Every now and then life hands you a bag of lemons. As one author has said, "If you have lemons, make lemonade!" I didn't realize that circumstances would set me up to do exactly that. My name is Jack Smith and I am a widower. I'm also financially secure and own my own business.
Amy, my only child, and a close friend of hers, Lois, had been on their way to visit me. Amy had a good heart. Her friend, Lois, had lost her only surviving relative six months before the trip. She hadn't yet been able to put the death behind her. Lois was about ten years older than Amy, but when you are in your late twenties the late thirties don't seem to be that much older.
After driving almost fifteen hundred miles, without so much as a slight delay, it was almost unbelievable that the accident happened just as they got off the interstate near my home. It was a bad accident! The fact that anyone survived baffled the EMTs at the scene. According to the EMTs Amy died instantly. Lois survived, but in very bad condition.
Lois had multiple internal soft tissue injuries as well as broken bones. The doctor's thought that they could get her to the point of walking again but one eye and one hand, both on the right side, would no longer be fully functional. The right side of her face had been pretty badly broken. The surgeons had done a good job, but it was obvious that things were not truly right. She had been on the passenger's side when the big pickup truck hit them. The pickup hit the driver's door and drove the car into a heavy power pole. It was the pole that had damaged Lois. The pickup's driver was drunk, speeding, and driving with a suspended license. His very unhappy insurance carrier would pick up the medical bills for Lois.
Lois had nobody to visit her, except me. Because she was my daughter's friend I felt that I owed her as much care as I could provide. It was two and a half months before Lois was fit enough to leave the hospital. I insisted that she use my guest room during her recovery.
I contracted, with a temp agency, for three nurses. They took eight hour shifts around the clock. I specifically asked for nurses with extreme desecration regarding the patents privacy. As I found out later, they were very good at being quiet.
It was several months before Lois was fit to take care of herself without help. I found that I loved having someone to talk to at the dinner table. Lois wasn't really good at doing housework with a bad right hand, but that was okay. I had forgotten how nice it was to sit down at the kitchen table and enjoy a conversation.
I had told Lois that she should consider herself part of my family. She didn't have to pay rent, or do work to enjoy staying with me. She also knew that I respected her personal boundaries.
Lois was about the same size and build as my wife had been. My wife's clothes and jewelry fit her just fine. I made it a practice to take her out to dinner several times a month. We, jokingly, called our outings "dates" although there was initially nothing romantic about them.
Our routine continued for a year and a half before we noticed the subtle difference. I was seeing Lois not only as a friend but as an attractive member of the opposite sex. She had, unknown to me, found herself thinking of me in the same way.
It was at Thanksgiving dinner that we both learned about each other's feelings. I had suggested that we share something that we were grateful for before the meal. I decided to go first, since it was my idea.
"Lois, I am grateful for you. At first it was only because you were good company, later because I really liked you, and most recently because I have fallen in love with you. You really are very important to me."
An unusual shadow seemed to pass over Lois' face. It was gone in a moment.
"Jack, I am very happy that you feel that way about me! The thing I am grateful for is the mirror image of yours. I have fallen in love with you, as well. With that said, I think we still need to go slow and make sure that we are as compatible as we seem to be. I'm sure that we each have our own little secret areas that will have to be discussed, in time. I will now be able to cuddle up against you when we sit down to listen to music. I pray that all goes well between us."
I was a bit uneasy with her wording. It sounded like she had something significant that I needed to know; but now was not the time to pry.
"Lois, unless you turn out to be an axe murderer or have a husband hidden away someplace, I don't think that there is much that could make me feel any differently than I do now. We'll take it slowly, there is no rush to jump into something that one or the other of us are uneasy about."
