Seb (3 page)

My uncle was a proud man who refused to take charity. When he found out I’d sold my little house to help pay for his medical bills, he’d nearly hit the roof. But I reminded him he would have done the same for me had our situations been reversed. We were family. There was nothing I wouldn’t do for him.

“Did you hear the sirens?” I asked, sitting on the arm of “my chair”, as he called it.

“No, must’ve been sleeping.”

I wasn’t surprised. Uncle Charlie could have slept through a hail of gunfire most of the time. “They took Mrs. Ryan to the hospital.”

Looking alarmed, he struggled to sit up. “No, not Flo.”

“It’s okay.” I patted his forearm to calm him. Getting agitated wasn’t good for him. “She’s going to be fine. She didn’t even want to go to the hospital. They just took her as a precaution. I was thinking I might throw together a tuna casserole for dinner then go down to the hospital and see if she needs a lift home.”

“Good idea,” he said. “After all she’s done for me, I wish I could do more for her.”

“You know she does all that for you because she wants to. She doesn’t expect anything in return.”

He sighed, leaning his head back as he closed his eyes. “I know. It’s just not easy, feeling like such a burden all the time. Some days, I wish this damn disease would take me already instead of making us all suffer this way.”

I knelt beside his chair, squeezing his hand as tears prickled my eyes. “Listen to me—we agreed we would be grateful for every day God gave us, right?”

He nodded, still looking glum.

“If I get back early enough, why don’t I take you out for a walk before it gets dark? The fresh air would do you good.”

The doctor had suggested buying an electric wheelchair or scooter to help Uncle Charlie get around, but unless the doctor intended to discount his services, there was no way we could afford one. So we made do with a manual wheelchair, which meant my uncle had to depend on me a lot more than he would have liked.

“Don’t worry about me.” He pointed at the TV, which he’d paused with the remote. “I’ve got Seb here to keep me company.”

I glanced over my shoulder at the TV. Seb’s handsome face was frozen on the screen, a half smile tilting those full, kissable lips. “Why don’t you call a friend? One of your old coworkers from the school? They should be home from work by now. You know any one of them would love to hear from you.”
And it’s better than wasting time watching TV
.

“Maybe later,” he said, pressing the button to resume the show. “This is just getting good.”

I walked toward the door, pausing in the doorframe as I pretended to watch the show. I wanted to believe he would take me up on my suggestion and reach out to a friend, but I knew he wouldn’t. He was isolating himself more and more as the disease got a firmer grip on him, and I hated to see it. He had been the fun, outgoing one. “The life of the party,” his colleagues had always said. I wanted to see that man again, not a shadow of him wasting away in a recliner with his eyes glued to the idiot box.

***

“You know you didn’t have to come get me, dear,” Mrs. Ryan said, patting my leg as I drove out of the hospital parking lot.

“Nonsense. It’s the least I could do after all you’ve done for us. I would have followed the ambulance to the hospital, but I had to check on Uncle Charlie first.”

“How is the stubborn old fool today?” she asked, her smile revealing a slightly chipped front tooth.

“He’s doing okay.”

“Sitting around feeling sorry for himself, if I know him.”

I curled my hand around the steering wheel. Mrs. Ryan had never been shy about speaking her mind. It was one of the many things I loved about her, but my first instinct was always to defend my uncle. “With all due respect, Mrs. Ryan, this hasn’t been easy on him. The doctor’s prognosis has been pretty grave, and he’s experiencing a lot of discomfort—”

“He’s not dead yet,” she said, folding her arms over her ample chest with a huff. “But you sure as hell wouldn’t know it to look at him. As soon as those doctors slapped an expiration date on him, it’s like he’s been counting down the days.”

I gaped at our landlady, unable to believe what I was hearing. “It can’t be easy to get that kind of news.”

“I’ll grant you that, but he still had a choice: life or death. He chose death.”

“I don’t think he chose it,” I said, getting angry on his behalf. “He didn’t do anything to contribute to this. They don’t know the cause of pulmonary hypertension, only that—”

“That’s not what I mean,” she said, waving off my explanation. “Medical miracles happen all the time. Why couldn’t he be one of them?”

I gave her a confused look. “What do you mean?”

“When he told me the news, I gave him a bunch of books to read.” She shrugged, her lips pursed.

“What kind of books?”

“Just books about people living with their disease, not dying from it. Some about natural healing. Just trying to give him some hope, to let him know that all isn’t lost until he decides it is.”

No one wanted to hold on to hope more than I did, but that was difficult in the face of the doctor’s pessimism. According to his physician, my uncle’s death was inevitable, and it was a question of preparing for it. Was I wrong to let Uncle Charlie accept his fate without trying to keep his spirits up or offer him hope? I’d been trying to respect his wishes and follow his lead, reasoning that I couldn’t possibly understand what he was feeling, but maybe he needed me to play the devil’s advocate, to help him see another possibility.

“My husband lived with cancer for years before it finally took him,” Mrs. Ryan said, looking out the window. “But he had many happy, productive days long after doctors said he should have been gone. He never gave up, not on life. And I don’t think Charlie should either.” She sighed. “But of course, that’s not for me to say. He has to decide for himself the way he’s going to live out the rest of his days.”

“You really care about him, don’t you?” I saw the shimmer of tears in her soft green eyes, and it finally dawned on me her reasons for being there for my uncle may have extended beyond neighborly concern.

“Of course I do.”

“Have you told him how you feel?”

Uncle Charlie had had his heart broken once, many years ago, when his fiancé left him a Dear John letter before taking off with their next-door neighbor. Ever since then, he’d refused to try again, claiming he didn’t need the headache of a relationship.

“What would be the point?” she asked. “He’s already made up his mind about everything. There’s no getting through to him.”

I would have given anything to see my uncle have some happiness in his final days, but I couldn’t believe Mrs. Ryan would be willing to risk her heart on a man who may not be around to bring in another year. How incredibly brave of her. Looking at her now, I saw her in a completely different light. I’d always known she was independent and tough as nails, but putting her heart on the line, risking that kind of loss, was beyond courageous.

“Do you want me to talk to him?”

“Honey,” she said, offering a small smile, “you know your uncle better than anyone. Do you really think there’s anything either of us could say to make him change his mind about the way he spends his days? He could be out sitting in the park, watching the kids playing, listening to the birds chirping, experiencing life. Instead, he’s holed up in that damn apartment with the drapes drawn all day, waiting for the Grim Reaper to pay him a visit.”

I agreed with her, but I didn’t think it was right to push him if he didn’t feel up to it. “We don’t know how he feels, Mrs. Ryan.”

“I’ll tell you how he feels—sorry for himself,” she said, sounding disgusted. She raised a hand to silence me when I would have jumped to his defense. “I know this isn’t easy, but child, my son was hit by a car when he was ten years old. Those doctors, who thought they knew it all, said he’d never walk again.”

I’d met her son and knew he was walking just fine today. “What happened?”

“We decided to make up our minds about what his outcome would be. I made it my mission to keep his spirits up through the surgeries, the physical therapy—through it all. We never gave up. That boy had an iron will, and I’ll tell you, he taught me a hell of a lot about fighting the good fight no matter what life throws at you. I think that’s what got my husband through those years of living with cancer, remembering how brave our little boy had been.”

“That’s a great story,” I said, feeling tears well in my eyes. “But I don’t know that it’s realistic to think Uncle Charlie could get a happy ending.”

She frowned. “Who’s talking about a happy ending? None of us know how long we’ll be here, honey. Hell, I could’ve bit the bullet today. But I’ll tell you what—if I did, I wouldn’t have had any regrets.”

I wished I could have said the same. I’d always walked on the safe side of the street because my parents’ accident had taught me there was danger lurking around every corner.

“I know this isn’t easy for either of you,” she said, her tone softening. “And you know I’m there for you, for both of you. If it ever gets to be too much for you and you just need to vent, know I’m there to listen.”

I pulled into a space in our parking lot, put the car in park, and hugged her. “Thank you. What would we do without you?” God had taken Nan from us around the same time he brought Mrs. Ryan into our lives, and I knew that was no coincidence.

Seb

I knew my production manager, Jim, was right. There was no way we could take on another job right now, and I sure as hell couldn’t ask my guys to work late nights and weekends on a charity case.

“I’m sorry, boss,” Jim said, running a hand over his receding hairline. “I’d find a way to make it happen if I could, but there are only so many hours a day, and every one of ours is already spoken for.”

I stared straight ahead, trying to figure out how the hell to break the news to Skylar. She would be crushed, and I’d walk away feeling like the bad guy even though she’d been the one to ask the impossible of me.

“This is a friend of yours?” Jim asked.

“Uh, no, I just met the girl. Why?” I asked, returning my attention to him.

“Just seems kind of personal to you.”

How could I not want to help someone with a story like hers? I’d watched my mother slip away when I was barely a teenager, and I would have done anything to make her smile one last time. Fortunately for us, our mother had been a born optimist who never stopped finding reasons to smile, even when life dealt her hands that would have broken a lesser woman.

“Thanks, Jim, I know you’re busy. You can get back at it.”

“The guys are gonna head out for some grub. You want anything?”

I should have eaten, but I couldn’t until I’d broken the news to Skylar. After that, I had a feeling I’d need to step out for some fresh air. “No, I’ll just get something later. Thanks.”

After Jim left my office, I slid my cell phone across the desk, staring at the screen and rehearsing the best way to let her down gently. In the end, I decided to just come straight out with it. She would understand, wouldn’t she? She’d have to. I was running a business, not a goddamn nonprofit.

As I connected the call, I heard my mother’s voice reminding me to do something nice for someone else whenever I could. Karma, she always said, would repay us in the most unexpected ways. Damn, now not only did I feel as if I was letting Skylar down but my late mother too. Could this day get any worse?

I should have been mad at Skylar for putting me in this situation, but the sound of her sweet voice, filled with so much hope and expectation as she said, “Hi, Seb,” softened all my frustration.

“Hi, Skylar.”

“You can call me Sky if you want. All my friends do.”

I didn’t want to. Skylar was a beautiful name, and she sure as hell wouldn’t count me among her friends when I broke the news. “So, um, I talked to my production manager and—”

She sighed, sounding so dejected I could barely stand it. “You can’t do it, can you? It’s okay. I knew it was a longshot.”

She sounded so different from the determined young woman who’d marched into my office refusing to take no for an answer.

“Did, uh, something happen with your uncle? You seem kind of down.”
Of course she’s down, asshole. You just crushed her dream of doing this one last thing for her uncle.

“It wasn’t my uncle, actually. I came home to find my landlady being carted off to the hospital on a stretcher. I guess when you see someone you care about in trouble, it hits you how few people you can really count on.”

I’d never forget the day I came home from school and saw them taking my mom’s body away. Except she had been covered with a sheet, and I knew she wouldn’t be coming home. “I’m sorry to hear that. How is she?”

“Oh, she’s doing fine. Mrs. Ryan’s a real trouper. I picked her up from the hospital a little while ago and got her settled in upstairs. I’ll go check on her later to see if she needs anything before I turn in.”

It occurred to me Skylar was so busy taking care of everyone else she probably didn’t have much time for herself. I wondered how long it had been since someone had done something nice for her. This was my chance, but it would mean one hell of a sacrifice on my part.

“Skylar, do you think you can have the car towed to my place?”

“Oh my God, does that mean your team can work on it?”

I took a deep breath, wondering whether I was crazy to agree to this. “My team, no. Me, yes. But it won’t be at my shop. It’ll be at my house. I’ve got an extra garage there, so I sometimes work on projects in my spare time.” Of course, they were usually for my personal collection, not for some stunning redhead who’d tugged at my heartstrings with her plea for help.

“I can’t believe you’d be willing to sacrifice your free time to help me with this.”

Neither could I. Since I’d given up casual sex, I had a lot more time on my hands though. Maybe this was exactly the kind of distraction I needed to keep me from sitting around the house feeling sorry for myself on Saturday nights.