“I know,” Dani said. “But it honestly won’t be forever. You won’t stay this way. And a time will come when you think that maybe something else could be out there for you, and I’m here to tell you that lots of patients here found love again, even after thinking that they were too broken and were only half of what they used to be for anybody to care.”
“I haven’t seen any response that was terribly positive from any of the men I’ve met.”
“And I don’t think that’s necessarily quite true,” Dani said, her tone a little cautious. “I think we often view everybody from our own lens. So, if we see ourselves as broken, we think other people will see the same thing. But it’s not true. Everybody sees people from a different perspective, and you have to be open to seeing what they see too.”
“Wow. That’s pretty Zen words coming from you,” she said. “I hadn’t realized you became such a guru in this stuff.”
“I’m so not,” Dani said. “But one of the things I have learned is that our perception often is tainted by our experience, and we need to open up to see that a lot more is to life than just our negativity and our problems and the challenges that we face.”
“Maybe,” Melissa said. “I’m just not there yet.”
“And that’s why I’m here to tell you that you will get there,” Dani said with the softest of smiles. “And, by the way, I’m really happy that you’re here. It’s great to catch up with you.” With that, Dani headed back to her office, leaving Melissa alone with her thoughts.
“Here, Dennis,” Shane said, holding out the empty glass. “We got it down her at least.”
“Was there much of a fight?”
Shane chuckled. “Well, a bit of a fight,” he said. “Seems to be almost a standard response, regardless of how good it is for them.”
“I can understand that,” Dennis said. “We’ve all become big proponents of these shakes. Yet it took time to get the doubters on board.”
“But, if they know it’s good for them,” Shane argued, “you’d think they would step up a little more.”
“Some people will accept it blindly. Other people have been lied to or given such optimistic responses to everything they do that they no longer believe what they’re doing.”
“I think, in Melissa’s case, she’s been given optimistic outcomes that haven’t manifested. So she’s more of the belief that it’s not so much that we’re lying but that we’re not based on reality for our outcomes,” Shane said.
“And we’ve seen that before too,” Dennis said, grinning broadly. He took the glass from Shane and said, “I’ll take it to the kitchen and get it into the dishwasher. What about you? Do you need anything? I think you missed a meal or two today.”
“We seem to get busier and busier every day.”
“Which is also why you need to stop and look after yourself,” Dennis scolded. “You can’t be a mother hen to everybody.”
“And yet,” Shane said, “the longer I’m here, it seems to be the more I do.”
“Because you have yet to come up with your own girlfriend.”
“I work so much it’s almost impossible to even imagine it happening at all.”
“Well, I’m pretty sure that’ll change over time,” Dennis said.
Shane looked at him and asked, “What about you? You’re always behind that counter. You haven’t got a partner either.”
Dennis nodded. “It’s something I’ve been considering, wondering what to do about it,” he said. “But, like you said, it’s not an easy answer when we work so much. The trouble is, I love my work, so it’s not something I want to stop doing.”
“Nope. I’m in the same boat, and we’re needed here,” Shane said quietly. “Both of us. We each have a unique perspective to offer everybody who comes through these doors. And I think it’s important that they see that.”
“How can I disagree with you there?” he said. “It’s amazing just how much people have suffered throughout the years, and all they really needed was a new outlook on life.”
“And that’s not easy to get,” Shane said. He walked over to the coffee area and asked, “How old is the coffee?”
“Let’s put on a fresh pot,” Dennis said, doing just that, as Shane looked down at the food.
“The last thing I need is more carbs.”
“I’ve got some stir-fry happening in the back. If you want some, we’ve got a couple staff members who didn’t get lunch either.”
“I could have a bit of that,” he said. “Not too much though.”
Dennis disappeared while Shane waited for the coffee to brew, then poured himself a cup of coffee and wandered about the almost empty cafeteria. It was a popular place for meetings, and a lot of the patients would hang out here with their friends. But, at the moment, it was relatively quiet. And he appreciated a lot of the time when the quiet was something he craved, and a lot of the time it was something hard to get a hold of because just so much activity was going on, sometimes even live music.
Lance was setting up more and more concerts, and it was a joy to hear, yet, at the same time, silence was golden. And right now, for whatever reason, maybe because of Melissa, that’s how Shane felt. It was nice to see her coming along, but she’d scared him today too, to see that much stubbornness, that much blind obedience, and yet complete lack of regard for her own health and safety.
She had a lot to learn. He knew that he could help her with a lot, but she had to be open and accepting of it. And that was always where a lot of the hurdles were with patients like her. They had to get over that initial stumble and get to the point where they could accept the help and be grateful to get that because then they got thirsty for
