Chapter 39
Emily tucked the children in. Her mother had insisted that they sleep in her room, which had a bed large enough to share. “I’ll sleep on the couch.”
“No, Mom, I will.”
“I fall asleep there half the time anyway, watching TV. You sleep in your own room. Enough. I don’t want to hear it.
My house, my rules.” She told Emily to eat before driving to the farmhouse and reheated fried pork tenderloin in the microwave.
“You listen. I’m sure Gen Hall has the money to hire a round-the-clock private nurse but there are good ones and bad ones.
If Nella’s in pain and it’s not time for morphine, she’ll need gabapentin, one hundred milligrams daily.
Haloperidol for delirium, once it comes.
I’m writing this down. If she can’t swallow good, give her glycopyrrolate, one milligram every four to six hours as needed.
Stop looking at me like that. You think I worked at a hospital for fun? ”
Emily accepted her mother’s notes.
“Maybe Nella’s got a while, I don’t know, but you tell Gen to talk to her at the end. Hearing is the last sense to go.”
Emily hadn’t known this. It stunned her that it wasn’t common knowledge. It felt reckless that she hadn’t known this crucial fact.
“Don’t worry about the kids,” her mother said. “I’ll see you when I see you.”
It was late and dark. The soft, heavy summer came in when Emily rolled down the car windows.
She heard crickets, the crunch of gravel beneath tires, then the rush of wind.
It was dark, especially on the country roads, but Emily knew the way.
She wouldn’t miss a turn. Gen had always driven Emily to the farmhouse when they were young, except for the time Emily had taken her mother’s keys.
Even so, knowing the way was instinct. Although more than fifteen years had passed since Emily had been on this road, she had taken it many times in her mind.
She had imagined the old beech at the corner, the intersection that led to town and how she would need to go the opposite way.
She had often imagined driving to Gen’s home, if not like this.
Gen was sitting on the porch, shoulders hunched, when Emily drove up.
Two dogs that Emily didn’t recognize—of course she didn’t recognize them; the ones she knew were long gone—bounded up to the car.
They were the size of baby deer. Gen called them back, her voice threadbare.
Emily had never seen her look so tired. It seemed as if she couldn’t stand, so Emily sat down next to her and held her.
Gen buried her face in Emily’s hair. Emily heard the flap of bats overhead.
Gen’s ragged breath. “She lied to me,” Gen said.
“Arthritis. Bullshit. She was diagnosed last fall. She didn’t want me to come home.
Didn’t want to interfere with my training.
Said she didn’t want me to miss my big chance.
” She lifted her wet face. “I am so angry. I am so fucking mad. I feel horrible for being mad.”
“She probably understands that.”
“She doesn’t know. I didn’t tell her.”
“I think she knows anyway. She knows you.”
“What am I going to do?”
“I’m going to help you.” Emily looked more carefully at Gen’s face in the porchlight and saw deep shadows under her reddened eyes.
She asked after Nella and was told that she was sleeping under the watch of the nurse.
Emily remembered the advice she’d read online when Connor was born: sleep while the baby sleeps.
She remembered how hard that had been to do, despite exhaustion.
She told Gen to go to bed. She or the nurse would wake Gen for anything important.
As they entered the house, Emily noticed how it had changed.
The walls were freshly painted. Radiators had been ripped out; discreet vents showed that central air had been put in.
The furniture was new, comfortable-looking, and bright; a poppy-red sofa was strewn with Nella’s afghans.
One striped blanket was unfinished, its yarn trailing into a basket on the floor.
Nella slept in the living room in a hospital bed, equipment arrayed around her.
Her thin hair—she had refused chemotherapy—was like dandelion fluff.
Emily was reminded again of a baby; Nella’s hands were curled into frail, loose fists.
The skin of her eyelids, while wrinkled, had the sheer quality of an infant’s: a near translucence.
The nurse sat nearby, reading a romance novel.
Emily led Gen to her bedroom. Emily paused, slightly, before they entered, startled to recognize a whorl in the wood of the doorframe.
She remembered noticing it long ago, that first time with Gen.
She remembered being filled with desire and nervousness, and how she had thought, then, that after she followed Gen into that room and into her bed, she would change.
She would become a different person. She had forgotten that.
How had she forgotten? And now she was different.
Emily didn’t believe in ghosts, not really, but sometimes she came close to believing, and while everyone assumes ghosts are from the past, it occurred to her that they might be glimpses of the future.
What would the Emily she had been think of the Emily she was now, if the teenager had seen the adult standing on the threshold?
Gen’s hand tightened around hers. Nothing is ever the same again.
Emily loved her more now. She led Gen to bed—the old twin beds had been replaced by a large one—and drew the light summer quilt over her.
She intended to sit at the edge of the bed until Gen fell asleep, but Gen slept almost instantly.
Emily wondered when Gen had last slept. Emily was tired, too, but collected dirty clothes from the floor and explored the house until she found a brand-new washer and dryer set in the basement.
Then she spoke with the nurse, who stuck a thumb in her novel and confirmed Nella’s medications.
Relieved, Emily left the living room and tackled the kitchen.
It was almost unrecognizable—a carnation pink Aga stove, a shiny lime backsplash.
The one thing that remained the same in the kitchen was the big clock with its loud tick.
It ticked as Emily loaded the dishwasher.
It ticked as she swept and mopped the floor.
The fridge wasn’t full but it had some essentials.
A rooster crowed. The sky was apricot. Emily went outside—the once-sagging porch was firm beneath her feet—and let the chickens out of their coop.
The feed was where it had always been. She scattered the feed, the two dogs nosing curiously and largely about her.
Feeling acutely that she hadn’t slept since a nap on the plane, Emily returned to the house, where she went to Gen’s bedroom.
She missed the twin bed that she had lain in that Christmas when she told Gen that she wanted to be somebody.
She wrote a note explaining that Connor and Stella, though they had obediently packed their small suitcases to come to Ohio, were confused by their presence here and needed an explanation.
I’ll be back as soon as I’ve slept. She set the note on Gen’s nightstand.
On the drive home, the cornfields were as high as a human.
The day was clear, the mountains sharp. They looked as though they had been cut from construction paper and glued to the sky.
Her car trailing dirt, Emily saw a sign along the road: Eggs .
A woman sat by a stand. Eggs! Emily had forgotten to collect eggs from the coop.
Later, she would do it later. Pulling over to the side of the road felt like an act of penance.
The woman’s eggs were pale blue. Emily realized that fatigue was making everything seem more than it was.
She was going to have to be very careful driving home.
She was practically dreaming while awake.
She could have an accident. It was good that she had stopped. She bought all the eggs the woman had.
At home, Connor and Stella were in pajamas and sitting at the table with her mother, eating cereal.
The linoleum—the same as when Emily lived here—had peeled up in places.
The room was sunny. Her mother drank from a Styrofoam cup.
“What’s all this?” she said as Emily set the many dozens of eggs on the table.
“They’re blue, ” said Stella.
“Are they robin’s eggs?” said Connor.
“Take a big robin to lay those,” said her mother. “A neighbor brought coffee. There’s a box of it on the counter. Want some?”
Emily shook her head.
“Look what Grandma showed me how to do.” Stella held up a white paper cutout girl. She stretched her hands wide and the girl became many girls, a garland of them, pleated where they joined.
“Better get some sleep,” said her mother, “or you’ll drop where you stand.”
Emily went to her room. The sheets were clean. Emily closed her eyes and saw the paper doll chain, each girl identical—were they identical?—unfolding between her daughter’s hands. Sleep was an undertow. Her room smelled like childhood.
When she woke, her mother was watching television and the children were playing outside. It was late afternoon. Through the open windows, Emily could hear that Connor was trying to catch a garter snake. “But what will you do with it?” said Stella. “What will you do ?”
Emily went outside and said that she wanted to talk with them. They squinted up at her. “Gen’s grandmother is sick and won’t get better,” she said. “Nella will die soon. She’s Gen’s only parent.”
“No, she’s her grandmother,” said Stella.
“She’s a parent, too. Gen’s mother died when Gen was a little older than Connor. I’m not sure if Gen’s father knows that she exists. When Gen was born, her mother lived with Nella and worked as a carpenter. Then Gen’s mother was injured at work and the doctor gave her bad medicine.”
“What kind of medicine?” said Connor.