by Nancy Allan
He blinked, unable to believe what he'd just heard. “What’s happening to you, Amy? In all the years we’ve been married, you’ve never talked to me like this,” he thought a minute and then added, “It’s not like you at all. Of course, we both know you don’t handle stress well.”
She took another sip of coffee, savored the flavor, and inhaled the aroma, praying for revitalization. Mug in hand, Amy turned toward the hall and headed for the stairs.
Dan stood up. “Where’re you going?”
She threw the answer over her shoulder. “Shower. See you tonight, or tomorrow, or whenever you decide to come home.”
Dumbfounded, Dan stared after her.
CHAPTER 4
As Amy drove toward town, she turned up the morning news. Local reports were first, including mention of a woman reported missing near Cape Peril. There’s the publicity Dan’s worried about.
She pulled up to her Grandfather’s ranch style bungalow within the golf course community, where he once enjoyed a daily round of golf with Grams and his friends. Amy parked behind what she had nicknamed, his eight-wheel ride. The van was in the carport, the electric scooter mounted across the extended steel bumper. No room in the garage. It housed a lifetime of keepsakes and memories. What didn’t fit in there had been stuffed into the crawlspace.
At the front door a weathered sign hung above the mailbox, boldly stating, The Haddens. Only one Hadden lived here now.
Amy glanced at her watch and pounded on the door. It wasn’t quite eight a.m., but he’d be up; he’d been an early riser all his life. The door opened and Amy leaned across the wheelchair to give her grandfather a warm hug. He smelled of soap. His craggy face was lined with crevices and ridges; his reading glasses perched halfway down his nose, and the hazel eyes peering over them, danced with delight. “Checking to see if I’m still alive, are ya?” he bellowed.
“I know you’re still alive, Gramps,” she replied. “No point visiting a corpse.” Gripping the handles of the wheelchair, she swung it into the living room, kicking the front door closed behind her. “How’re you doing?” she asked him.
“Better, now you’re here,” he hollered.
Amy motioned for him to lower his voice. He refused to wear a hearing aide. “Sorry,” he yelled.
“Get you anything?” Amy looked at his bony frame and frowned.
“Nope. Had breakfast hours ago. Day’s half over.”
“I can hear you,” Amy said loudly.
“Keep forgettin’. Hardly talk to anybody anymore,” he grumbled pointedly.
Amy curled into a corner of the old leather couch that had been in her grandparents’ living room since she could remember. “Something happened at our house last night,” Amy told him. When she saw that she had his undivided attention, she related what had occurred, pausing occasionally for his reaction. Seeing none, she continued.
Even though Gramps Hadden was in his seventies, his mind was sharp. The two of them had always been close. She knew him as well as he knew her. He was the quiet type—a thinker, not a talker. Until sixteen years ago, he had been an astute businessman, opening his own carpet store just after her birth. Under his management the business had thrived, multiplying into a national chain within a decade. Then tragedy struck. His only daughter and son-in-law were killed. He sold the stores, gave the funds over to an investment firm, and became withdrawn and absent-minded. After the accident, he began spending time away from home, alone, at his cabin. Amy’s laughing, fun-loving grandfather disappeared, although he’d been, and still was, one heck of a card player.
He taught her to play when she was two. She learned that he never revealed his hand, at cards, or in life. In later years, they’d play long into the night, Amy vowing to beat him. It finally happened when she was twelve.
Now the old man’s stoic expression aggravated her. She watched for a sign, a twinge, any reaction at all that would indicate that he knew something about the woman Amy had seen. But of course, being the poker player that he was, he revealed nothing. Amy concluded by repeating Sheriff Wayburne’s summation. “…the car was pushed over the cliff.”
He sat perfectly still. They eyed each other. Silence hung heavily between them. Amy watched for an indication he knew something. Finally, she saw it in his eyes. A flicker. Was it fear? Knowledge? What?
He cleared his throat. “Amy, I think it best if you to take Jamie and go away for a while.”
Amy stood up. “That’s the second time I’ve heard that today.” She began pacing across the worn living room carpet, never taking her eyes off her grandfather. “Why do you want me to go away?”
“Safer,” he said quietly, looking down. “For you and Jamie.”
Amy caught the fear in his voice. “Safer? What do you mean?”
He looked up at her, grimacing. “They could come back.”
“They?”
He shook his head.
“Gramps,” she stopped where she was. “Who is they?”
He covered his eyes with his hands and shook his head.
Amy whirled on him, “Gramps, tell me what you’re not telling me!”
He sat stubbornly silent. Then he whispered, “How about a coffee?”
Amy glared at him. “Coffee! I want to hear something that makes sense. There was a woman at our house last night that looks just like me. Do you know who she is?”
“What does it matter? Doubtful you’ll see her again.”
“Are you saying you know who she is?” Amy sat down in front of him, watching him, waiting out his silence.
He twisted uncomfortably in the stainless steel chair. “I’m not sure who you saw, Amy,” his voice was barely a whisper, “but I know you have to be extremely careful now. You and Jamie.” Their eyes locked. Neither moved. Finally, the old man reached for her hands. “Amy”, he paused, struggling to find the right words. “I can’t tell you much, but what I can say is this. Horrible things have happened to our family in the past. Accidents. Your parents’ death, my fall at the cabin…other things…” he struggled, agonizing over how to explain.
Amy squeezed his hand. “Gramps, those were accidents. Accidents happen to people now and then. What do they have to do with this?”
He rubbed the back of her hands with his thumbs and when he looked up, Amy saw the pain in his eyes. “Please, Amy, take Jamie and go somewhere safe.”
She stared at him, and then pulled her hands from his grasp. “I’m not going anywhere. Jamie’s in school and I’ve got a big project to finish. I need to find out who this woman is.” She searched his weathered face knowing he was holding back. “I need answers, Gramps. I came here for your help.”
The old man leaned back in the chair and rubbed his leg with gnarled knuckles. He always did that when she asked him for something he wouldn’t, or couldn’t, give. Recognizing the motion, she sighed and pushed herself off the sofa. He could be so damned stubborn. There was something he wasn’t telling her. “Damn!” Her arm flew out, sending a golf trophy crashing to the floor. “How can you just sit there after what’s happened and not help me? You’re holding back. Whatever it is, I need to know. Gramps, please!”
His determined expression hurt. She didn’t understand it, but she knew it was pointless to pursue it right now. Reluctantly, she gave in. “All right, I’ll make coffee,” she said, picking up the bronze trophy and placing it back on the shelf.
Handing Gramps his mug a few minutes later, Amy sank back into the couch. They sipped in silence, each deep in thought.
Gramps spoke first, “What’s Dan say about all this?”
“He’s worried about bad publicity.”
“Asshole.”
Amy added, “And he wants me to go away for a while.”
Gramps’s eyebrows shot up, “First thing he’s said in years that makes sense,” he scratched his chin and added under his breath, “the egotistical prick.”
“Don’t get started on Dan. You two never did like one another, but this isn’t the time to get int
o that.”
“Well, I’ve got my reasons,” he said peering over his glasses.
Amy never did know what those were and Gramps never did tell her. She had always assumed in was simply a mutual dislike between the two men.
Gramps continued, “I keep telling you to stand up to him. He pushes you around. Talks down to you. Treats you like live-in help. You deserve better than that, Girl.”
Amy stood abruptly. She didn’t want to hear anymore. “Enough of this,” she said. “Want to come with me?”
“Where to?”
“We’ll go see Grams.” She saw his face fall. Grams was the love of his life. They’d been together forty-five years when Alzheimer’s—at least that’s what they thought it was—took hold of her. Amy knew it pained Gramps to see her like that.
“What would I want to see her for?”
Amy tipped her head sideways and frowned.
He leaned forward in the wheelchair. “Now don’t you go giving me that look of yours. You know darned well the woman’s lost her marbles. She doesn’t know who I am anymore. Last time I was there she thought I was the janitor. Told me to stop gaping at her and start sweeping.”
“Maybe it was a hint.”
“Now don’t go getting surly. She’s best left alone.”
“That’s the last thing she needs, Gramps, and you know it. If there’s even a chance for Grams, we need to do all we can for her.”
“You go ahead. I figure if I hang around that place, I could end up in the next bed. Not good for a person’s health, getting too close to those places. Besides,” he cleared his throat noisily. His voice broke and he looked down, “I’d rather remember her the way she was.”
Amy bent down and wrapped her arms around his frail frame, hugging him. “Want anything before I go?”
He looked up. “How ‘bout a round of poker.”
Amy laughed in spite of herself and stopped at the front door, looking back at him fondly. “Soon, Gramps. Take care.”
CHAPTER 5
Amy swung the Jeep Cherokee onto the US101 for the ten-mile drive down the Oregon coast highway to the Summerset Meadows, the special care facility that had been her grandmother’s home for the past few years. The neurologist couldn’t be sure Cynthia Hadden had Alzheimer’s, as test results hadn’t proven it conclusively, but she had many of the symptoms. At the very least, he said it was dementia.
As Amy drove, she reflected upon her grandfather’s reaction. She was sure it had been fear she’d seen in his eyes. But why? She considered the traumas he had suffered over the years. He’d lost his only daughter in a tragic car accident. Her death had almost broken him. He was close to his son-in-law, making it a double tragedy. Shortly after, Gramps had the fall at the cabin that had broken his right leg and crushed the left. Then, a few years ago, he’d lost Grams to Alzheimer’s. Now, he’s probably afraid he’ll lose Jamie and me, and we’re all he’s got left. Still, there was more than fear in his eyes and in his voice. There had been something else, a flicker of recognition. Gramps knew something. And if he knows, then Grams knows. Or did.
Still pondering this, Amy parked in the vast parking area in front of the sprawling facility. She hurried up the long walk, up the front steps, and through the busy lobby where she signed in before climbing the stairs to her grandmother’s floor. The private room was airy and bright with a large ocean view window that provided a distant vista of the rugged coastline. The older woman, her tiny frame clothed in sweats, sat in a chair staring blankly through the thick glass, a blanket draped across her lap, her eyes fixed on the horizon.
Amy assessed her from the doorway, searching as always, for some sign of improvement. Cynthia Hadden’s sparkle and intelligence were gone. The essence that made her the special person she once was, had been stolen by the destructive process of the disease. Yet, her beauty remained, diminished only minimally by Mother Nature. Studying her profile, Amy could see that even though her grandmother was in her seventies, she was still attractive. She had passed those unusual features on to her daughter, and to Amy.
And perhaps… to someone else.
“Grams,” Amy called to her. The white head turned slowly; two gray eyes searched the room and found Amy, but they showed no sign of recognition. Amy pulled up an armchair and sat down opposite her grandmother. "Came by to talk, Grams.”
The old woman dropped her chin and eyed her suspiciously. Amy waited for her grandmother to adjust to Amy’s presence, and then choosing her words with care, she began talking about her mother. Gently, Amy placed a photo of her mom on her grandmother’s lap blanket. The older woman stared at it blankly at first, and then with shaky fingers, she plucked it off the blanket and turned it to the light. A smile eased the tension from her face. “Sharalynn,“ she whispered.
Another strange aspect of the disease was her Grandmother’s inability to remember who Amy was, but with a struggle, the older woman could often recall the years prior to Amy’s birth. Amy wasn’t sure where the line was drawn, or whether it was simply a foggy zone where memory fragments drifted in and out.
“Sharalynn’s wedding day,” Amy reminded her.
Grandma Hadden’s eyes seemed to look inward. “Small wedding…our garden.” She rubbed the photo with the tip of her index finger.
Amy encouraged her. “Yes. You lived in Beaverdale then.”
“Beaverdale…by the bridge.”
Amy grew hopeful. If her grandmother could remember her daughter’s wedding, maybe she could remember her daughter giving birth, just six months later. “That’s right! We had to cross the bridge to get to your house.” Amy pulled a baby photo of herself from her purse and slipped it into the elder woman’s other hand. “Sharalynn had a baby girl.”
Her grandmother inspected the second photo, her face brightening once more. “My pretty--“ she twisted in her chair. “Can’t remember...”
Amy swallowed the lump in her throat. It was so hard to hear those words. Her grandmother had been there for her, always. When Amy’s parents were killed, Grams had pulled Amy into her arms and taken her home to live with her and Gramps. She had encouraged Amy to go on to university, telling her: “You’ve been drawing and designing buildings since you were a little girl. This is your chance to go to university and learn to do it for real. Lord knows, you’ve got the brains.” When Amy graduated with a degree in Architecture, her grandmother was there with an armload of roses. “Now, my dear, you can change the world, literally!”
Leaning forward, Amy placed her hand on her grandmother’s knee and said gently, “The baby’s name is Amy.”
“Amy! Yes…Amy.” The old woman looked up at Amy in amazement. “How’d you know?” Her eyes glazed with sudden memories. “My Amy. Smart…quick like—like...” she stumbled, unable to find the word she wanted.
“Lightning. That’s what you used to say, Grams, ‘quick like lightning.’” Amy realized that the moment had come. She pulled a second baby photo of herself from her purse and hesitated. She was taking a huge chance by positioning two of the same photos side by side with the hope of triggering a memory. At best, Amy might learn something. At worst, her grandmother would simply not understand why Amy had placed two identical photos on the lap blanket. Convincing herself she had nothing to lose, Amy positioned the second photo beside the first one. Now, the two baby photos of Amy were side by side. She didn’t expect what happened next.
The older woman stared at the identical photographs. Her eyes darted back and forth between them. Suddenly her head flew up and she looked up at Amy in alarm, her eyes wide. “The same!”
Amy nodded, “Yes, Grams, they’re exactly the same.”
Cynthia Hadden’s gray eyes darted around the room and her fingers began to tremble. She dropped the photo of Sharalynn. Her hands flew to her face. She rocked back and forth in her chair. “No,” she wailed, “No, no, no!” Amy reached over to comfort her, but the woman’s cries grew frantic. When the nurse came running in, Amy fled, tears streaming down her cheek
s.
CHAPTER 6
As Amy left the US101 at Sanville, she noticed dark storm clouds building over the Pacific and a fresh breeze whipping up whitecaps close to shore. She pulled into an area of estate properties, slowing in front of a sprawling two-story set well back from the road. Amy turned down a long, drive and parked behind her sister-in-law’s Camry.
The front door burst open and Nita stepped onto the porch, her ample arms motioning for Amy to move her car.
Amy grabbed Jamie’s favorite stuffie from the passenger seat and stepped out, the wind whipping her long hair across her face. “I’ll only stay a few minutes,” She told Nita, waggling the toy. “Just wanted to drop Mush off. Jamie must’ve missed him last night. He hates going to sleep without him.”
Suddenly, a small flaxen-haired boy burst past Nita, “Mommy! Mommy!” He raced down the steps, running toward Amy, the wind pushing him around like a toy. He squealed with delight.
Amy knelt and drew him into her arms and his tiny body connected with hers, giving off a penetrating warmth that made her heart swell. She kissed his soft, rubbery cheek and inhaled his sweet scent, then pulled back and looked at him. “Brought Mush.”
He smiled, his little hands seizing the teddy bear. “Can we go home now, Mommy?”
She looked up at Nita, wishing she had the nerve to tell her son, “Yes.” Amy wanted nothing more than to pick him up, put him in the Jeep, and leave. Instead, she said, “Mommy will be back for you tomorrow night, Sweetheart.” She ran her hand through his unruly, platinum curls. “Big hug now.” Two twiggy arms scuttled around her neck and a damp kiss was planted on her cheek.
Jamie pulled back and examined the wet mark with two huge gray eyes that sparkled with mischief. “Bye Mommy, be good,” he told her through a smile. Always a smile.
