Page 81 of Catching the Coach
Hudson appears out of his room bleary eyed, rubbing the sleep from them. Yawning, he sees me and quietly pads over. “What’s going on?” he asks, looking around.
I scratch the back of my head. “I’m not entirely sure bud. The pot hitting the wall woke me up, and I came out to find this,” I tell him, motioning to the scene before us.
“Oh,” he says, yawning again. “Mom must be sleep walking.”
I raise my eyebrows. Looking down at him I ask, “Does she do that alot?”
Hudson shrugs his shoulders and walks into the living room, turning off the TV. “It’s only this bad when she’s, like, super stressed.” He nods towards the open sliding door. “She’s probably outside watering the plants. That’s what she does when she’s stressed, she gardens, or runs.”
I lightly clap my hands down on his shoulders, turning him back to the hallway. “Why don’t you try to go back to bed. I’ll get your mom and turn everything off.”
He nods and heads back to his room, he makes it halfway to his door before he turns and looks back at me “Kessler?”
“Yeah, bud?”
“Don’t try to wake her up, it’s not good to wake up people who sleep walk.”
I tip my chin at him. “Got it. Thanks, Hud.”
He nods and goes to his room, closing the door behind him.
I let out a sigh and scrub my hand down my face again. I knew something was eating at Lucy.
I walk outside onto the back patio. Turning towards the sound of running water, I find Lucy. She’s standing barefoot, watering her geraniums in her light blue short sleep shorts and matching tank top, nothing else. Goosebumps rise on my arms from the gust of wind. I don’t know how long she’s been out here, but she’s got to be cold.
I walk over to her and gently place a hand on her shoulder. Her skin feels like ice. She turns and looks at me, a blank expression in her eyes. It’s weird seeing her awake, but knowing she’s not. I try to take the hose from her hands, but her grip tightens and she pulls it away from me and moves down to the next plant, muttering something I can’t make out.
I huff out a sigh and grip the back of my neck. I’m going to have to convince her to go back to bed herself. Walking over to her again, I place both hands on her shoulders and softly whisper into her ear, “Lucy, you’re getting cold, let’s go back to bed.”
She stands there unphased by my words, watering her damn geraniums.
Sliding my hand down to hers I cover it with mine. “We need to get some sleep, Luce. Your plants have plenty of water,” I tell her in a soothing tone.
Her hand releases the trigger on the nozzle and she turns her head to me. “Cold?” she questions.
Thank fuck.
“Yes, Lucy. You’re getting cold. Let’s go to bed baby.”
She drops the hose and turns back to the house, going through the sliding door.
After turning the water off, I follow her into the house, locking the slider behind me. I head back to the bedroom, turning off the lights as I go. I stop at Hudson’s room and quietly open the door. Peaking in, I see him laying on his back, one arm slung over his face, softly snoring. Satisfied he was able to go back to sleep, I close the door and head into our room.
When I get there, Lucy is on top of the covers curled onto her side in a ball. I notice her feet are dirty from being outside barefoot, so I go into the bathroom and grab a washcloth. Running it under warm water, I go into the bedroom and gently wipe her feet off. After I’ve cleaned them the best I can, I pull the covers out from under her legs and pull them up her body, tucking her in.
I wipe my own feet off and toss the rag into the dirty clothes hamper before laying back into bed. Pulling the covers over myself, Lucy turns and snuggles into me. I suck in a breath at the chill of her body. Wrapping my arms around her I pull her into my body as close as I can, trying to use my body heat to warm her up. She lets out a sigh, mumbling an “I love you” into my chest.
I place a kiss on her head. “I love you too, baby. I just wish you’d talk to me,” I whisper into her hair. She lets out a soft snore in response.
I lay there for hours listening to her softly snore, wondering if what Brent said is true, or if there’s something else bothering her. Sleep finally takes over and I drift off with Lucy on my mind.
CHAPTERTWENTY
lucy
It’s alreadylunch time and I plop down at my desk, lying my head down. My eyes feel like sandpaper and my head is pounding. When I got up this morning, Kessler was already awake, watching me. His worry lines were in full force when he told me he found me outside watering my plants last night. I haven’t slept walked like that in a long time. Normally if I do, it’s going out to the living room and falling asleep on the couch, or moving things around in my room or kitchen, not the level of chaos I caused last night.
I rearranged everything in the kitchen cabinets and it took us a few minutes to find where I put things in my state last night. Hudson found my phone in the fridge with the grapes, which I had been frantically looking for in my room, where I had plugged it in last night. I tried to make a joke out of it, but Kessler didn’t laugh, instead he just watched me with worried eyes.
