Page 17

A brunette nursing assistant smiled prettily at Nico as she led him through the Life Homes Nursing Home.

Obvious distractions had delayed the first of his planned daily visits to his mother by a few days, but he was eager to see her today.

After the previous night’s debacle with Ginny, he was grateful for any distraction.

He needed time to regroup and regain his emotional footings, but that was darn near impossible when his mind kept replaying the sight of her electric eyes and taut body.

He needed a brain surgeon or a hypnotist to perform a Ginnyectomy, but, short of that, he needed to re-ground himself.

His mother had always been the best person in the world for that job.

The hallways were wide, carpeted, and clean.

The facility itself was arranged into “households” of eight residents per section, each with private rooms and shared, home-like living and dining areas.

Essential oil diffusers released the day’s scents, which were apparently lavender and vanilla.

All in all, it was the best long-term care money could buy.

“How’s my mom been doing?” he said to the nurse as they neared his mother’s household.

The woman lowered her eyes slightly but did not slow her pace. “She can still walk and sit perfectly fine on her own, which is good considering how long she’s had the diagnosis. I sometimes think there’s more going on with her mentally than she’s able to show us.”

“I’m hoping she’ll recognize me. She didn’t last time.”

They reached his mother’s door. The nurse knocked lightly before cracking it a few inches and motioning for him to enter. “It’s always good to hope,” she said, but her smile seemed sad. She turned and walked away.

His mother sat in one of two tall chairs facing a window.

The view overlooked a flower garden where birds and butterflies flitted, but his mother’s eyes were motionless.

Nico couldn’t help smiling at the chairs.

The matched and regal pair of orange and cream floral wingbacks had sat in the living room of their Picard Street home for as long as Nico could remember.

To him, the chairs had been thrones—one for his mother and the other for his Aunt Celia.

They represented the nicest furniture by far that the little family had owned, and no little boys were ever allowed to put their grubby bottoms on them.

Still pristine, Celia’s had been reunited with his mother’s chair in her long-term care room upon his aunt’s passing.

“Hi, Mom,” he said as he took a seat on Celia’s throne and angled himself toward her. “It’s good to see you.”

His mother swiveled her head his way in cartoonishly slow motion. Once so vibrant, so ever-alert for her offspring’s half-truths, her green eyes were misted now and sunken, the loose skin of their lids draped over them in a final curtain call. He searched her eyes for signs of recognition.

“Is it Tuesday already?” she said. Her weakening lungs barely dimmed her powerful voice.

He lifted her hand and cradled it in both of his. The skin was papery and loose, but her hand was warm. He borrowed strength from that. “Mom, it’s me, Nico, your eldest son.”

His chest clenched, and he allowed himself a breath, trying to calm the panic and pain.

Please recognize me. Please, please just recognize me.

She looked back at him, and for a moment seemed to be searching his face.

There might as well have been a computer program “loading” message revolving on her forehead.

Nico held his breath, willing her memories of him to click in, but the glimmer in her eyes extinguished, and she turned her gaze back toward the window. “I don’t want my hair done today.”

Reversing his steps through the facility an hour later, defeat and shame enveloped him in a cloud so thick it felt like a too-tight scarf he couldn’t loosen.

The last time he’d visited, he’d been certain she almost recognized him.

Now, it had been twice in a row. Had he really lost her forever?

Would all his future visits be like this one, sitting in near total silence as if they were strangers?

He missed her advice. He missed her all-knowing smile and her sardonic wit.

He missed her strength. It seemed impossible that any disease, even Alzheimer’s, could snuff out the human firecracker his mother had been.

Just as he reached the exit, the pretty nurse came up to him. “Any luck?”

His fingers clenched air as he worked to keep his emotions from showing in this public place. He forced out an artificially steady sounding, “No.”

She rested a palm ever-so-lightly on his arm. “Well, try again if you can,” she said encouragingly. “She’s different from day to day.”

“Would it help if I brought her something from her past? Could it jog her memory?”

She nodded almost too eagerly, as if looking for a ray of hope—even a false one—to offer him. “We see that work sometimes. Just snaps them right back to their old selves for a bit. It can be like a miracle.”

Nico thanked her and headed out the door. How could he bring her something from her past? Except for the items already with her at the nursing home, her house, and everything she’d owned, had been completely cleared out.

There was one thing that might work…if he could find it. But given how much Ginny loathed him, access to the house was looking like it could take weeks or longer. All the while, his mother’s mind slipped further from reality’s grasp.

Striding toward his car, flames of anger and frustration licked at the edges of Nico’s mind.

They grew hotter as they burned their way to his center.

This couldn’t be it. His mother deserved one more day to be herself.

He deserved a final chance to tell her how much he loved her.

She had never, for one second, given up on him, even when the rest of the world hadn’t expected him to amount to anything.

He would not give up on her now. He would not let his mother, a woman who’d lived her entire life in vivid color, fade to gray without a battle.

Sitting in his car, his hands strangling the steering wheel, the flames inside him reached his core and ignited. How much jail time could he really get for breaking and entering his own home? He slammed his car into reverse and peeled out of the parking lot.

Forty-five minutes later, he pulled up to the house, his resolve stronger than ever.

He reached into the glove compartment and fished around until his fingers felt the large brass key, the sister to the one Ginny had shown him.

Ginny would surely call the police the moment he forced his way inside, but he’d have some time before they arrived.

Maybe it would be enough to give the place a decent search.

It was a tiny house, after all, and he certainly knew it by heart.

But as he reached for the car door handle, he heard a whimper.

Peering out the driver’s side window, he saw Annie staring back up at him, eyes wide and ears raised.

Annie’s emotional range up to now had included excitement, anger, and content.

This wasn't any of those. She looked…scared?

He started to open the door, and Annie immediately backed up, letting him out.

She ran half-sideways toward the house, then back to him, then toward the house again, whimpering all the while and never taking her eyes off him.

“What’s going on, girl?” he said as he got out of the car. The house was still, and there was no sign of Mick or Jack. “Why are you out here all alone?”

Odd. There was no way Ginny would have forgotten Annie outside.

Annie let off a couple of plaintive barks, then ran to the porch front steps and looked back at him, clearly asking him to follow her. Anxiety building, he did. Annie scratched at the front door, but still there was no sign of Ginny.

Alarmed now, Nico’s feet pounded up the handful of wooden steps, the ‘no touching the house’ rule far from his mind.

He cocked his head and peered through the front door window but saw only Mick and Jack bumping each other about as they vied for the limited space before the door.

He knocked loudly and waited a few beats, but there was no sight or sound from Ginny.

Where was she? Beside him, Annie paced in an agitated circle as she whined and yipped.

The curtain was drawn across the window that faced into the kitchen, but there was a narrow gap between the hanging panels that he could just peek through.

From this mostly obstructed viewpoint, the small room was still and appeared completely empty.

He was deciding whether to head next toward the window in the living room or to one of the bedroom windows when he spotted something on the kitchen floor.

A more careful second look sent a shiver of cold through him.

Just beyond the end of the booth table, he could see Ginny’s foot and leg extended into the middle of the room.

But why would she be lying unmoving on the floor? No innocent reasons came to mind.

He tapped as hard as he dared on the glass. “Ginny!” No movement from her foot. He rushed back to the front door and inserted his key. “I'm coming in!”