Wild Like the Wind (Chaos #5)(16)
Hound didn’t hesitate at all on his way to his morning location where he journeyed every day, but he did stop at the door that was cracked open. The door to the bedroom that shared a wall with his living room.
He knocked on the jamb.
“You up?” he called.
He got the usual answer, “Yes, sweetheart.”
Hound pushed the door open and further didn’t hesitate to stroll right in, his eyes to the woman in the bed.
“Yo,” he greeted, smiling at her.
She smiled back.
He stopped at the side of her bed.
“What we doin’ this mornin’?” he asked.
“Shower, motek. Okay?”
He nodded. Reaching to the side to grab her walker, he positioned it how she needed it then he moved how he needed to move, pulling down the covers and carefully taking hold of the frail, thin body in its granny nightie.
With practice, they went through the motions until she had her slippers on and her hands firm on the walker.
He turned from her and let her shuffle her way toward the bathroom as he walked right to it.
He checked the angle of the showerhead, the seat in the bath, not that they would ever change position since him and her cleaner were the only ones to touch either, but that needed to be like it needed to be so Hound never failed to check it.
He also checked the towels and moved her shit from where it was out of the way to where she’d need to grab it when the time came.
She came in behind him and he helped her get into position. With practice, he was able to look away even as he pulled up her nightie and yanked down her granny panties that she insisted be put on over the adult diaper she wore.
“Good?” he muttered when he had her as she needed to be.
“Thanks, sweetie,” she whispered.
Grasping his forearms as hard as she could, which was feeble, he twisted his hands to hold hers as gentle as he could and still do the job that needed to get done. He held her steady while she slowly aimed her ass at the john.
Once she hit it, not looking at her, he walked out, closing the door behind him in a way that it was still open a crack.
He had never made his bed. Even when he’d changed his sheets the day before, he put them on, tossed the comforter on top and that was it.
Every day, he made Jean’s.
“Done, Shepherd!” she called.
He threw a pillow to the headboard and walked back to the bathroom.
He left her where she was and turned on the shower so it’d be nice and hot when he got her in there.
And then they danced the dance they’d been dancing every morning for years after he had grabbed a towel and handed it to her.
He never caught a look and by the time he lifted her scrawny body up, she had the towel down her front.
It got totally wet, but he’d bought her a shit ton of them so they could go through three or four, or however many they needed, so she could have her modesty and her shower.
“Shout out, beautiful, yeah?” he told her, still not looking at her and moving to the door.
“Of course,” she murmured.
He closed it to its crack and moved in the kitchen.
He made coffee and checked her pill case. Then her pill stash. She was getting low on a few so he wrote that on her grocery list, saw the list was getting long, so he yanked it off and shoved it in his back pocket.
He looked to her easy chair, saw she’d dropped a book to the floor, so he knew she was done with it. This meant he went to the stack he organized for her in the way she wanted it and did the rotation in order that she had a big pile so that she’d always have one to read close at hand, even if she finished one or started three she didn’t like the way they were going.
He checked her bottle of Baileys and saw she was good with that but made a mental note to stock her up. He cleared the area, set it up for the day including filling the water pitcher, putting out a glass for that, her squat glass for her Baileys when that time came, and then he went back to her room.
Fresh granny panties. Fresh diaper. Bra. Housecoat.
With timing borne of practice, he’d sorted all that shit right when he heard her call him.
Back to the bathroom, she was sopping wet, sitting on her bath seat, the towel held over her front, blinking up at him. Every morning she took her shower, the most precious thing he’d ever seen.
Except maybe Jagger, years ago, a mini-biker wearing his mom’s purple bandana.
Hound set her stuff for the day aside but in reach, turned off the shower, got a fresh towel and they went through the rigmarole that meant she and Hound got her dressed, she powdered, put on her Chanel No. 5, he did up her bra and got her bottom half sorted and then she shuffled out behind him with her walker to her easy chair.
He was in the kitchen starting breakfast.
Two eggs over easy, not a lot of salt, liberal pepper. Two pieces of toast, half burnt and slathered in butter. With that he either opened a tin of some fish that smelled foul or gave her a couple of strips of brined salmon.
He got that shit started and moved to her chair with her coffee and her pills.
She set the comb she was pulling through her wet hair aside as he poured her first glass of water that day, and after she had a sip of coffee and set the cup away, he handed her the pills and glass.
“My sweet boy,” she muttered, took them, downed her pills and set the glass on one of the two crowded tables that flanked her chair in order to go back to her coffee.