“All right,” I said with a sigh. “I’ll go see if Spencer has a robe.” I shook my head as I climbed the stairs. The twins hadn’t been this hard to give a bath to when they were little.
Spencer’s closet was neat and orderly and completely devoid of robes. The best I could find was a button-down shirt. He was taller than me, so it would dwarf Alyssa and cover almost as much as a robe would. I was halfway down the stairs with a white shirt before I thought of something. If she pulled it on after her shower and her body was still wet…
That thought did nothing to help the tightening in my pants, but I dutifully exchanged the white shirt for a light blue one and headed back downstairs. “No robes, but you can use this.”
She took the shirt doubtfully. “Won’t Spencer mind?”
“You’ve got a get out of jail card with him for the next hundred years or so.” I ran through the logistics once more. “Take off what you can without hurting yourself, and then put on that shirt. Then call me and I’ll help with the rest.”
She nodded, her cheeks turning an enticing shade of pink.
In my bedroom, I paced back and forth, reminding myself that my goal was only to help her. I needed to think like a nurse at the hospital. Or an orderly at the nursing home Charlotte and I visited once a month. We brought cookies, and Charlotte spent time with the deaf residents who always looked forward to her visits. In fact—
“I’m ready.”
Alyssa’s voice, made echoey from the tile walls of the bathroom, cut into my thoughts. Slowly, I opened the door. Her shirt and bra were slung over the towel rack, and she had on Spencer’s shirt. It covered her to mid-thigh.
She gestured at her legs. “I tried to get the pants off, but bending hurts so much.” She looked tired. She’d definitely need some rest after her shower.
“Not a problem. That’s what I’m here for.” I knelt down on the bathmat in front of her and stretched the sweatpants so that I could ease them past the top of the cast. Belatedly, I realized that her pink panties were bunched up around her thighs, too. Keeping a neutral expression, I pulled those down as well. I focused on the leg covered by the cast, not the shapely, bare one next to it.
When her pants and panties were pooled on the ground, she made a move to step out of them, but I put my hands around her waist and stopped her. Rising to my feet, I lifted her up and put her right at the edge of the tub. She grabbed onto one of the handrails that Flynn had installed.
Moving quickly, I put the shower bench back down and gathered shampoo and body wash and anything else she might need. I put a towel and washcloth within reach. “Now for the hard part.”
She gave a small sigh. “Pretty much all of it is hard.” The honesty in her voice touched me. My concern was helping her to recover, but I couldn’t lose sight of how difficult and exhausting this was for her.
“I’m sorry, cher. Can you raise your leg a little?” I asked as I crouched in front of her with the plastic sleeve for her cast. “Like you’re going to take a goose step?”
She did so, and I saw her knuckles whiten on the handrail. The shower sleeve for the cast had a big plastic circle at the top, sort of like the embroidery hoops Nana used for her needlework. Then there was a tight rubber seal that would prevent water getting on her cast. I had to stretch the seal wide to slide it over her foot, and then wider still as I tugged the sleeve up her cast. How on earth could any injured person do that without help?
Finally, I got it pulled up over her cast. It snapped into place, and I tried not to notice how it made the hem of the blue shirt rise up. “All set.”
By this point, Alyssa looked like she’d prefer a nap to a shower, but I suspected she’d feel better after she was clean. I lifted her up, as I had many times this week, but it was different now. The backs of her thighs were bare as I cradled her against me. Gently, I set her down. “I’ll be just out in the room if you need me, or if you feel like you’re going to fall.”
She nodded as she clutched the handrail inside the shower. “Um… could you leave the door open? Just in case?”
“Sure.” As I pulled the shower curtain closed, I saw her start to undo the top button of Spencer’s shirt.
I felt like an anxious parent as I listened to her progress. As I sat on the edge of her bed, I heard the water go on. My bed, I meant. It was funny how I already thought of it as hers. Then the tone of the water changed, and I wondered if she’d taken the handheld showerhead off the wall. She still couldn’t bend her leg, but hopefully she could perch on the edge of the shower seat and have her leg stick straight out in front of her. That damn shower sleeve had better do something besides cut off her circulation.