Page 140 of Hot Tea & Bird Calls

“Until I heard your story yesterday, I thought Walter had been holding out on some talent.” Luce lifted a shoulder at Skye’s fallen jaw. “It’d been sitting in the dresser next to his bed, tucked behind tissues like a little secret. I put it in the bottom drawer out here, angry about him keeping it from me. Now, I know.”

The daisy. The mosaic daisy she’d haphazardly fused together. Skye figured it’d been disposed of in the wake of clearing him from the bedroom, after he’d taken his last breath. Seeing it in the present day, it wasn’t as lopsided as she remembered. The piece she’d used for the yellow disk floret in the center gleamed like the citrine stones Thalia sneaked in her messenger bag.

“Can I keep it?” Skye asked, wishing she had her phone to snap a photo.

Luce’s eyes glazed over in a quick thinking session, a hint of apology in her, “No. That daisy links you and Walter’s bond. It deserves to stay in his possession.”

Skye nodded despite her heart plunging. “Understood.”

“Instead...” Her grandmother sipped her coffee as she peered around the study in almost fitful scrutiny. It stoked fear, like she’d regretted letting Skye in. Though what followed cushioned the blow. “Daisy stays, but you can keep something else in here. Within reason.”

A keepsake? From here?

Unlike the careful slowness of the rest of her visit, Skye spun in the chair as she had in her early teen years, back when her biggest worries were exam results and if she’d finally find a girl who loved bugs as much as she did.

Skye didnotfind that. Good thing she’d evolved.

With her heel, she slowed herself to her choice. It spoke to her so loudly, she’d argue if Luce denied her.

Licking her lips, Skye announced, “His record player. It deserves to be used.” The more she thought about it, the more sure her voice rang out. “With the records, too. I bet this is how Granddad and I sorted through the tiles so quickly—his music.”

Luce’s chuckle secured that record player even before she verified, “You have a point. For the sake of sorting faster, it’s yours.”

She crossed the gate to help Skye carefully extract the flat, black-and-silver player. And Walter’s records—all entertainers who’d shaped him as a music lover. Skye couldn’t wait to delve into his mind, into his tastes again.

Palpable anxiety shook Luce’s directions as she placed it in a box cushioned with cloth napkins, back out in the living room. “Take this straight to the house, no stops.”

Skye drummed her fingers on the see-through bin of records, eager to throw on some pants and take it that very minute. “I will.”

“I’ll come with you when you do it. To make sure you know how to use it.”

“Of course.” Skye glanced at Swindle and Phish as she wrapped an arm around Luce’s shoulders. She’d miss seeing their metallic fins and spotty scales every day, too. Choked up again, she pressed her cheek to Luce’s head. “I love you, Grandma.”

They’d gotten so used to Luce’s mononym, her name. So that reminder of their relation, of a generation revering what came earlier must’ve gotten to Luce.

“I love you, too,” Luce rasped in a low, mournful voice, hooking an arm around Skye’s waist. “Down the street. You’re right down the street.”

Kissing Luce’s soft, coily hair, Skye smiled.

In this fog of emotion, she could tell Luce hadn’t conceived another benefit of this move. In addition to Skye’s continuous attention, she’d gained another confidante in Celene, who loved her company. More family to keep everything running, everyone included.

They held each other long after, Luce reminiscing on Granddad as the birds sang outside. Skye traveled between listening and floating off in a haze of comfort, wondering if she and Celene’s love would make a similarly beautiful impression on Yielding. Or New York. Anywhere.

As the two of them whipped up breakfast sandwiches and coffee for her parents, Skye could only hope.

37

Awind chime.

A wind chime with a dangling glass goldfinch swung outside the Vale summer, attached above the doorbell camera.

Parked next to Skye’s car, Celene stepped out, stretching from four hours trapped in her car. That included an hour of traffic, when all she wanted was to push the speed limit to Yielding. Joining rustling trees and the growl of a neighbor’s lawn mower, the chiming brought Celene back to Luce’s Mosaic Wonderland, amongst the tiles.

Celene anticipated the crunch of leaves and branches under her feet. Thankfully, the yard had been cleared of excess brush, raked into neat piles lining the property.

The rewards of the house occupied daily. A proper residence.

She waved a fly from buzzing around her face, not quite liking that part of their outdoors orchestra. It soon fled to bother someone else, floating in zips and zags around trees and grass a little longer than Celene’s ideal. Expected of Nature Girl. She eyed the fibrous mounds of Boob Mountain. Snakes still grossed her out, so Celene kept her distance.