He opened the door for her, the aroma of bacon hitting her immediately. Only it was turkey bacon, which the twin Matthews siblings were not happy about. Apparently, their bloodwork results had not been the greatest, and Bette Cooper, Kerrie’s fiancée, had demanded that they make some changes to their diet. It was still a sore topic in the household.
“Good morning, Kenny,” she greeted the tall, wobbly man as he opened the door for her.
“Hi, Matty,” he echoed back, a smile on his face as he returned to his spot at the table.
She walked over to the stove, where Mabel, Kenny’s day aide, was packing up Kerrie’s breakfast into a container. She snagged a leftover piece of turkey bacon. It wasn’t nearly as tasty as the real stuff. “Hey, Mabel.”
“Hello, Matty,” she greeted, then turned to Kenny. “How about Matty skips work and comes with us to the day center? You’ll love it, Matty. We’re having pizza and learning how to do the electric slide.”
“Oh, physical day, huh? I wish I could. Are you going to impress that little girlfriend of yours with your smooth moves?” she asked, wiggling her eyebrows.
Kenny’s hand instantly began rubbing the balding patch on top of his head while his cheeks turned pink. She knew she had him flustered when he stuttered his denial.
“She’s—she’s not my girlfriend, Matty.”
“That’s not what I heard,” interjected Kerrie as she walked into the kitchen.
Kenny let out a nervous laugh, his eyes darting around.
Kenny and Kerrie were twins, a little over six feet tall, and shared the same graying brown hair and kind eyes. Kerrie was Kenny’s main caregiver, as he had a cognitive delay that caused him to move around the world with child-like openness. When Matty moved into the basement apartment that had once been rented by Bette, she instantly clicked with the man. She enjoyed watching him occasionally and seeing him almost every morning when Kerrie and Matty would ride to work together.
“She’s not my girlfriend. I told her that.”
“She’s not taking no for an answer, huh?”
“No. She keeps leaving cards on my desk.”
“You can’t really blame her. It’s hard to resist the Matthews charm,” bragged Kerrie with a grin.
They all laughed.
Matty waited patiently while Kerrie grabbed her stuff before they bid Kenny and Mabel goodbye. They piled into Kerrie’s old black Ford Ranger, and off they went to work.
***
The walk to the Fire Hall was one she took every morning, unless it was raining. Then Kerrie would drop her off.
She nodded to clients as she crossed from one side of the rehabilitation campus to the other, where an old two-story fire station came into view. Like most buildings on the property, it had been bought and renovated for the use of staff and clients and, in thiscase, the maintenance team. It still looked like a fire station and even had the pole that went from the second floor to the first.
Maintenance did everything from simple fixes like changing a lightbulb to repairing plumbing issues to landscaping. Between the five-member team, they were all skilled in enough things that they rarely had to call for outside help. They also went to the other side of town to work at the women’s facility. It was smaller and not as old, so the men’s side, the property she was on now, got a lot more of their attention.
She walked through the front door and went straight to the kitchen to put her lunch bag away. She was happy to see her favorite coworker there, Grady Buie.
“Hey, man,” she greeted him.
“Hey, Matty. You hungry? I went to Main for breakfast, and they gave me an extra plate. They cooked too many eggs, so they were being generous today.”
She nodded, setting her coffee thermos down and then herself into one of the mismatched chairs at the table. That was one of the perks of working at Turtle Grove. They allowed staff to eat lunch for free from the cafeteria, but sometimes they would have extras from breakfast. She often had lunch there and snacked out of her lunch bag throughout the day. Her appetite had come back tenfold since getting sober, and with all the physical labor she did, she found herself hungry all the time. Considering how skeletal she had looked when she entered treatment, it was a welcome problem.
She flipped open the container, pleased to see a biscuit along with the pile of yellow eggs. And they were still warm. “Nice.”
“So, did you see the email from Tracy saying everyone needed to come to this morning’s meeting?”
She shoveled a spoonful of eggs into her mouth just as he asked his question, so she nodded in response.
“I wonder what it’s all about. The wife thinks we may be reducing staff since it’s the slow season.”
Matty frowned. She needed the job. “I hope not.”
