Was this some sort of dementia? “How are you?” I asked gently. “We met earlier this month. I’m Ali Abadi’s wife. Remember?”
She studied me with cloudy eyes. Then she smiled. “Of course. How are you?”
I exhaled. At least she knew who I was. “May I come in?”
“Yes, yes.” She moved aside to allow me to enter. “I’m forgetting my manners along with many other things.”
We settled in the same seats as we had at our previous visit. “How are you?” I began, eager to get to the point before someone discovered that Mrs. Martins had a forbidden visitor.
“Billy said you moved to another state and would no longer be coming to see me.”
“Excuse me?” It took a moment to process her words. “Your son told you that I moved away?”
“But I’m so happy you’re here,” she continued. “I’ve been asking to see you.”
“You have? No one told me.” What was Bill Warren up to? Why take steps to ban me from seeing his mother and then lie to her about me relocating? “If I had known you wanted to see me, I would have come right away.”
Confusion filled her gaze. “But Billy promised to tell you.”
“I guess he forgot,” I said as kindly as I could, determined to avoid upsetting her like last time. “But I’m here now. What did you want to talk with me about?”
Her gaze wandered over to the window. “That’s why I called Ali at work the day he came to see me. I didn’t want Billy to know.”
My skin prickled. “Why not?”
She continued as if she hadn’t heard me. “I knew Ali worked where my Billy worked, so Bernice helped me find Ali’s work number.”
“That was nice of Bernice. Why did you call Ali?”
“I wanted him to come and see me.” She sighed heavily, as if releasing years of suppressed emotions. “It was wrong what I did to him after my Lawrence died.”
“Did you ask Ali to come and see you so you could apologize?”
She shook her head. “I didn’t deserve his forgiveness. What I did to that young man was far worse than he could imagine. Ali had no idea what really happened the night Lawrence died.”
“I don’t understand.” Had the woman become confused again? “Ali saw what happened because he was there the night your husband died.”
“He was therebeforemy husband died,” she corrected me.
What did she mean? “Do you remember Ali pushing your husband, causing him to stumble and hit his head on the fireplace?”
“Yes.” She teared up. “I remember. I’ll never forget.”
“What did you tell Ali the day he came to see you?”
“Do you know that I’m dying?”
I sucked in a breath. “No. I had no idea.”
“It’s cancer. Slow moving, the doctors tell me, but it will eventually get me.”
“I’m very sorry to hear that.”
“That’s why I need to talk to you before it’s too late.”
“I’m here,” I prodded, hoping she’d get to the point before we were interrupted. “And I’m listening. Please go ahead.”
“After Lawrence hit his head, he lost consciousness, and I told Ali to go home. I thought everything would be all right ...” Her voice wandered off. She turned her head to stare out the window again.
