Chapter Fifteen—Julie
TWO DAYS AFTER MEG and I fall down the stairs together, a surgeon puts my right knee back together.
This is an oversimplification of a procedure that takes nearly three hours and leaves me with a brace, several small incisions, enough swelling to alarm me, and strict instructions to keep weight off that leg.
The wheelchair is temporary. The surgeon says that several times, possibly because I keep staring at it as if he personally designed it to ruin my life.
The problem is Westover. I knew the house had narrow passages, steep stairs, and quirky old doorways when I rented it.
I loved all of those things until I tried navigating the hospital rehabilitation floor in a wheelchair and realized the downstairs bathroom at Westover is barely wide enough for me on two functional legs.
The claw-foot tub upstairs might as well be on another continent.
Mara offers her house. Laurent offers his guest room. Dalen doesn’t offer anything. He stands beside the hospital window with his hands in his pockets until I reject both alternatives. “What do you want to do?”
A week ago, he would’ve already arranged the answer. “I need to go home. Temporarily,” I add when his expression shows hope. “I need the downstairs guest room, and I’ll need some help until I can use crutches better.”
“Tell me what you need.”
I narrow my eyes. “You’re being suspiciously agreeable.”
He smiles slightly. “I’m terrified of getting this wrong.”
Good. I’m a little tired of being the only terrified person in our marriage.
I go home with him the following afternoon. The first thing I discover is that Dalen has gotten it wrong.
Spectacularly.
The downstairs guest room looks mostly the same until he wheels me toward the bathroom.
The doorway is wider. The threshold is gone.
Grab bars have appeared beside the toilet and inside the shower, which no longer has a curb.
There’s a shower chair, a handheld sprayer, and enough open floor space to turn my wheelchair around. “What did you do?”
Behind me, Dalen clears his throat. “I can explain.”
“I’m sure you can.”
A woman I don’t recognize appears in the bedroom doorway carrying a small overnight bag. “Mrs. Dorsey? I’m Maribel.”
I turn toward my husband.
He lifts one hand. “She’s a private nurse.”
“You hired a nurse?”
“For the first week.”
“A week?” I glance at Maribel. “You hired someone to take care of me for a week?”
“Full-time for the first forty-eight hours, then days. I thought after surgery—”
“You thought.”
He stops.
Maribel has the excellent instincts of a woman who has worked in wealthy people’s houses before. She adjusts the strap of her bag and backs toward the hall. “I’ll wait in the kitchen.”
The second she’s gone, I wheel around. “How long did this take?”
“The bathroom?”
“Yes, Dalen. The bathroom that wasn’t accessible three days ago.”
He looks almost sheepish. “A day and a half. I used Charlie.”
I frown. “You called my contractor?”
“He’s worked here before.”
“That’s beside the point.” I gesture toward the bathroom. “My situation is temporary. You remodeled an entire room because I’ll be in a wheelchair for a few weeks.”
He’s frowning. “I wanted you to be comfortable.”
“You wanted to fix it.”
His mouth closes.
I wheel past him into the bedroom. “I told you I needed somewhere I could function. I didn’t ask you to redesign the house or hire someone to watch me around the clock.”
“The surgeon said someone should be with you for at least the first twenty-four hours, until you find a routine.”
I grip the wheels. “Did you call my surgeon?”
“The office. I asked about general aftercare for the discharge. They didn’t give me any information about you.” He rubs his forehead. “That sounded better before I said it.”
I arch a brow. “That distinction is doing a lot of work.”
“Yes.”
I turn the wheelchair toward the bed, then stop because transferring from chair to mattress currently requires more coordination than I possess.
The humiliation of needing help collides with my anger, and for several seconds, I hate everything about this situation, including the man standing six feet away trying very hard to keep his hands to himself.
“Do you want help?” Dalen asks.
I hate needing to say it. “Yes.”
He comes over without comment. I tell him what the physical therapist showed me, and he positions the chair, locks the wheels, then moves the footrest. He doesn’t grab me when I wobble. His hands stay close until I tell him where I need them.
Once I’m sitting on the mattress, he steps away. “Send the nurse home. With full pay.”
“I already planned to pay her.”
I sigh. “That doesn’t earn you anything.”
“I know.”
I point toward the bathroom. “Leave that alone. Undoing it would be even more ridiculous.”
He wisely says nothing.
“I’ll stay here until I’m mobile enough to manage Westover.” Hope appears on his face, and I shake my head. “This isn’t me coming back to you.”
“I understand.”
I glance toward the bathroom. The shower really is going to be much easier. “It’s a nice shower.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re still an ass.”
“I meant well.”
“Yeah.” That makes it hard to stay annoyed.
HIS SECOND ATTEMPT at a grand gesture arrives Tuesday morning.
Flowers. Hundreds of them. White roses, pale pink peonies, hydrangeas, and enough greenery to suggest Dalen purchased a small garden and had it delivered indoors. Arrangements cover the table in the sitting room, the console in the hall, two side tables, and every available surface in my bedroom.
I wheel into the hall. “You bought a funeral.”
Dalen comes out of his office carrying coffee and takes in the full display. “I may have overdone it.”
“You think? Are there flowers left in the city?”
“Probably.” He puts down his coffee and picks up an envelope from the nearest arrangement. “There’s a card.”
“Is it twelve pages?”
“One.”
“Progress.” I tuck the envelope beneath the blanket over my legs.
Dalen gestures toward the arrangements. “Do you want some of these moved?”
“Yes. Enough that I stop expecting a casket.”
His laugh follows me back into the bedroom.
By lunch, most of the flowers have migrated to other rooms. I keep the peonies beside my bed because they’re beautiful and because being angry with Dalen hasn’t changed the fact that I love peonies.
I read his card that night.
He doesn’t ask if I did.
AFTER THE FLOWERS, he finally stops trying to apologize in bulk.
On Wednesday, I call him because my water bottle is on the kitchen counter and Rosa is downstairs. Dalen answers from his office and immediately offers to come home.
“No. Can you ask Rosa to bring it upstairs?”
“Sure.”
He does exactly that.
No new water bottles appear. Nobody installs a miniature refrigerator beside my bed. Dalen has finally discovered that a problem can remain the size it was when I handed it to him. The relief of that is staggering.
On Thursday, Mara takes me to physical therapy. Dalen offers to drive once. When I say Mara already volunteered, he tells me to have a good appointment and returns to his office.
Mara watches him disappear. “He didn’t ask me what time I’ll have you back.”
“He’s trying.”
She leans over my wheelchair. “Should we check him for a fever?”
I swat at her with my purse. “Drive.”
Friday, my attorney calls about the fraudulent accounts. Northstar has accepted the police report and fraud affidavit. Wells Fargo is still investigating, but the attorney isn’t worried.
Dalen is across the breakfast table when I hang up. “Do you need anything?”
“No.”
“All right.” He picks up his coffee.
I make it almost thirty seconds. “You don’t want to know what he said?”
“Desperately.” His grip tightens slightly around the cup.
I laugh.
He doesn’t ask.
That afternoon, I ask him to lower the coffee mugs I use most often. He lowers four.
Only four.
Apparently, miracles come in ceramic.
A WEEK AFTER I COME home, I drop my hairbrush.
It skitters beneath the sink while I’m sitting in front of the bathroom mirror. I lean sideways, stretch until my ribs complain, then try to snag the handle with my fingertips.
Nothing.
My knee aches. My shoulder still hurts. My hair is half brushed, I haven’t worn real pants in more than a week, and I suddenly hate the chair so much I want to shove it through the glass shower door.
Dalen appears in the doorway. “Everything okay?”
“No.” I gesture toward the floor.
He spots the brush but leaves it there.
“You can pick it up.”
“Right.” He retrieves it and hands it to me.
I grip the handle. “I hate this chair. I hate needing help, and I hate that Meg did this to me.”
Dalen stays in the doorway.
“I hate that I miss her.”
That admission breaks whatever I’ve been holding together.
“Do you want me to stay?” he asks.
I nod.
He sits on the bathroom floor with his back against the cabinet, and I cry. Not the quiet, manageable kind I’ve been doing since the hospital. This comes from somewhere deeper, somewhere I’ve kept locked since the night Meg grabbed my ankle at the top of the stairs.
“I taught her to braid her hair.” The words come out ragged. “She was seven, and Mom couldn’t get out of bed, and Meg had picture day at school.”
Dalen doesn’t speak. His hand rests on my armrest, close enough to reach.
“I checked her homework every night for three years. I packed her lunches. I sat in the hallway outside her bedroom when she had nightmares because Mom slept through them.”
My voice breaks, and I grip the brush so hard the handle creaks.
“I waited until she got in her car every Sunday night because I’ve never stopped worrying about her.” I wipe my face with the heel of my hand. “I still worry, and she tried to drug me.”
Eventually, I wheel closer and hold out my hand.
Dalen takes it without trying to explain any of this to me. His thumb moves across my fingers, steady, warm, and he stays on the floor until I let go.
THE FOLLOWING SUNDAY, he doesn’t cook.
I find him making sandwiches while I do my physical therapy exercises at the kitchen table. The lack of smoke is noticeable enough that I glance toward the empty stove. “Giving up?”