As embarrassing as it was to admit to himself, Ryan wasn’t at all certain he would be able to get up off the floor right now, with his bad knee.
“If you think she won’t mind, I’ll stay in your mom’s room for now.”
“She won’t mind. She would want you to.”
“Okay. Point me to clean sheets.”
After she found them for him, he made the bed. When he returned to the living room, he found Audrey on the sofa, scrolling through her phone with her legs tucked under her.
He took a seat on the adjacent armchair. “How are you doing, Audrey? Really doing?”
Thanks to his dad’s example, Ryan did not like talking about emotions. And what he knew about the emotional journey of a teenage girl would fit in a headphone jack. But being here for his niece didn’t only mean showing up physically to feed her dinner and pick her up from school.
Audrey looked up from her phone, her eyes deep and troubled briefly before she blinked and forced a smile.
His instincts were right. Despite her casual air, Audrey was stressed out by the situation.
“I’m fine.”
He studied her, head cocked. “You know I’m a highly trained officer in the United States military, right? I’ve been trained in techniques to extract information from people who don’t want to talk.”
She snorted. “Ha. Are you going to torture me until I spill all my deepest feelings?”
“I hope it doesn’t have to come to that.” He smiled. “You need to know, though, that you can talk to me about anything that might be bothering or worrying you. I can’t guarantee I will always know the right thing to say but I’ll do my best.”
His and Kim’s father’s attitude after their mother died had been the exact opposite. He hadn’t allowed them to talk about her, had acted like they should go on with their lives as if nothing had happened, as if her loss had not left a gaping hole.
Kim had pushed everything down. Was it any wonder she had turned to self-medicating to cope, when their father had turned their home into a cold place with plenty of rules but very little love?
“Thanks, Uncle Ryan.”
She looked down at her phone for a moment then set it in her lap.
“I miss Mom,” she finally said after a long pause. “It’s only been a week but I really, really miss her. She’s my best friend, you know? We talk about everything. Don’t get me wrong. Holly is great and everything and I really love little Lydia but it’s not the same as being with my own mom.”
“It’s not,” he agreed. “Do you know that I was exactly your age when my own mom died? Thirteen.”
Kim and Audrey could both have been hurt far worse in that accident. What if Audrey had permanently lost her mother, like Ryan had at her age? The loss would have haunted her the rest of her life.
She hadn’t, though. Kim was alive and on the road to recovery. In a few short weeks, she would be back with her daughter, hopefully in a much better place.
Audrey’s features, so much like her mother’s, softened with sadness. “Mom was fifteen, right? She talks about Grandma Caldwell a lot. She said she was the kindest person she ever knew. I wish I’d had the chance to meet her.”
“So do I. She would have loved being a grandma. She would have spoiled you rotten.”
She grinned briefly before her mouth drooped with sadness again.
“Mom still really misses her. A few months ago, I was doing homework in my room while she was in here washing dishes. I came in for a drink of water and found her crying at the sink. She told me it was her mom’s birthday and she always misses her extra hard on that day.”
Laura Caldwell had been the glue holding his family together. Kind, giving, funny, she had seemed the exact opposite of their father. Wherever Doug’s military career had taken him across the world, Laura had worked hard to make their home a warm and welcoming space for her children and their friends. Her softness provided a counterpoint to Doug’s dogged ambition.Despite their differences, they seemed to have had a happy marriage, though Ryan had only been a kid. What did he know?
Regardless, Laura should have had decades more to bring light to the world instead of being taken far too early.
“I’m not sure you ever stop missing your parents when they’re gone, no matter how old you are.”
“I don’t really miss my dad,” Audrey said, almost as if she were confessing a guilty secret.
He wanted to tell her that Zachary Barnes was not someone who deserved to be missed but somehow he managed to restrain himself.
