First Love Again. Kristina Knight

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ

      The boy who’d been careless enough to ruin the life of his best friend was gone and in his place was a man people came to, to solve their problems.

      Jaime Brown’s big brown eyes seemed to dance in front of him. He’d left to make things simpler for her, but seeing her again... She was no longer the broken girl who’d come back from Pittsburgh, but she wasn’t the girl he remembered from before the attack, either.

      The front door creaked open and Gibson Deal stuck his head around the corner, a shock of white hair falling forward to hide eyes that were once a clear, bright blue and were now faded like Emmett’s Levi’s.

      “I’m not buyin’ nothin’,” Gibson said in a voice that still held the iron Emmett remembered from his youth. To listen to the old man, nothing had changed. It was probably one of the reasons no one on the island had figured out Gibson was fading. He could still talk a blue streak; had opinions on everything. Hell, during his visit to Cincinnati last fall Emmett had thought his father was fine. Last week the doctor had assured him that during that visit his father had already been losing his mind.

      Emmett was doing more than listening for the first time in years. He was observing and what he saw left no doubt in his mind that the doctors in Toledo were right. His father was fading.

      Gibson’s hand tremored against the door and there was a confused look in his gaze.

      “It’s me, Dad. Emmett.”

      The door creaked open a few more inches. Gibson pushed the hair from his face, squinted faded blue eyes and pressed his lips together while he inspected Emmett as if he’d never seen him before.

      “Well, what the hay are you doing on the porch? Come on in, boy. I’ve been expecting you.” As if nothing was wrong. As if Emmett landed on this doorstep every other weekend. “You said you’d bring paint. Did you bring paint? Mary Margaret loves to paint.”

      Emmett motioned to his truck loaded with enough paint, wood and various other supplies to fix up every house on the island, which was good since he’d volunteered to—at least—take a look at Gulliver School, too. Maybe his father wasn’t the only one losing his mind.

      Thinking about the school brought back the image of Jaime.

      Wearing white pants and a silky blue top. In eighty-five-degree weather. When he’d known her she’d worn sundresses on any day the temperature breached seventy.

      He could still see her standing on her front porch in a white sundress with pretty blue flowers long into October that last year he’d been on the island. It had been unseasonably warm that fall and when anyone had reminded her of the changing seasons she would smile and tell them she wasn’t ready for turtlenecks and snow boots just yet.

      The calendar would change over to June in a few days and already it felt like August on the island.

      She’d also cut her hair and the shoulder-length blond curls suited her face. She was thinner than he remembered, but those brown eyes were still deep enough to drown in. Not that he had any intention of drowning.

      The Jaime he remembered... The Jaime he remembered had grown up, Emmett told himself. Just as he had.

      “I’ve brought everything we’ll need with me.” He wasn’t sure what he would need when he’d left Cincinnati, only that the sooner he had the place fixed up the sooner it would sell. The sooner he could get Gibson into the assisted-living facility in Cincinnati where he could begin treatment. Not that treatment would change anything.

      He’d done enough late-night internet surfing to know there was no coming back from dementia. There would be good days and bad, and eventually he would lose his father altogether, even though the man might still be alive.

      Emmett’s heart beat rapidly at the thought. Gibson was his only family and he didn’t want to lose the old man.

      He shouldn’t have made such a big deal about coming back to Gulliver. Should have made more of an effort to put the past to rest. He’d lost ten years he could have had with Gibson and for what? Because he’d made a few mistakes as a teenager? Didn’t everyone?

      “You thirsty? Want a sandwich before we get started?”

      Emmett couldn’t stomach what might be on the inside of the refrigerator. “I thought we’d just make an inventory list today.” The farther into the house they walked, the more Emmett’s hopes sank. When he was a kid, the hardwood floors would have gleamed, the end tables sparkled. A few magazines might have been stacked on one end of the coffee table and there would have been a basket for the TV and radio remotes beside his father’s favorite green recliner. His mom would have been baking something and, more often than not, Jaime would wander in through the back door.

      Emmett refocused on his father.

      What he saw now were stacks and stacks of newspapers. A few empty food containers. The TV was on but muted. Two lampshades sat askew because of the jackets hanging from them. Envelopes—some opened and some still sealed—littered the dining-room table and a thin film of dust covered everything.

      Emmett swallowed. How much worse would it be if his father hadn’t taken the ferry to the mainland last month? He’d boarded a bus for Dayton at the ferry stop and become so disoriented that a restaurant manager had called the police. The police had called Emmett and now he could see for himself that things were very wrong. He dragged his finger through the dust covering his mom’s favorite side table and then wiped his caked finger on his jeans.

      “Dad, I thought you hired that local company to clean once a week after Mom died.” He tripped over something and picked it up, holding the cracked leather shoes by their strings. What were his old football cleats doing in the hallway?

      Gibson waved his hand as they continued through to the kitchen. He grabbed a bottle of water and passed it to Emmett. “Those girls didn’t know a broom from a dust rag. I let them go a while back.”

      His mother had passed away the summer after he’d left the island. God, how had he missed all of this in their weekly phone calls?

      Once more Emmett racked his brain, trying to remember any incident that could have alerted him during Gibson’s last visit. He’d been a little more crotchety and particular than normal, but when had Gibson not been particular? From the pressed pants and natty ties he’d worn every day to school to the way Emmett’s baseball uniforms should be washed after the games, Gibson had ideas. Ways of doing things. Emmett and his mother had become so used to his opinions that they’d forgotten any other way of doing things. So it was normal to fall into that routine when his father had visited for a couple of weeks in October.

      When he’d left Emmett had found a stack of newspapers under the bed but hadn’t thought anything of it.

      Now he wished he had.

      “I was thinking we’d start with the porch. You know how your mother likes a clean and pretty porch. Peach. That was her favorite color.” Gibson finished his water and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “The upper level should be navy and I think green would be a nice color around the eaves.”

      “Dad—”

      “And in here, I know your mother likes her wallpaper, but I think paint is more practical. And if we used some of that blue, it would be a nice accent for her paintings and things.”

      “Dad.” СКАЧАТЬ