“Aw, man...”
“Don’t argue with me about this. If you dangle your hand down at your side or try to use it, you’re going to have more bleeding, swelling and pain. Are we on the same page here?”
“Yeah. Jeez.”
“He’s all yours, Eleanor. Tell him about Press’n Seal.”
She pulled off her gloves, sat on her little stool and rolled over to where Rob was propped against the wall. His knees were raised and he rested his forearms on them. “I’m fine now,” he said. But he didn’t move. She noticed a glistening sheen of sweat on his upper lip.
“Don’t try to stand yet,” she said. “Close your eyes. Touch your chin to your chest. Yeah, that’s it.” She gently massaged his shoulders and neck for a moment. Then she put her hands on his head and gently rubbed his scalp. She massaged his temples briefly, then moved back to his scalp. She heard him moan softly but this time it wasn’t because he was about to faint. It was because it felt good. And she knew if it felt good and he relaxed, his blood would circulate better and he’d recover quickly. This little trick of massaging would take Rob’s mind off his light-headedness and perhaps any nausea. “So, you’re not so good with blood?” she asked very quietly.
“I’ve seen plenty of blood,” he said. “Just not plenty of my son’s blood.” He took a deep breath. “I thought he cut his hand off.”
“Not even close,” she said. “It was a gusher, though. Some parts of the body really bleed. Like the head. You can get a cut on your head that’s about an eighth of an inch, doesn’t even need a stitch, and the blood flow will still ruin a perfectly good shirt. It’s amazing.” She kept massaging his head with her fingertips while Eleanor bandaged Finn’s hand. Eleanor was asking him about baseball and what college he’d be going to, and they even talked about his friends, most of whom Eleanor knew.
“Did I hit my head?” Rob asked.
“I don’t think there was anything to hit it on. Why? You feel a sore spot or dizziness or something?”
“I think I hear bells or birds chirping,” he said. He lifted his chin and looked up at her. He smiled very handsomely. “You keep doing that and I’m going to want to take you home with me.”
She pulled her hands away. “You couldn’t afford me. I’m wicked expensive.”
He laughed. “I bet you are. Come down to the bar. I’ll buy you a drink.”
“That’s neighborly. You feeling better? Want to get up?”
“Yeah,” he said. Then he pulled himself to his feet and towered over her. “He’s never going to let me live that down.”
“Sure I will, Dad,” Finn said from the table. “Some people just can’t take the tough stuff.”
“I seriously thought we were holding his hand together with that towel. Aw, look. We got blood on you,” he said, touching Leigh’s sleeve.
“I know how to get it out,” she said. “Hydrogen peroxide. Straight. A little rubbing. Magic.”
“Listen, I think we should just get married,” he said. “You’re perfect for me. You make a good living, you know how to get out bloodstains and that head massage thing—that’s a little addicting.”
“Not interested, but really—I just can’t thank you enough for the offer. It sounds enchanting.”
“Yeah, that’s me. Mr. Enchantment. I will buy you a drink, though. Or however many drinks you want. You have a bad day—see me.”
Eleanor demonstrated how Finn should wrap his bandaged hand with Press’n Seal when he took his shower. That would keep the bandage from getting wet. Rob looked on in fascination.
Leigh wrote out a couple of prescriptions. She handed them to Rob. “As soon as you get the pain meds filled, give him one. Stay ahead of the pain. The anesthetic will wear off in a couple of hours. It’s going to throb, sting and eventually itch. No matter what, do not take that bandage off!”
“Yeah, I heard all that. Do you tell everyone that and do they still take it off?” Rob asked.
“You just wouldn’t believe it,” she said.
After Rob and Finn left, Leigh helped Eleanor clean up the treatment room.
“I love Rob,” Eleanor said. “I think you should just marry him. He’s probably ready to remarry now.”
Leigh knew he was a single father, but little else. “Is he divorced?”
“Widowed,” Eleanor said. “The poor guy. He lost his wife when the boys were little. That’s when he came to Timberlake to open the pub. He said he needed a business with flexible hours so he could raise his sons. He’s a wonderful father. He must be the best catch in town.”
Leigh’s mouth hung open for a moment. She hadn’t shared any details of her personal life with Eleanor. She had lost her mother very young. Years later when she was still quite young, she was abandoned by her fiancé just a week before their wedding and it had felt so much like a death. She rarely dated. And she was not shopping around for a guy. He could find someone else to get his stains out.
When Leigh Culver was a little girl, her childhood was idyllic. She was a lovely child with blond ringlets, a bit of a tomboy with a risky curiosity and an outgoing nature. The Holliday family lived next door; they had three children and their middle child was Leigh’s age. Johnny and Leigh were best friends from the age of three. Inseparable. They had regular sleepovers until Dottie Holliday and Aunt Helen decided they were getting too old for that to be appropriate.
Leigh’s mother had moved in with Aunt Helen when she realized she was pregnant at the age of eighteen. It was so long ago that her mother had died, Leigh could barely remember her. But Helen remembered and reminded her of the details—it was a freak accident. She’d had a reaction to anesthesia during a routine appendectomy, went into heart failure and they couldn’t save her. From that moment on it was Helen and Leigh.
Leigh went to and from school with Johnny and the other Holliday kids. Sometimes she went to Helen’s classroom after school and worked on her homework assignments while Helen finished her work. They had a very nice routine for many years. And, over time, Johnny Holliday went from being a best buddy to a boyfriend and they dated all through high school.
Leigh and Johnny wanted to get married as soon as they graduated. Johnny wanted to go into the marines and take Leigh with him. Helen wanted Leigh to go to college, get an education. “Haven’t we learned anything?” she’d said. “You could find yourself the sole support of a family! I won’t make you wait too long, but we have to find a way for you to get an education.”
They compromised. Johnny enlisted in the army reserve. Leigh registered at the local university. She wanted to be a teacher like her aunt Helen. Biology caught her interest. She would get her degree and they would marry at the age of twenty-one.
For a couple of years, things rolled by without too much stress or trauma, even though, looking back on it, she could see that Johnny had a tendency to grow restless. Helen went off now and then to visit writing friends or attend conferences when school was not in session. Johnny worked in his father’s home furnishings store and was gone for occasional reserve weekends or training.
Then he deployed. After nine months in Kuwait he was on his way home. Their wedding was scheduled to take place a few weeks after he got home. But something had changed. Suddenly, he had doubts. He said he couldn’t do it. He said he was sorry, he just wasn’t ready. He wanted to see more of the world. He didn’t want to spend the rest of his life working in his father’s store and living in the neighborhood he grew up in. And since he’d never even dated anyone else, how