Chapter Twenty-Six
Ashlee
Tuesday
The fact that Matthew wasn't at work made me feel like crap. Even if no one else could see it, it was totally obvious to me that he was going out of his way to avoid me.
Had I managed to blow it by accusing him of sleeping with Kerri and fathering her child? Things had certainly gone downhill since then. Or was I looking too deeply into it and this was all just to do with what Willy had told me? Was this all about his internal despair?
Every time I thought I knew what the hell was going on with Matthew and me, something else threw a wrench into the works.
As I lay in my bed the previous night, ever so slightly tipsy, looking through my yearbook photographs and remembering my mother’s story, I concluded that I would do whatever it took to be there for Matthew. I would be patient, kind, caring... I would do whatever he wanted, but how the hell could I do anything good if he was never going to be around me again?
“Are you free at the moment?” Ms. Peters asked me. “I’m sorry, I know that you’re very busy?”
“No, of course, I can do anything,” I stood up, grinning at her. Mary Peters really was a blessing in disguise around this place. She brought up the mood, rather than constantly dragging it down like Terri had done, and she always had cookies with her. Considering the confusion that I’d been experiencing, which coincided with her start date, the constant access to sugary treats was extremely welcome. “What do you need?”
“I have a little boy about to come in for his shots, Jago Lee he’s called. It says in his notes that he’s very nervous about needles, and considering I’m a new face, I figured that wouldn’t help much, so I was wondering if you could come in the room with me? It shouldn’t take more than a couple of minutes.”
“Well, I am a new face, too, but I’ll give it a shot.” My heart thundered in my chest as the next question fell past my lips. I already knew the answer to it, but I figured it might give me a little more insight. “Is Matthew not here? The kids know him very well.”
She bustled off and I followed closely behind her, not wanting to miss her answer. This was something that I could casually ask once without looking suspicious, but if I had to ask it again, Mary might suspect that something is up, and that my interest is something other than purely professional.
“I think he’s sick,” she called back to me. “I’m pretty sure he called in earlier this morning to have all of his appointments rescheduled.”
Matthew wasn't sick – that much I was certain of. That man seemed to have the immune system of an ox, which must have helped him working around the sick. When we were in school, he was never the one that caught anything; he managed to avoid all the viruses, all the bugs, all the colds... It used to drive me insane, especially as I seemed to be a magnet for things. It had gotten better as I got older, but I was still nowhere near as strong as he was.
Either he was avoiding me, or the money had made him depressed.
When I went in to his office to speak to him about everything, I didn’t even thank him for the roofing contractor, who was doing an amazing job of fixing up our house, because I hadn’t wanted to talk about his winnings unless he wanted to.
Now I was starting to see that might have been a mistake, a missed opportunity to help him out. Would it be totally weird if I went to him after work to try and sort things out, or would that be an intrusion on his personal space?
There it was again, the frustration at never knowing what the right thing to do was. It was helping me to see that not everything was black and white, that not everything was one person’s fault, and that made me needier for him than ever.
As we walked out into the waiting room, I found a young boy cowering on his mother’s lap, leaning into her chest as if he was about to face torture – and to some kids, shots really seemed that way.
“Hello there, Jago,” I knelt and grinned at him. I had a lot of experience with difficult children because, often, speech therapy wasn't very popular. Anything that took a child out of their comfort zone didn’t seem to go down well. “How are you feeling?”
“Don't wanna,” he insisted, pouting out his lip, moving closer to his mom, who didn’t seem to know what to do. She clearly wanted to hug him tighter, but she also needed him to get his shot, so she didn’t want to baby him too much.
I chuckled lightly, already knowing that this was going to be one stubborn little boy, and there was only one thing to help with that: a reward. Yes, offering the child sweets was bribery, and maybe not the best idea in the opinions of some, but a lot of the time it was the only way to get things done. Food was key, and as long as we only offered things that were sugar free, I didn’t see the harm.
“Okay,” I nodded, smiling at him. “I understand, you don't want to come with me. But I do think that’s a shame.” He sat up a little, becoming intrigued with what I was going to tell him. This was going to be easy, and even more so when I spotted the soldiers dotted over his shoes. “I really need a big, brave soldier to come with me. I have a very important mission that I need completed...and as soon as it’s done, there’s a sucker as a reward.”
“What... What’s the mission?” he couldn't resist asking, leaning in closer to me, proving that I had him now.
“I need help fighting off the big, red dragon who is hiding in Nurse Peters’ office,” I told him in an excitable tone of voice. “But there is a catch. Whoever is going to help me defeat him needs to have a tiny dot made on their arm. It stings a little, but it’ll protect the soldier from the fiery breath.”
“I’ll do it,” he gasped. “I want to fight a dragon!”
With that, I grinned, took his hand, and led him into the patient room. While we waited, I told him about all the awful deeds that the dragon had done, while the shot was administered, I held his hand and told him to be brave so that he could fight off the dragon’s breath, and once it was done, we played around for a while, acting out killing the monster.
Once he was worn out, and sitting with his reward, his mother grabbed my hand gratefully. “That was amazing,” she said, and happiness laced her tone as she spoke. “I’ve never seen him so calm. Normally, he cries before, during, and for hours afterwards. I can’t believe how well that went. This clinic really is amazing; you really do go the extra mile.”
That comment warmed me up, and helped me to forget about all the drama with Matthew for a just a little bit. It was nice to help and to be appreciated for that – it made all the difference in the world.
*****
I spent the rest of the day with my own patients, and thankfully because of what happened with Jago, I felt like I could throw myself into it a lot more. I became more confident in my abilities, able to focus on what needed to be done, so by the time the office closing hours came around, I felt an odd sense of satisfaction.
However, as everyone else started to pack away their belongings, wanting to go home, all my good feelings simply ebbed away. Much as my day had been productive, I still hadn’t managed to come up with any way to help Matthew. I wanted to do something for him, even if he wasn't currently taking to me, and it was endlessly frustrating that I hadn’t managed to come up with anything.
“Are you coming?” Mary asked me. “Or did you want to lock up?”
“I still have some paperwork to do. I’ll lock up in a little while.” I just wasn't quite ready to go home yet; I still felt like I needed to come up with the perfect solution. Plus, I really did have a lot to do, so I could always get around to that at some point.
Once the office was empty, I found myself wandering from room to room, trying to find that motivation once more. I was sure that I’d be all right once I got started; I just needed to get into the right frame of mind. Simply because I missed him so damn much, I even found myself wandering into Matthew’s office, just to get a feel for him, and that was where the solution came to me.
His office was a real mess – not dirty or anything, he just had stuff everywhere, which I could tidy up and organize for him. Sure, it wasn't much, it would only be a tiny gesture that wouldn’t go too far, but at least then I would feel like I’d done something. I just needed to be productive, even for a second, and this was a great way to do that.
I started off by tossing out his food wrappings and endless notes that clearly didn’t mean anything before moving on to his filing system. Paperwork was an undesirable part of the medical profession, one that was essential, but most of us were too busy to waste too much time putting it away properly. I painstakingly sorted it all out into the relevant files, even color-coding it to make his life that much easier when he returned.
If he was going through a hard time, the last thing he needed was to come back to a mess. Hopefully, this would go some way towards lightening his load.
I got to the point where I couldn't cope any longer without a stapler, and I already knew that my own was clean out of staples, so I tugged open his top drawer, hoping that he would have one there. What I found instead stopped my heart dead in my chest.
It was the picture, the one of us from the high school yearbook. I was on his back, he was carrying me down the hall, and we were both laughing at something ridiculous. It was that pure, carefree moment that defined the way we’d once been before the shit hit the fan.
Matthew stored that picture in his top desk drawer in a frame. This was something he cared about. I stroked the image for a second as another revelation swirled right through me. We were important to one another, me and Matthew – we always had been.
The last time things got difficult, we gave up on one another and went on to live or separate lives. This time, we were being faced with a situation that left us in a similar place, only this time, I wasn't going to give up. I wasn't going to stand back and let Matthew slip away. I was going to go to him, to fight for him, no matter what it took.
I glanced out of the window, noticing the pouring rain, but I wasn't going to let that stop me. I was going to go to him, and make everything right again, whatever it took.