Chapter 19

 

Connor

 

Well, what can I say? It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been “bad impulsive” and there’s no going back now. We’re both pretending we didn’t just blindly jump off a cliff together. I’m enjoying the fall enough to almost forget for real anyway.

Whitney makes me feel like... I don’t know... like nothing I’ve ever felt before. The longer I’m with her, the more I feel myself sinking into her. In the back of my head, I think I might be in serious trouble because I’m already in deeper than I was in Spain.

Deep enough, maybe, to change things.

After spending the night trying to appease this woman’s sexual appetite (which, by the way, earns her a big gold star in my book), we go to the game together and I get to meet Nadim and his parents. The way Whitney followed the action and cheered him on, you’d think we were watching the World Series. When he hit a fly out of left field, helping his team score two points, she jumped up and down and cheered in the cutest damn way. I was cheering right along with her.

Best Saturday morning I’ve had in a long time.

There’s a food shack across the street from the field, so we walk over after the game to get Philly cheesesteaks. We’re sitting on the grass, under a Monterey Pine, talking about the game. Well, partly about the game. She’s mostly focusing on Nadim.

“I can see why you like him so much,” I say. “That kid’s damn funny. He’s got personality coming out of his ears.”

“Doesn’t he? I’m so glad you got to meet him.”

“Me too.”

She takes another bite of her sandwich and smiles at the near-empty field across the way. It makes me smile just watching her. She gets a glow on her face when she thinks about “her kids.” But there’s something else I wonder about.

“So how are you doing with work these days?” It’s the third time I’ve asked this question. The first was during the tour, but she was too distracted by the resort to want to talk about much else. The second time was during dinner last night and she was holding back, licking her wounds. But I’ve been concerned about her, and I want to know how she really is. The look on her face tells me I may have been right to worry.

“I’m... about the same, I guess.”

She looks at me to see if I’m going to accept that as an answer. I raise my eyebrows as if to say, Try again.

She sighs. “It was better at first. I was doing really good when I first got back, trying to be more balanced, you know. That sort of helped. But, then again, not really. Back in March, two kids attempted suicide, within a week of each other.”

“Oh, wow.”

“Marcel is doing a lot better now. He just needed some counseling I think and seems to be okay. We’re still worried about Ophelya though. She just struggles. They have her on antidepressants, but now the doctors are wondering if she has bipolar disorder.” She sighs and picks at her sandwich. “Stuff like that... it’s almost more than I can handle. I’ve come close to quitting a couple of times.”

I’m surprised, but not. This girl is really torn.

“Then I feel bad because here these kids have real problems and I’m just over here whining.”

“You’re not whining.”

“It feels like it.”

“You’re an empath with compassion fatigue.”

She blinks at me. “What?”

“Empaths are people who kind of absorb the emotions of people around them. Or even just people they hear about. Do you have trouble watching the news?”

She just nods, watching me, thinking.

“My mom did, too. Dad would have to keep her up-to-date on the important stuff because it was too much for her to watch all the other crap. Like, she’d keep thinking about the family who died in a house fire or would have a hard time getting to sleep because there’s a little girl who went missing.”

“Me too! I can’t watch the news either.”

I nod. “You people are like sponges. You have to be careful.”

“What’s compassion fatigue?” She tucks her long hair behind her ear. “I think I can guess, but I’ve never heard of that.”

“I hadn’t either until last year. It’s just the term they use for what you have. I once had a conversation with a woman who left a career in nursing because she wore herself out. I guess it’s pretty common in fields like that and we talked about it awhile. She said most people try to manage it by making sure they’re taking care of themselves and stuff, but some end up finding different work and that’s what she decided to do.”

“What did she end up doing instead?”

“She’s an accountant.”

Whitney’s eyebrows shoot up. “No kidding? That’s a big change. Did she like it?”

“She said she did. Sounds boring as hell to me, but to each their own.”

“Hmm.” Whitney takes a bite of her sandwich and looks out at the field thoughtfully. There’s a congregation of soccer kids and their parents gathering. “I don’t know. I don’t know if I can leave my kids, but it’s been really hard this year. I need to figure something out though, because I can feel it coming to a head. I can’t go on like this forever, you know?”

Uh, yeah. I can relate.

“If you were to quit, have you thought about what you would do instead?”

She takes a drink of her soda, then puts the cup back on the grass. “Yeah, but everything else I think of would lead to the same problem eventually.”

“Why? What else have you thought of?”

“I don’t know. I did think about something like nursing. I don’t know.”

“You just want to help people,” I say, then take a bit of my sandwich.

“I really do.”

I think about the possibilities as I finish my bite. “Maybe something that’s more administrative and less hands on.”

“Yeah. Maybe.”

It’s tempting to think about her making a career change that would, conveniently, bring her to Swan Pointe. There are plenty of people here she could help. But Whitney’s problem is, well, her. Her greatest strength is also her greatest weakness.

The other problem is, well, me. Even if she came here, could I stay?