Chapter 12 Nelly #2
“Well, still.” She handed me the bag. My hand jutted out to take it automatically. “Put a nice movie on tonight, light the candle, eat chocolate, and tomorrow will be a new day.”
I wanted to tell her I wouldn’t eat the chocolate either, I had no way to light the candle, and the chances of me using the key chain to give her free advertisement was lower than zero, but I just forced myself to thank her in a vague way. “You didn't have to do this.”
“Of course I did!” She grinned. “Is there anything else I can do for you?” She asked, head tilting and eyes crinkling a little. I wondered what she wanted me to say.
Can you rewind time, so I haven’t signed and tear apart the paperwork?
Can you find the cure for cancer?
How about Alzheimer’s?
You know what… you can just stand there and watch me cry until I’m a dry husk of an empty human. How about that?
“I don’t think there’s anything else you can do, Jan, but thank you.
” I blinked past her, eyes landing on my car.
One thing I had decided to do was spend part of the house money on a new car.
I’d walk in with cash—maybe to the same guy who’d given me the brush off two months ago—and stop worrying that my old faithful Honda was going to bite the dust in the middle of the highway.
“Well, you did the right thing, you know. You’d have made a little more money with the other offer, but the Mitchells are going to love that house.
Their agent told me about the letter. I think it’s incredibly sweet.
Normally we only get letters as an attempt to sway a buyer into favoring an offer.
In my entire career, I don’t think I’ve had a seller send one simply as a thank you.
” She pulled the bottle from under her arm and grinned at the label.
“Guess I’ll have a double bottle celebration tonight. ”
“Pour a glass for me,” I halfheartedly joked, thinking this was the end of things and I could escape.
“Of course I will!” She looked at me now with a new glint in her eyes. Any hint of sympathy was gone. I could usually tell when people wanted something from me.
“Great,” I said quickly, trying to move around her. She touched my upper arm to stop me.
“Mind if we get a photo? You know I love to have client pictures!” Jan loved social media.
She plastered her clients, along with house shots and motivational sayings, all over every platform.
I wasn’t going to be her moment for the ‘gram’ today.
She also had a giant push pin board back at her office.
Hundreds of happy smiles. Couples holding keys, standing in front of new homes while they held her giant ‘sold’ sign.
The second I’d seen that display, I decided I never wanted to be pinned to it.
“I’m not dressed for a photo,” I tried to let her down gently. It was true. I’d come to the closing wearing running clothes with my hair pulled into a messy bun. This wasn’t something I wanted to dress up for, like it was some momentous event.
“Who cares about that!” She waved me off.
“It’s for posterity’s sake. I’ve even brought the sold sign!
” She darted to our right, pulling the white and red eyesore from behind two leather chairs.
I hadn’t even seen it hiding there. She came at me with it, nearly dropping the dark green, wine bottle in the process.
“No, I’d rather not,” I said sharply this time.
My cold response sobered her again.
Jan’s gaze locked with mine, eyes narrowing. “Oh, well. I won’t force you then.”
“Thanks for understanding,” I said flatly.
“I guess this is goodbye and good luck then, Nelly. I’m sure things are going to be great for you.
” Her voice was neutral now, until she gave herself a little shake as if shifting her work persona back into place.
“But if you ever find yourself looking for a home in Tacoma, you know where to find me! Tell your friends!”
She turned and swiftly moved back into the conference room.
As I pushed out into the too-warm air, laughter filtered outside after me. Jan and the others were all simply happy to have closed another deal. It wasn’t their life shifting like quicksand beneath them.
When I was in my shitty car, with its rumbling, protesting engine cranked, I pulled out the letter and read it.
The couple had found out the baby was a girl.
They were so excited to raise her in a house with history and character.
They’d fill the built-in bookshelves with children’s books and toys.
The backyard oak was just right for a tire swing.
They were building their own memories, writing their own life story, between the walls before mine had even properly been exorcised.
“Dammit,” I growled, slamming my hands into the steering wheel. Why had everything fallen apart?
My phone began ringing persistently. I’d had it on silent mode during closing, so the sheer fact the cell was blasting its telltale melody now told me who was calling.
I’d changed the settings recently so calls from Serenity House always came through, day or night, whether ‘do not disturb’ mode was engaged or not.
Fumbling for my purse and pulling out the phone, I smashed the answer icon.
“Hello,” I said quickly, pulse pounding.
Grandpa had been getting weaker by the day. They’d transitioned him to a new wing of Serenity last week. He was getting round the clock help now. Palliative care, they’d called it. Every moment, I wondered when the call would come.
“Is this Nelly Shaw?” The voice on the other line was calm, collected.
“Yes,” I managed, voice cracking.
“Hi, Nelly. I’m Nurse Meredith, I work with Doctor Jameson. He’s been into see your grandfather at the request of the night shift nurse. The log shows someone called you yesterday also. They told you about the morphine drip?”
“Yes, that’s right.” Just say it! Say the horrible thing! Say it so I can break apart completely!
“His pain responded well to the 10 mg every four hours, but he began to experience gastrointestinal distress along with severe nausea. It had a sedative effect on him as well, which isn’t uncommon.
When a patient voices the desire to be alert, the way your grandfather has, we prefer to try alternatives. ”
“Grandpa wants to be awake as much as possible,” I confirmed. Did he get to see my grandmother at all today? Was he alone in that room, with only machines beeping and stupid sitcoms on the small television to keep him company?
“Exactly. That, combined with the morphine side effects, has prompted the doctor to shift your grandfather to Dilaudid. Hopefully, he’ll be more comfortable as well as alert.
” The nurse spoke smoothly, clinically. Not an iota of feeling in any syllable uttered.
I hadn’t met this nurse in person yet, and I didn’t particularly want to.
Everyone else had been amazing at Serenity House though, so I reminded myself not to judge this nurse after one phone call.
“Okay, did Doctor Jameson say anything more?” I bit my lower lip, worrying at the skin brutally. I stopped when I felt flaking and the first bead of blood. “Does he think my grandfather is doing better or worse over all?”
Hesitation followed my question. Seconds passed, ticking by and making my heart clench. Finally, she put me out of my misery.
“Doctor Jameson only reiterates what our other doctors have said, Miss Shaw. Your grandfather’s prognosis hasn’t improved. We are hopeful he’ll have more time, of course, but it could be soon. Without treatment, well, we’re doing our best to keep him comfortable.”
It could be soon.
She didn’t have to define what ‘it’ was, not in her line of business.
‘It could be soon’ hung in the air around me as the nurse said goodbye and the line died.
I dropped the phone limply into my lap and stared out of the windshield.
The cars passing on the road next to the title company’s parking lot went in and out of focus.
Blinking back tears, I dropped my head, blurry gaze now trained on my hands.
When had my wrists gotten so thin? I lifted my left hand, touching the bones jutting out.
I traced my fingers up the line of my arm, at one point pausing to circle my elbow.
My thumb was nearly kissing the pointer’s tip.
I was wasting away, and I’d not even noticed. I’d been so focused on everything else.
What I needed right now, more than anything else, was to hug my grandparents.
I drove the Honda out of the lot without really seeing the road.
The dashboard lit up a warning about overheating, but I ignored it, just like I was ignoring the check engine light and the odd rattling under the hood.
I floored the gas and weaved around traffic with zero caution or sense of self-preservation.
It could be soon.
The nurse’s words chased me as I drove across town. I didn’t care about the speed limit. The red lights. The fact I nearly sideswiped a minivan. My vision went in and out. My heart pounded erratically. I wasn’t thinking about the future, or the past, or the money that would hit my bank soon.
All I could see was the color draining from Grandpa’s face, the way his hand had felt when he squeezed mine and told me he didn’t want to spend his last days too weak to care for Grandmother.
But he was already there. We’d blinked, and he was already at a point where ‘it could be soon’. The house was gone. He could be gone.
What if Grandpa died before I could get there? What if I never got to see his face full of life again?
Panic irrationally took over. I turned the twenty-minute drive into ten.
I screeched into the Serenity House lot, shaking so hard I could barely unbuckle my seatbelt.
I ran through the front doors, the cold air slapping my face, and I bypassed reception without signing in as a visitor.
At first, I forgot my grandpa’s room had changed and I went the wrong direction.
I spun around, nearly making myself dizzy, and raced towards the hospice wing.
This unit was so quiet... too quiet. I could hear my own heartbeat thumping in my ears as I rushed down the hall to his room, every step feeling like a countdown.
One, goodbye.
Two, goodbye.
Goodbye.
Three, goodbye.
Goodbye, goodbye.
It was like the world had its own heart. And that organ was desperately trying to keep beating, stuttering over the rhythm, unable to get back in sync.
I didn’t knock before I pushed the hospital room door open violently, bracing for whatever I’d find on the other side.
The world stumbled to a halt.
My lungs refused to inflate.
It took my brain a moment to realize what I was seeing.
Grandpa was sitting up in bed, propped by two pillows, reading an old issue of Alpha Health.
Even though her unit was memory care, Nurse Shay was there keeping him company.
She pointed at something in the magazine, and they both laughed.
Grandpa looked pale, sure, and thin as a scarecrow, but he was alive and talking and—when he saw me—he smiled.
It was a tired expression, the kind you put on to keep everyone else from worrying, but it was enough.
I exhaled, knees buckling, and I had to lean against the wall to stay upright.
“Nelly,” his gentle voice, raspier than normal, floated to me. “You look like you’ve just run a marathon.”
My laugh came out like a hiccup, wet and cracked. “More like took a few right turns in a Formula 1 race.”
“Left turns,” he corrected.
“Exactly,” I nodded. “Otherwise, I wouldn’t look like this.”
“Well, I’ll leave you folks to visit,” Nurse Shaw patted Grandpa gently on one shoulder before walking toward me. “He’s okay, Nelly. But starting now, I’d visit daily just in case.”
I nodded at her, understanding what she meant. This was why I’d gotten the hotel suite nearby. So, I could be here every day, so I wouldn’t miss my last chance to talk with him and hug him.
When she left, I rushed to his hospital bed. I leaned down and hugged Grandpa, feeling his shoulder bones press against my arms. I buried my face in the scratchy flannel of his pajama shirt, breathing him in—the fresh cut grass, the apples, the scent of sickness I wished to God would go away.
For a minute, I didn’t care about the house, or the car, or the empty hotel room waiting for me. I just let myself be a granddaughter, holding onto her favorite person, trying to make the moment last.
I didn’t let go until he did.