Page 5 of Vengeful Seduction
Fighting back the tears, I knew I had to be strong. No nurse would sit by their patient’s bedside, weeping as they left this world. We were there to be supportive and to give them help in letting it all go and allowing death to come and take them out of that body that gave them so much pain and anguish. The suffering would be no more. There would only be peace where they were going.
I believed it too. With all of my heart, I did.
I wasn’t a religious person, but I was spiritual. I was a true believer that we all go on. Death isn’t the end of us—only the end of our Earthly body.
With all that faith, it still took a piece of me when my patients left us all behind. Theodore would take more than a piece of me. He’d take a chunk.
I was all the man had. No family would be there to say their goodbyes to him. Only I would be there. Bittersweet though it was, I didn’t know if I was truly prepared for that day.
The door squeaked as I pulled it open. It had never squeaked once since I’d started working there. The house was aware of what was happening. I’d felt it all too often—how the houses would feel when a person passed within their walls. Like a scar, it would permanently affect the home.
I ran my hand over the wall as I walked inside. “You’ll be okay.”
Some people thought I was nuts with how I thought. I didn’t care. I felt it right down to my core. A person leaves their mark on a place. And Theodore had built that home, then lived in it for decades. He was a part of that place, and it knew it.
Peeking in on him, I saw his withered body barely breathing as he lay in the hospital bed. The head of the bed had been inclined to help him breathe. It wasn’t doing much for him. I went to his side and sat silently in the chair next to the bed. I didn’t want to disturb him at all.
Perhaps he was dreaming of his younger days. I’d hate to interrupt that. For a few hours, I just sat by and listened to his slow breathing and stayed quiet, letting him take all the time he needed in peace.
I was there when it happened. He’d called out to me, his voice barely a rasp.
“Kaye?”
He seemed to have aged ten years and lost twenty pounds overnight and his skin was pale and loose, his eyes finally losing their sparkle.
I’d taken his hand. “Theodore, I’m here.”
His eyes barely opened as he looked up at me. “Kaye.” For a long time, we stayed like that, him lying in bed and me sitting beside it and holding his hand like I could somehow keep him with me.
“It’s all going to be okay, Theodore.” The urge to cry was always right there, but I held those tears back. I had to stay strong for the man.
He didn’t ask for anything. He was utterly silent until I felt his fingers gripping mine suddenly—frantically. “Tell him I’m sorry.”
Moments later, before I could so much as frame the question to ask whom he wanted me to tell that to, he was gone. I didn’t really need to ask, though. There was really only one ‘him’ it could be.
His grandson.
The man who had, less than a day before, rejected the last attempt of a dying old man to reach him.
The whole situation was so terribly sad, so tragic, and tears leaked down my cheeks as I did what I needed to do.
The funeral was a few days after, and I’d dried my tears before then. I didn’t always go to the funerals of my clients. Sometimes I got the sense from the family they didn’t think that would be entirely appropriate. Of course I would respect their wishes.
In this case, though, the only family was a man I’d never met—a man I wasn’t sure I liked. David Black was not my most favorite person in the world. Though I tried to keep an open mind about most people, in his case, I was willing to make an exception.
What possible excuse could there be for ignoring a man and letting him die alone?
The sadness had been replaced by a fair bit of anger, and I let that energy carry me through what I knew would be a terrible day.
I wasn’t looking forward to the funeral, but it was, at least, a chance to say goodbye to someone I had cared for a great deal. The day was overcast and showers seemed sure to happen. Most had umbrellas at their side to make sure their black funeral clothes wouldn’t be ruined by the drops that would surely come from the sky at any moment.
After parking my car, I went inside. It wasn’t a large crowd—I knew it wouldn’t be. Theodore lay in a casket made out of oak. His body was in the spotlight. The knot in my throat grew and I took a seat, crying openly and knowing it didn’t matter anymore.
The people there were mostly old friends of his who didn’t even know who I was. Besides, they were all wrapped up in their own grief.
In the back of the funeral home, I sat and listened as the sad music played, drawing the pain out in us all. Pictures of Theodore in his younger days flashed on a white wall. He was such a handsome young man.
A man spoke to us about life and death and how we all have to meet our maker some day. Honestly, I tried not to listen to the words he said. They just made it all so much harder to take.
