Jaden Read online

  “It’s part of my overall worry,” Dani said with a half laugh. “A lot of people are here, and personality differences show up.”

  “I don’t think I’ve had trouble with anyone yet,” she said. Only now she wondered why Dani had brought it up.

  “Just a couple mentions were made to me,” Dani said quietly. “That you appeared to be very reserved and a loner.”

  “Ah,” Brianna said, staring off in the distance, nodded, a little hurt. “You’re right. I probably am.”

  “Still afraid of getting hurt?”

  “Not consciously, no,” she said, “but I have noticed that, when I go out to the general public areas here, I tend to be the only one at my table.”

  “Those walls are pretty hard to let go of, aren’t they?”

  “And do people know that instinctively?” Brianna asked, puzzled. “Do they look at me and say, Oh, wow, she looks like she’s in a bad mood. I better stay away?”

  At that, Dani burst out laughing. “No, not at all,” she said. “But I think it’s a case of, when there are two places open, you do tend to give off this stay-away vibe. So they instinctively go to the other place.”

  “Sounds like the same thing to me,” Brianna said with a sigh. “And here I had thought I was handling this so well. That I was projecting this happy, serene expression while I work through the remaining memories. I swear I thought I had this under control.” She frowned at Dani. Not at Dani but at the fact that Brianna had failed so miserably to conceal her lingering pain. Plus this felt like a psychotherapy session. Even with Dani, it felt invasive. No wonder Jaden hated them so. Brianna shook her head, gathering her thoughts. What had she just said to Dani? Oh, yeah … “I wasn’t thinking that my past relationship was basically telling everybody to keep out, but maybe that is what I’m doing.”

  “Well, at least you’re open about it,” Dani said, with a knowing smile.

  “I’m trying to be.”

  “Do you get along with anyone?”

  “If you’re asking about Jaden, then you might as well ask,” she said. “I’m obviously an open book, unbeknownst to me. Everybody else seems to be asking.”

  “Okay. I’m asking,” Dani’s grin split wide and grew infectious.

  “Honestly, when we first arrived, we were both new,” she said. “I think we gravitated together maybe because we each recognized a newbie, that new kid at school. I forgot to put up the walls, or maybe Jaden wouldn’t have regarded them as walls anyway. I don’t know.”

  “He came here not really as a last resort but more as a case of he might as well try our rehab system here, yet he didn’t really expect anything much, I think,” Dani said. “I’m pretty sure he came based on Iain’s recommendation as it was.”

  “Yes, and he has really enjoyed seeing his buddy back here. The fact that Iain came to visit yesterday was huge.”

  “And I think they’ll probably spend more time together too because Iain will remain in town. He’s also pretty handy with a hammer and nails and has done a few small jobs for us.”

  “Which is good for him too,” she said. “There’s such a vast difference between the two men though.”

  “In what way?”

  “Their physical fitness, for one,” Brianna said.

  “When he first arrived, Iain was in the same shape as Jaden. But he has come a long way.”

  Brianna stared at her in surprise. “Really?”

  “Yes,” Dani said with a smile. “Like I said, Iain has come a long way.”

  “He has, indeed.”

  “That’s what’s given Jaden so much hope that he can have the same success.” Dani focused on Brianna, watching her expressions.

  Inside, Brianna wondered if that was true, or if Dani was slightly exaggerating. “I’m not sure Jaden has that same potential to grow his leg back that big.”

  “Maybe his genetics might hold him back, but he can still grow a lot bigger and stronger than what he is now. And it’s not about size. It’s about strength, flexibility, and health.”

  “Exactly,” she said. “I wonder if that comparison is hard on him. Seeing his friend doing so well, and yet he’s not.”

  “Possibly, for the here and now, but it should also be encouraging to Jaden to realize he can come that far too.”

  Brianna nodded, wondering at another thought that came through her mind. But it was a little too horrible to contemplate. She frowned and looked down at her fingers.

  “Problems?”

  Not wanting to share at this point in time, Brianna smiled, shook her head, and said, “Dennis is very friendly.”

  “Dennis likes to know everyone here,” Dani said. “He’s been with me for years. Right from the beginning in fact.”

  “Not only does he run a great kitchen,” she said, “but he always seems to remember what I’ve eaten and what I should be eating.” She laughed, but it was stilted.

  “That’s because he cares,” Dani said seriously.

  “I think everybody here does,” Brianna said in bewilderment. “How did you find such a great collection of these very skilled people and pull them together like this?”

  “I’m not sure,” Dani said, “but you can bet I’m trying to maintain it.”

  “Well, you don’t have to worry about me,” Brianna said, ready to make her exit but remaining in her seat. She wasn’t sure if there was another reason behind Dani’s questions or not, but she wanted to set her boss at ease. “I really enjoy being here. I’m enjoying the atmosphere, the healing, just everything about the center. You’ve built yourself quite a place. You should be proud of your accomplishments.”

  Dani nodded. “I am,” she said. “It’s been a very long journey to this point. But, just like I see the progress of my own father and all the patients around here, it’s amazing how much that same growth, optimism, and positivity works outward to everybody else around us.”

  “Like you and me?”

  “Exactly,” Dani said with a half laugh. She looked at her watch and said, “And it’s lunchtime. Are you up for joining me?”

  “Sure,” she said. “I have no clue if Jaden is ready for lunch or not.”

  Dani added, “It’d be easy enough to join him.”

  On that note, the two of them got up and headed toward the cafeteria.

  “How do you decide when animals get to stay here?”

  “Stan has a certain budget to stick to, so I get his feedback,” she said. “One of the difficulties is some of the animals have very long lifespans, so we have to take that into account. For example, the horses. But, as I already have my own horses that I keep here,” she said with a tender smile as she looked outside, “it’s pretty easy to take in a few others that need help.”

  “I was thinking of the cats and dogs and Hoppers, I guess, is his name.”

  “Isn’t he a huge rabbit?”

  “He’s massive,” Brianna said in surprise. “And he’s got such a great temperament.”

  “Exactly. He’s a pretty easy addition for this place.”

  “We could set up a petting zoo,” Brianna said with a laugh.

  “Ugh,” Dani said. “I like people just fine, but I’m not sure I want to bring in curiosity seekers. Feels like that would change the healing energy of our place.”

  “Oh, good point,” she said. “I guess all of us here prefer our privacy.”

  “That’s the thing about a center like this,” she said. “You fit in here. Every broken soul knows there’s a place for them at Hathaway House. And, while they’re here, they slowly start to put the pieces of themselves back together again. Not just physically but it’s the emotional and the mental and the almost soulful levels that people have to heal. It’s a complete process in order to be whole, figuratively, regardless of the condition of the physical body. These individuals come here as patients, looking to get their bodies back, but they don’t realize it doesn’t happen unless all the parts and pieces come together in unity. And that goes for the staff too.”
/>   Out in the hallway was a commotion, then somebody called for Dani. She looked at Brianna and said, “Duty calls. I’ll see you later.” And she headed off down the hallway to where somebody stood outside a patient’s room, leaving Brianna to her thoughts.

  Except her thoughts were totally eclipsed by one bigger thought that couldn’t be true. Could it?

  “That was a great day,” Shane said, as he helped Jaden to sit back up again.

  Jaden sat in his wheelchair, literally shaking. “Says you,” he said. “My body is so done.”

  “Hot tub?”

  Jaden looked at Shane in surprise and then nodded slowly. “That might just be the answer. Let’s go then,” he said, and Shane stepped up behind him and grabbed a couple towels off the shelves, then dropped them into his lap and wheeled him toward the elevator. Jaden hated to say it, but he was so very glad that Shane pushed the wheelchair because Jaden wasn’t sure his arms would get him very far.

  But the thought of being in the hot tub or even in the pool first? … Either would work as his body continued to shake inside and outside. It was embarrassing, but it was also evidence of a truly hard workout. For that, he was proud of what he had accomplished this session. As the two of them hit the lower level, Jaden took several deep breaths to calm his body further before he faced anybody else here. “Any chance of the pool first?”

  “Absolutely,” Shane said. He walked Jaden up to the closest pool edge, braked the wheelchair alongside the crystal blue water, and said, “I’ll take the towels. You just go in.”

  Jaden had worn a muscle shirt and shorts for his PT, but now he took off the sweaty muscle shirt and tossed it to the tiled surround of the pool and grasped the railing that led to the ladder into the pool and by the steps of the shallow end. He stood from his wheelchair, still with some residual shakiness, and, rather than even trying to take any steps or to make a graceful entrance, he just fell in over the side into the pool.

  As soon as the water closed over his head, he groaned. He waited until he was out of air before slowly rising to the surface, floating. It was all he could do. He saw Shane watching him as he broke through the surface. He just smiled and said, “I’m fine, but I sure as heck am not going to move much. Yet the water feels great.”

  “Was the session today that bad?”

  “No, not necessarily,” he said, “but you pushed me hard, and I am exhausted.”

  “Good,” Shane said. “So let’s see how you feel after you get back out again.”

  “I figured I’ll stay here for a bit.”

  “And miss lunch?”

  “I can’t afford to miss lunch,” he said. “I’m always hungry these days.”

  Shane looked at him in surprise, then grabbed his notebook from his pocket and wrote down something. “You need to tell me things like that,” he said.

  Jaden rolled over in the water, then looked up at him and said, “I didn’t think that was important.”

  “It’s very important,” he said. “What are you typically eating?”

  “Protein,” he said. “I’m always craving protein.”

  Shane nodded and wrote something else down.

  “Don’t tell me that’s wrong too?”

  “No, not wrong at all,” Shane said. “It’s important you get enough protein while you’re building muscles. But we also want to make sure that you’re getting a lot of vegetables too, so you’re not lacking nutrients.”

  “And cake and ice cream are nutrients, right?”

  “Not quite,” Shane said with a laugh. He looked over, assessing Jaden. “Will you make it to lunch?”

  “I just said so,” he said, a little irritated at having to repeat himself, at having Shane questioning his mobility right now.

  “Or do you want me to get Dennis to bring you something?”

  The thought almost stopped him in his tracks. That would be so much nicer. So much easier. “Would he?”

  “Sure, he would,” Shane said. “If you want to stay in the water and work some of those muscles, just make sure you do ten minutes in the hot tub too.”

  “I think I could manage that.” He thought about it, nodded, and said, “Actually I’d really appreciate it if Dennis would deliver my meal. The thought of having to get up, get changed, go in for lunch, and then return to my room …” He just shook his head, wordless.

  “Exactly what I was thinking,” Shane said. “Let me go talk to him.”

  “Although I don’t know what lunch is,” Jaden said, suddenly realizing he may not get what he wanted for lunch. Shane just lifted a hand as he took the stairs to the dining area deck. Too late for Jaden to even make a suggestion. Maybe that was for the best. As he knew already, Dennis was always looking after everybody’s nutritional values anyway. So Jaden was worrying for no good reason.

  He stayed and floated in the water, absolutely loving it, until he got a little chilled. Then, instead of using his wheelchair or crab-walking, Jaden crossed the cement on his butt and slipped into the nearby hot tub. As soon as he did, shivers racked his soul, and he realized just how chilled he’d gotten. He immediately sank until just his face showed, letting his body warm up.

  It was one of the oddities of sunshine and pools, that, at one point in time, your body did cool to the point that you just couldn’t stay in the water.

  “That’s a heck of a picture,” a man said.

  Jaden opened his eyes to see Dennis standing here, his hands on his hips, studying Jaden.

  He rose up out of the water and sat a little higher up on the steps in the hot tub. “I caught a chill,” he confessed.

  Immediately Dennis’s smile disappeared. He shook his head. “You know what happens when you overdo it, right?”

  “Don’t tell Shane, please,” Jaden begged in a teasing manner. “I promise I’ll be good. But I don’t want Shane to take the pool away from me.”

  “I can see that,” Dennis said. “So, I would have just served you up something, but I figured, since we had such a wide variety today, that I might as well come and ask you what you wanted.”

  When he listed off the reams of food choices, Jaden was stunned. “Is it a special day today?”

  “In a way,” he said. “Dani’s got a bunch of investors and doctors and whatnot coming and walking through the place.”

  “Well, all of the food sounds wonderful,” he said. “I don’t even know what to ask for.”

  “Do you trust me?” Dennis asked as he turned away and headed for the stairs.

  “Absolutely, but I’m starved.”

  “I’ve heard that a time or two,” he said. “Back in ten.”

  Dennis was a man of his word, so Jaden knew to just relax and wait on his meal. He sat on the edge of the hot tub, wondering if it was safe for him to make his way over to one of the lounges in the sun to stay warm. He looked at it, then calculated the distance between it and the hot tub … and groaned.

  Just then, a female spoke. “How about I move one of the chairs in closer?”

  He shifted to see Brianna standing nearby, holding a cup of coffee in one hand and a piece of cake in the other. He grinned at her. “Did you just read my mind?”

  “Nope, but I heard Dennis speaking with you,” she said. “So, if you don’t mind, I thought I’d bring my dessert and join you.”

  “You’re always welcome. You know that,” he said. He looked over at the lounge chairs. “I think the sun will be too hot, yet I don’t want to get cold either.”

  “So,” she said, “I’ll give you these to hold,” and she reached down and gave him her plate and her cup, and he held them easily and watched her, as she grabbed two loungers and brought them between the pool and the hot tub in the semishade. Then she walked back over, accepted her cup and plate back, and sat down on the chaise farther away.

  He hitched his butt over a few feet and made his way up into the chair. “Thank you,” he said. “That made life that much easier.”

  “You were looking a little tired,” she said.
>
  “Just a little? Then I’m doing pretty good,” he said. “Both Shane and Dennis have been on my case this morning.”

  “And how’s it going?”

  “I guess I’m seeing progress,” he said. “And Iain’s visit was great.”

  “Ah, Iain,” she said, with a nod, as if that explained everything.

  He looked at her curiously. “You met him, didn’t you?”

  “I did,” she said. “It’s remarkable. He’s looking so fit and healthy. And he had that crazy techno prosthetic.”

  “Right. Isn’t that all amazing?” he said. “I don’t know that I can get quite as good or quite as strong or quite as fit as Iain, but he’s my benchmark. Wow. I want to get as close to all that as I can.”

  Chapter 7

  Brianna did worry about how much Iain’s success affected Jaden’s own hoped-for outcome but knew that she couldn’t really say anything to him about tempering his hopes a bit. The last thing she wanted to do was be a downer, raining on his parade, stalling his progress in any way. “I’m sure you’ll do your utmost best,” she said warmly.

  “And the question is whether that’ll be good enough, right?” His mood appeared to dim along with his smile.

  “Not at all,” she said, sitting up and throwing her legs over the chaise to face Jaden. “It’s important that you stay positive and hopeful and give it your all because I don’t think anybody knows how much we can do for ourselves until we just give ourselves permission to go after what we want, to stay out of our own way.”

  “Of course. I agree,” he said, “and I really want to get where Iain is. I guess he felt doubts like this along the way to where he is now too.”

  Brianna nodded. “Yes, ask Iain about his doubts and what pushed him through those. I bet some successes here have even surprised Shane.”

  At that, Jaden quirked one eyebrow up, considering. “Yeah, I bet so.”

  Just then Dennis came down the stairs with a large tray.

  Jaden sat up and accepted the tray, staring at the double plates, and said, “Man, this looks divine.”