Page 28 of Sizzle

“It’s my house,” says Dad, frowning.

“I’m sure it is,” says Connie. “But as I understand it, you haven’t been up on your feet much the last couple of years.”

Dad grumbles, but Connie talks over it.

“In any event, I hear you’ve got yourself a team of proper physical therapists coming to see you tomorrow.”

“I don’t see how that’s any of your business,” says Dad. I widen my eyes at him. I’ve never seen him be deliberately rude to anybody, not even when he was first injured. Suddenly he’s trying to set a freaking record.

I start to apologize to Connie but she waves me off and keeps talking to him.

“It’s my business to see that you’re taking your recovery seriously.”

That pisses him off.

“What makes you think I’m not taking it seriously? You only just got here. What the heck do you think you know about it?”

Connie looks at him for a long moment.

“I know that you got hurt several years ago. I know that you’re months past your last surgery and, from what Joelle tells me, won’t be needing another one for a good long while. And I know that for somebody who’s only fifty-some years old, you’ve spent too much time in that chair.”

Dad’s face has gone a shade of red I don’t think I’ve ever seen before. Before he can say something I’m going to regret, I intervene.

“Connie, I’m just going to make dad some tea. Would you mind giving me a hand?”

She nods, rising gracefully. Dad grabs the remote control and turns the TV on, glaring at it as we walk past.

As soon as we get to the kitchen, I stop to face her.

“Look, I really appreciate you offering to stay with him but you don’t have to do this. I thought he’d come around to the idea, you know? But it’s not worth you having to sit through this. I’m so sorry.”

Connie looks at me and laughs.

“You think I’m done just because he doesn’t like me? Girlie, this ain’t shit.” I half expect to hear Dad yelling from the other room to protest the swearing, but the only noise comes from the television.

“Are you sure? Because I can—”

“You can what?”

I stutter, then frown. Because I don’t exactly have a backup plan here, and she knows it.

“That’s what I thought.”

“He’s done okay on his own.”

“Okay, maybe. But he could do better,” Connie says, raising her voice.

“It’s been hard on him,” I say. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all.

“I have no doubt the accident was hard on him. Recovery’s never easy and anybody who says otherwise is a fool or a liar. But recovery means getting better, not getting waited on while you sit on your ass and make your daughter take care of you.”

I wince. Even over the TV, there’s no way Dad didn’t hear that part. Connie pats my hand before turning to open the cabinet behind her.

“Don’t you worry, girlie. Me and your dad, we’ll work it out. I’m not going anywhere.”

Barring kicking her out of our house, which I have no desire to do, I don’t see another option. We can’t afford to hire a nurse, and I don’t know of anyone else who’d do it for free.

I show her where we keep the tea, then leave her to it when she shoos me out.

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