Chapter Twenty-Nine
N ate showed up just as Duke was walking out of the automatic front doors. He took the spot next to Brooke and sat vigil with the Warter family in the waiting room. Brooke was grateful she had Nate’s strong shoulder as a pillow, and it seemed like Cornelia felt a similar gratitude for Trig’s. They stayed that way all night. It wasn’t until nine A.M. that they were finally allowed to see Nana. She would need to remain hospitalized for at least another three days to monitor her for brain swelling. The doctor warned them that she looked a bit different and had mild aphasia, so she might be difficult to understand.
Even with the warning, it was a shock to see Nana looking so tiny and gray in the long hospital bed. “Go away,” she tried to say when they all moved as a mass into her room. Only half of her mouth moved. The rest of her face looked like clay that had been smashed downward, closing half of her eye and making the corner of her mouth droop. The words came out jumbled, like her tongue didn’t work.
“Mama,” Trig sighed, pulling a chair up next to her bed while Cornelia grabbed the poor woman’s hand and kissed it. “Mama”—his voice sounded strangely young—“are you okay?”
It was hard to make out the words, but Brooke was pretty sure that Nana called her son stupid. Not much progress was made from that point on. After forty-five minutes, Nana was sound asleep and they all decided to go home.
It was already humid when they walked out of the main entrance to the hospital. After sitting on a chair all night, Brooke could hardly wait to be horizontal underneath a set of soft cotton sheets. She was looking for her car when she saw a hunched figure sitting on a bench next to the road. She would recognize the combover anywhere.
“Mr. Bradley!” Brooke said. “You’re still here!”
He looked up, his face pale and drawn.
“Duke Bradley!” Cornelia exclaimed, jogging toward him. She had both of the man’s hands in hers before Brooke could say another word. “Have you been here all night? For heaven’s sake. You have got to be plumb wiped out.”
He hunched over even more, like his spine had turned to jelly. His light blue button-down shirt pressed against their combined hands. “Is she dead?” he asked in the saddest, most pitiful voice.
“No, sir.” Cornelia patted his hands. “She’s gonna be okay. They just need to keep her for a bit longer for observation.”
Immediately, the tide shifted. Duke’s head lifted, and then his chest. Soon, he was patting Cornelia’s hands instead of the other way around. “Can I see her?”
“Of course you can.” With a quick goodbye to Brooke and Nate, Cornelia and Trigger each took an arm and guided Duke back inside the hospital.
“Are you as tired as I am?” Brooke asked Nate.
“Pretty sure I could sleep underneath that bush right there.” He pointed to the hospital landscaping. “But I’m glad we were here. It was nice feeling like part of your family,” he said. “I can barely remember what it was like to feel that kind of belonging.”
Brooke linked her arm in his and leaned her head against his chest.
“You drove here?” he asked.
“My car’s over there.” In the parking lot was a huge yellow truck with Salty Dot’s in blue curlicue writing. People began exiting the truck like it was a school bus dropping off kids. First Jessa, then Tulip, Fred, and finally Dottie came around the front. The group spotted Brooke and Nate immediately.
“We’re here!” Dottie yelled from about fifteen parking spaces away.
All of the Boones waved enthusiastically, but none of them had a smile on their face. Jessa ran straight to Brooke and took her in an aggressive hug. “We’re sorry, Brooke. So, so sorry. We know how much your nana meant to you.”
Meant?
“We brought it all,” Dottie said. “Everything that y’all asked for.”
“Did Cornelia call you?”
“No, honey,” Dottie said. “We got the email.”
“What email?”
“From the winery,” Jessa said.
Brooke made a confused face at Jessa. “Did Duke send it?”
“It came from the main outreach account, the one we use for customers. It went to the entire list. It had to be either Duke or Libby.”
“Anyhoo,” Dottie interrupted, “like I said, we’ve got the biscuits with tomato gravy, the baked beans, and the corn. Fred made the pork ribs and brought the bourbon. I believe Allie will be here soon with the RC Colas and the wine.”
“Are y’all holding the funeral in the hospital chapel? If I remember correctly, they don’t allow food in there, so we’ll have to find a spot in the cafeteria.”
“Duke arranged a funeral?” Brooke asked.
“It’s okay,” Jessa said. “No one minds that it happened so fast. We just want to be here in support of you and your family.”
It was Nate who started laughing first.
Brooke joined in. “She’s not dead.”
It took a few seconds to sink in, then Fred joined in, chuckling louder than Nate. Jessa looked as shocked as Brooke probably did. “Well, thank the Lord,” Dottie said.
“Can I see that email?” Brooke asked.
Jessa quickly pulled it up.
The title of the email was Potluck Funeral . And the rest of it didn’t sound like it was written by Duke or Libby. It sounded like it was written by Nana herself.
We regret to inform you that our beloved employee and former Miss South Carolina, Grace Sharon Beauregard Warter, has passed on to the highest realm of peace and tranquility. If she were here, she would tell you herself that she has wished for peace for many years, yet no one would give it to her. Finally, God has answered her most fervent prayers and delivered her from this ungrateful earth. In remembrance of our beloved Grace, please bring a food offering to the Charleston Memorial Hospital tomorrow by 10 A.M. Most appreciated would be pork ribs with Carolina BBQ sauce, baked beans, corn, Dottie Boone’s biscuits with tomato gravy, RC Cola, wine, and a large bottle of bourbon. Desserts of all sorts are welcome, except for ice cream cakes. Any woman of stature knows that ice cream should only be served on the side and never in cake form. We look forward to your attendance.
—The Saltwater Winery
Now Brooke joined in the laughter. Nana may have trouble speaking, but the sly old fox’s brain was working just fine.
It was almost ten o’clock, and cars were streaming into the parking lot. Trig and Cornelia were in conversation with someone in a black Mercedes, probably figuring out what Nana had done in the same way Brooke just had. A small crowd was beginning to form by the hospital entrance.
For a full twenty minutes, the crowd kept growing inside and outside of the glass front doors. At least seventy-five people had arrived. Cornelia was red-faced at this point. How did a classy woman explain to folks that her dead mother-in-law was in fact not dead, and furthermore, managed to send an email to every wine lover near and far requesting her favorite foods?
Sheet pans, drink cans, and wine bottles were piled up on every bench outside and every chair and table in the waiting room inside. The whole place smelled like a BBQ restaurant. Hospital staff ran interference and tried to keep the crowd noise low until finally, Nana was wheeled out wearing two blue hospital gowns. One as a dress, and another one open in the front and tied around her waist like a dressing jacket. Her hair was slicked back into her signature black-ribboned low ponytail and she wore red lipstick and a pair of enormous round sunglasses. A nurse or two must have been complicit in her makeover.
Only half of her face smiled when she was wheeled into the room, but even so, it was clear that not only was she not at all embarrassed by what she’d done. In truth, she appeared quite pleased. Cornelia was immediately by her side doing her best to appear calm and nonplussed. The crowd instantly became silent and turned toward the lady of the hour.
Nana took Cornelia’s hand and squeezed it. “Welcome them,” she slurred.
“Welcome, everyone,” Cornelia began, her neck red and splotchy with embarrassment. “Grace is so pleased that you’re here. We do apologize for the—ouch!”
Nana pressed her fingernails into Cornelia’s hand. “No apologies, Cornelia.”
“As you can see,” Cornelia tried again. “Grace is alive and”—she paused to choose her word carefully—“recovering.”
“Where’s Duke?” Nana asked.
Cornelia asked the crowd, “Mr. Bradley?”
Duke raised his hand like a schoolboy at the back of the class. “Here.”
“Tell him to come here.” Cornelia repeated the request since Nana’s tongue was still thick and uncooperative.
The crowd parted for Duke like the Red Sea as he shuffled his way to the front. Nana pointed to a spot next to her and dropped Cornelia’s hand for his.
“Trigger,” Nana called out. “There.” She pointed to a spot next to Cornelia. “Anna Brooke,” she demanded, pointing to a spot next to Duke. “Nathan.”
Both Nate and Brooke went wide-eyed when his name was called. Nana pointed to a spot that would have them all lined up together as couples. Then she waved back toward the door she’d just come from like she was the Queen of England. Out walked a man carrying a leather Bible.
“Tell them,” Nana said to the man. “Welcome friends, and family,” he began. “I am Pastor Thompson and you are gathered here today not for a funeral but for a wedding.”
Cornelia first looked at Brooke, then at Duke. Brooke shrugged at her mother and whispered to Nate, “This can’t be legally binding. Do you want to walk away? We can watch them instead of standing up here.”
“Let’s stay,” Nate whispered back, standing tall and sure beside her. “If it’s okay with you.”
She nodded and moved closer to him. He put his arm around her shoulders.
Duke looked like the happiest of the seven dwarves with his gnarled hand firmly holding on to Nana’s.
Trig looked like he was about to kill someone, and Cornelia’s eyes kept going to Brooke and Nate with serious questions.
“It’s okay,” Brooke mouthed to her parents. As soon as she said it, she noticed a tall figure moving toward the exit from the back of the room. Everyone’s attention shifted to the person who was leaving. Brooke’s heart fell to her knees. It was Gates, and he looked like he’d just walked into a wasp’s nest and had to run for his life.
Between Gates and the panic on her mother’s face, Brooke felt more and more alarmed. Surely, her mother was sick with the thought that her one and only daughter was getting married in such a manner. The woman had been dreaming about and planning for Brooke’s wedding since the day she was born. Actually, Brooke herself had been dreaming about her wedding for as long as she could remember. Even if Nate was the right guy, this was not the way she wanted to do it.
Brooke felt like her feet were rooted to the ground. Should she run after Gates? Should she stay here and say God only knew what to Nate in front of their friends, a great portion of the residents of Goose Island, and a whole bunch of other people she didn’t recognize? Trig and Cornelia looked like marble statues, and Brooke was pretty sure she did too.
Nana had really done it this time. She’d embarrassed them all so much that she had rendered them immobile.