Chapter 8
Diem
Nana had good days and bad days. At her age and with her advanced disease, the bad days outweighed the good.
I treasured every minute we had together, no matter how mundane or frustrating.
I endured her confusion and accepted whatever role she cast me in.
I could be my grandfather Boone one minute and my father the next.
On occasion, I was the boy who lived next door to her as a child.
I was the man who delivered the mail in the sixties.
The cousin she hadn’t seen in four decades.
Her nurse, a doctor, a long-dead friend’s ex-husband.
Once, I was the guy who read her meter when she lived on her own.
On good days, I got the privilege of being her grandson, for a few minutes at least.
Donna arranged for me to view Evergreen’s security footage on Wednesday morning.
I didn’t know how she talked her director into agreeing, considering it was usually one of those points of contention that required the police to get a warrant, but I didn’t ask.
The director had agreed, and I had my appointment.
I suspected that having one of their residents scammed out of tens of thousands of dollars by a boy claiming to be Elwood’s grandson, a boy who managed to enter the property not once, not twice, but three times without being ID’d by the reception staff, had raised the alarm.
The police weren’t doing much, and Benaiah was rightfully pissed.
If word got out, it would look bad for the home, and the director knew it.
Letting a PI do some internal investigating was in their best interest. So what if I viewed their security footage?
Hopefully, I would get a look at the kid posing as Elwood’s grandson and figure out my next step in the investigation.
Maybe I’d be able to track him down and put an end to this before he struck again.
I was more likely to hit a wall. Either way, my involvement kept Benaiah happy and hopefully silent, which was probably the only reason I was permitted access to the footage at all.
Before I met with Evergreen’s director and the head of security, I wanted to pop in to see Nana. I had no idea how often my father visited, or if it was always early in the morning, but his truck wasn’t in the lot when I pulled in, so I took a chance.
I usually stuck to evenings or weekends and sensed my father avoided those times on purpose. We danced around one another like we’d been doing all our lives. Chance run-ins ended in the same way as a cold front and a warm front colliding on a spring evening. With a boom.
The scent of breakfast filled the air as I got off the elevator on the second floor, a cumulation of smells that did nothing to stir my appetite.
The residents at Evergreen were well taken care of.
The meals were suitable for the ageing crowd, but something in the fragrance reminded me too much of a hospital or high school cafeteria to be appealing.
Plus, I was in the minority when it came to the scent of coffee.
I drank it when there was no other caffeine option available, but the scent wasn’t euphoric.
It didn’t break my head like it did Tallus’s.
The smell of coffee was a permanent fixture at the nursing home, like it had long ago embedded itself into the paint.
I found Nana in the common room, sitting in a plush, floral chair that was likely older than me. Doilies and crocheted lap blankets in a rainbow of colors filled the area. Warm wooden accents gave the room a softness that I assumed appealed to the geriatric crowd.
Nana had been dressed in beige slacks and a dusty-rose knitted sweater. A gold chain circled her neck, pearl earrings decorated her lobes, and someone had helped her apply lipstick. She must have felt like dressing up today, and god help anyone who told her no.
The only incongruous feature was the bedroom slippers covering her dainty feet, the kind with sticky bottoms so she wouldn’t slip when she walked.
Nana used a walker on good days, shuffling along at a snail’s pace.
The walker sat within reach today, ready for her next excursion.
Its presence told me enough without my having to ask a nurse how she was doing.
On bad days, she used a wheelchair or stayed in bed.
Nana cradled a brass five-by-eight picture frame between her hands.
It held a sepia-toned image of my grandfather Boone in his army uniform.
That particular photograph used to sit on the mantel when she lived with my father.
It was taken not long after he enlisted.
1941. Boone was eighteen years old. He wouldn’t meet Nana until after the war, but that wasn’t how she remembered it.
It was no wonder that my grandmother often mistook me for Boone.
The resemblance was uncanny, like looking in a mirror.
The man in the photograph might have been close to two decades younger than me when the picture was taken, with a pencil mustache that was no longer in style, but we could have been twins.
Nana’s attention was on the photograph. She didn’t sense Echo’s and my presence, lingering behind her. She was lost in another time, in another place, studying the image of a man who had been more of a father to me than my real dad. A man who had died close to fifteen years ago.
I had time to absorb Nana’s contorted features and watched her trace Boone’s square jaw with a trembling finger. I had time to listen to her softly mutter words as she told her long-dead husband she’d received his recent letter and couldn’t wait to see him and asked when he was coming home.
In Nana’s broken mind, Boone was away at war. For whatever reason, this was how she processed his death. She imagined he’d gone back to the front line and would come home again soon. She waited endlessly for letters. For his return.
I deposited myself on the dated couch, caddy corner to the chair. A ceramic mug filled with a watery brown liquid grew cold on the side table. I assumed it was a long-forgotten coffee.
“What’s that you’ve got?” I leaned forward to see the picture better.
Nana’s confused gaze took me in. “Well, there you are.”
“Here I am. How are you, Nana?”
“I’m swell. Oh, you brought Dianna. Hello, pup-pup. What a good girl.”
“Her name is Echo, Nana, remember?”
Nana frowned and stared at Echo for a moment before shifting her attention to my face. She still didn’t seem to recognize me, but that was typical.
“Do you know who I am?”
She tsked and waved a dismissive hand. “Of course I do.”
When she didn’t give me a name, I knew she didn’t. With Boone’s photograph in hand, I could only assume I would take on his role.
“Where did you get that?”
“Oh, it was in the closet. The nice boy found it for me. He was looking at all your pictures. You were so strapping in your uniform. Did you know I’m having a party?”
“I did. It’s going to be your birthday.”
She made a giddy noise of delight that made me smile. “Isn’t it wonderful? Is there going to be dancing?”
“Oh, probably. Tallus is planning it, so it’s going to be extravagant.”
“You should wear your uniform, Boone. It’s so handsome on you.”
“Not sure it fits anymore, Nana.”
“Oh, pish-posh. You won’t know until you try.”
I wasn’t sure the uniform existed anymore. Boone had been gone for ages, and the amount of Nana’s belongings we had moved to the home was minimal. If it was sitting in a box somewhere, that box was likely in my father’s basement, and it would be a cold day in hell before I went looking for it.
Besides, the thought of playing dress up in Boone’s uniform made me uncomfortable.
“Who did you say found this for you?” I took the frame from her so I could look at the picture. So far as I understood, Nana’s albums were still at my father’s house.
“The nice boy. You know. The one giving me a party.”
“Tallus?” I wasn’t aware Tallus had done such a thing, but Nana was likely mistaken. Nice boy could refer to anyone who presented masculine and paid her attention.
Nana clucked her tongue. “I don’t remember his name. But I know you.” She waggled a shaky finger, tittering again. “Oh, Boone. Would you like some coffee? I sure would. It’s right there. Be a dear.”
“It’s probably cold, Nana. Do you want a fresh one?”
“Oh no. It’s fine.”
I passed her the ceramic mug, ensuring she had hold of it before letting go.
She turned her attention to the drink, so I studied Boone’s face in the faded picture, making a mental note to ask Tallus if he planned to have music and dancing because Nana might enjoy it.
He might have told me already, but I wasn’t retaining much information when it came to the party.
“Mr. Krause?”
I glanced away from the photo to find a bejeweled woman standing off to the side of the seating area.
Her gaudy ensemble and rhinestone-emblazoned frames reeked of pretension.
Ruby Kensington was a squat woman in her early fifties.
She wore a calf-length skirt and silk blouse that needed to be done up a smidge higher lest her god-given assets tumble free.
I feared the slightest wrong movement might perpetuate an avalanche of life-scarring proportions.
Evergreen had a no scent policy, but I imagined Ruby was the type of woman who bathed unashamedly in noxious floral scents on her days off.
Once she had my attention, she waved to the elevator. “This way.”
I set the picture frame on the end table since Nana was still drinking her cold coffee and kissed her silver curls. “I’ll come back and say goodbye before I leave.”
Nana didn’t respond, eyes glazed over, no doubt lost in time gone by.