Impulsively, I reach over and squeeze his hand. His skin is dry and cool, but his grip is strong. “I missed you,” I say.
He pats my hand, and a comfortable silence passes between us. I squeeze his hand once more before I let go.
“I suppose you’ve made up with John?” he asks.
I pull a face. “Not yet. He’s in Toronto for the week. I haven’t told him I’m back yet.” I drum my fingers on the arms of my chair. “I could call him, I guess. But it sort of feels like something I should do in person.”
Jim nods absently. “He’s a nice boy.”
We sit out on the porch for a while, watching the trees ripple gently in the breeze. The neighbor’s horses flick their tails absently in the fields, and in the distance, someone is methodically chopping wood.
“It’s good to be back,” I murmur.
I’m not sure Jim hears me. He’s looking out at the view, just like I am, with a faraway look in his eyes. I reach over and take his hand again, and smile as the time slips by between us.
The next three days, I spend every waking moment working.
And yes, okay, that’s obviously an exaggeration. I do take breaks to eat, and do Wordle, and there’s an hour when my brain is so frazzled that I binge-watch like fifty YouTube videos about puppies.
But most of the time, I’m working.
After my visit with Jim, I go see Mrs. Finnamore and Doris toask if they want me to start up my services again. To my relief, they both accept without giving me any grief. I mean, Mrs. Finnamore is a bit annoyed that I’ve moved, because someone’s already bought my old house and she’s convinced they’re going to be a “ruffian,” and Doris makes a comment about how she knew I’d be back, because New York City is more of a place for “brainy girls” like her niece Florence, but I pretend I don’t hear that.
After that, I spend an hour with a twenty-two-year-old guy named Kevin who lives in his parents’ basement in Charlottetown.
Hang on, that sounds bad when I put it like that.
Let me rephrase.
After that, I spend an hour with a freelance graphic designer named Kevin, who I found on the web and who offered to make a logo for my caregiving business at half price if I wrote a five-star review for his graphic design business.
He’s a bit of an intense guy—I make a polite comment about how fancy his computer looks, and he spends thirty minutes telling me how anyone who uses fewer than three monitors is a simpleton—but I actually really like the logo he designs. It’s the outline of an old-fashioned-style house, the kind you see all over PEI with a gable roof and a brick chimney, with a tiny heart instead of a front doorknob. In a circle around the house, it says STAY-AT-HOME CAREGIVING, which is the business name I’ve decided on. I thought about putting my name in it somehow, but I think this is better. Because it’s why a lot of older people get caregivers, and it’s why I want to do this work. So I can help people stay in their homes a little longer.
Kevin also helps me design two flyers, and uses his printer to print out fifty copies of each. From there, I head to the universitycampus, where I wander around pinning my first flyer to every notice board I can find. This one isn’t for caregiver services, obviously. It’s for a part-time job providing in-home caregiving to the elderly. It’s a bit of a long shot, looking for employees, but I figure if I’m going to do this, I may as well go big. And this way, I can expand the business outside of Waldon.
My plan is to be in charge of finding and vetting clients and coordinating schedules, as well as communicating with clients’ families and dealing with any conflict or issues that arise. I’ll take 10percent of any employee profit for doing that part of the job. (I felt a bit squicky about that part, but then I reminded myself of how awful it always was to talk to Debra, and I decided that 10 percent is more than fair.)
It’s a gorgeous summer day, and the campus is bright and bustling. I wander around for a little while, watching the students hurrying from class to class or lazing around on bright green lawns. I could have being doing that myself at NYU in a few weeks. Finding my way to my classes, nervously making friends, hunting out the perfect library nook to do all my late-night studying.
I feel a genuine pang of sadness at the loss of it, but then I look down at the flyers in my hand and the pain eases up a little bit. This is the life I’ve chosen. This is the path I’ve decided to take. It’s not going to be perfect, or easy, but it feels as right as it did when I was standing under the glittering lights of the Met with David stretching his hand out toward me.
I take a deep breath and let it out again, then turn and head back to my car, humming a little as I go.
37
The next day, I make the rounds of Summerside, pinning flyers for clients on every grocery store, church, and community hall bulletin board I can find. The day after that, I paper the town of Waldon. I stop at the local hospital and put up flyers there—most of them are aimed at clients, but some for workers as well—then I make the rounds of the local shops. At the bakery, the cashier brightens when she sees the flyer and tells me that her great-aunt is desperate for some help.
“I’d do it myself,” she says, “but she won’t let me. I think it’s easier for her to ask a stranger for help. She feels like she’s a burden to us.”
I smile and give her my cell phone number, and she promises to pass it along to her great-aunt. Then she gives me a free iced coffee and a chocolate chip cookie.
I walk back out into the sun and head to my car, sipping on my iced coffee as I drive to Jim’s house. I don’t think he’s done any laundry since I left, and I want to tidy up his kitchen a bit as well.
When I pull into the driveway, there’s another car there, a red Honda with a New Brunswick license plate. I peer at it in interest. Jim’s son and daughter-in-law were supposed to arrive yesterday for a visit. They were taking him out for dinner last night at a restaurant in Summerside.
As I climb the creaky porch steps, the front door swings open, and a tall man in his seventies steps out. My first thought is thatthis can’t possibly be Jim’s son—he’s old enough to be my grandfather himself. But then I remember that Jim is ninety-six, which means even his youngest son is in his midseventies.
“Hi, there,” I say brightly. “I’m Emily.”
