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“Can we talk? Just for a second?” his mother asked.
I turned and looked at her. Took in her desperate stare and the way she was already huffing for air. She was exhausted. The bags underneath her eyes told me the story of how long they had been struggling to take care of that man. I nodded my head and she led me into a room. A room full of books and a fireplace.
Then she dragged me into another room that was tinged with the faint essence of smoke.
“Yes?” I asked.
I watched his sister come into the room before she shut the double doors behind her.
“We’ve been struggling to find another nurse to help us out with Hayden.”
“That your son’s name?” I asked.
“Yes,” the younger woman said. “I’m Cara, and this is our mother. Clarisse.”
“It’s nice to meet you both,” I said. “I’m Grace.”
“You picked him up so easily. How?” Clarisse asked.
“I go to the gym everyday. I consider myself to be pretty strong. When you know how to properly squat and deadlift weights, it becomes easier to pick up a man of that size,” I said.
“It’s exhausting,” Cara said. “Keeping up with the things he needs. The showering and the physical therapy. The cooking and the cleaning.”
“Hauling him up and down the stairs whenever he wants to be in a different part of the house,” Clarisse said.
“I can only imagine,” I said.
“The nurses the center is sending over aren’t cutting it. If it’s not one thing, it’s another. It’s hard to find a nurse that will take him on full-time. They’re usually rotating between two or three patients a day. My mom and I are having to pick up the slack, but we can’t do it all. It’s been two and a half months and it’s only making the three of us angrier at one another,” Cara said.
My heart ached for them, but I was also presented another opportunity. I had the credentials to be his nurse. I had the specialty of working with people with disabilities. And the money from being a private nurse would really do me some good. I had a feeling they were unloading onto me because they had no one else to talk to, but I had a solution that might benefit everyone involved.
And get me into the nursing game the way my parents wished I was.
“I’m sorry,” Clarisse said. “We just… you’ve witnessed so much and our son’s been less than hospitable in his actions towards you. We wanted the chance to fill you in on what was going on since you’re sort of around everyday anyway.”
“We know you have other things to do. We just thought we owed you an explanation as to our attitudes,” Cara said.
“We aren’t neglecting Hayden,” his mother said.
“I never thought you were,” I said. “But the truth is, you can’t keep up with his needs.”
“We know,” Cara said. “We’re… trying to find a solution for that.”
“I have a suggestion. If it isn’t out of place,” I said.
“We’ll take anything at this point,” Clarisse said.
“I’m a licensed nurse. And I’m trained to work with people with disabilities like Hayden’s. Recoveries and P.T. and things like that. I go to the gym regularly, so I can physically handle the demands of his caretaking, and all of my extracurricular activities were devoted to psychology classes, so I know a thing or two about taking care of the mental health of my patients.”
I watched their jaws go slack as I drew in a deep breath.
“I could help you guys out during his recovery if you need it. And I don’t come with the added weight of being employed by a center who rotates me through clients,” I said.
I watched the two of them look at each other as my mind began to swirl. I wasn’t sure if I had overstepped a line or anything, but this family all needed someone to lean on. Someone to give them a break. Given the house they lived in and the expensive bouquet of flowers they had on rotation, being their private nurse would pay my bills, give me plenty to put away after paying off my student debt, and give me the ability to travel some in the future. It would be a wonderful move into a career I didn’t think I’d be able to step into right out of graduate school, and part of me was hoping they would offer me the job.
A chance to take a different life path. Though I was going to miss the flower shop if they hired me.
“That’s very generous of you,” Cara said. “But I don’t know if bringing in someone outside of the center is a good idea.”
