On good days, I got the privilege of being her grandson, for a few minutes at least.
Donna arranged for me to view Evergreen’s security footage on Wednesday morning. I didn’t know how she talked her director into agreeing, considering it was usually one of those points of contentionthat required the police to get a warrant, but I didn’t ask. The directorhadagreed, and I had my appointment.
I suspected that having one of their residents scammed out of tens of thousands of dollars by a boy claiming to be Elwood’s grandson, a boy who managed to enter the property not once, not twice, but three times without being ID’d by the reception staff, had raised the alarm. The police weren’t doing much, and Benaiah was rightfully pissed. If word got out, it would look bad for the home, and the director knew it.
Letting a PI do some internal investigating was in their best interest. So what if I viewed their security footage? Hopefully, I would get a look at the kid posing as Elwood’s grandson and figure out my next step in the investigation. Maybe I’d be able to track him down and put an end to this before he struck again. I was more likely to hit a wall. Either way, my involvement kept Benaiah happy and hopefully silent, which was probably the only reason I was permitted access to the footage at all.
Before I met with Evergreen’s director and the head of security, I wanted to pop in to see Nana. I had no idea how often my father visited, or if it was always early in the morning, but his truck wasn’t in the lot when I pulled in, so I took a chance.
I usually stuck to evenings or weekends and sensed my father avoided those times on purpose. We danced around one another like we’d been doing all our lives. Chance run-ins ended in the same way as a cold front and a warm front colliding on a spring evening. With aboom.
The scent of breakfast filled the air as I got off the elevator on the second floor, a cumulation of smells that did nothing to stir my appetite. The residents at Evergreen were well taken care of. The meals were suitable for the ageing crowd, but something in the fragrance reminded me too much of a hospital or high school cafeteria to beappealing. Plus, I was in the minority when it came to the scent of coffee. I drank it when there was no other caffeine option available, but the scent wasn’t euphoric. It didn’t break my head like it did Tallus’s. The smell of coffee was a permanent fixture at the nursing home, like it had long ago embedded itself into the paint.
I found Nana in the common room, sitting in a plush, floral chair that was likely older than me. Doilies and crocheted lap blankets in a rainbow of colors filled the area. Warm wooden accents gave the room a softness that I assumed appealed to the geriatric crowd.
Nana had been dressed in beige slacks and a dusty-rose knitted sweater. A gold chain circled her neck, pearl earrings decorated her lobes, and someone had helped her apply lipstick. She must have felt like dressing up today, and god help anyone who told her no.
The only incongruous feature was the bedroom slippers covering her dainty feet, the kind with sticky bottoms so she wouldn’t slip when she walked. Nana used a walker on good days, shuffling along at a snail’s pace. The walker sat within reach today, ready for her next excursion. Its presence told me enough without my having to ask a nurse how she was doing.
On bad days, she used a wheelchair or stayed in bed.
Nana cradled a brass five-by-eight picture frame between her hands. It held a sepia-toned image of my grandfather Boone in his army uniform. That particular photograph used to sit on the mantel when she lived with my father. It was taken not long after he enlisted. 1941. Boone was eighteen years old. He wouldn’t meet Nana until after the war, but that wasn’t how she remembered it.
It was no wonder that my grandmother often mistook me for Boone. The resemblance was uncanny, like looking in a mirror. The man in the photograph might have been close to two decades youngerthan me when the picture was taken, with a pencil mustache that was no longer in style, but we could have been twins.
Nana’s attention was on the photograph. She didn’t sense Echo’s and my presence, lingering behind her. She was lost in another time, in another place, studying the image of a man who had been more of a father to me than my real dad. A man who had died close to fifteen years ago.
I had time to absorb Nana’s contorted features and watched her trace Boone’s square jaw with a trembling finger. I had time to listen to her softly mutter words as she told her long-dead husband she’d received his recent letter and couldn’t wait to see him and asked when he was coming home.
In Nana’s broken mind, Boone was away at war. For whatever reason, this was how she processed his death. She imagined he’d gone back to the front line and would come home again soon. She waited endlessly for letters. For his return.
I deposited myself on the dated couch, caddy corner to the chair. A ceramic mug filled with a watery brown liquid grew cold on the side table. I assumed it was a long-forgotten coffee.
“What’s that you’ve got?” I leaned forward to see the picture better.
Nana’s confused gaze took me in. “Well, there you are.”
“Here I am. How are you, Nana?”
“I’m swell. Oh, you brought Dianna. Hello, pup-pup. What a good girl.”
“Her name is Echo, Nana, remember?”
Nana frowned and stared at Echo for a moment before shifting her attention to my face. She still didn’t seem to recognize me, but that was typical.
“Do you know who I am?”
Shetsked and waved a dismissivehand. “Of course I do.”
When she didn’t give me a name, I knew she didn’t. With Boone’s photograph in hand, I could only assume I would take on his role.
“Where did you get that?”
“Oh, it was in the closet. The nice boy found it for me. He was looking at all your pictures. You were so strapping in your uniform. Did you know I’m having a party?”
“I did. It’s going to be your birthday.”
She made a giddy noise of delight that made me smile. “Isn’t it wonderful? Is there going to be dancing?”
