Page 11 of Before the Bond
“I’m the nurse, yes,” I said with a nod. “Olivia Cruz. You must be Jake.”
I offered my hand. Unlike Maureen, he shook it with both hands, enthusiastic.
“With everyliteralbreaking bone in my body,” he said. “That’s only half a joke, by the way.”
“Jake’s condition can get a little… troublesome,” Maureen said.
“Not that I ever let it keep my spirits down!” Jake reassured.
Jake took over the tour for me as Maureen had to excuse herself to get some things ready. He showed me a few more areas: the dining room (that he claimed no one ever used), a cozy fireplace area that looked out into the fields, and some of the rooms on the upper floor.
As we passed through the hallway lined with portraits, Jake slowed and gestured broadly at the walls.
"Three generations," he said. "Logging, originally. Timber rights going back further than anyone cares to track." He said it the way people said things they'd repeated so many times it had lost all weight. "My eldest brother handles all of it now. Investments, land management, whatever keeps the lights on."
"So you don't have to worry about any of that," I said.
Jake looked almost amused. "Never have. Never plan to." He knocked once on the wooden paneling as we moved on. "That's the benefit of this family, I suppose. We don't run out of things. Just patience, occasionally."
“So where’s the rest of your family?” I asked.
Jake looked at me with interest. “You mean my brothers?” he asked. “Somewhere, probably. Honestly, you’ll hate just how much they keep to themselves.”
Jake paused as we reached the end of one corridor. He pointed to a door that was ajar. Inside was a navy blue bedroom. A nearby end table was littered with medication bottles, bandages, and paraphernalia.
“My room,” Jake said. “Which I try to avoid at all costs, but never can.”
Jake suddenly winced and touched his arm. His legs wobbled but he kept steady.
“Are you alright?” I asked.
“Ah, that’s just the pain acting up,” he said. He tried to turn his grimace into a smile.
“You should lie down,” I didn't say it as a suggestion. “I can use this time to make my general assessment of you, too.”
Jake accepted reluctantly.
Once we were inside the room, I put down my medical bag and did a general physical examination. He was feverish, but on the lower end fortunately. His pulse was slightly elevated and his blood pressure high, no doubt from the stress. Between his symptoms, his records and the way he described his bone pain to me, I was surprised he was walking around the manor at all.
But something else didn’t fit what I was looking at.
Jake sat on the edge of the bed and watched me reach over his existing patient chart.
"You're surprised," he said.
"Pardon?”
"You make a face when you're surprised." He tapped the space between his own brows. "That one."
I smiled. “There’s no clear diagnosis here,” I admitted. “You said you’ve had this condition for a while.”
“A while, yeah.” That didn’t answer the question at all.
“Do you have a ballpark figure? A few weeks? A few months?”
“I think a few months works, yeah.” Jake said, examining me. “Now you’re unsure.”
“My face can’t be that easy to read.”
