Chapter 9

"That went well," Alba muttered for probably the umpteenth time that day. As she walked into the dining room for dinner that night, she looked around but saw no sign of him.

As she stepped up to Dennis, he asked, "Trouble?"

She shrugged. "Only when we don't like the truth."

"And yet you still deliver it anyway."

"It's my job," she murmured quietly, so nobody else could hear.

"Sometimes your job sucks though, doesn't it?"

She looked over at him, hearing the compassion in his tone. "Where is he?"

"He's having dinner over on the side with the other guys."

"Good. He needs some adjustment time."

"Seems you do, too."

She smiled at him, but there was that tinge of sadness. "You know when you like somebody but you can't allow that to stop you from doing what needs to be done?"

"Yep, I hear you," Dennis said. "And I appreciate that you're doing what you need to do that is the best for him, even if it hurts you and him."

"But he doesn't appreciate it," she whispered, "yet I get that. I have to be honest, sometimes I'm harsh maybe, in order to deal with the truth."

"And it's your job, which has always kept you apart from the others here, hasn't it?" he asked curiously, as he slowly served up her food.

She nodded. "It's one thing to watch all the relationships here, but you see that they don't have to deal with some of the harder issues," she murmured. "Or at least when you do, some of those issues come across, maybe better than the ones that I had to deliver."

"Right." Dennis handed her a plate. "Go and enjoy. Your body needs food, even when your soul's suffering."

"My soul will be just fine," she replied. "It's not the first time I've had to be a bit of a bad-news bearer."

He shook his head. "You come from the heart, and, even though they might not appreciate it right now, they will later."

She nodded, but she couldn't see the appreciation yet. She headed out to the deck, walking past Wesley, as if she didn't see him. Which, in truth, she didn't. If Dennis had not mentioned where Wesley was, she wouldn't have known. And neither did Wesley call out to her. Which said a lot. She sat here by herself at the table for a long time, eating slowly.

Dennis came out to visit for a while. He took a look at her plate and pointed. "You need more food than that."

"Yeah, but, if I eat on an upset stomach, I'll suffer later."

He nodded. "Got it. Do you want a fancy coffee?"

She looked at him in surprise. "What does that mean?"

"How about a latte?" he murmured.

"I would love one," she said. "Then I think I'll go into town."

"Sounds good. What will you do?"

"Maybe a little bit of shopping, hit the bookstore," she muttered. "I'm off for the next two days, so I could use the break."

"In that case, the coffee won't hurt either." He disappeared and returned a few minutes later with a big foamy concoction in an Irish-motif coffee cup. He sat down beside her.

"I never even see you eat," she shared. "Why don't you join me?"

"I'll eat with the kitchen staff later," he replied. "One of the guys is having a tough time."

"Right." She nodded. "Even when we're not on duty, we're on duty."

"I don't think it's so much that we're on duty. I think it's just a case of we're here, and people need support, so we give it. We don't really count the cost to our time because it's who we are," he shared. "Any more than counting the cost of the bad news is something that you would hold against them."

"No, of course not," she agreed. "But it does get to be a bit much at times."

"Time for a change?"

"No," she declared, "just enough of the good things are happening around here that I wouldn't want to do that."

"Hold that thought," Dennis said, with a smile. "Because we do have a lot of good things happening, so it does keep you a little better focused."

"Oh, I'm focused," she muttered sadly, "but that focus comes with a price tag."

He nodded. "And it's one that you're willing to pay."

"I've paid it this time," she stated, as she sipped her coffee. "I wonder how many more times before I decide that relationships just aren't worth it?"

"I think, when love happens, it happens, and you don't really get a choice," he murmured. "It's not as if you set out to get to know him or that you set out to realize just what a special person he is."

"No, I didn't," she admitted. "I just fell into it."

"I think that's partly what this is all about. If you could have protected your heart, you would have, but sometimes our hearts aren't what needs protecting."

"Oh, I agree," she declared, "but I've seen so many happy relationships around this place that I just wondered if maybe…"

"Of course you did," he said, smiling. "And yet, when you think about it, happy relationships aren't something that happen overnight. We've seen every one of them hit the rocks, before people pick up and realize what's important."

She stared down at her coffee cup. "And when they don't realize it?"

"Then it wasn't meant to be," he replied. "And that's absolutely a bad-news answer for you right now."

"We aren't even that far along," she muttered, "but it's kinda like pulling the wings off a butterfly. They're already hurting here, and sometimes I have to deliver life in a hard-knock package."

"And again they don't appreciate it—yet. However, it is definitely something that's worthwhile doing."

She flashed him a grin. "I get it. Not to worry. I won't quit or anything like that. It's definitely not that bad."

"Good, but, just like everybody else here, we hate to see you suffer."

"I'm not suffering," she murmured. "Sometimes other people suffer, and you can't do anything to help."

"But sometimes they need to have a pity party and to suffer for a bit, before they straighten up and shake off that mood. Then sometimes it's not even that, but they don't know how to get out of the doldrums."

"And sometimes they're so stuck in suffering that they don't even know what they're doing."

"That's called wallowing," Dennis noted.

She burst out laughing. "Oh, I won't argue with you there. Though, when you start to wallow, it gets to be a habit."

"And I can't argue with that either," Dennis replied. "So head off to town, have a good evening and a couple days off. We'll see how you feel when you come back."

"It's not so much how I feel," she muttered. "It's whether there'll be any progress on his side."

"Oh, there'll be progress," Dennis declared. "However, you can't guarantee in what direction it'll travel." And, with that, Dennis stood. "I have to go back to work."

*

Wesley realized ithad been a childish thing to do. They'd met for dinner for weeks, and now, last night, after their session, Wesley had been persuaded to go sit with a bunch of other guys. In fact, he'd initiated it, needing a distance from her more than anything. But when he'd seen her arrive, he hadn't been friendly. She'd walked right past him and sat all alone out on the deck. And, for the first time, at that moment, he realized how solitary her life must be.

As one of the therapists here at Hathaway House, she had to deliver a lot of hard truths. And yet it wasn't so much that she had to deliver them as she had to point out that he was ignoring a few. He'd already decided to speak with her the next day, but, when he went to her office that morning, it was locked up. He frowned at that and tried later. And again locked. He waited for another day and still the same. Finally he asked Shane, "Where's Alba been lately?"

"She's on her days off," he replied absentmindedly, as he studied the laptop and some of the video he'd just taken. "Okay, let's take a look at that arm of yours. I want you to do these stress tests again."

Wesley stared at him. "I just did them." He pointed to the video on pause on Shane's screen.

"Yep, and we'll up the voltage now."

And, with that, they upped the weight and did a couple of the exercises. By the time he was done, Wesley was sweating profusely. "So," Wesley muttered, gasping for breath.

"Yep, I hear you," Shane noted, "but honestly the arm is coming along nicely."

"Says you."

Shane shook his head. "Nope, says the video. Remember the testing we did when you first got here?" he asked. "Even a napkin, a piece of paper, was hard for you to keep in place under your little wing. Now look at this."

Wesley watched Shane's video from today, as Wesley slowly raised and lowered five-pound weights hung onto his partial arm. "It's definitely getting stronger then, but it's still only one-quarter of an arm."

"It is. But I also see some nerve endings coming awake," Shane declared. "So that's also very much some significant progress."

"Play that again?" Wesley asked. And he watched as his arm continued to shift and move. "It definitely looks better," he admitted. "Not that I'm quite ready to say it's there yet."

"No, it's not there at all," Shane confirmed, "but it's progress. When are the guys coming to look at your leg prosthetic?" he asked.

"Tomorrow. And we'll see about what, if any, improvements they could make with the arm prosthetic too."

Shane nodded at that. "It'll be interesting to see what they say."

"Have you had very many guys through here with missing arms?"

"Lots," Shane said. "Yet every situation is unique. It depends on whatever muscle they have—muscle, movement, bone, skin—whatever the stumps have left. In some cases, more surgery's required."

"I already had more surgery to build up my arm stump," Wesley said.

"So then you should be good to go."

"Maybe, but what I had for a prosthetic last time wasn't very helpful, whether for the arm or the leg."

"But each was also a prototype, wasn't it? Just beginner ones?"

"Sure, but it seems as if the arm one didn't do very much."

"But your arm was weaker back then, and your leg wasn't fitted properly, leaving a lesion as well. Still, let's see what they have to say about prosthetics when they get here tomorrow," Shane said. "Fact of the matter is, there's still an awful lot of room for this technology to grow and to improve. It'll take somebody who's on the cutting edge to know what you're capable of doing and what technology is capable of assisting you."

"Right," Wesley agreed, his thoughts going back to the woman in New Mexico. "Have you heard of this Kat somebody in New Mexico?"

"Yep, sure have. She does amazing work."

"She'll also be expensive, huh?"

"I imagine," he guessed. He turned to look at him and asked, "Did you contact her?"

"Not yet. Dr. Fendrick suggested it though."

"I would wait until tomorrow and see what the prosthetics guy says, and then I would definitely contact her. She's doing some pretty unique stuff."

"But does it work?"

"It has to work for you, and she can probably point you in the direction of somebody who's got some of her work, so you can talk to them. I would suggest you get those recommendations before you go down that pathway and get an idea on costs and how far out she's booked too."

"Right," he noted. "I didn't think about talking to somebody who has one of her pieces."

"How else will you know whether Kat's pieces work or not?" he asked. "The fact of the matter is, even if you do talk to somebody, it doesn't guarantee that they'll have the information you want because their scenario will, again, be completely different."

Wesley took those words back to his room later that afternoon, and he looked up the website for this woman. Studying it, he realized that she had all kinds of prosthetics on her site. However, she also made it very clear that there was absolutely no one case where one size fits all. He composed an email and sent it off, before he gave himself a chance to question it.

At least with an email, all he had to do was send in his inquiry. It wouldn't guarantee an answer, but, if it gave him something to go on, that would help. At least he hoped. When he looked at some of the sample pictures on her website, he saw no reason why some of these wouldn't work for him. And he had already been through the surgery to prep both his stumps. So, it would all be about the cost, about what was doable for him.

Yet, for the first time in a long time, after seeing those images, he felt more positive about everything going on in his life. Except for Dr. Fendrick. He should never have walked away from Alba like he had. Talk about acting like a two-year-old. And instead of being an adult about everything, he'd blamed the messenger.

Still, all she'd done was her job. And that just reminded Wesley that most of their relationship was based on her being his counselor.