Page 134 of Summer Holiday Lifeline

STEVEN: Glad you got there okay. How’s the house?

MYLES: Sulking.

STEVEN: Be patient.

MYLES: How’s your house?

STEVEN: Fantastic. Didn’t fall down or anything. Let you know more after a few days of my plan, though.

MYLES: Keep me posted.

STEVEN: I will. Love you.

MYLES: Love you, too.

He hit send before he could second-guess the message, then released a huff of relief. And a grin. Why had he held back saying it before now?

The rattling of the front door handle alerted him to Jet’s return, and he hobbled over to let him back inside.

Myles thought he would be eager to settle back into a routine; however, the thought of registering the kids in their schools sent him on a cleaning jag that spread over the next two weeks. Even Shelly asked him about it. He had no good answer for why he was cleaning a house no one had really lived in all summer.

Yet here he was, on hands and knees scrubbing the kitchen floor under the cabinet skirts because whatever had happened in his kitchen since he’d left, no one had bothered to sweep the crumbs up properly. Shelly watched him, arms crossed over her chest.

“Did you need something, honey?”

She shook her head, so he kept scrubbing. He’d already gone through the living room, putting furniture back where Natalie had placed it. Someone had moved it around, maybe to better accommodate television viewing, but the carpet had required a thorough vacuuming under every chair and couch. And that had been just the start.

Shelly plopped on the floor next to him.

For a few minutes, Myles continued working, feeling Shelly’s gaze follow his every move. “What, Shelly?” he asked at last, trying, though failing miserably, to keep the exasperation from his voice.

She hopped back up so she could reach to put a small hand on his cheek. “Are you cleaning it so we can go home?”

“Shelly.” He sat back on his heels, instantly missing her warm touch. “We are home. This is our home.”

She shook her head. “I mean with Mr. Lucky and Mr. Kreed.”

“We were visiting them.”

She frowned at him, and he cringed, expecting an outburst that didn’t come. “Well. That’s silly. We should live where our hearts live.”

“What?”

“It only makes sense.” She cocked her head to one side. “Jet says a heart can’t live outside its body. I asked. So.” She shrugged, patted his shoulder, like she knew without question that he would fix this mix-up, then skipped off to the living room to resume colouring in the middle of the floor.

Fed up with cleaning—it wasn’t calming his mind as it used to anyway—he tossed the sponge he’d been using into the bucket by his knees. He wasn’t even careful as he peeled off his rubber gloves just in time for a knock at the front door. It took him a moment to get to his feet to go let Pat in.

“Hey there.” She didn’t hesitate to wade right in past his protests of a sweat-damp T-shirt to give him a bear hug.

“Hi.”

She patted his cheek, much like Shelly had. “I want to hear all the tea, and then I will tell you all of mine.”

“Hope it includes where you’ve been for two weeks!” he called after her as she left him in the entrance and made her way into the kitchen. The lights came on over the stove long before she reached it to put the kettle on.

“Oh. So her, you like,” he muttered at the walls and promptly stubbed his toe on the corner of a tile that had never been sticking up and still wasn’t when he looked down. “Fuck you, too.”

The kitchen door began to swing shut as he tried to follow Pat.