Fourth Down (5 page)

“Why have you gone through so many
aide assignments?”

Poppy glanced at my mom before
answering my question. “The agency assigns me exclusively to cancer
patients because of my career interest…specifically terminal cancer
patients.”

She may have been qualified after all,
but her implication that my mom was the next on her list of soon to
be dead patients didn’t sit well with me. Not after the meeting I
had already endured earlier with Dr. Greeme.

“So, what? Are you like the Angel of
Death?” I sneered.

I got the reaction I was looking for
when Poppy flinched at my accusation. My mom glared at
me.

“Ford! That’s enough.”

Poppy ignored my mom and responded in
a snotty tone of voice. “The agency assigns me to these patients,
because there aren’t many people who can handle it. The patients
are usually very accepting of their situation and grateful for my
help. It’s the family members who are the most difficult to deal
with.”

I leaned forward in my seat, prepared
to tell her just what she could do with this difficult family
member when my mom cut me off.

“Ford, you need to leave.
Now!”

With one last glare at Poppy, I pushed
out of my chair and stalked out of the house. How dare she talk so
casually about my mom dying. This was just a job for her, a
stepping stone in her well planned out career path. But this was my
fucking life. My reality.

Chapter Three

Poppy

It had been two weeks since my first
day as Maggie’s home health aide. The other aide on her service,
Jane, and I split the week with me working Tuesday, Wednesday and
Thursday. My shifts went from 2:00 pm to midnight. I knew that Ford
worked from 3:00 pm to 11:00 pm on those days, but he always left
right when I got there and didn’t get home until exactly
midnight.

He was definitely avoiding me, and I
tried not to take it personally. I was used to hostility from
family members who hadn’t yet accepted that their loved one was
dying. But with Ford, I couldn’t help but feel like our run-in on
Halloween was still clouding his opinion of me.

On my first day I got the distinct
impression that I would be told not to come back, but I think
Maggie liked me too much. Ford was mean and unforgiving, but it was
clear that he loved his mom. If she wanted me to stay, I doubt he
would have gone against her wishes.

Maggie had accepted her diagnosis
well, and she wasn’t yet in bad physical shape. Although she knew
the time was coming where she wouldn’t be able to do much other
than rest. In the meantime she was trying to get her affairs in
order, and she had asked for my help. During my shifts last week I
had driven her to the funeral home to pre-arrange her funeral, to
her lawyer’s office to finalize her will, and to the realtor’s
office to discuss putting her house up for sale.

This week her goal was to start
packing up the house. Since I had only seen Ford in passing, I had
no idea if he knew what she was doing. I doubted it though. Given
his hostility before, I thought he was having a hard time accepting
the situation. And he was home with Maggie every morning. If he
knew all that she was doing he would probably have been the one to
drive her around. I cringed to think of his reaction when he found
out. Hopefully it happened during Jane’s shift.

Parking my car on the street in front
of Maggie’s house, I ran my fingers through my long wavy hair
before getting out. I had learned the first day not to take Ford’s
spot in the driveway.

I was dressed in tight jeans, a navy
blue cardigan with a white tank top underneath and my secondhand
Uggs that I had found at the thrift store. The agency required we
wear scrubs unless the patient preferred us to wear regular
clothes. Some people, like Maggie, wanted to feel like the aide was
more of a friend than a health care worker.

I got out of my old Honda and shut the
door gently so it didn’t fall off. Before I made it two steps up
the sidewalk, the front door opened and Ford came out looking mad
as hell.

Uh oh.

He wasn’t wearing his signature ball
cap, and his hair was sticking up in all directions like he had
been running his fingers through it. His faded jeans hugged his
long legs as he stalked down the steps, muttering to
himself.

I halted in place, hoping he would
just get in his truck and leave. But today was not my lucky day
when his angry blue eyes landed on me. I didn’t think he could look
any meaner than he usually did, but his eyes narrowed at me and his
frown deepened.

“You,” he shouted across the yard,
pointing his finger directly at me. I really hoped there was
someone standing behind me, but I knew that wasn’t the case. I
sighed and braced myself for the onslaught of Hurricane Ford. He
must have found out about his mom’s preparations, and now he was
going to take it out on me.

Normally I would be able to handle
this situation professionally, but Ford was different. None of my
other patients’ family members had made my palms sweat and my
stomach churn because of their…hotness. If I was being reasonable,
his irate demeanor and general gruffness should have been a
complete turnoff. Instead it only served to make him more
interesting. Several times over the last two weeks I had caught
myself wondering what had made him that way. It wasn’t his mom -
anyone could see he loved her and treated her with the utmost
respect.

Ford strode across the cold crunchy
grass and stopped just a foot away from me, bordering on invading
my personal space bubble. His hands were clenched in fists at his
sides, and he was practically vibrating with tension.

“Why didn’t you tell me what she was
doing?” He demanded, leaning down so his face was only inches from
mine. The smell of his cologne was faint but enticing, and I was
unnerved by his close proximity.

Taking a step back, I exhaled and
answered as calmly as possible, “Maggie is my patient, not you.
It’s my job to support her and help her with anything she
needs…”

His lip curled up in a snarl, and he
abruptly turned away to pace the sidewalk with both hands in his
messy hair.

“Well, I’m her son. And I need to know
what’s going on at all times. You can’t just waltz in here and help
her die,” he ranted. “After today, I don’t want you here. I’m
calling the agency for a replacement,” he growled, still facing
away from me.

I wanted to be understanding of his
pain, but he just made it so hard. His words hurt. Not just because
he was basically firing me, but because it felt like he was blaming
me for everything that was going on with his mom. This time it
wasn’t possible to not take his words personally.

It wasn’t until Maggie touched my arm
that I realized Ford was gone and I was still standing on the
sidewalk.

“Come inside, Poppy. Let me make you
some coffee,” Maggie said gently. I followed her into the house,
swiping away the tears that had pooled in my eyes.

She sat me at the kitchen table and
busied herself with brewing a pot of coffee. Normally I only drank
coffee in the morning, but the warmth and caffeine would be
comforting now.

With her back to me, Maggie said, “I
apologize for my son, Poppy. He can be very…intense. And don’t
worry about your job. I don’t want you to leave, and I’m the
patient, right?” She winked at me over her shoulder.

I offered a weak smile and asked the
question that I’d been stewing over since meeting Ford. “Why is he
so angry? I understand he’s having a hard time accepting your
illness, but it seems like he really hates me.”

Maggie set a mug down in front of me
and left the room. When she returned a moment later, she was
holding a large photo album. Sitting down next to me she opened it
to the first page. Taking a sip of my coffee I looked over the
pictures of a much younger Maggie holding a baby boy.

“Ford wasn’t always this way. He was
such a happy baby, always smiling.” She flipped to the next page to
reveal Ford as a toddler, with lighter hair and the same striking
blue eyes. There was a man, who I assumed to be his father, in the
pictures as well. Maggie continued to flip through the pages of
Ford as a child looking happy, and I realized I had never seen the
grown up Ford smile.

When we reached the time when Ford
looked to be about seven or eight years old, the man disappeared
from the pictures and only Maggie remained.

“Ford’s father left when he was seven.
We had been high school sweethearts, and apparently he was bored
with our life,” Maggie explained. I knew what it was like to lose a
father at a young age, though I had never had to experience the
feeling that my father just didn’t want me.

“After Ford’s father left, I had to
work two jobs to keep up with the bills. This was the only home
Ford had known, and I didn’t want him to lose that too. I thought
signing him up to play football would keep him busy and out of
trouble.”

One of the reasons I wanted to be in
the health care field was that I felt like I was really able to
empathize with people. And right now it was like I could feel the
pain that Ford would have felt as a child.

Maggie got up to pour herself a cup of
coffee while I continued looking through the album. Nearly all of
the pictures that followed were of Ford in a football uniform, from
seven years old all the way through high school. I was glad I
didn’t know him then, or I would have had a serious crush on him. I
snorted quietly. Like I didn’t have a crush on him now.

Maggie sat back down and continued
Ford’s life story. “He was very good,” she said, pointing at an
action shot of Ford on the field getting ready to throw a pass. How
had I never watched football before? He looked seriously hot in his
uniform.

“He was going all the way. From high
school to college and then to the NFL.”

Wow, I had no idea he
was
that
good.
Since he was currently tending bar and not playing in the NFL, I
braced myself for the unhappy ending to this story.

“It’s coming up on three years now
since he broke his leg - a career ending injury,” Maggie said
quietly. “His football career ended that day, and his hopes and
dreams with it. He hasn’t been the same since.” She looked so sad
that I reached over and covered her hand with mine.

“I’m sorry, Maggie. That would be very
difficult to get over such a disappointment,” I said.

She shook her head. “He won’t watch
football anymore or even talk about it. His friends and I have
probably enabled him to hide from it by tiptoeing around the
subject. But looking back I think we may have done more harm than
good. It probably would have been better to force him to deal with
it and move on.”

Ford seemed to be the epitome of
stubborn, and I doubted he would have faced his issues before he
was ready. But what struck me most was that he had friends, which I
let slip out without thinking.

“He has friends?”

Maggie must have laughed for two
minutes at my question. “Yes, Poppy. He does have friends, although
they all knew him before. When he was a nice guy and not
perpetually grouchy.”

I wondered what nice guy Ford would be
like. It was hard to imagine given his only interactions with me
had all involved him yelling at me.

After finishing our coffee, we spent
the rest of the afternoon sorting through Maggie’s personal items -
jewelry, photos and keepsakes. At her direction I sorted them into
piles to either get rid of or box up for Ford in case he would want
them in the future.

“What will Ford do when you’re gone?
If you’re selling the house?” I asked Maggie. Now that I knew about
his past, I could look past some of his behavior. I actually felt a
little worried for him.

“I haven’t asked him yet. I doubt he
has a plan that extends past tomorrow, but sometime soon I am going
to sit him down and make him talk to me. When I go, I need to know
that he will be okay. He doesn’t have to sell the house if he wants
to stay here, but I think he won’t be able to get out of this town
fast enough once I’m gone.”

It was always hard when one of my
patients passed away, but I had a feeling this would be the hardest
of all. No one had included me in their life quite like Maggie had.
And no one had made me feel anything close to what Ford had - good
and bad. It would be hard to say goodbye when the time came - to
both of them.

By dinner time Maggie was tired, and I
got her settled on the couch with a blanket and her favorite TV
show while I fixed dinner. Looking through the cabinets I found the
ingredients for vegetarian chili. Combining all the ingredients in
a large pot on the stove, I let the chili simmer while I mixed up
some homemade cornbread. My sorry excuse for a kitchen didn’t allow
me to do any actual cooking, so this was kind of fun. I ate with
Maggie in the family room, and we watched Wheel of Fortune
together. Maggie went to get ready for bed early while I cleaned up
the kitchen.

It was only 8:00 pm and Maggie was
already asleep. That gave me four hours to work on homework before
Ford got home. I did get a lot of reading done and a few pages of
my paper written, but my mind kept drifting to Ford.