“She was so tired last night. She barely made it through dinner. Another ten minutes, and I’ll send Bishop up to get her.”
Bishop smirked. “She’d love that.”
I laughed. “Wouldn’t she?”
Anna set a plate of eggs and bacon in front of him and another in front of me.
I checked my mobile. It was zero seven hundred. I doubted my grandmother had slept this late in thirty years.
“I’ll go up,” I said. “Let her wake up to me instead of him.”
Anna smiled. “Thatwould be kinder.”
“Stay,” I said to Bishop, who had half risen. “I’ll only be a minute.”
I knocked on her door.“Babushka, Anna has your breakfast ready.”
I waited and knocked again, and when she didn’t answer, I let myself in.
The fire had gone to coals, and it was warm in the room. Her braid lay on the pillow over her shoulder, the way she wore it at night. She had turned her face to the window, and she was smiling.
I went to her and sat down on the edge of the bed.
Her hand was cold and stiff when I took it.
“Oh, Grandmother.”
I pressed her fingers against my cheek, the way she used to press mine against hers. “I’m sorry I didn’t come looking for you sooner.” I lowered our hands to my lap and kept hers wrapped in both of mine.
“You were ready, weren’t you? That’s what yesterday was about.”
I smoothed her thumb with mine.
“You asked us to meet you in the meadow, and you put my hand in Bishop’s. You told him to take care of me. You told me to let him. That was you saying goodbye, wasn’t it?”
I could see her there.The soul knows, my darling granddaughter.
“I should have known. You were so quiet at dinner. Anna thought you were tired. I thought so too.”
I brushed her hair from her forehead and brought her hand to my cheek again.
“I told Bishop I loved him last night, and he said he loved me too. He said he’d wanted to say it first, but I beat him to it. I’m glad I did. That way, he knows I really meant it.”
I bent and kissed her forehead.
“I wish I’d said it to you every day instead of some of them. I said it enough, didn’t I? Even if I didn’t, you knew.” I ran my finger over her hand. “Wait. Where’s your ring?”
I turned my head and saw it on her nightstand, next to the lamp. I’d never known her to take it off. Ever.
I reached for it and saw a piece of paper folded under it. I held the ring in one hand and opened it with the other.For my Katarina,it read.
I shook my head. “You knew it was time for you to go. You knew, and you didn’t say goodbye in a way that I could recognize it. Did you think I’d try to talk you out of leaving me? I wouldn’t have. I would’ve known you were ready.”
I closed my fingers around the ring. The metal was cold, and I held it in my fist until my palm warmed it. Then I slid it onto the third finger of my right hand, where she had worn it. It fit perfectly.
“I would’ve told you that I’d build Orenda and that I hoped the rooms you and my grandfather planned to fill with children would be filled with mine and Bishop’s. I would’ve promised. I would also have promised that I’d take care of Lyra and Henry and Anna the same way you always did. And if you’re still here, if you can hear me, I want you to know that you can go. I know you’ve been waiting a long time. Go find your husband and your son, and tell them I love them too, eventhough I never got the chance to know them. And my mother. Tell her too.”
“Katarina, tell your grandmother that Bishop has designs on her bacon and I’ve given up trying to stop him,” I heard Anna say from somewhere down the hallway.
