Page 2

"It was nothing." That satisfies her. She turns into the lot, and the casseroles slide to the other side of the bench seat.

The lobby doors slide open, and a wall of cool air and cinnamon plug-ins rush out to greet us. I've got both big casseroles stacked against my chest, chin pinning the top foil down, while Lis carries the little mac and cheese in one hand and signs the clipboard with the other. Her reading glasses slide down her nose, like they always do.

By the front desk, an inflatable snowman lists hard to one side, half-deflated, top hat drooping toward its own shoulder. Someone's taped its base to the tile.

"Alisa." A petite man rounds the desk. He takes both casseroles off my stack before I can figure out how to set them down. I don’t know why it cracks me up that he calls her by her first name, and not Lis, the one everyone else does. "You didn't have to."

"I know I didn't, but y'all gotta eat." Mom caps the pen. "Manny, this is Mackie."

"The daughter." He nods at me over the foil, then sets them on the desk and pulls me into a bear hug. He's all of five feet tall, but he's got a tight grip on me.

"How's my girl?" My mom asks, which finally prompts him to let go of me. I don't even have a chance to say a word to my new best friend before they hug. He isn't quite as aggressive with her.

"She's been up since six. She asked about the bridge game twice already."

"I know it." Mom says it the way you'd say the sky's out. There’s no surprise in it.

He's already walking the casseroles toward the back as we head down the hall.

Hildie's room is set to what feels like eighty degrees, and she's in a cardigan anyway, buttoned to the throat. She sits by the window, one hand moving slowly across the chair arm, over and over, smoothing something that isn't there. Then she looks up and sees my mother, and her whole face lights up.

"There she is." She's up before I can offer a hand, arms around my mom, holding on. "There she is."

I stand in the doorway and watch my mother get held like that, and something in my chest goes tight and unfamiliar. Hildie was my mom's first friend when she moved to Florida full time six months after my dad died. They were connected at the hip until Hildie started forgetting things to the point it was obviously more than "old age."

Hildie takes my hand in both of hers. They're cool and papery, despite the warm air in the room. She studies me for a long time without saying anything, so I go first. "Miss Hildie. It's so good to see you again."

"You stop it with that 'Miss' stuff. You're making me feel old."

Then her eyes cut past me to the window. She's got a perfect view of the front entrance. "That snowman in the lobby looks like he got into the eggnog. What kind of impression are they trying to give our guests?"

The laugh's out of me before I can stop it. "I agree with you! I thought the same thing when we walked in."

She turns back, and the map's gone blank. "Now what's your name, honey?"

"Mackie," Mom says in the same voice. Hildie really has really progressed since I saw her in May before they moved her in here.

On the shelf by the window, there are photos. Most of them are Hildie when she was younger, laughing. And off to one side, framed alone, a sunburned blond boy on a dock, maybe eight, fishing rod in hand, squinting hard into the sun.

Hildie's already standing. "I want to go outside. The weather is magnificent today, don't you think, Lis?"

She reaches the door first, hand on the knob.

"That's a lovely idea. You want to walk with us, Mackie?" My mom asks, looking at me with eyebrows raised.

I nod, and we follow Hildie out to the back patio. The path loops the grounds in a long oval, and Hildie sets the pace, which is slower than a stroll and exactly right. Her hand rests on Mom's forearm, like she's showing us around instead of holding on.

The breeze has picked up in the short time since Mom picked me up. I’m down to a tank top, but I still have on the boots I wore out of a snowstorm nine hours ago. I look like two different weather systems collided at the knee..

"There." Hildie stops and points. "See him?"

A heron stands in the shallows of the retention pond, gray and still, one leg tucked, staring down at the water as if he’s holding court. He’s stunning

"He comes every afternoon," she says. "The maintenance man feeds him even though he's not supposed to." She lowers her voice on the last part, pleased to be telling on him.

"Is that right?" Mom leans in like she's getting a secret worth having.

We start walking again. "You play bridge?" Hildie asks me.