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Even if Josh was back home, there were many things to do still. He had chemo during the night, was scheduled to stay another "three" days starting the 27th, blood counts on Monday, and a big Christmas party I wanted to plan. Hopefully I could pull it off in ten days.
"I'm a little tired, Dad." had become one of the most heard sentences around the house.
"Have a nap." I said, feeling his forehead for fever. Nothing, what a relief.
"And my leg hurts." he added. I was not surprised. Dr. Wilson had informed me that it was a common side effect of the chemo, as well as mouth sores, bruising, vomiting, nausea, and a long et cetera.
Josh went to bed after a light supper, and then I faced the "Nut house", also called my home. It was living up to the nickname. The cleaning lady had done her best, but we weren't co-operating. Everything was messy and strange objects were strewn all around: a box of melted ice-cream in the living room, a half eaten slice of pizza, a cassette, a clean spoon, a broken photograph of... me?
Who would have done this?
I let it go, trying to focus on something else. I noticed two small red and blue hands printed on the white wall, most likely Mike's fault.
Upstairs, Hilary Duff's music sounded loudly.
"Jamie, please lower the music, Josh is sleeping!" I called, half-expecting her not to take any notice.
"I don't care!"
"Would you like him to wake up, honey?"
"YES!" Jamie yelled. "Everything's changed and it's all HIS fault!"
I ran upstairs and grabbed the yelling girl by the shoulders, firmly lifting her up as she kicked and screamed and into her room. Then I let her go as I was closing the door.
"Jamie, I want something to be clear to you."
Jamie started weeping in rage. "What?!"
"I know everything's changed, and I didn't want it to change either. But it's not his fault."
"Then whose is it, I wanna kill him!"
"I don't know, Princess, I don't know..." I was crying, too.
I pulled her into a hug.
"But it's not Joshua's. I assure you that. Now we've got to be quiet and let him sleep and get better, and then everything will start going back to normal." I quietly assured Jamie.
"I want to go to the park with you again." Jamie said. "I wanna do it every day. And now that Josh is home you don't have to go see him anymore."
"All right, the park it is." I smiled. "Do you want to go only with me, or can Michael come too?"
"He can come, and Ryan too, and Josh!" Jamie exclaimed, the tears drying in her cheeks as she started looking forward to the trip.
"Oh, honey, I don't know if Josh is going to want to come. He's very tired and sleeping." I said, opening the door to Jamie's room, with her already much more peaceful, and happier.
"I'm not sleeping." Josh came out of his room, rubbing his eyes, and trying to fix his hair, rather thin but unruly from his sleep.
"Can't sleep, Hero?"
Josh smiled sheepishly. "Nope. And I'm looking forward to the park, too."
Jamie bounced up and down. "Yay! Joshie's coming to the park, Joshie's coming to the park!" She chanted happily.
"WhaT?" Ryan exclaimed, coming out of his room. "You're leaving me here by myself?"
"Yeah, sorry, Ryan." I apologised.
"Are you kidding? That's the best news I've heard in months!"
"It'll only be for an hour or so." I frowned, wondering why Ryan wanted to be by himself and hoping it wasn't anything too weird or harmful. I didn't really want to come home to find Ryan passed out or worse.
And I was disappointed that Ryan didn't want us around- though, to some extent, I could understand why.