She laughs again as she grips me harder, and I find I am becoming more and more drawn to that sound. She’s not the type of woman who giggles, but instead shows her amusement with that same husky tone with which she sings and talks, which means essentially anything that comes out of her mouth is sexy and amazing.
I get her to my SUV without incident or broken bones and manage to walk around the front without sliding too much and looking like an idiot.
You’d think as a hockey star I’d be able to maneuver on ice with more sophistication, but truly it’s the skates that make all the difference.
I merge carefully into traffic, which takes some time since it’s moving so slowly, then settle in for a perilous four-mile drive to the little garage apartment that Lexi rents from her boss, Georgia.
We move less than a mile in thirty minutes and talk is limited to sarcastic comments made about all the terrible drivers we see. We wince as cars start to slide off the road onto shoulders, and several accidents that occur, although they are more like fender benders, fortunately. On two occasions, cars slide my way and I brace for impact, but then they veer off, which is more from happenstance than from any real skill by the drivers. By the time we get close to our exit onto Wade Avenue, I make a decision and turn right into a residential neighborhood.
“What are you doing?” Lexi asks curiously.
“Getting us off the big roads before some idiot hits us,” I tell her as I glance at the navigation screen just below my dashboard. I’m vaguely familiar with this area, as I dated—fucked—a nurse who lives close to here, which is also how I found the pizza joint next to The Grind. I was starving one night after I slipped out of her house and had a pie all to myself after.
This was apparently a good idea, as hardly any vehicles are on the street. I see a few have slid off the road, gone up onto sidewalks and such, but for the most part the cut-through traffic is light. My navigation system self-corrects for a new route to Lexi’s house.
I drive extremely slowly, because even though my vehicle is heavy, I can still feel it sliding if I get much over five miles per hour. However, without all the traffic, I can relax a little bit, so I ease into some more personal conversation, since this car ride is probably the extent of my date with Lexi.
“So, care to tell me more details about Brian Brannon and how that all came about?” I ask her, daring to glance over at her. I see her hands are relaxed in her lap, an indication she’s secure with my driving, but her face is seriously studying the road before us.
“Like I told you the other night, my mom got really sick a little over a year ago. Pancreatic cancer,” she adds on for explanation.
“I didn’t say it the other night, but I’m really sorry,” I tell her, because that’s what you say in these situations although admittedly, it’s difficult to me to relate to what she might be feeling.
“She had been sick awhile and made the decision not to tell me about it, but I was planning on a visit home for Christmas and she knew she couldn’t hide it from me.”
“Where were you living?” I ask her curiously, because she’s told me she’s lived sort of all over the place.
“Pittsburgh,” she tells me, but then her voice gets a little tense. “I was bartending there, taking some classes at night. Partying and having a good time.”
“Nothing wrong with having a good time,” I assure her, because I sense some self-loathing in her tone.
“Not when your mom is dying,” she murmurs, and I can’t fucking help myself. It’s dangerous as hell because of the road conditions, and it’s antithetical to who I am, but I reach across the console and take one her of her hands in mine.
“You can’t blame yourself if you didn’t know, Lexi,” I say gently.
She reacts with a squeeze to my hand and a sigh. “I know. Logically I know that, but emotionally, I feel terrible she went through any of that alone.”
I can only imagine.
Seriously. That’s not a metaphor, as I just have never experienced loss like that.
“So you moved back home?” I ask, to move her forward a bit and not dwell on her guilt.
“Yup,” she says, and her voice sounds stronger again. “She was pretty bad by the time she told me. Was in a lot of pain, very weak. She went into hospice not long after I moved back, and I pretty much lived in her room until she died.”
“How long did it take?” I ask, stemming from a slight amount of morbid curiosity, but also because I want her to share the details with me. For some reason, I really want her to share those brutal details because perhaps that will ease some of her burden.
“Once she went into hospice, she lasted almost another two weeks. She was unconscious most of the time, heavily drugged to keep the pain down. She couldn’t talk to me. She couldn’t eat. Not even sure she knew I was there. I sat by her bed for almost two weeks and watched her wither away until she just stopped breathing.”
“Jesus,” I mutter under my breath. “That’s awful.”