as well.”
“Kelly says that because we have the monument, it’s a place she can go mourn.”
“And does she?” he asked.
She turned to him and then shook her head. “No, she doesn’t go anywhere. I drag her out of the house to go shopping once in a while, but she screams and howls and makes a scene. It’s not worth it.”
“And then she becomes too housebound, and her world has narrowed to the first floor—or at least her bedroom and your living room.”
“Yeah, and not even the kitchen hardly,” she added.
“She’s not eating very much, and, when she does eat, she invariably wants something other than what I’ve cooked.
” He just stared at her, and she shrugged.
“I think it’s all part and parcel of the depression, part of the …
my life sucks mantra of hers.” She gave a hearty sigh.
“And then there’s me. I’m healthy. I have my own practice.
I have absolutely no reason to be feeling anything other than grateful. ”
“Which is what you use to trash yourself all the more,” he pointed out, “because that’s a comparison that isn’t easy to turn around. It’s like survivor’s guilt, hard to release yourself from the blame of.”
“No, it isn’t,” she agreed, “and that makes it even worse.”
He laughed. “You always were the kind to blame yourself if you couldn’t fix things.”
She winced and nodded. “Apparently.”
“No apparently about it,” he declared. “And I got over my distress when I realized just how overwhelmed you were. Sure, I was upset for a while, feeling as if my family didn’t matter, but yours apparently did.”
Her breath caught in the back of her throat, and she stared at him and started to shake again.
“Easy. I’m not saying these things to hurt you.”
“And yet you’re doing a hell of a good job.”
He winced. “You’re right. I just need to stop talking.”
“No, you don’t,” she said in frustration, “because I didn’t know. I had no idea of the loss that you’ve been going through.”
“I did tell Kelly to tell you, and I did mention it later to her and to you.”
“Did you mention it in a way that, if I hadn’t heard the news, I would have understood, or did you just say something because you were hurting?”
He sighed. “I have no idea. And it doesn’t matter now. That part is definitely over with.”
“Maybe for you,” she muttered, “but it doesn’t feel like it’s over for me.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I wasn’t trying to bring all that up, but it was something that I struggled with and didn’t understand why the loss of my father didn’t matter.”
“It did matter,” she stated immediately. She shook her head, as if not sure what to say or do. “Could you just take me home? I think I’ve had enough truth bombs for the night. Right now I feel like I should have driven home instead of leaving my car at the clinic.”
“I’ll take you back to the clinic to get it.” Without a word, he turned on the engine. As he drove, he added, “I don’t want to leave us like this, on such a sour note.”
“No, no, I’m fine.” Then she gave a broken laugh. “Obviously I’m not fine, but it’s a little hard to see myself through your eyes and face the reality of what I missed. And maybe for good reasons or bad,” she noted, “but I look back, and it just highlights …”
“It highlights,” he interjected, “how overwhelmed you were then and how overwhelmed you still are.”
She shot him a look and then nodded. “But it doesn’t matter because I can’t get out of this life that I’m in.” And, with that, as they pulled up to her clinic, she hopped out and turned to him. “Thanks for dinner.”
Then she quickly got into her car and drove off.