by Cassia Leo
But wait. Dane hadn’t met her. Grandma needed to meet Dane! Why hadn’t she thought of it before? She broke free of the embrace. “Dane, take me to her house.”
“Is something wrong?”
She clutched his hand. “I need you to meet her, before it’s too late.” She began dragging him to the front door, then remembered his motorcycle. “Your bike is here, right?”
“In the back.”
She changed directions. “That will be faster.”
Beatrice leaned against the counter, shaking her head. “It’s all right. Take the morning off.”
Stella stopped. “I’m sorry. Will you be all right?”
“Of course I will. You go on. Introduce your boy to Grandma. She can still hear, even if she doesn’t open her eyes.” Beatrice absently rearranged the desk supplies by the register. “Be mindful what you say.”
“We will.” Stella tugged on Dane. His bike was parked by the back door. “I don’t know why, but I feel like we have to hurry.”
“I am good at speed.” He rolled the bike out the door and threw his leg over the seat. “Hang on.”
Stella jumped on behind him and grasped his belly tightly. She laid her head in that perfect spot between his shoulder blades, her cheek against the back of his heart. He fired up the motor, and they lurched forward, zooming down the alley to connect with the back street.
“Which way?” he shouted.
“Right on Cherry Street. Blue house on the left.”
Stella’s sense of urgency increased as they approached the driveway. Dane had barely come to a stop before she leapt from the bike and dashed up the walkway.
The door was locked, so she fumbled in her purse for the keys.
Dane caught up with her. “Hey, slow down.” He pulled her to him. “Take a breath. One minute isn’t going to change anything. This doesn’t happen suddenly. Someone would have called if it was close.”
“What do you mean, it doesn’t happen suddenly? She was talking two days ago!”
“The time from when they stop talking to when they stop breathing is a couple days.”
Stella rushed into the living room, immediately spying the form of her grandmother. A nurse sat in a rocking chair next to her, reading a book.
Seeing Stella’s alarm, she closed the cover. “She’s no different. No need to panic.”
“Has she woke up?” Stella reached for Grandma’s hand as though she hadn’t seen her in months, years, even though she’d been there just an hour ago.
“I don’t think she will at this point. Blood pressure is down again.”
“How long?” Stella watched the gentle flicker behind Grandma’s eyelids. If only she’d open them, just once!
“You never really know. But I’d guess one to three days,” the nurse said.
One day! Stella stole a quick peek under the covers at her grandmother’s legs as though the discoloration might be a barometer. They didn’t seem to have changed. She kept having this vision of the purple creeping to her knees, her thighs, and eventually taking her over.
Dane’s hands encircled her upper arms, squeezing lightly. “She’s a lovely lady.”
“You should see pictures of her as a girl,” Stella said. “A showstopper.”
“You take after her.”
Stella knelt by the bed. “I don’t hold a candle to her. She was kind to everyone. You just wait. The whole town will be at her—” God, she’d almost said it. Right in front of her.
Dane got on his knees beside her. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Grandma Angie.”
“This is Dane,” Stella said. “The one we talked about.”
Still nothing. Stella washed over with disappointment. She had hoped that maybe this would wake her up a little, sharpen her enough to cut through the morphine, just for a moment.
“We’re getting along real well, Grandma, just like you said.” Stella stole a glance at Dane. “Too bad you’re not up for taking a look at him. You wouldn’t be sorry.” Her voice broke a little. Damn emotion. “He’s a real looker.”
“A bodacious babe,” Dane chuckled. “You know, I haven’t missed the Valley speak at all since I’ve been to Holly.”
“They string you up for talking like that,” Stella said.
“I can believe that.”
They shouldn’t talk of that either. “Isn’t his voice a lovely thing, Grandma? I’m glad you at least get to hear it.” She nudged Dane. “Talk some more.”
“I never was much for pretty words,” Dane said.
Stella nudged him again.
“But I do come from Texas. I work on motorcycles.” He glanced down at Grandma and covered Stella’s hand so that they both held on to Angie. “My mother passed on just a month ago. I’d be mighty appreciative if you brought along a greeting to her should you cross her path.”
And Stella felt it. The tiniest twitch in Grandma’s hand. She lifted it, along with Dane’s, to kiss her fingers. “She moved!” She swallowed thickly, vowing not to cry. “Thank you, Grandma, for letting us know you heard him.” She looked to heaven. “And thank you, too.”
***
15: Ryker’s Warning
DANE closed the door gently behind him. His mother had been a chronic door slammer, and he’d always hated the sound. Sometimes he imagined that was why his father had left them when Dane was little. One too many slammed doors.
Ryker sat at the kitchen table, his boot propped on one of the rickety metal chairs. He rolled a bottle of Miller Light between his palms. He’d been peeling the label, and it flapped with each movement. They hadn’t seen each other all day, as Ryker had the afternoon off.
“Get through a day without anybody slicing a chunk out of you?” He tugged a fresh bottle from the six-pack and tossed it to Dane.
The throw was low, but Dane managed to snatch it before it hit the ground. Ryker normally had good aim. He must have had a few. No way to tell from the empties. The kitchen was a sea of brown bottles reclining in various positions, like whores in a Wild West brothel.
“Dick is intact.” His workday had been uneventful, and for that he was damn grateful. He’d finally gotten that Yamaha running smooth again.
Ryker kicked the chair out from under the table and pushed it toward Dane.
Dane turned the seat around and straddled the back. “What’s up?”
Ryker pondered the label on his beer a moment, then tore the rest of it off. “Some information has come my way.” He flicked the paper on the floor. “Seems there’s going to be more where that cut came from.”
Dane leaned on the chair, the bottle loose in his fingers. “Why they got to keep this going? I’m clear of Darlene.”
Ryker set the beer on the table. “Remember when Mom dated Mike, that asshole plumber?”
Dane grunted.
“Yeah. How many times did she try to quit him?”
Dane downed a swig. “Five, maybe.”
“He just kept coming back, angrier every time.”
“She should have kept it clean. I’m keeping it clean.”
Ryker leaned forward on the table. “That’s the thing. It’s clean to Darlene, and it’s clean to you, but it’s not to Bobby Ray. He thinks as long as you’re still seeing Stella, he’s got an ax to grind.”
Dane pushed the chair away to pace the kitchen, kicking pizza boxes out of his way. “We ought to bulldoze this pigsty.”
Ryker jumped up, grabbing Dane by the shoulder. “You’re not listening. I think they’re going to fuck you up. Bad.”
“I’m not going to live my life in fear of sons of bitches like Bobby Ray.”
“You don’t have to be afraid to see the handwriting on the wall.”
“I’m not giving up Stella.”
Ryker pushed Dane away and plunked back down in the chair. “She better be worth it.”
Dane sat down opposite him again. “Look. He had a thing for her. That’s all. He’s just pissed right now. He’ll get over it.”
Ryker shook his hea
d. “These people don’t have anything else to do or think about. They’ll keep it going just for the hell of it. So they aren’t bored. Or thinking about what shit their life is.”
“So what are you saying? I should get out of town? Just leave?”
“Maybe.”
Dane crossed his arms over the back of the chair and laid his head down. “Stella is planning on blowing out of here.”
“Well, problem solved. Leave with her.”
“I’ve known her less than a week.”
“So what? You can see if it works. If not, take off.”
“Why is leaving the solution to everything for you?”
Ryker stared at him, stunned, and Dane realized what he’d said. “I didn’t mean it like that.”
Ryker plucked another beer out of the carton and popped the top on the edge of the table. “You always acted like I was cut from the same cloth as Dad.”
“Didn’t mean it like that.”
Ryker took a long pull on the beer. “You going to be fucked up all your life over that?”
“Don’t plan on it.”
“You’re doing a mighty fine imitation of it, then.”
Dane lifted his head. “I hardly knew the man.”
“And you always hated that I knew him longer.”
Dane didn’t want this. Not now, not really ever. “Dad did what he had to do. Mom was no picnic.”
“You got that right.”
Cars rumbled by outside. Holly began its slide into night, quieting down by degrees. Dane remembered when his mother died. “Your father” was all she’d managed. Last words on her lips were about that bastard.
Ryker rocked the chair back on two legs. “At least lay low, brother. Try to get off everybody’s minds.”
***
16: Goodbye
STELLA couldn’t get Dane out of her mind. Once again, two days had passed since she’d seen him. Layin’ low, he’d said. But he’d called, and they made plans for the weekend. Big ones. To get on his bike and leave town for a while, be free and without worry of who might be watching or plotting.
As Grandma Angie’s life clock ticked down toward inevitable silence, Beatrice sent Stella home more and more, anytime the shop was quiet. “You’ll want to be there, love,” she told her. “It’s something everyone should do, usher a loved one out of this world and into the next.”
Business had picked up that morning, though, as the first cold front blowing through Holly sent everyone into a rush of buying new scents to go with fall clothes.
“Don’t get stuck with a summer perfume now that it’s cold,” Beatrice told some housewife whose name Stella could never remember. She spritzed Poison on a card. The look on the woman’s face said she was believing the whole gambit. Stella had learned from the best.
She kept busy removing the summer displays with beach balls and sandpaper, ready to replace them with fake leaves and orange tissue. Redecorating was one of her favorite parts of the job, something she never got to do in Vivian’s house. Everything had to be just so at home, the perfectly matched drapes and pillows, even though most everything was bought at Wal-Mart. Stella wasn’t fond of people putting on airs in the first place, but doing it when you were barely holding on to a façade was even worse.
She’d mentioned this to Beatrice once, and immediately received a lecture on taking pride in what you had. “It isn’t the price of something that makes it valuable,” her boss chastised. “It’s the joy it brings you in looking nice.”
Of course, perfumes were an entirely different matter. Beatrice had zero patience for women who walked in wearing Givenchy but wouldn’t pay more than thirty dollars for cologne.
Many of Beatrice’s regulars came in looking for her. It might have made for a piss-poor commission if she hadn’t been so fair about the men. Stella got to handle most of them, even Mr. Haggardy, who arrived every month or two to purchase a bottle for his “wife.”
“Even I can’t go through that many bottles,” Beatrice said. She was so disgusted with his all-over-the-map purchases that she’d immediately handed him over to Stella, who was happy to sell him something expensive and impressive for whoever might be on the receiving end, however long she lasted.
Stella had just started spreading the brown and gold leaves in the front window when the phone rang. Beatrice was still helping the housewife, so Stella headed to the counter to get it.
“Oh, thank God,” her mother said. “Stella, get here. Get here fast. It’s time.”
Stella hung up the phone and crashed through the curtains to grab her purse. Grandma’s car was still at Joe’s, as they’d had to order the glass, but she could run. She’d been wearing sneakers every day, knowing this might happen.
She barreled through the store again. Beatrice looked up, and Stella choked out, “Grandma.”
Beatrice nodded and shooed her out with a sympathetic look and a wave of her hand. “Take care, love.”
Lawns and shrubbery blurred past as Stella ran flat-footed through the streets of Holly to her grandmother’s house. Her hair pulled loose from the banana clip, flying behind her in a tangle. The cold blistered her cheeks and nose, making her eyes water. Several cars lined the street as she pounded out the last block. Was everyone in town there before her? If Vivian had waited too long to call her, there would be hell to pay.
Anger spurred her to run even faster. She dashed up the sidewalk and burst through the front door.
She dropped her purse and scarf just inside. The house was eerily quiet. She steadied herself and walked through the foyer to the living room.
A half-dozen people stood around Grandma’s bed. Vivian, of course. And Stella’s father. The preacher from Vivian’s church. Two neighbors. And the nurse.
Stella tried to set aside her anger that all these people had obviously been notified ahead of her, but she was furious. She wanted Grandma all to herself, to clear them all out. Nobody loved her like she had. None of them. Tears threatened, and she bit her lip painfully to keep them at bay.
She pushed past the neighbors to get to Grandma’s side. Vivian was holding one of Angie’s hands. The preacher had the other.
Stella stepped in front of the preacher, not caring if it was rude, to make him let go. This was HER grandmother. HER grandmother’s hand. She picked it up, so fragile and limp. Was she already dead? How did you tell? She didn’t want to ask.
The nurse laid a stethoscope on Grandma’s chest. “She hasn’t breathed in about two minutes,” she whispered. “But she still has heart tones.”
Stella nodded, completely unable to speak. She glanced over at her mother, who sat, lips pressed together, almost as if she were being inconvenienced. Her father hovered, shifting from foot to foot, probably anxious to get back to his television programs. None of these people cared a whit. She wished she could kick them all out, make a fuss, scream.
The room was dim, the windows shuttered. Death permeated everything, from the grayness of the light to the grim expressions. Stella wanted to fill the room with sunshine. Why would anyone want to stay in a world this gloomy? She should turn on the radio. Play a Johnny Mathis record, Grandma’s favorite. In fact, screw this, she would.
“I’m going to fix this, Grandma,” Stella said. “It’s all wrong, and I don’t blame you a bit for protesting.”
She kissed her grandmother’s hand and laid it back on the bed. Without a glance behind her, she strode right up to the big gray curtains and yanked them back. Sunlight flooded the room, and dust mites billowed from the fabric like bursting dandelions.
The turntable sat in the center of the wall of shelves, the records lined up neatly in a cabinet below. Stella knew exactly what to choose. She tugged out a case featuring a young Mathis in a white shirt, open at the throat, a standard 1970s-styled type spelling out his name, followed by the title of the album, I’m Coming Home.
She powered up the record player with a gentle hum. The album popped and hissed as she lay the needle against the edge, feeling
it slip into place to start the first song.
She walked back to the bed as a triangle measured out its tinkling introduction. By the time she had resumed her place, Mathis was belting out his main theme. “I’m coming home.”
Melody, the longtime neighbor across the street, patted Stella’s shoulder. “She would have loved that, Stella. Johnny was her favorite.”
“She likes it right now,” Stella said.
“Four minutes,” the nurse said.
Stella tuned that out. She let the song wash over her, the millions of times she’d heard it, Grandma Angie fluffing a pillow or dusting a table or sorting through beads. She didn’t sing, but often hummed along, sometimes breathing a line or two that particularly struck her.
Stella did the same now, squeezing her hand. And then Grandma’s chin jerked upward, and she inhaled a huge rushing gulp of air, almost arching. Stella held on tight. “I’m here, Grandma. Right here.”
And everyone seemed to fall away as Grandma Angie relaxed into the exhale, her jaw falling, her chest settling back onto the bed, as if she were slipping into some other dimension, eternally down and away from the body lying limply on the white sheets.
The song played on, and as it ended, the nurse slid the silver disc against Grandma’s chest. She sighed as she pulled it away. “She’s gone.”
Stella could not let go of her hand, would not let go. She knew this was it, the last trace of warmth, the last gentle curl of her fingers. In the coffin she would be waxen and cold, her hands immovable and stiff.
In science class she’d learned that energy could change forms but never went away. She hoped that somehow her grandmother’s love would stay with her, travel wherever she went. Because now that the only person she really considered family was gone, Holly was already shifting into a memory.
***
17: Wake
