Page 21 of Over the Verdant Hills
They didn’t detract from it, though.
He opened his eyes. “I’m acting a little strange, aren’t I? Maybe I should stop moaning at the dinner table and just go eat outside on the porch.”
They laughed. “It’s not that bad,” Claire assured him.
After she’d rolled her eyes at the idea of taking care of him, he wasn’t sure that she actually meant it, but he wasn’t going to hold it against her. Whatever she felt for him, he couldn’t help it. It didn’t make it any easier that every time he was around her, he admired her a little more. She was funny and truly wanted to master the bread, and the grit that she displayed as she continued to scrape the paint off the side of the house was inspiring as well. She had allowed him to order a lift for her, and she had figured out how to use it, and now she was almost up to the second story with it. Yeah, he thought she was going to do it, and he didn’t tell her, but he was rooting for her.
“I don’t know how long it’s going to take you with the other projects, but with Claire in here using the kitchen, I was thinking that it might be nice to do a total kitchen makeover. I’ve been looking at prices online and getting ideas as well. Is that something you might be interested in?” Miss Mattie said, surprising him.
“That’s a pretty big project, but I’m sure I can do it. I might need a little help with lifting some of the heavier things, like putting the cabinets up and stuff.” He usually worked alone, but there had been multiple times when he’d wished for a partner. Someone to help him with lifting heavy things or giving him a hand on a rush job on a yacht. A lot of times, the highbrow owners wanted impossible work done in an impossible amount of time. A partner would make the impossiblepossible some of the time. Sometimes there just wasn’t anything anybody could do to do what the owners wanted.
But he didn’t complain, because those jobs were what contributed to the nest egg he was saving. Since he didn’t have to pay for room and board and didn’t have a mortgage or rent to pay.
He figured someday his parents would be gone, and… He didn’t know what he would do then, but it wouldn’t hurt to have some money stashed away.
“Maybe before you go back out, I can show you some of the things I was thinking about, to make sure. And then we’ll have to figure out what we need to order.”
“All right. I’ve got all the time you need. As long as the bread keeps coming, I’ll sit here and not move a muscle. You can show me anything. Even purses.”
“Oh. Purses? I didn’t realize you were interested in those,” Claire teased him, and it was his turn to roll his eyes. He didn’t figure he was probably as good at it as Claire was, and he was guessing he probably didn’t have as much practice. After all, he was an adult, and adults were supposed to have outgrown the proclivity toward eye rolls, right?
Still, Claire laughed, and he thought she got his joke.
It was fun to share a little bit of wordless interplay and laugh about it.
He had to turn away. He didn’t want to have those feelings toward someone who could barely stand to look at him and would prefer that he not be in her house at all, if she had any say in it.
It was over an hour before Miss Mattie was done showing him all the things she wanted to show him on her computer. He had her email him a few links and told her he’d work up a price for her in the next few days.
By that time, both loaves of bread were gone, and they truly hadn’t had anything else to eat for lunch. He figured he would probably be hungry in the middle of the afternoon since there hadn’t been any protein at the meal, although the butter he’d consumed would probably keep him full a little bit longer. And it was worth it, just to have that warm homemade bread.
“You do really well with my grandma,” Claire said as they walkedoutside the front door together. She could have gone around the side—it would be closer for her—but she seemed to be in a talking mood.
“What did you think of her kitchen?” he asked, not knowing what to say about her compliment. Thank you? That was the only thing that came to mind. After all, he wasn’t trying to be good with her grandma. He just liked Grandma and enjoyed spending time with her and enjoyed talking to her, and he supposed that came out in their interactions. It wasn’t something that was contrived. But he didn’t want to lecture Claire about that. She probably knew it anyway.
“I liked it. She and I had looked at some things previously, but I didn’t really think that she was going to have it done so quickly.”
He thought about the issues that Grandma had and wondered if the kitchen would even be done before she passed away. He’d looked leukemia up online, but most of it talked about treatment and life expectancy and that type of thing if someone were going to a doctor. Since Miss Mattie had chosen to not be treated, he wasn’t sure where that put her.
“Did she seem like she was extra tired to you?” Claire said as they stepped off the bottom of the front porch steps. She sounded like she hadn’t really wanted to ask him, but the question came out anyway. Now she tilted her head and studied him, her eyes narrowed as though she were running over all the things in her mind that had hit her and just wanted him to reassure her that Grandma was fine.
What was he supposed to do? He couldn’t lie. But he didn’t want to tell her what was going on with her grandmother if Miss Mattie hadn’t said something herself. After all, if Miss Mattie hadn’t told her, there must’ve been a reason for it.
“Well, I suppose she does seem more tired than she used to be.” Even from this winter, when she was first diagnosed. Definitely from last summer, when she had been much more spry, still smiling and energetic, although obviously older.
“That’s how I feel too. A lot more tired than what she should be. I think I’m going to say something to her about going to the doctor. I… I don’t want to borrow trouble, but my gut tells me there’s something wrong.”
“Maybe you should see if she would go,” he said, knowing thatClaire was going to be mad when she found out that he knew and didn’t tell her. She might not understand that he wasn’t going to spout off knowledge that wasn’t his to share.
“Did you see those big bruises on her arms?” Claire started to take a step away but turned around and shot that question out.
“I saw them while we were talking, yeah.”
“She told me she didn’t know what she did to cause them.”
“I guess that happens sometimes,” he said, knowing that bruising was one of the symptoms of leukemia that he’d read about.
“But big bruises like that. You’d think that she would remember, wouldn’t you?” She paused and then continued before he could answer her. It was a good thing, since he really didn’t know what to say. “I guess part of me wonders whether she’s losing her mind too. She…seems like she’s all there, but then something like that happens, and I know that she should remember what happened, but she claims not to. I just… I have so many other things on my mind right now, I don’t know if I can handle anything happening to my grandma.”
