Chapter 13
It was an odd thing to realize, when she had coffee with Keith, just how addicted she was to being in his presence. And just how much she wanted to be with him. How much she wanted to take this relationship to the next level. Whatever that meant. And so, when he spoke about leaving, her heart just surged.
Of course he would leave at some point. She too was grateful that it wouldn’t be anytime soon, but she could also see he’d been thinking about it. And so he should. This wasn’t just his life; this was her life. But it didn’t have to be quite so crazy of a life. She was the one who had made it that way. But the thought of him leaving left a great big gaping hole in her heart.
She’d been off now for a couple days. Mentally off and physically off. She had worked hard to hide it, but it was obvious by the looks of everybody around her that they were walking on tiptoes, trying to figure out just what was going on. She didn’t have an answer for them. It seemed like she didn’t have any answers for anybody these days, and that was apparently how Keith felt too.
She didn’t see a shrink. She didn’t go through therapy or any of the other million treatments that they went through here. She was just the person who provided food. But she could see how much the food meant to the staff but mostly to the patients, when she saw their progress throughout the weeks. But she also saw men come and men go, and maybe that’s why she had avoided relationships here and elsewhere—because she didn’t like the leaving part.
It felt wrong to get involved with somebody only to say goodbye. As she stared down at her hands, holding the great big bowl of dough in front of her, she realized she didn’t want to say goodbye. That was the difference this time. She really didn’t want to say goodbye. So, in a way, she wished she hadn’t even said hello. But it was too late for that. She couldn’t put this genie back in the bottle, and it was definitely something she would have to find a way to work around. Relationships work for all kinds of people, in all kinds of ways. She just had to find what would work for them.
The trouble was, she didn’t even know where he lived permanently. People came here from all across the country. If he would be local, that was a whole different story, but, if he was returning to somewhere else, she wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do. And, because of that, it seemed like everything she did had a little extra snap to her wrist or a little extra bite to her voice.
She didn’t mean it that way; she was just dealing with the fact that she didn’t have any answers, and she was frustrated. And that completely sucked. She went through a couple more days of seeing him in the morning but then being busy during the day, as she tried to work her way through this personal dilemma of hers. And still, she didn’t find any answers. Finally, at noon one day, she looked up to see Dennis staring at her. “What’s the matter?”
“That’s my line,” he said with a smile. “What’s the matter with you?”
“I didn’t think anything was the matter,” she said cautiously.
“You probably should just sit down and talk with him.”
“What makes you think I need to talk with him?”
“Because the only things that can twist a person into a pretzel and spit you out like this, not even whole,” he said, “are relationships.”
She winced at that. “Is it that obvious?”
“Not really,” he said, “but I know you pretty well. I also happen to think that you and Keith are a great match.”
“Most people wouldn’t agree with you,” she said, fascinated.
“Doesn’t matter what most people think,” he said. “The only ones in this relationship are the two of you, and you two are all that matter.”
“Well, that’s true enough,” she said, “but you know how I never get involved because people come and go all the time.”
“Yeah,” he said. “You said you aren’t into short-term relationships. That you’re an all-or-nothing gal.”
“When he started talking about leaving,” she said, looking down at the bowl in her hands again, “it just hit me that I’d done exactly what I said I would never do. I would never get involved in a short-term relationship.”
“How do you know it’s a short-term relationship?” he asked.
She looked up at him. “He’s not necessarily talking about staying close by. Like all of them, he’ll leave here.”
“Maybe so but his sister is here,” he said. “You’re forgetting that.”
She looked at him in surprise, and then a delighted grin split her face. “You know something? I did forget. So … I guess, even if he does leave the center, he’s not necessarily breaking off all contact with his sister, is he?”
Dennis laughed. “You see? Normally you’re a smart, intelligent woman, but I’ve seen other smart people break down and become needy, pathetic, completely uncertain—simply because of a failure to sit down and to work things out with their partner.”
“I know,” she said. “Relationships make me all wobbly and unsure of myself.”
“Exactly. If you’re worried about what to do from here,” he said, “then I suggest you talk to him.”
“I just don’t want to add to his stress,” she said. “He’s under a lot of pressure already.”
“News flash. Relationships are pressure. They are stress. There isn’t any easy answer for anybody,” he said. “So go get the answers that you need now, and then you have something to work forward from. Without the answers, all you’ll end up doing is stewing for nothing and spinning around in circles.”
She looked at him in surprise. “When did you get to be so smart?”
“I was born this way.” And, with a chuckling laugh, he turned and walked out again.
But he was right. All her nerves and worries were because she hadn’t sat down and talked with Keith. And that was something she aimed to fix. She smiled. She’d have to do something special, but what?
His father’s email burned away at the back of his brain. Keith wasn’t ready to open that can of worms, but he couldn’t stop himself from feeling like he should. He did need to make sure that Robin was out of the middle and that he was moving forward with his life. After what seemed like an interminable amount of time, where he’d made no progress at all, he was now making progress by leaps and bounds. The fact that every morning he woke up early, waiting and hoping Ilse would walk in the door, said so much about his mental state. But more than that, he also knew that she liked him and that they were building something together. Something he hadn’t expected. He had deliberately shied away from relationships all his life, not only because of his work but because of his father.
His sister was his only healthy relationship, and that didn’t say a whole lot about him. On the other hand, Keith was prepared to learn and to grow and to move on in reclaiming his life and his health. Anything to keep Ilse at his side. That brought up something else, as in what he would do for a job. He remembered the suggestions from the discussion with his shrink before and wondered about it. He could also ask somebody else in his condition about what kind of issues there were in this transition from naval life to civilian life, in this transition from his first career to his second one.