Max swallowed his drink. “Yeah, it was great seeing her. Plus she made biscuits so I couldn’t refuse.” Vince laughed. “Josh seems like a nice guy.”
“That he is,” Vince agreed. “Treats my baby girl right.”
“It’s a damned good job.” Max’s eyes once again found Grace, who was taking pictures of the exterior of the house and the surrounding forest. He tilted his chin in her direction. “What’s she doin’ here? She working for you or something?”
Vince scowled in confusion. “No. This is her place. Bought it before Christmas.”
Well, shit.
“Don’t know much about her,” he continued around his baloney sandwich. “She’s nice and all but keeps herself to herself. I don’t know much about her story other than she’s paying for all this up front. Must come from money.” Vince side-eyed Max and leaned in close. “She’s a missus, too, ya know?” He paused for effect. “But there ain’t no mister staying with her at the boardinghouse. I’m thinkin’ a huge alimony payout.”
Max snorted. “You know what they say about gossip, Uncle Vince.”
Vince laughed heartily and clapped Max on the back. He gradually quieted and nudged him with his elbow gently. “We haven’t had a chance to talk properly, Max. How ya doin’? You feelin’ okay bein’ here?”
“Yes.” The word was out without thought. “I’m okay. I feel . . . better. Less stressed.” And it was the truth. “Thank you.” Although still restless, he was sleeping better, and his appetite was coming back. He hadn’t painted yet, but that would come. “I’m at my NA meeting tomorrow morning. I’ll try and get back so I can help out—”
“Max,” Vince chastised. “Not that I don’t appreciate your thought, son, but it’s all right. You come and help me out when you can. You don’t have to punch a time clock.” He shrugged. “You do what you need to do. Get better. That’s what’s important right now. That’s why you’re here.”
“I know. I will, but I want to pay my way and—”
“Look,” Vince interrupted, turning to look at Max directly, “when he was sick, and even before then when he lost your momma, I promised your daddy that I’d help you whenever I could, or whenever you’d let me. I told him I’d be there just as he promised he’d be there for my Ruby should anything happen to me. Now, I know, like him, you can be a stubborn son of a gun when you want to be.” He smiled fondly. “Especially when it comes to accepting help. So imagine how surprised I was when you called.”
“Yeah.”
“But call you did because somewhere deep inside you knew that, no matter what, I’d be there for you. We all would.” He nudged him again. “So let me do this, okay? Let me help.”
Max exhaled through a thick throat.
“The only job for you now is to make your daddy proud and get yourself healthy. You hear me, son?”
“Yes, sir.” His words were soft and laced with gratitude.
“All right.” Vince scrunched up his sandwich packaging and leaped from the truck bed. “Now, stop sittin’ around, eyin’ up my clients, and get your ass back to work.”
The NA meeting the following morning was just as Max expected. He sat in the church hall, surrounded by strangers brought together by their dependencies and addictions. He introduced himself, then listened to the unfamiliar faces relay their tales of misery, regret, and recovery. Since his stay in rehab, Max had become a lot more sympathetic to hearing others’ stories, so he listened and he understood.
Over the months of his rehabilitation, he’d come to recognize why he’d initially been so closed off from lending an empathetic ear in group. The fact was, every account he heard, every anecdote about hurting loved ones in order to score, and no matter what the consequence, hit close to home. Whether he wanted to or not, Max saw himself in every face of his fellow addicts, the remorse, the cravings that would never ever go away, the need for forgiveness, and the fear of what that forgiveness would mean. He’d never wanted to be that guy, the guy who fucked over the people closest to him, the guy who wallowed in self-pity and the what-ifs, but there it was.
He grabbed a cheeseburger for lunch on his contemplative return drive, went for a midafternoon run, and had been in his room at the boardinghouse for more than an hour when a thunderous bang, a squeal of pipes in the wall and the floor, and a scream emitted from the next room.
Max shot from his place on the bed, dropping the book he’d been reading, and flung open the door, scanning the empty hallway. He hurried to the next room, knocking hard, hearing what sounded like water hissing from somewhere and muffled expletives. The door opened abruptly, revealing Grace in nothing but a towel, drenched and breathing heavily.
“The pipe burst!” she exclaimed, leaving the door open for Max to follow, bewildered. “I can’t stop it!”
Max hurried into the bathroom after her, his socked feet sloshing in the water that had already gathered. Water spurted forcefully from one of the shower pipes, jetting across the bathroom. “Holy shit.”