Chapter 3
T wo days later Dennis seemed to always have his radar on Yvonne, on her every move, on everybody who stopped to say hi to her, on every person who came close to her vicinity. Dennis didn’t know why he was still so hyper-aware of her, and God knows Dennis would be better off if he wasn’t. Yet she’d been an important part of his life at one point in time, and it was hard to even imagine that she was back here now. He had to think he was being offered a second chance with her, but then his brain would tell him to wait and see on that angle. Regardless, he kept checking on her to ensure that he wasn’t fooling himself, that she was truly here again.
For good or for bad, as it dealt with him.
He sighed, resigned to stay back, waiting for permission from Yvonne to get closer.
When he realized that she’d finished eating, and her usual mealtime companion Stan had left, Dennis quickly poured a cup of coffee and brought it over for her. Not taking care of her was something so foreign to him that it wasn’t anything he could stop. Not until she told him to butt out. And that would come, just because that’s who she was. However, in the meantime, if he could do something to make her transition back to Hathaway House a little bit easier, then he was all for it.
Dennis placed the cup in front of her. “I don’t know if you still take it the same way.”
Yvonne eyed the cup and then nodded at him. “Yes, black.” She smiled. “How can you always be so nice?”
“Being nice doesn’t come with an expiration date,” he noted, studying her. “Sometimes it just requires opening yourself up a little more.”
“I don’t know about that,” she countered. “You’re the only person I know who’s always this nice.”
He chuckled. “In that case, you need to widen the group of people who you know.”
“You could be right,” she admitted. “I’ve been working with big corporations in high-pressure jobs. It’s definitely not a great environment. Everyone is stressed to the max. Even if they are nice, the situation doesn’t let them show it.”
“No, I can’t imagine what you do. I thought you would go into law, where you were helping women.”
“I did too,” she noted glumly. “Didn’t work out that way.”
“It’s not as if it’s a done deal where you can’t pursue it. You’ve got lots of time where you can switch careers, if you want to.”
“Are you still happy here?” she asked.
He nodded. “Yep.”
“Still happy doing the same thing?” she asked, motioning at the rag in his hand.
He looked down at it, smiled, and replied, “This is just one of those mundane parts of my work. It never defined me.”
“No, it never did before either,” she agreed. “You’re one of the few men I know who was totally okay to wait on people and to clean tables and chairs and to not feel diminished by it.”
“That is an interesting statement. I can’t say I ever felt diminished by anything I did, not when I was of service to someone. Some people are meant to be of service, and some people, well, I guess they’re not.”
“I don’t hear that phrase often,” she noted. “Matter of fact I don’t think I’ve ever heard somebody say that they’ve been in a service industry—unless it’s military service.”
“That’s never been the usual, as you well know,” he pointed out. “However, I always felt as if what I was doing was still important.”
“And it is,” she stated. “Some of us are just a little slow to get it.” She tossed back the rest of her coffee, handed him her cup, and said, “I guess I need to go get prepped.”
“Prepped for what?”
She winced. “Shane.”
Dennis burst out laughing. “He knows so much more about the latest rehab tricks and tips and techniques now too,” he shared. “Yet he’s still not anybody to be scared of.”
“Ha,” she muttered. “That’s because you’re on that side of the table, not on this one.”
Dennis walked around to stand beside her. “Still looks as if Shane’s a normal guy to me.”
She rolled her eyes and half chuckled. “Anyway, I need to go.” She smiled at him. “Thanks.”
“For what?” he asked. “I just brought you a cup of coffee.”
She nodded. “For being you.” And, with yet another cryptic comment, she slowly wheeled herself from the dining room.
*
Back in her room Yvonne changed into a looser T-shirt, one that gave her a little bit more room for movement, and slowly wheeled her way to Shane, who was waiting for her.
He looked up and smiled. “Hey. How did you do at breakfast?”
“I didn’t do too badly. I was there about thirty minutes.” She motioned at the mat. “Any chance I can get out of the chair?”
He nodded. “Absolutely. Floor or standing?”
“Depends on what you’ve got planned,” she replied. “Floor’s probably easier, if we’ll be a while.”
“Down to the floor it is then,” he agreed.
She made her way to her knees and slowly lowered herself to the floor. She rolled over until she was on her back, and a sigh of relief slipped out.
“It really does help, huh ?” Shane asked.
“It really does help,” she murmured. “So many things hurt these days.”
“Well, you’re still fresh from that car accident and the surgery thereafter,” he pointed out.
“I know, and I’m not sure I have the strength to fight that good fight anymore.”
He shrugged. “I remember back when, one of the things that we tried to get through to you was how some things you needed to fight and other things you needed to just relax about,” he shared. “Maybe this time you’ll take a little more relaxed pathway to rehab.”
She rolled her head and frowned at him.
He laughed. “Or maybe not.”
“I never got that technique down pat,” she admitted. She rubbed her hands over her arms, as a chill passed over her.
“Are you cold?” Shane asked in concern.
“Not necessarily cold,” she clarified. “Sometimes you look back on your life, and you wonder at the choices you made—considering why and how you could possibly have made the decisions you did—and then question how you’re supposed to go back and make better choices. You know what I mean?”
“Kind of,” he hedged, with a cautious note in his tone.
She frowned at him. “Of course not. You don’t have a clue what I’m talking about.”
“I think we’ve all made choices that we’ve regretted,” he shared, “but you’re among friends here. So any choice that you want to revisit, it’s available to you.”
“Maybe,” she murmured. And then she yawned a big, long jaw-breaking yawn.
“Still tired?”
“Yes,” she murmured. “Still tired still . Yet it’s more than just tired. It’s a bone-weary fatigue.”
“I guess you’ve been working too hard lately, haven’t you?”
“I’ve been working too hard since I left Hathaway House the last time,” she admitted. “And I’ve never really had a chance to stop and to take a break.”
“Which is also likely why you’re so exhausted right now,” he noted. “I think, for today especially, you need to just head back to your room and rest.”
“I don’t know about that,” she argued. “I need to get whatever benefit I can get, while I can.”
“And yet you’re not ready,” he declared, “not ready at all.”
She winced and stared at him. “But you could help me get ready.”
“Nope, you wore yourself to the bone the last time with all that go-getter high-energy determined to set the world on fire mentality,” he shared. “What I see right now is a completely different person.”
“But she’s getting me immediately sent back to my room. She needs to take a back seat in my life.”
He stared at her for a long moment. “Maybe you should start with some shrink sessions.”
She snorted. “Do I have to?”
“Yeah,” he said, making a quick decision. “I think you do.”
“I don’t want to have anything to do with that, if I have a choice.”
“If you’re here, counseling is part of it,” he told her. “Since I have no medicals still on your recent events, I have no idea yet how bad these new injuries are, how much the surgery helped. Thus, I don’t know what progress we’ll make without those records. And you should be happy and grateful in dealing and living with whatever point we can get you back to.”
“I already came to terms with that,” she muttered.
“But did you?” he asked. “Because you left here last time, bound and determined that nothing would hold you back. I’m not seeing that this time.”
“No.” She sighed. “I think that’s because I am so very tired. It’s hard to always find that oomph to get up and go when you don’t want to anymore, when you’re afraid that everything that you’ve already done is for nought. That explains why I am here, right back at the same place again.”
“You’re hardly back to the same place physically and mentally,” he pointed out, with an odd look in her direction.
“Maybe, but it does feel as if I’ve come full circle.”
“Then maybe you should look at the last time you were here as a practice run.”
She stared at him. “That was not much of a practice run,” she declared immediately.
He laughed. “Okay, so maybe that’s not the best way to look at it. However, you already did this once, so you know how much you can achieve.”
“I also know what I lost,” she admitted. “And I also know what that cost me.”
“And I presume those statements have absolutely nothing to do with the rehab work we’re talking about right now. Instead it seems to have everything to do with Dennis.”
She stared at him for a moment. “I guess it’s pretty obvious, isn’t it?”
“You guys were pretty intense back then, and then you left.”
“And I learned my lesson, or at least one,” she corrected. “I wish I’d had the guts to understand what I needed to do back then, instead of always pushing, pushing, pushing.”
“If that’s what you did back then,” Shane began, “maybe that’s what you needed to do. You can’t go back and change the past.… All you can do is make peace with it and move forward.”
“And that’s the problem I’m struggling with,” she stated, “and I don’t know if this accident hadn’t happened would I have always just held that inside and not done anything about it?”
“If that is the case, then I’m really glad you’re here. If nothing else, it’ll give you a chance to clear your history and to start fresh again,” Shane explained. “You can’t keep dragging that stuff around in your head, in your heart, and in your soul. All that emotional baggage and judgment weighs you down, and it stops you from being the best that you can be.” He shook his head. “So doctor’s orders. Head back to bed and stay there, for the rest of the day.” And, with that, he packed up his stuff and walked out.
*
It was hard for Dennis to ignore Yvonne. But, as her first few days went by, and he saw her settling in somewhat—although she looked incredibly tired—he relaxed. And, as he relaxed, everybody around him relaxed.
Ilse came up to him and said, “Good, we made it through the first few days of Yvonne’s return, so maybe you’ll be okay now.” He looked over at her in surprise. She nodded. “Believe me that everybody’s noticed.”
“Of course they have,” he muttered, with a wince. “Can’t say I like being on public display.”
“And yet so many of us have already been through it,” she noted.
“And so have I, once before,” he murmured, giving her a pointed look.
“That doesn’t mean that this time will be the same.”
“No, but that doesn’t mean that it would be anything different. I have no reason to go in that direction anymore,” he muttered. “I can only open up myself to just so much pain.”
“Nope,” she argued, “you’re wrong there. You will continue to open yourself up because you love, and when you love and where you love is very deep,” she pointed out. “You care about people, even when they don’t necessarily have the wherewithal to care about anybody else but themselves.”
He immediately frowned.
Ilse added, “I’m not saying that about Yvonne specifically. I’m not insulting her in any way. However, you will always be the first one to offer the shirt off your back, even if so many of us don’t agree with it.”
He stared at her.
Ilse shrugged. “I like Yvonne just fine, but she hurt you. So, from my point of view, I’ll move forward ever-so-slightly now, just to see how things will be this time.”
“For all I know, she’s married,” he grumbled, looking at Ilse intently. “I don’t know anything about who she is right now. It’s been years.”
“Five,” Ilse noted. “It’s been five years. And, in those five years, she’s gone through a lot, but that doesn’t mean that I’m necessarily ready to welcome her with open arms.”
He smiled. “And yet you say that, and then I see you out there doing what you can to make her comfortable and to find out what are her favorite dishes.”
Ilse’s lips quirked. “And here I thought that was more about you.”
He shrugged. “You’re right. Still, I shouldn’t be focusing on her so much. We have a lot of other patients here now. Honestly, Hathaway’s gotten so big that I’m scared it’ll be in danger of getting too big.”
“I already talked to Dani about that because it’s a concern that several of us have. Something is very special about what we have right now, and we don’t want to lose that special personal touch by getting so massive. And Dani’s aware of it. At the same time, she also knows so many people out there need our help.”
“And that’s the crux of it, isn’t it?” Dennis asked. “With so many people in need, how can we not help more?”
“Which is why we got the extra wing and the extra staff, and-and-and ,” she replied. “It never really ends.”
“Is it too much, do you think?”
“No, I don’t think it is, particularly if we keep in mind what makes us special is the people on staff, the extra things that we do, everything that we live with and deal with,” Ilse noted. “So, if we keep all that in mind, we won’t be in trouble, but it is something I think we need to be judicious about.”
“And does Dani agree with you?”
“I don’t know.” Then Ilse laughed. “Dani has got so much going on with her upcoming wedding that I am not sure she even has the time to think about anything else.”
“It is coming fast, isn’t it?” Dennis noted. “What, eight weeks, ten weeks?”
“I think it’s ten now,” Ilse replied. “And then they’re off on a honeymoon, for which I’m very grateful because otherwise she would never take a holiday.”
“Yeah, she’s as much of a workaholic as you are,” he teased.
“Look who’s talking,” she quipped. “Look who’s here almost every day of the week.”
“Well, Sunday is pretty well self-serve,” he noted, “at least for those people who can handle it.”
“Exactly, but I still often see you here, helping those you can.”
“I’m just being me.”
“And I get that, and I respect that. At some point you also should have a life out there too.”
“And I have one,” he protested. “I’m really happy here. And, no, I’m not hiding away in Hathaway House. I’m not, no matter whatever garbage people say about how I could leave and do so much better elsewhere.”
“I would hope that’s not what they’re saying, but, people being people, probably some do say that.”
He nodded. “The bottom line is, I much prefer to be here than a lot of places in life.”
“And we’re all grateful,” she murmured. “You don’t get paid enough for a lot of the stuff that you deal with here though.”
“No, but it’s not as if I’m here for the money either,” he noted, with a laugh. “Besides, I have zero expenses. It’s pretty easy to have a decent life at Hathaway when you don’t have to pay for everything.”
“I know.” Ilse smiled. “I’m in the same boat. Free food and board. Part of my salary.”
“Until you get married.”
She flushed. “And honestly, I’m not sure I’m leaving afterward either. Dani is wondering about expanding some of the housing to allow for family quarters.”
Dennis raised his eyebrows and nodded. “That’s an awesome idea.”
Ilse nodded. “And Dani told me that Yvonne never married.”