Chapter Twenty-Eight
T hursday evening, Brooke walked across the wide backyard and knocked on Nana’s door. “Nana, I have a business proposal for you.”
“I figured you would,” Nana said with a puffy-eyed smile. “Come on in.” Everything in her little back house was navy blue or white—the blue velvet couch, the white damask curtains, and the big blue vase of dogwood branches artistically spilling over in the middle of the round dining table.
“Now, I know that you had a reason for purchasing Camp Dogwood, and I don’t want to step on any toes, but—”
Nana interrupted. “Anna Brooke, I have no patience for this preamble. What is your proposition?”
“I can get a small business loan, and—”
“And you want to buy the place from me.”
“That’s what I was thinking, yes.”
There was a curious twinkle in her eyes. “And why do you think I purchased that old plot of land to begin with?”
“Well, you have emotional ties to it, and in a business sense, a place to stay near Duke’s winery works nicely.”
“Honey. Have yourself a seat.” Nana cleared a magazine from the blue couch and gestured for Brooke to sit. She remained standing like an angel with her white hair, white bathrobe, and white slippers. “You are aware that business decisions should never be made out of emotion, correct?”
Brooke nodded.
“But I tell you what…time passes. And I don’t care how much time—ten years, thirty years, eighty, one hundred, it doesn’t matter. People are not forgotten and feelings do not disappear like the danged morning fog. Mark my words, as long as I am alive, I will always hold love for your grandfather and for my best friends. Sometimes we have to tamp down those memories because they are so very hard to bear. But they are there. They live in our souls.”
“When you and Mother were swimming, it seemed—”
“I remembered,” Nana interrupted. She sat beside Brooke and put a small, cold hand on her knee. “I remembered them all so well. It was like they were right there with me.”
“Is that when you decided to buy it?”
“That’s when I decided that it would stay in our family. And by our family, I am including your young man, Nathan Daugherty. I bought it for both of you.”
“Nana, what are you saying?”
“I am saying that at my age I can do whatever I damn well please. The place has been yours all along.”
“No, Nana. I will take out this loan and I will buy it from you.”
“The hell you will.” Nana stood and turned her back to Brooke. “Do you think your mother has started preparing our breakfast? Duke made me too many gin and tonics last night and my stomach is telling me all about it.” She led the way to the front door, no qualms about going outside in her bathrobe and slippers. “Damn wet grass. I’m going to have your father make me a concrete walkway to the house.”
“Good idea.” Brooke tiptoed alongside her.
“Now,” Nana began, “don’t you think it’s special that you have a connection to that place just like I do? These things should not be ignored. We’ll get the paperwork together and I’ll sign it over to you. You can consider it an early inheritance, but I see it as part of my legacy. Use that loan you’re getting to fix it up and pay the taxes. It’s in your hands now. I made it possible, but with hard work, you can turn it into something.”
Trigger was sitting on the screened-in back porch drinking whiskey when they approached. He stood and opened the door for them. “What are you two up to?”
“I thought it would take her longer to ask, but our girl knows her mind,” Nana said.
“The land,” Trig said with a knowing smile. “Cornelia’s in the kitchen.”
“She did it!” Nana announced as they walked into the oversized kitchen where Cornelia stood flipping oatcakes. “She asked.”
“Well, I’ll be. Good on you, Anna Brooke. And you didn’t even say a word about it.”
“I was figuring things out—the loan, the rest of the renovations. I think Nate is going to help as an investor.”
“I am a genius,” Nana said, picking pieces from the plate and stuffing bites into her mouth. “I saw it all coming.”
“As much as I hate to say it, Dottie Boone had something to do with all this,” Cornelia said.
“Hush your mouth!” Nana accidentally spat a mouthful of oaty cake onto the counter.
“What are you talking about?” Brooke asked.
“Dottie Boone had some sort of vision about a duck,” Cornelia said, “and she was so sure of whatever it was she saw that she called up your grandmother.”
Brooke remembered Dottie saying that symbols were hard to interpret. “She called you, Nana?”
“It wasn’t just the duck. It was also the boy.”
Cornelia flipped another cake before adding, “Dottie said you left camp with the wrong thing—which presumably was Gates Lancaster. According to her, you were supposed to leave camp with my Nathan.”
“Your Nathan, Mother?”
Cornelia grinned and shrugged. “That’s what I said.”
Brooke shook her head. Cornelia’s Nathan , what a strange and beautiful development. “Is that what she saw coming? Me and Nathan?”
“She saw a yellow duck, rubber or plastic, I think, blocking the way of something.”
“It was stolen. It had his phone number on it, and it was my only way to find him.”
Cornelia stepped back from the stovetop. “My word. That actually makes sense.”
“And now he’s back,” Nana said.
“Yeah.” It was a delicious thing to admit.
Cornelia stacked more oat cakes onto a pile that was becoming wobbly with the height as she spoke. “I cannot for the life of me understand all of this nonsense. Ducks, visions. I declare, it must all be some sort of strange happenstance.”
Trigger joined the women at the kitchen island after putting his coffee cup in the sink. “Y’all talking about ducks?”
Cornelia nodded.
“Gun’s still ready if you need me to take care of that injured one.”
“Trig!” Brooke shouted. “Zippy’s mine, he’s healthy, and I love him.”
Trigger chuckled.
“That’s it,” Nana said with a frown. “Not another word about ducks, or I will take that rifle and shut you up for good. This is about family, and business, and futures.”
*
The Friday night band played riffs into the evening summer air, and groups of people swayed and sipped wine all over the grounds of the Saltwater Winery. Brooke set up a table and chairs to the side of the stage, far enough away that she could talk to Nate over the music and avoid the swell of the crowd. Dottie’s food truck was in full force selling Lowcountry Boil in rectangular paper bowls. Jessa and Tulip stacked the corn, pork sausage, shrimp, and potatoes, added extra butter and Old Bay seasoning, then handed it to customers through the truck window. Nana was dancing with Duke, dressed like a flapper in a fringed skirt and a sparkly headband complete with huge black feather. It was the golden hour, and the setting sun cast shades of yellow and orange on everyone as Brooke waited for Nate at their table. She passed the time watching Nana shimmy and Duke beam like she was pure happiness shining onto him like a spotlight.
Brooke felt an overwhelming sense of pride. That was her grandmother out there dancing joyfully, unencumbered by rules and the judgment of others. How liberating it must be to let go of societal expectations and free yourself to dance loose and wide open to the rhythm and magic of the music. Nana kicked her leg out like she was about to do the Charleston, and Brooke smiled at the entertaining old moves. But when Nana went to put her foot down, her ankle bent sideways, limp and useless. Duke tried to catch her, but she was on the ground in a blink. First her hip, then her head. She never even put an arm out to catch herself. The crowd around them echoed Brooke’s gasp.
Brooke couldn’t remember running to Nana or holding her bleeding head in her lap. She recalled Duke looking frightened, seated in the ambulance next to Nana on the gurney as the doors closed. She ran to her car to follow them and quickly texted Nate to let him know he could find her at the hospital rather than the winery. Duke now sat stiffly on the purple hospital waiting-room chair staring into space. As far as she knew, he hadn’t spoken a word since it happened. If she didn’t know better, she would have thought it was Duke who’d had the stroke, not Nana. She tried to hug the old man, but he turned away. She offered him water and food from the vending machine, but he wouldn’t so much as make eye contact with her. His body may be waiting for news, but his soul was either with Nana or back with Amelia at her Patch of Happiness. Brooke didn’t know which.
Life came slamming back into technicolor once Trigger and Cornelia arrived at the hospital. “Mother!” Brooke jumped up and hugged her tightly. Trig stood behind them as expressionless and stiff as a Christmas nutcracker. Brooke worked her way underneath Trig’s arm to hug him from the side. “Are you okay?”
“Where are the doctors?”
“They’ll be out in a minute,” Brooke said. “They’re trying to stabilize her.”
“So she’s not dead?” Cornelia sounded like a squirrel.
Brooke shook her head. “No, but I think Duke might need some help.”
Both parents looked his way. Cornelia sighed deeply and whispered, “The poor man. He probably sat in that very spot when his wife died.”
“No wonder he’s not talking.”
Trig made his way to the nurses’ station and Cornelia seemed torn between following him and tending to Duke. She opted to rush over to the nurses’ station, push Trig aside, and animatedly discuss the merits of the doctors on staff, trying her best to take control. Was there a specialist in the hospital? Were they aware that Grace was a Warter? She must have the absolute best care possible. Additionally, the family must be allowed to see her immediately or they would be in contact with hospital management.
Brooke took the seat across from Duke. “Nana taught them well,” she said.
Duke turned and fixed his watery eyes on her.
“I mean, Nana would do the same thing for you, right? Demand the best care, insist on seeing you.”
Duke nodded sadly.
“It’s what we do when we love someone.”
“I held Amelia’s hand as she died,” he uttered.
Brooke could barely hear him. “What a beautiful thing to do for her.”
“I should’ve stayed alone.”
“Mr. Bradley. I apologize if my timing is bad,” Brooke began, “but I’ve always believed that it’s worth the pain to have had the love.”
“I was supposed to die first. The man dies first.” Duke abruptly stood. “Please tell Grace…” he began, but he didn’t finish. Instead, he shuffled as fast as he could through the automatic doors leading outside of the hospital. Brooke watched him go and wondered how he planned to get home.