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“You just said that you fall asleep really easily. So, I kind of thought that you would have been asleep a long time ago.”
“I usually would have been. But what you said about the flue made me realize that I probably should be keeping watch. Still, I’m not deliberately trying to stay awake.”
“Me either. Maybe I’m just too keyed up to sleep, or maybe it’s the hard floor. Whatever it is, I’ve been lying here daydreaming but not the slightest bit sleepy.”
“Same. You’re not scared, are you?” he asked, his voice quiet but low and rumbly and with vibrations that were not unpleasant against her back.
“No. I guess I could be, but rather than focusing on the what ifs, I try to focus on the what I can do right now to fix things.”
“That’s smart.”
“It helps me keep my mind running over the things that I can do to help, rather than getting myself worked up and afraid of the things that might or might not happen.”
“That’s a good way to look at things. A great way to shape your brain.”
“It didn’t used to be like that,” she said softly.
He paused for a moment, as though that surprised him, and then he said, “No?”
It was a question, an invitation to say more if she wanted to. Normally she would let that drop, if she had even said that much. But considering their close proximity and the fact that they were going to be spending the night together, and neither one of them would probably be sleeping much, or maybe it was just late and she was tired and didn’t have as much self-control.
Or maybe she trusted him.
Whatever it was, she found herself talking about something she normally didn’t.
“I struggled with anxiety, pretty bad anxiety actually. It started when I was in high school.”
“High school can be pretty harsh. There are a lot of expectations and a lot of pressure. Sometimes it’s really hard to handle everything that gets thrown at us. The pressure for grades and to perform and to get into the right college and to do well in every subject. Even subjects we’re not good at.”
“Yeah. I guess. Maybe it was that my dad left too, and Mom was alone. No one else seemed to really notice, but I was kind of sensitive to it.”
“I remember that, vaguely,” he murmured.
He had been there, grown up in Strawberry Sands. And they went to school together, although not in the same grade. Still, the town was small enough that everyone knew everyone else, and he would have known about her dad leaving.
“Mom did such a good job of holding everything together, but... I guess I just worried. I don’t know. But I know that I had all the things that could go wrong running around my head. That’s probably what the problem was.”
“It’s never helpful when we worry.”
“No.”
“I thought I remembered you having a boyfriend. So you eventually just got over it?”
She didn’t know whether he was asking to make conversation, or if he was really truly interested.
“I did. I hid behind him, to some extent, I guess. The anxiety became overwhelming when I didn’t have him to use as a crutch. I got to the point where I didn’t even want to leave the house. He was content to come over and watch TV, and we didn’t usually go anywhere. Looking back, it wasn’t a great relationship, but I held onto it...I guess because of Mom and my extreme fear of...I don’t even know what I was afraid of. I managed to finish school, and I was accepted at several different colleges, but I was too scared to go.”
“Ouch.”
“I know. That’s sad, isn’t it? But seriously, I just hated the idea of leaving home. And I have to admit that Mom could use the help at the bed-and-breakfast. And I took classes for my freshman and sophomore years. So it wasn’t like I was sitting at home with the covers over my head. But I didn’t interact with any of the guests, and I did the cleaning and cooking without talking to anyone as much as I could. And when I actually had to show up on campus for my junior year...”
“You were basically a recluse.”
“Yeah. But I was so afraid that business would die down, that we would stop getting customers, that I wouldn’t be able to make a living, that I actually got a dog grooming certificate online.”
“Just a backup for your backup?”
“Yeah. I wasn’t really expecting to use it, but once I got it, my siblings knew that I had it, and they would ask me to do their dogs or their friends’ dogs. Eventually, I bought a small studio outside of town. It wasn’t originally a dog groomer place, but it worked for me. I was able to get the equipment I needed inexpensively. It was the right price, and I didn’t feel like I had to make a whole lot of money in order to pay my bills. I had saved enough to be able to purchase the building for cash.”
