said, his voice gruff. “There are times when we all talk about her and it’s casual and we’ll laugh at the memories, and other times…it’s still raw.” He reached out and took one of her hands in his. “What I’m saying is…Haley’s going to have good days—like right now—and bad ones, like the day at the Y.”
“It’s all so overwhelming,” she admitted. “Like…there’s no manual on how to handle something like this. One minute I had a life and a job up in Boston and my family was here, happy and healthy. The next…” She shook her head. “I’m afraid I’m going to let her down.”
Sydney had no idea why she was suddenly sharing all of this with him when just a few hours ago she had been more than ready to throat punch him.
“You could never let her down,” Kyle said softly, and when she looked up at him, she almost believed him. “You’re here and you’re taking care of her, and you’re loving her.”
“I wish it were that easy.”
Nodding, he said, “My dad was…well…he was a wreck for a long time. My oldest brother, Dean, he really stepped in and helped us all. I still don’t know how he did it. He was grieving like the rest of us, and yet…he just always seemed to know what had to be done.” He paused and chuckled. “Of course, that doesn’t mean there weren’t times when we didn’t have clean clothes or when we ended up eating toast and popcorn for dinner. Sometimes it’s okay when things don’t go exactly as planned. At the end of the day, you’ve got each other, right?”
She nodded and…felt better.
“Thanks, Kyle. I…”
“Aunt Syd! Can we bake cookies to have with the ice cream?”
Both she and Kyle shook their heads at Haley’s request. Gently pulling her hand from his, she looked up at where her niece was standing on the deck. “Um…why don’t you see if we have all the ingredients first?”
“Okay!” There was a pause. “Oh, we looked at the Chinese menu and marked all the stuff we want. I’ll leave it on the table for you!”
“Sounds good!” Sydney called back. And then all they heard were footsteps running back into the house. “I should definitely get in there and make sure they’re not ordering half the menu,” she said, taking a small step back.
“Yeah. I can imagine them totally doing that.”
“So, um…I guess I’ll see you tomorrow. What…” She paused and cleared her throat. “What will you be working on tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow’s Saturday so I hadn’t planned on coming by…”
She shook her head and wanted to kick herself. “Right. Saturday. It’s like I can’t even keep track of the days of the week anymore. Sorry.”
“If you’re really okay with the balance beam thing, I was going to take some wood home to work on it and I could bring it by Sunday.”
“You really don’t have to do that. She’ll be fine without one.”
“Nah,” he said with a grin. “It won’t be anything fancy, but she’ll be able to goof around and practice on it. It won’t take me that long to do.”
“Well…if you’re sure.”
He nodded.
“And don’t rush,” she rambled on. “You know, with the beam. You can just bring it on Monday. We have plans to go out on a friend’s boat on Sunday.”
He nodded again.
“And…what about Monday? What should I be bracing myself for?”
He smiled at her and she really hated how much she liked it. “Monday, I’ll be starting work on the inside. Is there a particular room or space you want to begin with?”
Pretty much every room needed work, and even though some rooms were just getting a coat of paint or new flooring, she did have a request.
“Okay, I know this is going to sound weird…”
“But…?”
She told him about the job she was going to be starting for Mia. “I was thinking of turning one of the rooms downstairs into an office. Actually, if we could set up one room to sort of be a hangout space for Haley and then the other for me to work in, that would be amazing. I mean…I don’t know what you have planned or budgeted to do so if that’s not part of the plan, please just say so.”
His expression gave nothing away. “The downstairs was included. Why don’t you take the weekend to think about what you’re going to need—and maybe get some pictures online or something—and we’ll talk about it Monday morning. Will that work?”