“We need to find a new nurse,” Cara said. “The one the center keeps sending over can’t keep up with Hayden.”
“This’ll be the third nurse in two months,” my mom said. “We can’t keep switching them out because you don’t think they’re adequate.”
“The first nurse was flirting with him, the second was stealing, and the third can’t keep up with the demand because she’s not spry enough to handle Hayden. Those aren’t terrible reasons for requesting another nurse, Mom.”
“Then maybe we need to find another agency. You mean to tell me your father worked his entire life at that company only to be able to provide measly medical service for his own family?”
“The next center that deals in this kind of physical therapy is over an hour away,” Cara said. “And Hayden’s got another hip surgery soon!”
They argued all the time. Everyday. Like I wasn’t even fucking there. I stared out over the backyard, wondering when the hell I was ever going to walk through it again. It had been my father and I’s passion project before he died. He always wanted a garden to walk through and read in whenever he needed to get away from work. Or life.
Or Mom.
Fuck, Mom’s voice was beginning to grate on my ears.
“We need to make a decision,” Cara said.
“We need to stop fighting about this,” Mom said.
Hell yeah, they did.
I sat there, listening to them bickering behind me. It was true. The nursing staff that had been provided for my care was less than subpar. And the second nurse wasn’t stealing. Not anything that made a difference, anyway. Just some silver forks and a couple of delicate china plates.
Who the hell cared about that shit anyway?
I only cared about it if it was going in one of my luxury hotel chains.
It had been two months since that fucking accident, but I still wasn’t healed. And I was waiting for my fourth surgery to take place. I had a follow-up hip surgery that was required of me in order to walk again. In order to function again.
In order to get out of this damn wheelchair.
I hated the fucking thing. It was a symbol of everything that had been ripped from me that day. Of the luxury hotel that fell through and the losses my COO cut when I couldn’t come back to work. It had sank my company’s reputation and I was stuck with no other decisions I could make to come back. The fucking luxury chain that was supposed to start up got put on pause and things resumed normally. Despite the contracting company that tanked the project.
Despite the money I had to schmooze out of the investors.
Despite the sleepless nights trying to keep behind everyone on it.
From a business perspective, I got it. Mike made the right fucking call. But from a personal perspective? From a ‘forwarding the company’ perspective? It was a shit call. One that boiled my blood as I listened to my sister and mother continue to bicker behind me.
I wished they would shut the fuck up.
“He hasn’t left the house in two months, Mom. We need to get him a nurse that can help him with his daily physical therapy.”
“Cara, he isn’t going outside because he can’t move. He isn’t going outside because he’s depressed. That’s why we need a new nurse. The ones being sent to us aren’t filling him with any kind of hope of recovery,” my mother said.
“That isn’t their job. They aren’t therapists. They don’t care about his feelings. Hell, Hayden doesn’t care about his feelings half the time,” my sister said.
“Keep your voice down. He’ll hear you.”
Seriously? They were standing seven feet behind me.
And they were right. I hadn’t left the house since the accident. Why the fuck would I? The last thing the press needed were snaps of the CEO of the best luxury hotel chain in the world in a goddamn wheelchair. Being pushed around by some homely-looking nurse who had to flex his fucking legs every two hours. Why the hell would I go out in public like that? Why the fuck would anyone?
I hadn’t left my parent’s house since the accident, and I didn’t plan on it until I could walk again.
I couldn’t care for myself on my own. I couldn’t cook for myself. I couldn’t even fucking drive myself places. I couldn’t shower on my own or reach the damn toothbrush on my own or get up the fucking stairs. It was the most miserable and isolated I’d ever felt in my life. I couldn’t show that kind of image to the public. My company was already stalemating. Governing it from my parent’s dining room was bad enough. Knowing it wasn’t going anywhere until I got back was bad enough.
But risking demolishing the strong reputation my family had built over the decades?