Sweet Forty-Two (10 page)

“That bakery downstairs ... is it ever open? Who owns it?”

“Which do you want me to answer first?” She seemed annoyed.

“The second.”

“I do.”

“
You
own it?” My eyes may well have bugged right out of my head.

She shrugged. “Yep, I’m full of all kinds of surprises.” She seemed to be trying to wink with her voice, if one could do that, but it fell a little short and my stomach dropped a little.

“When is it open?”

“It’s not, really. I don’t have a ton of time to run it properly. Just mainly for catering and stuff.” She was growing flustered by the second. Who knew a bakery could be such a sore spot? “Do you want the place or not, Regan?”

I wasn’t sure if living across from Georgia was what I wanted to do. Well, it was what I
wanted
to do, but I didn’t know if it was right. I didn’t have a clear read on her, and she caused all kinds of feelings to stir up inside me that I definitely wasn’t ready to feel. I was curious. With each second that passed I wanted to get closer to her than my brain was comfortable with.

“Why do you trust me so much?” was the first sentence out of my mouth.

“You haven’t tried to get in my pants.” She slid her backpack over her shoulders and looked at me as if she’d said the most normal thing on the planet.

“I’ve known you for, like, a minute.”

“Precisely. You’re good, Regan. I need some good around here.” It was as if a grey scarf had slipped from the ceiling and surrounded her eyes as she spoke.

“I’ll take it.” That was the only thing to say.

Georgia walked toward me and slowly wrapped her arms around my neck as she squeezed me close. “Thank you,” she whispered.

“I ... you’re welcome.” I went to set my hands on her lower back, but her backpack stopped me, so I settled for the curve of her hip.

Not a bad compromise.

Georgia’s muscles froze, and for a moment her eyes locked on mine. I didn’t want to pull my hands off of her hips in reaction, so I left them there. And took a deep breath because I felt the overwhelming urge to kiss her. It could have been the relief and excitement of finding the perfect apartment, but more than likely it was the lavish garnet color painted across her smile. She was smiling. Slightly, but it was there. The color in her lips seemed to make its way up to her cheeks.

She’d been looking at me with her eyes only, not moving her face from the level of my chest, but when she tilted her chin upward, her expression fully exposed and vulnerable, everything got too real.

I had to kiss her.

In the span of my emotional volley, she cleared her throat and took a step back. My hands felt cold as she shimmied her hips away from my hold.

“Okay, so you remember how to get back to Mission Bay? I’ve got to go north, so I can’t drive you back.” She moved to the door.

“I remember. When can I move in?” I asked this in the hopes that my line-crossing moment hadn’t just lost me the best apartment I’d ever seen.

Georgia handed me a key. “Any time. Get me the first month’s rent whenever. See ya.” She stretched way up on her toes, gave me a quick kiss on the cheek, smiled, and bounded down the stone stairs.

As I closed her door and unlocked what was now mine, it hit me. While I’d seen Georgia bounce across the line between excessively seductive and perfectly badass, the only time I’d seen anything soft and bright from her was in her interactions with her coworkers and with CJ. The girl that leaped over the bar and gripped CJ into a squealing hug was the same girl that offered me the apartment in her building.

She trusted me. Seemed relieved I hadn’t tried to “get in her pants.”

“Crap,” I whispered to myself as I gazed out what was now
my
picture window.

Pressing my forehead into the single-pane of glass I let out a low groan.

I’d just been friend-zoned by Georgia.

Living in her building certainly
was
going to be a ride. Maybe Lissa was right, after all.

We
’
ll see...

My breathing didn’t get ahold of itself until I was a good two miles away from the apartment. He’d wanted to kiss me, and under normal circumstances I would have allowed him to. But, by design, he was going to be living across the hall from me. I needed friends, according to my therapist. I wondered, though, if she’d meant that I should rent an apartment to someone I was incredibly attracted to.

Probably not.

But, given the resignation that I’d be alone for the rest of my life, I thought it would be okay to have someone nice and good looking living across the hall. Just to remind me what being human feels like. Even if I could never act on those feelings, it would be nice to
feel
them. While I still could feel, that is.

Merging onto the highway, heading North, I had to take a cleansing breath to erase the cool scent of the hazel-eyed, brassy-haired hottie from my senses. It was time to focus. To prepare.

A half an hour later I was pulling into the parking lot of Breezy Pointe. Sounds pleasant, right? A small town on the coast, maybe? A picnic spot where one might spend careless Sundays in the sand?

It was designed that way. To make you think a million happy thoughts before you walked through the doors and were confronted by every awful thing you wanted to fix.

“Hi Wendy.” I smiled to the sixty-five-year-old nurse at the desk. I didn’t see her too often, as I usually came right after my shifts at E’s, and she worked the day shift.

“Georgia Rose, how are you?” Her voice held a hint of the southern sweet tea she carried with her from Texas when she moved here last year. She always said my name like
Jo-ja
. I loved it. “You didn’t come last night?”

I shook my head. “Bad night the night before. I...”

“Needing a break is okay, Sugar. We all need them. Given the last few months you’ve had ... well, I’m glad you got some rest.”
She
was allowed to call me
Sugar
all she wanted. She had a heart big enough for the both of us.

“Thanks. Can you check to see if she’s ... available?”

Wendy nodded as she handed me the sign-in binder. She picked up the black phone, pressing a few buttons as I stared at the cheap art posters on the wall behind her. For a place that costs so much money, you’d think they might want to buy something other than a screen print of a shitty sunflower field. I vowed to call my photog friend, Kate, in Illinois this week to ask her to send me some canvas shots.

“Georgia.” Wendy’s tone indicated this was not the first time she’d called my name. I was busy making plans to pretty up the place I’d been spending more and more time as the days wore on.

“Sorry, what?”

“You can head on back.”

I took my visitor badge and smiled through the sad gaze she gave me as I wandered to the locked door for the unit.

After being buzzed in and giving a silent greeting to the nurses at the desk, I made my way down the hall.

1826
.

I paused at the familiar door, tracing the curves of the numbers with my eyes as I caught my breath. Typically, I’d be able to visit her in her room. Still with a nurse present, but at least in her own space. Not today, though. Not after Saturday night left me shaken and with a bruise on my wrist. It’d been over a year since she’d had an episode like that.

Just one more locked door separated me from the visiting area. Another nurse greeted me at the door and escorted me in.

“How is she today?” I checked my backpack and jewelry at the nurses’ station before going further.

Daniel, the nurse who seemed to always be here, gave a stern nod. “Not excitable. We’re not sure yet if the sedatives haven’t fully worn off or if she’s back on the immobility end.”

I swallowed hard as we entered the large, bright space, gilded with damaged dreams, disappointment, and fear. The sign out front scribbled something about
hope
, but I’d only ever been in here when hope failed.

Daniel started discussing some of the protocols they’d put in place over the last twenty-four hours, but as soon as I saw her slender figure in the wheelchair by the window, all other attention fled my body as I walked toward her. She was facing me, and I mumbled a small prayer under my breath that she’d recognize me.

“Mama,” I whispered, kneeling in front of her, trying to find the focus of her eyes.

Her head didn’t move, but her eyes did. The empty brown holes fluttered over my face before settling on my eyes. They opened a little wider, just as her lips parted.

Please, please let her say something.

She tilted her head to the side, her greying brown hair laying over one shoulder, and with a slight smile she quietly spoke. “Baby.”

Tears clouded my view of the faraway woman I still called
Mama
. Taking her hand, I smiled and nodded.

“I’m here.”

Catatonic Schizophrenia.

The name doesn’t look pretty, doesn’t sound pretty, and the effects on the person and their family are a self-contained Antichrist to pretty. At that point there were several other diagnoses on the brink of landing on her chart, but the original catalyst was catatonic schizophrenia.

“Georgia?” A delicate male voice called from above.

At the sound of my actual name, my mother’s eyebrows drew in, and she mouthed
Georgia
, looking between me and the floor for a few moments before turning her wheelchair to face the polka-dot caps of the ocean.

I cleared my throat, sniffing once as I stood. “Hello, Dr. Carver.”

Dr. Carver was well seasoned. Easily in his early sixties, with a head of thick salt and pepper hair. The only wrinkles he had were around his eyes and mouth, and only appeared when he smiled. I admired that despite the work he’d chosen to dedicate his life to, he spent most of it smiling.

“Take a little walk with me?” He held what I presumed to be my mother’s chart as he tilted his head to the hallway that hosted his tiny office.

I looked back at my mother with a sinkhole slowly caving in my stomach. Moving slowly, I put my hand on her shoulder. “I’ll be right back, Mom, okay?”

A thin, cool hand reaching up and resting on mine for a second was the only response I got. It was good enough for now, and far better than Saturday’s responses.

I walked to Dr. Carver’s office with my head down, feeling somewhat like I was on my way to the principal’s office. He was quiet, too. There were very few good reasons to have to sit in a doctor’s actual office, and I wasn’t betting this was one of them.

“Please sit.”

I did. Then, waited.

“Georgia,” Dr. Carver started with great hesitation, “we’ve known for some time that your mother hasn’t been seeing the progress we’d like. What happened Saturday was a setback—”

“She has catatonic schizophrenia, Doctor. By definition she swings between excessive mobility and immobility.” I cut him off by reciting basic medical information to a man who’d been practicing medicine since long before I existed.

He patiently cleared his throat and clasped his hands on the desk in front of him. “I’m aware of her admitting diagnosis, Georgia. That’s what concerns me. Typically, this type of schizophrenia can respond well to benzodiazepines, which she’s on, and psychotherapy, which she’s involved with.” He took a deep breath. “As you’re aware, the length of time between her hospital visits have been shortening...”

“Yes, I’m aware.”

“Is she still living with her sister?”

I shook my head, looking down. “No. My aunt Susan had a baby a few months ago. It wasn’t really ... you know...”
Safe.
I couldn’t say the word, but it made itself known inside my hesitation.

“So she’s been living on her own?”

I nodded. “She’s refused for six months to move into the vacant apartment in my building. I finally had to rent it out today.” My throat closed around the words. I’d known she’d put up a fight, but I hadn’t counted on it being a forever fight.

She didn’t want to live with me.

He sighed. A long, heavy, preemptively apologetic sigh. “It’s time we actively consider adding ECT to her treatment plan.”

“
No.
” I stood with such force that my chair slid several feet behind me, tapping the back wall of his small office.

Dr. Carver didn’t flinch. I’m certain he’s dealt with more startling situations than my brewing temper tantrum. “Georgia. ECT, in conjunction with medications, like the ones she’s taking, has time and again proven the most effective for patients with catatonic schizophrenia.”

Electroconvulsive Therapy. Sounds fancy, right? Shock therapy is what it is.

“Dr. Carver, when I became her healthcare proxy she made it
very
clear to me that ECT was not up for discussion. I intend to honor her wishes.”

I wiped my palms against the soft cotton of my skirt. I knew she wasn’t getting better. She only had to be hospitalized when she slid to either end of her catatonic spectrum. She’d been spending less and less time in the middle, making living on her own a dangerous option.

However, she still had life left in her. I could feel it as sure as I could feel the sun was out even if my eyes were closed.