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But what am I supposed to do?
Cave to her every demand?
Become a “yes man”.
Neither of those are me.
Everyone claims she wouldn’t ask me to be someone I’m not, but isn’t that exactly what she’s asking me to do?
Unhappy grumbles become buried behind another chip.
And another.
“Might I suggest a conversation about communication on her way to work?” He poorly hides his grin over my continuous munching. “I do believe I overheard her calling for travel arrangements when I went to visit Lauren.”
“How is Lauren?” Grabbing half of the grilled cheese and bacon sandwich precedes further questioning. “Still stable?”
“Going a bit stir crazy,” Clark lightly chortles in an obvious adoring nature, “but health wise, yes. Still stable.”
“Misses work?” J.T. inquires and snatches the other half of my meal.
“Misses personal space.” The clarification causes him to chuckle even more. “Bryn is…apparently…hovering.” He fails to swallow his amusement. “Lauren is actually looking forward to her daughter going to work this evening.”
“My mom was the same way when she first got sick,” my best friend fondly recalls between bites. “Swore up and down children weren’t supposed to parent their parents.”
I offer him a heartfelt grin.
Joyce was a wonderful woman.
Not the socialite type, yet still someone my mother loved to have over for tea or cocktails.
She taught at the private academy, which is why he was granted free tuition, thus inevitably starting a brotherhood both of us needed.
Watching her decline with Huntington’s Disease was a horror show, and the fact that he had to start facing it alone at fourteen simply made it that much worse. My parents did what they could for her, of course, but her decline was rapid.
And her death abrupt.
The loss of her swallowing capabilities is what ultimately led to her choking to death on her vomit while we were getting drunk at junior prom.
Needless to say, we didn’t go the next year.
I was in and out of physical rehabilitation programs, and he was at my side.
“I won’t speak on behalf of Lauren,” Clark politely resumes conversing, “but I will say I do believe she would greatly benefit from you and her daughter ending your stalemate.”
“I can a thousand percent say we all would,” J.T. juvenilely declares.
“It’s not been that awful.”
“It so has,” he mirthfully argues on another mouthful. “Zaidee threatened to quit after our meeting last night.”
Disbelief drops my jaw. “You’re kidding.”
“No.” The remainder of the sandwich is stuffed into his mouth. “You sent her a sunflower bouquet and a spa gift certificate to apologize for being such an asshole.”
“That was kind of me.”
“And it was kind of me to save you from having to find, hire, as well as train someone new to tolerate your…less than professional mood swings.”
