Heath Read online

  Shane smiled said, “You haven’t done anything except be a perfect human being.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Because Heath is progressing beautifully,” he said. “I understand you’re the little bird that may have been out there mopping the hallway in the middle of the night.” She winced at that and glared at Dani.

  Dani shrugged and said, “You can’t expect the world not to find out.”

  “Does Heath know?”

  “No,” Shane said. “But you should probably tell him.”

  “Why? It’ll just make him feel guilty.”

  “How so?” Dani asked.

  “He won’t want his sleep at the cost of my sleep,” she said bluntly.

  “Maybe not,” Shane said. “So we need a solution.”

  “Not sure what that is though,” she said.

  “Well, I have a suggestion,” Dani said. “It might take a little bit to make it work though. I don’t want to say too much about it, in case I can’t get it to come together. Let me think it through and get back to you.”

  Hailee nodded and settled in for the day. When she looked up, it was already eleven, and, sure enough, Heath was at her doorway with a bright smile on his face. “Hey,” she said.

  “Well, it looks like I’m doing well for sleeping, but you? I’m not so sure.”

  “Hey, I’m not sleeping too bad,” she said with as bright a smile as she could muster.

  “No,” he said, “maybe not, but I can see you’re not sleeping precisely the same as I am.”

  “Well, I don’t think you were sleeping for a long time, so it’s hardly a surprise that you’re doing better now that you’re finally getting some sleep.”

  He nodded. “Got time for lunch?”

  “Sure, why not?” she said. And she looked at her desk, smiled, and said, “I just need a couple minutes to put stuff away.”

  “I’ll head down because I’m slower than you,” he said. “I’ll see you there.”

  She smiled and locked up her office and headed in behind him. She caught up with him just as he went into the cafeteria. “Good timing,” she said.

  He smiled and stepped up to talk to Dennis. “I want all of it,” he declared. Dennis burst out laughing but gave him a huge plateful. Hailee snagged it and carried both of their plates down the aisle.

  Soon Heath and Hailee were both sitting outside. Not in the sun because it was too hot but off to the side in the shade. They’d both been working on their individual problems. At least she thought so.

  “How are you doing these days?” she asked.

  “The world is a better place when you have sleep,” he said almost complacently. She immediately felt guilty for even considering not doing the mopping. He just nodded and looked at her and said, “But obviously you’re not feeling the same way.”

  Dani’s words were in her mind as Hailee thought about that. “I’m learning to let go a little bit more,” she said quietly. “It’s not easy though.”

  “Nothing worth doing ever is,” he reminded her.

  She smiled. “Isn’t that the truth?”

  “Will you avoid relationships for the rest of your life?”

  “Of course not,” she said, and then she stopped and thought about that. “That was a trick question too.”

  “Not at all, but I figured it was probably more comfortable to ask you that one outright instead of beating around the bush.”

  “Do you even know my history?” She appreciated his honesty, even as she worried what he’d say if he knew it all.

  “Some of it, yes,” he said. “The rest? … Well, it isn’t too hard to connect the dots.”

  She quickly filled him in about Jacob’s painful fight for life, right from day one, followed by the pain and the sense of betrayal she’d gone through with her husband, and the final straw—Jacob’s death.

  Heath listened quietly and sadly. “And, of course, it’s no wonder why you don’t want to trust anybody again.”

  “Maybe,” she said with a half smile. “I might have been a little too quick to make that decision. Somebody reminded me that, if I hadn’t met my husband, and if I hadn’t married him, and if I hadn’t had Jacob in the first place, there would have been this massive hole in my heart about a joy that I wouldn’t even know that existed. So, even though it was painful, I would still have wanted Jacob in my life.”

  “Meaning that, even though you lost him, he was still such a joy that you’re grateful he came to you in the first place.”

  “Exactly,” she said. “And, therefore, I can’t really begrudge my husband either.”

  “Are you divorced?”

  “Yes,” she said. “He divorced me. As soon as possible to get away from the situation.”

  “Well, maybe you’ll be ready soon,” he said.

  “Maybe, but it would probably take somebody else in my life to make me care enough.”

  “Right.” And, at that, he fell silent.

  She looked up, realized that she, in a way, had cut him off from that and said, “And maybe it’s time to do that.” There was an odd silence, and she looked up to see him staring at her intently. She smiled at him and said, “I really enjoy the time we spend together.”

  “I’m glad,” he said softly. “How have your nights been?”

  “They’ve been great. I’m not sleeping as well as I could, but then I’m still dealing with stuff,” she said with an airy wave of her hand.

  “And how do you feel about being honest and open and not keeping secrets?”

  “Sometimes secrets need to be kept,” she said honestly. “If they’ll hurt somebody to share them, I don’t think they should be told.” He just nodded and kept eating. She wondered where the question was going. “What about you?”

  “It’s like little white lies,” he said. “I don’t think there’s any point in telling them if we don’t have to, but sometimes telling a little white lie could save a world of hurt, yet it could cause a world of hurt in some instances. In the end, I don’t really believe in hurting others unnecessarily.”

  She smiled at that. Because, of course, he didn’t. “And are you dealing with your losses?”

  “A little better than I expected,” he said. “Now that I’m sleeping. Now that I’ve got an email.” At that, he fell silent.

  “What kind of an email?” she nudged.

  “From the sister of one of my friends. It was an odd email, awkward, I guess. And I still haven’t read it thoroughly.”

  “Maybe you should,” she said.

  “Maybe,” he said, then shrugged. “But I read enough to realize that she doesn’t blame me. Instead she thanked me for being in her brother’s life. And that her brother, my best friend, had always spoken about me and how much he really loved spending time with me.” At that, he seemed to choke up.

  She reached across, gently laced her fingers with his, and said, “And I can see that. I’m thrilled she took the step to tell you that.”

  He nodded, smiled, squeezed her fingers, and then continued eating. “Me too.”

  Heath headed back to his room after lunch, surprised that he’d even mentioned the email to Hailee. But, of course, she understood. So far, there hadn’t been a whole lot that they hadn’t had some level of understanding on. So, if she was the cleaning lady, why wouldn’t she have said anything to him? Was it not important to her? And that just brought him back to being afraid that maybe he’d been wrong the whole time.

  This time, he was determined to stay up and see who it was. He didn’t want to put her on the spot, but, if it was her, well then, he didn’t know what it meant. His heart raced when he thought about if it had been her, then what would it say? And, if it wasn’t her, he had almost a deflated feeling to it. But also guilt and something he didn’t want any more of. He couldn’t turn off his mixed emotions for the rest of the day.

  By the time he headed to bed that night, his whole mind-set was in turmoil. He hadn’t seen her all afternoon, and then, at the end of the
day, he’d seen her yawning. He frowned with that same need to sort it out, and he went back to his room and waited until the dinner hours were almost done before he headed in and got his.

  He passed the evening answering emails and talking to his best friend’s sister. She was married with two kids, and, as soon as he’d responded to her email, she phoned him. They’d spent a lovely hour talking and reminiscing about the men that had both been so special to them. When he hung up, he’d felt raw, heartsore, but also happy. And he realized that he’d reached yet another stage of grief and was actually capable of letting some of that guilt go. He headed to bed and, with a smile on his face, crashed right away.

  When he woke up, it was once again two a.m. His body was into this weird rhythmical cycle that made no sense. He listened intently, but he couldn’t hear the cleaning lady outside. He tossed and turned and then thought he heard something. He hesitated and listened intently. And there it was, that same rhythmical back-and-forth footsteps, with the rolling of the bucket and the swishing of the mop. He got out of bed, quietly grabbed his crutches, and crept forward until he stood right at the door. He could hear the cleaning lady’s motions. He wondered, did he dare find out who it was. If it was some other lady, it might scare the crap out of her.

  He leaned on his crutches and slowly and quietly opened the door to see who might be out there. He only opened it enough to stick his head out, and the hallway was dark. But there was a long, lean form, calmly and methodically mopping the floor. He couldn’t tell for sure who it was. He wanted to see her face underneath the ambient light of the hallway. When she went around the corner, he would get just that second to find out. She yawned, then reached for the bucket and the mop, nudging them out of the way.

  She turned, and his heart raced. It was her. Hailee. Ever-so-softly, he closed the door and thought about it. His heart raced with joy, but, at the same time, he knew it had to stop. He didn’t know how or why she was doing this, but he could guess. It was one of the sweetest things he’d ever had done for him in his life.

  He headed back to bed with a big smile on his face, and he fell asleep instantly.

  Chapter 16

  She was yawning the next morning when she made it to her office. She put down her purse, turned on her computers, and then realized she couldn’t do anything without coffee. She hadn’t even had time for breakfast because she’d overslept. As she walked into the cafeteria, it was still full of people. She smiled and walked straight to the coffee, and Dennis called out, “Tut, tut, tut. You need more than coffee.”

  “You’re a mother hen,” she said to him.

  “I am,” he said. “I like to take care of all my chicks, and you’re one of them. What would you like for breakfast? Something with more protein, like sausages and eggs, or something like yogurt and fresh fruit?”

  “Yogurt and fresh fruit,” she admitted, “with maybe a bit of granola?”

  He pointed to several freshly made parfaits.

  She nodded and said, “Is there one with seeds?”

  “How about I make you one right now?” He grabbed an empty parfait glass and filled it in the layers that she requested. By the time he was done, he looked at it and said, “You know what? That looks mighty fine.”

  She smiled. “You’re right.”

  She grabbed a spoon with the parfait glass on one hand and her coffee in the other, then headed back to the office. As soon as she got inside, she sat and started eating. Dani called her extension and asked, “Hey, you got a moment?”

  “Sure,” she said. “I’m eating, but whatever.”

  “My office in ten minutes or so?”

  “Perfect,” she said. She sat back, checked her emails, finished her parfait, and tossed back the last of her coffee. Then she got up and headed to Dani’s office. She greeted her friend with a bright smile, but Hailee’s smile immediately fell off when she saw Shane and Heath here. She looked at them in surprise. “Sorry. Am I intruding?”

  “Not at all,” Dani said with a warm smile. “We’re waiting for you. Close the door behind you, please.”

  Slowly closing the door, she took the last chair available and sat down. She wasn’t sure her legs would support her at this point anyway. “What’s up?”

  “What’s up?” Heath said, his voice was a little harsher than she’d ever heard from him. “I don’t want you losing sleep to help me sleep.”

  She stared at him, wordlessly. “Sorry?”

  “I saw you last night,” he said. He shook his head. “You know I’m not exactly sure why you’re doing what you’re doing. If it’s for the reason I think it is, then I really, really appreciate it, but I don’t want to sleep if it means you don’t get any.”

  “Uh,” she said but then fell silent. She really didn’t know what to say.

  “Uh?” he repeated with an eyebrow raised.

  She shrugged. “It’s just, whenever I do mop the floors, you sleep. And when you were struggling so much for so many weeks without it, I realized how much it meant to you. And that I was being very selfish when it was something so simple that I could do to help.” She didn’t know why this conversation was happening in Dani’s office, but both Dani’s and Shane’s attentions were going from Hailee to Heath, depending on who was speaking.

  “I get that,” he said, “and that’s precisely why I thought you were doing it.” And then he sighed heavily. “But you’re also tired, and you’re getting run-down. You’re rising before two in the morning to come mop that hallway,” he said in exasperation. “I wake up. I hear the mop, and I fall back asleep. Immediately. And I get that. But you were up earlier, getting dressed, coming up here, then spending an hour mopping that hallway. That’s got to be the darnedest cleanest hallway in the entire place. And then I’m supposed to go back to sleep in just minutes, knowing that you’ve come up here, spent like ninety minutes of your own time in the middle of the night to mop so that I can sleep?” He shook his head. “I’ll admit that I fell asleep last night with a smile on my face,” he said, “but I don’t want you doing it again.”

  She didn’t even know what to say. She was ultimately embarrassed and felt extremely awkward. Not to mention hurt. “I hear you,” she said. “And, of course, I won’t if you don’t want me to do.” She tried to stand, moving the chair back out of the way.

  Shane lifted a hand and said, “Stop.”

  She looked at him, refusing to look at Heath.

  “He’s not asking you to stop for the reason you think he is.”

  She frowned at Shane. “What other reason is there?” She used all of her experience of many years gone by. If life wasn’t turning out the way she wanted it to, she’d put some steel in her spine. If she was getting a talking-to or things were turning out differently than she wished them to, well, that’s fine. She’d face it and move on. She’d been here before.

  “He doesn’t want you to lose sleep because it makes him feel guiltier. And we’re trying to stop the guilt.”

  Her mouth formed a small O. “I hadn’t considered that.”

  “No, of course not,” Heath said. “You were trying to do something beautiful for me, and it just makes me feel worse.”

  She frowned at him. “You could just take it as a gift that somebody wanted to give you,” she said in a tart voice.

  He grinned. “Well, I would. It’s actually something I was talking to Dani and Shane about earlier,” he said. “So I would ask you if maybe you could mop the floor once or twice again, perhaps more if we need to. And I know it’s stupid, and I know that nobody else would even understand why the sound is putting me to sleep—except that I now remember my mother always did this in the evenings. After I went to bed, that’s when she would clean.

  “And I now recognize that that was the sound and the feeling of the comfort of home for me. It was the meaning of family. It was what I had before I lost so much. So, when you did that, it was like bringing back my childhood security blanket and wrapping it around me. And, for that, I am forever gra
teful because I think you’ve probably come up with the answer to how I can get over my insomnia.”

  She stared at him, a question in her gaze. “Okay. I guess that’s a good thing?” she asked hesitantly. “I’m honestly still in the dark.”

  “I know,” he said.

  At that point, Dani stepped in. “We’ll have you mop in the night again, when everything’s quiet and soundless, and we’ll record it. I do have some sound experts in town, and, once we’ve got the recording that we need, we’ll give it to Heath as his own personalized white noise that he could use to go to sleep. Whether we give it to him as a CD or an MP3 format that he can play on his phone, I don’t know yet. But we’re hoping it will give him that same security-blanket feeling so he can sleep at night.”

  She sat down with a hard thump. “But that’s wonderful,” she said. “I didn’t even think of that.”

  “Which is why we’re all here in this room together right now,” Shane said with a smile. “It’s not that what you’re doing was wrong. That’s far from it. You actually solved a massive issue for us. We’re just trying to find a way to make it happen without you losing your sleep too.”

  Hailee grinned. “Hey, as long as it works, I’m totally okay with doing this again.”

  Heath had been delighted with the solution. It had been something that they set up later without him even being aware of it because they wanted it to be as natural as they could. So several nights later he was presented with the MP3 player and with a CD and an MP3 file that he could play both on a small desk speaker system and also on his phone. So, at any time that he woke up in the middle of the night, he could just hit a button and hear the same sounds over and over again.

  Now, four days later, with the first night under his belt with that recorded sound, he realized just what a blessing it was. Sometimes he wondered just how many memories he had left of his mother. He’d been young when she had died in a car accident, but he eventually remembered falling asleep to the sounds of her cleaning all the time.