Coming Home to Love (Lakeside Porch Series Book 2) (12 page)

Phil sat back. “Give me specifics.”

“I can’t explain it very well, but I think he’s got some really toxic thinking that’s affecting his relationships. Manda’s ready to kill him half the time, but she chalks it up to his personality and says she needs to practice tolerance. You’re sensing something, too, something ‘off.’ He’s acting like a dry drunk, and you know how insane that can get.”

“Any chance we can entice him into recovery?”

Joel plucked at the bed covers with his good hand. “He wants what I have, so I take every opportunity to pitch the program to him.”

“You can’t prevent him from hitting bottom, Joel, but we can hope it’s an emotional bottom, that he doesn’t start drinking again.”

“I know you’re right. He’s got to be ready or it won’t work.”

“Or if he gets really bizarre, some of us could do an intervention.” Phil’s gaze was on Joel’s nervous picking at the bed linens.

“Good thought, thank you.”

Phil patted Joel’s forearm, and Joel stopped fussing.

“So tell me about you, Phil. Catch me up.”

They talked a few minutes more until Phil had assured Joel he was taking care of his health and getting rides to enough meetings without him. A noisy knock at the door got their attention.

Phil motioned Tony to join them.

Tony gripped Joel’s good hand and grinned from ear to ear. “I hear you’re coming home soon, pal.”

“It’s about time you found your Big Book and got back here with it,” Phil’s gravelly voice chided Tony. “Were you chasing nurses on the way or what?” He winked.

“As if. I’ve got all the woman I need.”

“Wait a minute. Someone told me you and Roxanne broke up.” Joel gave Tony a sly wink. “What’s the story?”

“We did. Long story. Right after we broke up, I fell for my physical therapist, Sunny.”

Phil grinned and continued. “You’ll like her, Joel. She’s a cute blond and a very nice girl. She told me she’s almost finished with her doctor of physical therapy degree.”

“Yeah, she was interning here when we had the accident, and I got lucky. She was assigned to my case. Thanks to her, my shoulder’s almost one hundred percent now.”

Joel grumbled and kicked at the covers with his good foot.

Phil and Tony looked at each other.

“Didn’t hear you, pal.” Tony insisted. “What’s up?”

Joel admitted, “Feeling sorry for myself. I think I should be one hundred percent by now, but I’m only about twenty percent.”

“Unrealistic expectations, Joel,” Phil told him. “They’ll take you down every time.”

“Yeah, you need a meeting, pal. You need to focus on what’s going good.”

Tony pushed his copy of
Alcoholics Anonymous
at Phil. “Listen to your sponsor read about how it works and then we’ll have a meeting about the promises of the program.” He pointed a finger at Joel. “Especially the one about uselessness and self-pity disappearing.”

“Wise guy.”

“Tough love.”

Joel nodded. “You guys and a meeting are exactly what I need.”

“We’ll begin with a moment of silence,” Phil said, and the meeting began.

After the readings, after twenty minutes of discussion about the AA promises, Phil asked Tony to fill them in on the progress at the Manse.

Phil endured another round of construction details, while Joel pounded Tony with questions. The more Joel heard, the more he perked up.

"I’ve got the best friends in the world.”

“You bet you do, pal.”

“And I need to say something else,” Phil chimed in. “I am really impressed with what Justin’s doing for Joel and Manda. He’s given careful thought to their lifestyle and their happiness.”

“Manda is beyond excited about the new suite,” Joel said. “She thinks we should live there until we build a house and start a family.”

“And think about what the project is doing for me and the crew,” Tony said. “These are guys that were out of work and going stir crazy.”

“Justin’s got his faults,” Joel said, “but he’s been there for me at my worst, every time.” He shared a look with Phil. “I hope to return the favor very soon.”

Phil took his cue. “Joel, you say that as if you’re expecting a crisis?”

Joel locked eyes with his wise sponsor. “I am. Justin’s not drinking, and he’s doing a lot of things right, but he’s carrying too much baggage.”

“Is he an alcoholic?” Tony asked him.

“Maybe. It’s for him to say. And he’s not saying.”
That’s enough to plant the seed with Tony
. He wanted someone at the site who could observe Justin and talk about the principles of the AA program.

“Here’s what I want to know,” Tony said impatiently. “Are Justin and Gianessa an item?”

Joel’s head swung toward him. The pain made him suck air through his teeth.

“Take it easy, Joel.” Phil rested a hand on his arm. “Do you need a nurse?”

“No, I’m okay,” he croaked. “Just can’t turn my head that fast, I guess.”

“What’s this about, Tony? And let’s remember Joel needs to lighten up, not to worry.”

“Have you met Gianessa, Phil?” Tony followed the question with a suggestive whistle.

“I’ve seen her at a few meetings. Manda has befriended her.”

“Gianessa’s going to help Manda find her wedding gown.”

“That chick knows how to wear clothes.”

Phil chuckled. “I hope she doesn’t pick something all crinoline and poufy. I’m walking Manda down the aisle, and I might have to lean on her a little. You can’t lean on a hoop skirt.”

“Poufy? Manda?”

“Yeah, Phil,” Tony teased, “I think petticoats went out with Scarlet O’Hara.”

“No they didn’t. You see these magazine covers—celebrity weddings with the big princess gowns.” Phil’s hands pantomimed puffed sleeves and yards of skirts layered over hoops.

Tony whooped.

Joel let out a belly laugh. “It’s only been a few days since laughing hurt. I thought I’d never be able to let loose again.”

“See, you’re getting better? They’re gonna kick you outa here, pal.”

“Let’s hear it,” Justin said with quiet authority. “What happened between last night and this morning?”

The face Gianessa turned to him was bereft. Her lips parted, as if she wanted to tell him something, but she didn’t speak.

Instinctively, Justin reached out a hand to her, but something told him not to touch her just yet.

“I’m sorry,” she said with a shake of her head. She flashed a smile at him. “I didn’t sleep well, that’s all.”

“No, that’s not all. I’m concerned.”

“Thank you” was all she said.

“Would you rather cancel our brunch?”

The question shook her.

Justin backpedaled. “Darling, I think we both need a good meal. And god knows I need a lesson in omelets.”

She didn’t even flinch at his slip of the tongue calling her
darling
. He didn’t know why that endearment bothered her, but she’d admonished him several times in the past couple weeks. Still, he hadn’t been able to stop thinking of that word when they were together. For her not to comment when he used it was another indication that she was in pain or in crisis or something just as serious.

He lightened his voice and gave her a warm smile. “What do you say, Gianessa? We’ll stay in and make our own omelets. What do you like on yours?”

That brought a weak smile. “Lots of spinach. Avocado.”

Justin rubbed his hands together. “Let’s see what we’ve got in the refrigerator.” He bounded across the kitchen and threw open the double doors. “Eggs,” he announced and handed the carton to her.

Gianessa ferried them to the island without faltering.

Justin rummaged in the vegetable bins. “Fresh spinach, loaded with sand. This will take some washing.”

“I’ll take care of that,” Gianessa sounded more cheerful with a job to do. She took the bunch of spinach to the sink on the island.

He heard water splashing into the sink. “One perfect avocado,” he continued.

“You don’t know if it’s perfect until you cut into it,” Gianessa reminded him.

“How could I forget? Roma tomatoes?”

“Good choice.”

Glad to see her back in the role of cooking teacher, he asked, “What should I do first?”

“Peel the tomatoes, remove the seeds, and dice. Then do you remember how to open the avocado?”

“Um, I’ll be thinking while I’m dicing.”

That brought a big smile.

Justin finished the dicing as Gianessa started a third bath for the spinach. He came up behind her and touched her shoulder. “I shouldn’t have bought a bunch so loaded with sand,” he said apologetically. “Is there hope for it?”

Something in his question made her lean forward over the sink. She dropped a fistful of spinach and brought trembling hands to her face. Her shoulders shook with sobs.

Justin reached past her to turn off the faucet and drew her close. She didn’t pull away. Instead she turned and let him wrap her in his arms. He felt her hands clutch at his sweater as though she desperately needed to hang onto something.

Justin remembered what Joel had told him in the beginning, that she was recovering from devastating personal losses. He thought about his joking words just before she doubled over the sink, asking her if there was hope for the spinach. “There’s always hope,” he told her.

Gianessa cried harder at that, but her hands opened and she slid her arms around his waist.

Justin was unaccustomed to intimacy, aside from sex, but this felt like intimacy to him. It felt right to search for a way to comfort and to share a dear friend’s pain. He’d only ever done that with Joel, and theirs was a joking, manly exchange. This was, well, he didn’t have words for this.

“There’s always hope,” he said again and bent his head so his cheek rested against her hair.

She nestled her head against his shoulder with a hiccough.

When her crying subsided, he led her to the sofa and grabbed a box of tissues on the way.

“You’re very kind,” Gianessa said tearfully. “I shouldn’t have come, knowing this could happen.”

“Nonsense. Do you think you should be alone with your pain? Where’s the sense in that? What are friends for?”

She blotted her eyes with a tissue and touched his arm with her other hand. “Thank you for understanding.”

He blustered comically. “Well, I’m not entirely sure I do understand.” She didn’t explain. “Just tell me, is this something I precipitated? Or did something happen between last night and this morning?”

“Oh, good god, no, you didn’t have anything to do with this.” She shook her head and plunged ahead. “I got a phone call from an old friend last night telling me . . .” She exhaled, at a loss to continue.

“It might help to share it.”

Gianessa bit her lower lip and made a decision. “You know that I was married.”

“Yes.”

“Les was,
is
, a good man, very principled, very successful in high tech. A major geek.”

Justin guessed she needed to talk a bit before getting to the heart of the matter. “Major in what way?”

“Brilliant, worked his way up to corporate consultant and into top management in one of the research and development firms in the Bay Area. He’s highly respected, and he didn’t deserve the fallout from my addiction.” She didn’t wait for him to ask. “I was an alcoholic—am an alcoholic—and drove drunk one night with our baby girl in the car, Isabella. I had an accident. Isabella was unhurt, thank god, but traumatized. I was injured, arrested, terrified of what I’d done. It was shameful, not just to me but to Les, and it had repercussions in his job. The main thing, of course, was the damage to Isabella, and I couldn’t forgive myself for that.

“Les, of course, immediately filed for divorce and full custody, which he was granted. Unbelievable as it sounds, I was not yet done with my addiction. When I was released from the hospital, I was sent to rehab for a month, rather than jail, thank god. But I had been prescribed Oxycontin for the pain from my injuries, and I got hooked on it. After a few months my physician would no longer prescribe it, so I stole it from work.”

“Where were you working?”

“I was a physical therapist on staff at an exclusive spa and fitness club on the coast below San Francisco. I was caught and fired and had my PT license revoked in the state of California.

“I finally got clean and sober in AA and have maintained that, but it was hard to find work—any work—in the Bay Area. For a while, all I could do was go to meetings, but I needed to support myself.”

“You had no alimony?”

“No. I knew some of the staff at a high-end, New-Age retreat and spa in northern California. I moved there, worked a little job at the spa and sometimes was asked to do follow-up treatment for a client. I did okay, and I worked a strong AA program. The puny income didn’t matter. I was able to live with a woman friend and cook for her—the same arrangement I have with Sara. I was grateful that I had work in my field.

“That’s where I met Joel, you probably know. He was there for a meeting of spa owners last fall, and he liked our set-up. We saw each other at an AA meeting the second night and realized we had a lot to talk about. When he suggested I come east and help him redesign the Spa at the Manse, I didn’t know if I could leave the coast. But I already had no way of seeing Isabella, my beautiful baby girl. I had no hope of seeing her.” Gianessa choked on the word “hope.”

Justin stroked her back. “I’m so sorry.”

“And this has turned into a long story, I’m afraid.”

“Keep going.”

She took a shaky breath and plunged ahead. “A friend of ours in Palo Alto agreed to let me know from time to time how Isabella was doing and to tell me if she needed anything. She has been good about sending me pictures and updates at the holidays.”