Chapter 22 #2
MYLES: Keep me posted.
STEVEN: I will. Love you.
MYLES: Love you, too.
He hit send before he could second-guess the message, then released a huff of relief. And a grin. Why had he held back saying it before now?
The rattling of the front door handle alerted him to Jet’s return, and he hobbled over to let him back inside.
Myles thought he would be eager to settle back into a routine; however, the thought of registering the kids in their schools sent him on a cleaning jag that spread over the next two weeks.
Even Shelly asked him about it. He had no good answer for why he was cleaning a house no one had really lived in all summer.
Yet here he was, on hands and knees scrubbing the kitchen floor under the cabinet skirts because whatever had happened in his kitchen since he’d left, no one had bothered to sweep the crumbs up properly. Shelly watched him, arms crossed over her chest.
“Did you need something, honey?”
She shook her head, so he kept scrubbing.
He’d already gone through the living room, putting furniture back where Natalie had placed it.
Someone had moved it around, maybe to better accommodate television viewing, but the carpet had required a thorough vacuuming under every chair and couch. And that had been just the start.
Shelly plopped on the floor next to him.
For a few minutes, Myles continued working, feeling Shelly’s gaze follow his every move. “What, Shelly?” he asked at last, trying, though failing miserably, to keep the exasperation from his voice.
She hopped back up so she could reach to put a small hand on his cheek. “Are you cleaning it so we can go home?”
“Shelly.” He sat back on his heels, instantly missing her warm touch. “We are home. This is our home.”
She shook her head. “I mean with Mr. Lucky and Mr. Kreed.”
“We were visiting them.”
She frowned at him, and he cringed, expecting an outburst that didn’t come. “Well. That’s silly. We should live where our hearts live.”
“What?”
“It only makes sense.” She cocked her head to one side. “Jet says a heart can’t live outside its body. I asked. So.” She shrugged, patted his shoulder, like she knew without question that he would fix this mix-up, then skipped off to the living room to resume colouring in the middle of the floor.
Fed up with cleaning—it wasn’t calming his mind as it used to anyway—he tossed the sponge he’d been using into the bucket by his knees. He wasn’t even careful as he peeled off his rubber gloves just in time for a knock at the front door. It took him a moment to get to his feet to go let Pat in.
“Hey there.” She didn’t hesitate to wade right in past his protests of a sweat-damp T-shirt to give him a bear hug.
“Hi.”
She patted his cheek, much like Shelly had. “I want to hear all the tea, and then I will tell you all of mine.”
“Hope it includes where you’ve been for two weeks!” he called after her as she left him in the entrance and made her way into the kitchen. The lights came on over the stove long before she reached it to put the kettle on.
“Oh. So her, you like,” he muttered at the walls and promptly stubbed his toe on the corner of a tile that had never been sticking up and still wasn’t when he looked down. “Fuck you, too.”
The kitchen door began to swing shut as he tried to follow Pat.
“Leave him alone,” Pat said without looking up from measuring tea.
Myles didn’t know if she was talking to him or the house, but the door swung back open, so he didn’t ask.
They settled on the couch to chat, and the dregs of Myles’s tea were cold by the time he’d related their summer adventures.
Of course she interrogated him about Steven first, and he answered all her questions, including everything up to and including his phone conversation a few days prior, when Steven had told him they thought there was something living under his eaves that Ozzy was going to go up and investigate.
“And you know, he didn’t even sound panicked about it. Worried, of course, but matter-of-fact. Like it was under control, and he wasn’t the least bit worried.”
“People heal, Myles. Sounds like he’s making progress.”
Myles nodded. “Yeah. I think we all are. Jet still talks to Wyatt every day.”
“I’m so glad he made a friend,” she said, putting her mug down and turning, tucking her feet under her so she could face him.
“Me too.”
“Those kids he was hanging with here are very sus, according to my secret sources.”
“Secret sources?”
She waved a hand. “Sharon’s part of the local music scene, remember? You meet all sorts. Tell me more about this new kid.”
“You’d think the stray homeless kid we found in a parking lot would be the one to worry about, and not the poor little rich kids in their McMansions.”
“You’d think, yet here we are.” She wiggled her butt deeper into the couch cushions. “And what are you going to do about his father?”
“He’s there now, actually. This is his third visit.”
“You don’t go with him?”
“I did the first time. Priory was as much of a complete snob as I remembered. But he was nice enough to Jet, I suppose. It felt like I was more of a hindrance than a help, being there.”
“How does Jet feel about all this?”
“Ask him, if you want. I’ve come to the conclusion he will tell me what he needs to tell me when he’s ready. Plus, he facetimes with Ozzy about every third day, and I think he talks to him about it.”
“And Ozzy hasn’t told you anything?”
“Why would he? It’s Jet’s therapy. None of my business.”
“That killing you?”
It was, a bit, but if he’d learned anything over the summer, it was the necessity of patience, so he shrugged. “Like I said, Jet will tell me when he’s ready. Until then, I have to stay out of it.”
“That’s very…”
“What? Very what?”
“I don’t know. Parental? Trusting.” She leaned back. “You seem… grounded.”
He studied his hands, puckered from the hot water because his gloves had holes in them, and picked at a burst blister.
She took a hand in hers. “Okay. The cleaning, not so much.”
“What do you know about the cleaning?”
She squinted at him. “Jet does not call me Auntie for nothing.”
“What does he say?”
This time, she winked. “He vents.”
“But you’re not going to give me specifics.”
“If I thought it was something you really needed to know…”
“Okay, okay. Point taken.”
“Don’t fret. You’re doing great.” She jerked her chin at Shelly. “Look at her. She’s happy. Or at least, content. Calm. All that kinetic energy is gone.”
“How long before it comes back?”
“You seem calmer too. Less terrified you’ll do or say the wrong thing.” She smiled at him. “Way less sad.”
“I’m still sad. I miss her.”
“But it’s not eating you alive anymore.” Her smile became a grin. “Love can do that. This Steven…”
“He is amazing. Do you know he devised this whole plan for himself to get used to leaving his house again…” And he was off on an entire jag about his recent conversations with Steven, about his breakfasts at the Oaks and trips to the Cabin and whole afternoons out with his twin to shop for her house.
“Every time I talk to him, Pat, he seems… happier? Stronger, I guess. He’s enjoying himself when he goes out now.
On one hand, I wish I was there to see it in person.
On the other, maybe it’s good I’m not. He has to do it all himself, and he is.
I can hear it in his voice, though.” A goofy smile took over his face.
“Can I offer a bit of advice?” she asked.
“Always.”
“Leave this place.”
“We live here.”
“It’s just a house. Even if you stay in Calgary, sell this place and buy a house you actually like. Maybe one that likes you back.”
He blinked at her. “Explain that.” Because outside of Griffon’s Elbow, he’d never heard anyone refer to a house’s feelings, much less do so in such a conversational way.
She drew her shoulders up near her ears and looked around the room, a bemused smile on her face. “You know how the feel of a place can change depending on who’s in it?”
“Sure.”
“And now don’t take this the wrong way, sweetie.” She put a hand on his knee. “But almost as soon as you left? This place started to detox. I kept finding windows open when I hadn’t been in a couple of days, full-on breezes blowing through. And the more I came, the less anxious I felt being here.”
“You like this house?”
“Starting to.” She glanced around the room.
He followed her gaze. So many thoughts of Natalie still permeated the place. He saw her everywhere. They’d been back two weeks and Shelly still hadn’t slept in her own room. Jet spent all his time hanging out with his little sister. Myles suspected that was to not be alone in any room.
“Maybe,” he muttered, following her gaze to a portrait of Natalie and the kids that could be moved to a new house, the blankets she’d knitted that could drape over a different couch, a framed photo of their father that could… sit n a box in some other attic. He smiled at the thought.
Time to start honouring the things that mattered and letting go of the things that hurt.
They were deep in a conversation about the progress on Pat’s tiny house build when Jet banged in the door, grumbling into his headphones about something.
“Hi?” Myles lifted a hand.
“Hey.” He was almost past them to the stairs when he noticed Pat. “Auntie Pat! Wyatt, I gotta go. Call you back in a bit.” He tossed the headset onto the couch, his backpack on the floor, and scooped Pat into a long, fierce hug.
“And what were you complaining to your new friend about?” Pat asked when he finally put her down.
Jet glanced at Myles, then let out a tsunami of annoyance.
“Uncle Myles was right. Bentley Priory is a stuck-up asshole.” He dumped himself onto the couch, fiddling restlessly with the multiple leather bracelets around one wrist. “I’m like some kind of pet project to keep himself busy while he dies or something. ”