Page 84 of Friend Me

25

Friday night,I dragged up our porch steps and stuck my key in the lock. It was almost more effort than I could manage to turn it.

I’d been a coward. I’d waited most of the day, hoping Tyler would break his silent streak and come upstairs to see me. But at four o’clock, I’d marched downstairs and into the programmers’ bullpen to find Tyler’s cube deserted. Sam told me I’d missed him by just twenty minutes.

I’d thought about texting, but could you really tell someone you loved him for the first time over text? I hadn’t read that in any of my romance novels. I’d find him in the office on Monday. After the long, lonely weekend.

All I wanted to do was crash onto my bed and binge-watch some romantic comedies. I pushed open the door.

Sylvia greeted me in the kitchen with words I never wanted to hear again: “We should talk.” Lines of strain bracketed her eyes, and her mouth was set in a thin line.

“Is he okay?” I asked, slipping off my heels. Dad wasn’t in the kitchen, and he wasn’t in his recliner, either.

“He had a rough day. I gave him a sedative.”

“A sedative?” I glared at her. “We didn’t talk about that.”

“He was agitated and asking to talk to Maggie. Is that what he calls you?” Her expression told me she knew it wasn’t.

“No. That was my mother’s name.”

The older woman’s eyes softened and she unclenched her jaw. “I assume she’s…gone?”

“Yes.” I wasn’t about to go into the details with her, not after the week I’d had.

She squared up her solid figure. “He said he needed to see her. He pushed me to try to get outside.” She tugged up her sleeve to show me a long purple bruise on her upper arm.

I blinked. My kind, gentle father had pushed a woman? Surely it’d been an accident. “That doesn’t sound like Dad.”

Her dark eyes filled with pity. “This disease, it takes away who your dad was. He’ll do a lot of things that aren’t like the man you knew.”

Her words were a knife in my gut. Dad had cared for me all my life, most of it alone. He’d kissed my scraped knees, braided my hair, taught me to drive in his old Ford pickup. He’d cheered me when I’d graduated from high school and college, and he’d consoled me after breakups. I couldn’t lose him. And I needed Sylvia to keep him.

“Are you okay? He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“No, honey. He’s not the first patient to get a little rowdy. But this might not be the right place for him anymore.”

“Here, with me, is the best place for him. I’m all he has.” And Dad was allIhad. I wasn’t about to lose him.

She put a hand on her hip. “Do you want me to teach you how to give the sedative injection?”

The constriction in my throat blocked my words. I couldn’tgive anyone a shot, certainly not Dad. And he’d never hurt me. I didn’t know what had gone on with Sylvia today, but I wouldn’t need the drugs.

I shook my head.

“All right.” She took her jacket from the hook by the back door. “I’ll see you Monday.”

“Thanks, Sylvia. Have a good weekend.”

After she left, I sagged against the door. Not even romantic comedy was going to ease the blow she’d given me. I reached for the bottle of vodka from the cabinet above the oven.

* * *

Sunday afternoon,I muted the commercial during the Raiders game. “Want some popcorn?”

“Sure.” Dad smiled at me from his recliner.

I grinned back, set aside my paperback—in this one, the hero was a football player, so it was like we were really bonding over the game—and passed him the remote. Dad was having a good weekend.

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