Page 20 of Mountain Man Bad Boy

“Oh, Mom.” I knelt beside her marker, scanning the cemetery quickly to make sure we were alone. There were a few people visiting their own relatives, but no one within earshot. “I’m in trouble.” I paused, imagining her smiling, welcoming me into her arms as she had hardly ever done in real life. “There’s a patient that I’m starting to develop feelings for.” I exhaled, determined to tell the whole truth. “Starting is the wrong word. I have feelings for him. I don’t know what to do. I can’t tell anyone, especially not him. If anybody knew…” I put my head down into my palms, letting all the frustration and pent-up tension roll off my shoulders.

“He’s so beautiful, and he’s kind and funny, and I think he has feelings for me too. But he’s an addict and a patient. Mom, what do I do? I can’t stop thinking about him.” I felt a sob rising from my chest that had nothing to do with Porter. All my life, I’d wished I had a functioning mother I could come to with problems like this. Now, in death, she had almost become more of a confidant than she had been in life.

A breeze stirred the trees in the distance, picking up my hair and whispering across my back. It was like my mom had heard me and was using the wind to comfort me. I could picture her in Heaven, a beacon of light, having shed the chains of alcoholism, restored to her natural self. She was beautiful. I placed a kiss on my fingertips and touched them to the headstone before climbing to my feet.

Driving back to Nashville, I decided to pick up some Thai food at my favorite restaurant. It was too far away to use a delivery app and much too far to walk. Thai food was a treat I only allowed myself when I decided to use the car. And after the day I had, a reward was in order.

Evil and I stretched out on the couch to watch a movie when I got home. The visit to the gravesite had left me feeling hollow and itchy. I wanted to relax, but I couldn’t seem to manage it. I texted Cindy to see what she was up to, and I wasn’t disappointed.

You want to go dancing? Cindy responded after I explained what I had done that day.

It’s a Tuesday, I responded.

Doesn’t matter. I’ll pick you up in half an hour.

I set the phone down. Sometimes Cindy was too much to handle, but on nights like this, when I really needed to get out of my own headspace, she was a godsend. I boxed up my leftovers and put them in the fridge and changed into my one and only clubbing outfit. It was a tight yellow dress with a big blue belt and these gaudy high heels that I scored at a vintage clothing store. I wasn’t actually looking for male attention, but if someone happened to notice and happened to check off all my boxes, that wouldn’t be the worst thing.

Cindy picked me up, just as she said she would, a half hour later. Her car was packed. Cindy never went anywhere without a friend or three, so I wasn’t surprised. I knew Kara, the girl in the front seat. She worked night shift, but she must have had the day off, like me. There was a man and a woman in the back seat, and I had to squish in beside them.

“Hi, I’m Todd,” the man said, offering his hand around the woman between us.

“Gina,” I said, grinning.

“Shira.” The woman opted for a hug instead, and I took it, eager for the contact.

We stayed out until two in the morning. I offered to be the designated driver, and Cindy didn’t wait for me to offer twice. She began pounding back shots at the bar as if there were no tomorrow. I had a thing or two I could have said about working in a treatment center and getting plastered on a Tuesday night, but I held my tongue.

I had a lot of fun. I danced with Todd and with Shira. There was one guy who showed some interest, who wanted to buy me a drink. I explained that I wasn’t drinking, and that apparently soured him on the relationship because he walked away. Kara decided to go home with someone she met at the club, so I had only three people to taxi at the end of the night. Todd and Shira were apparently a couple, who lived at the same address, so that left Cindy and me.

“I’ll pick up the car tomorrow,” she muttered, waving away my offer to spend the night or take an Uber.

I didn’t really feel like climbing into a car with a stranger, or crashing on Cindy’s couch, so I took the car home and parked it next to my own. Crawling into bed, I finally felt relieved. The night’s activity took my mind off my problems, allowing me a glimpse into a world where I could date someone if I desired. Unfortunately, it hadn’t been the start of anything new. But it had been fun, and exhausting, and I slept like a baby straight through the morning to the early afternoon.

Cindy buzzed my door the next day, wearing dark sunglasses, looking like something the cat dragged in.

“You had to work today?” I gasped.

“I’m fine.” She waved off my concern. “Your boy helped us out of a jam in the game room.”

“He’s not ‘my boy.’” I frowned, knowing instinctively that she was talking about Porter. “What happened?”

“One of the other residents got rowdy, and Porter calmed him down,” Cindy shared, moving to the kitchen to rummage through the fridge.

“Rowdy how?” I asked, following her.

“Throwing things, threatening the orderlies.” Cindy came up with some orange juice and grabbed a mug from the cabinet.

“Oh my gosh.” I selected another mug for myself and put it down next to Cindy’s.

She poured juice into both cups. “Yeah. He was smooth. He just went in there, with his arms up like he was approaching a terrorist gunman, and he started talking some crap about cartoon shows, and the guy calmed right down. Porter had him singing the theme song to something or other by the time he was done.”

I picked up my mug, laughing. It looked like Porter might have found his calling. Maybe he would come back to the treatment center as a peer counselor. I wasn’t sure if liaisons between nurses and peer counselors were above board, but they had to be more acceptable than screwing patients. I frowned, nipping that particular thought in the bud. I really needed to stop thinking of him like that.

By the time my weekend was over, I was ready to go back. Just like the previous “Monday,” I woke eager to return to work and see him. It was getting harder and harder to suppress my interest. Now that I had admitted it to my mother, and now that Cindy made it obvious that she knew, I was a little more comfortable acknowledging my feelings. Not that it made any difference. He was still off-limits, but at least I was coming to terms with my own fantasies.

I clocked in and checked the whiteboard. Porter wasn’t on my schedule anymore. He had moved beyond needing a dedicated nurse and was close to release. When the next time his name appeared on my clipboard, it would be to say goodbye. The thought gave me pause, but that day wasn’t today. He was around somewhere.

I decided a quick visit couldn’t hurt, but I took pains to disguise my real intentions by peeking in on other patients first. Mrs. Berger was in her room, sitting straight up in bed. I breezed in, fluffing her pillow, pretending to be interested in how many calories were in the hot dog buns we served. I excused myself after a moment, moving on to Mr. Dyers’ room. As my luck would have it, he was there too, fumbling his way through a Stephen King novel. He had so many questions about the plot and the characters, I hunted through his bookshelf for a more appropriate title.

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