Mi Casa et Su Casa

Understanding the circumstances of the situation, Tess has to concede leaving Tom with Cassidy made more sense than trying to hide him at the school, but she was reluctant to do so without a host of restrictions including untrammeled visiting access to which Cassidy agreed.

Tom snapped his fingers before touching the side of his head, “Tess, there’s this one thing I may have forgotten to mention,” he said, a look of consternation on his face.

Suspicious, Tess frowned, “Oh? And what was that?” she inquired, knowing when he put it the way he had, she would not like it.

“I spoke to mother, she will be down next weekend for a visit,” he explained, inspecting his fingernails and avoiding eye contact with his sister.

Tess shook her head, fine dark hair swishing across her shoulders and upper back. “You spoke to her?” she asked.

Looking up, he smiled his most innocent smile, “I tried to text you, but I mixed up the numbers and texted mom instead. She called. We spoke. She’ll be here Friday night,” he replied, shrugging his shoulder.

Growling under her breath, Tess was not happy, but she nodded, trying to devise a scheme to stall their mater. “Did you happen to mention this?” she queried, opening her hand in his direction to indicate his size.

“That may have slipped my mind,” he answered, smile broad on his face.

“May? Did you or did you not tell her you are the size of Jiminy Cricket?” she demanded, not up to playing semantic word games.

Smile fading, he shook his head, “No, I did not your honor,” he answered, bringing his right hand up.

“Okay,” she said, turning away, pondering.

A slow smile crossed her lips. “Just as an FYI, did you know Janine has an older sister?” she inquired,

“An older sister? Really?” Tom asked, left eyebrow raising, “Is she hot?” he queried, smoothing the side of his hair.

“Are you kidding me right now? You look like you were put in a paper bag and beaten with a phone book by Janine and you want to know if her sister is hot?” She leaned her head back and rolled her eyes, before looking at Cassidy. “This is what I’ve had to deal with,” she said.

Cassidy chuckled and looked down at Tom. “You do seem to be quite a handful,” she said. He did his best to appear an innocent victim, swollen and thrashed as he was, it wasn’t too difficult.

Tess curled her hand into a fist, and held it over him, “One time, just one time,” she menaced, raising her eyebrows and making a mean face.

Cassie giggled, “It’s okay, I think I can handle him, I’ve had some experience with problematic patients in the past and I’m pretty good at dealing with the more quarrelsome ones,” she assured, smile bright.

“If he gets too uppity, roll him up in scotch tape, that should take some of the wind out of his sails,” she suggested.

“Tess!” he scolded.

She raised a cautioning finger. “Behave yourself. We will need to come up with strategy to redirect mom so she doesn’t come down here.” Shaking her head, “If she saw you like this, we’d both be a heap of trouble,” she added.

He rolled his eyes.

Turning back to Cassidy, Tess smiled, enfolding the other woman in a hug. “I’m trusting you to look out for my little brother,” she said before disengaging.

“I know,” Cassie replied.

Heading toward the door of the nurse’s apartment, Tess stopped and waved to Tom. Inwardly she desperately hoped she was making the right decision in leaving him with a woman who was for all intents and purposes a stranger. Sighing, she stepped out of the apartment.

Tom spent the balance of Saturday and all day Sunday essentially sleeping, waking up long enough to eat before dozing off again. In that time, Cassie set up a small habitat for him where he would be undisturbed during his convalescence or if he needed to toilet.

It was amazing the physical progress he was able to make in those two short days. She made arrangement to use a couple of her vacation days to be able to be there for him during his recuperation.

While he was very young, she found him incredibly handsome after the swelling had subsided from the damage to his face. His smile was positively devastating and when he used it, he made her blush.

It was late Sunday afternoon when he roused, stretching and yawning.

“It feel like I’ve been hibernating,” he said, scratching at his sides. “Why am I so itchy?” he asked, looking down at his body.

“You were abraded fairly extensively, so I would guess it’s the sensation of your skin repairing itself. It’s remarkable how quickly you’ve healed,” she said, truly astonished. “I’ll get some more hydrocortisone for you,” she added, getting up and fetching the small plastic container and a Q-tip from the medicine cabinet in her bathroom.  Opening the container, she dipped the cotton swab in and presented it to him.

He winked at her, “Clean living,” he said.

She grinned and shook her head. Reaching down, she held her right index finger down to him. Spreading open the fingers of his left hand, he put it up against her digit and pressed his hand into her.

The odd sensation of his entire hand against the pad of just one of her fingers sent a shiver through her.

Bringing his hand away, “No boyfriend, husband, significant other?” he asked, “House cat?” he added, peering around the floor level.

“I just got out of a three year relationship a few months back and really haven’t felt compelled to jump back into the dating scene. Work has kept me pretty busy in the interim,” she said, glum expression on her face.

Nodding sympathetically, “Sorry,” he said. “Would it be impolite to pry?” he asked, moving closer to the edge of the table and sitting down with his legs hanging over.

“We were in different places with different agendas so,” she explained, voice trailing off.

“It happens,” he said. “You are very attractive, you have a huge heart and deserve to find someone special,” he stated, smiling up at her.

Touching old wounds that weren’t completely healed, she smiled politely and looked away.

Seeing emotion welling up in her, he wanted to comfort her, console her, “Hey,” he said, standing up and extending an arm.

She shook her head and reached up to catch a tear threatening to spill from her right eye. What she hadn’t told him was that when Wade left, she immersed herself in work, suppressing all of the feelings of hurt and anger. Here, now, with Tom, all of those buried feelings were surfacing. “I’m so embarrassed,” she said, chuckling.

Tom chuckled back, spreading his arms wide, “You’re embarrassed? Think how I feel standing here knee high to a grasshopper in all my naked glory,” he said with mirth in his voice.

She laughed softly.

“In my defense, it is a little cold in here too,” he said, cocking his head, “If you follow my meaning.”

She shook her head. It was nice to have someone to talk to, to have someone share her feelings with.

“What do you say we make some popcorn and throw a movie in the old video player and just kick back?” he offered, smiling warmly.

She nodded, “That sounds good,” she replied.