A Mrs. Miracle Christmas(19)

The older woman laughed, finding the comment amusing. “Me? A professional decorator? Never.”

“Then you have an innate talent for it,” Laurel concluded.

She was about to walk out the door when her grandmother appeared in the kitchen, dressed for the day and looking ten years younger. Laurel marveled at the new energy and spirit she’d noticed in her grandmother and wondered why it had taken her so long to recognize her grandmother’s needs. Being home alone every day must have been depressing and lonely. Paying the monthly fee to have a Caring Angel was certainly going to be a challenge to their budget, but the benefits were worth every penny. The changes in her grandmother were nothing short of miraculous. Her observation produced a smile, seeing that the caregiver was indeed a Mrs. Miracle.

    “Good morning, Laurel,” Nana greeted her, hugging her granddaughter for an extra heartbeat.

“Did you sleep well, Nana?”

“Like a lazy kitten.”

A picture formed in Laurel’s head of a tiny cat curled up on a chair, snoozing without a care in the world.

“I had a wonderful dream,” Nana continued.

“Was it about Gramps?”

“No,” Nana replied. “It was about you.”

“Me?”

“Yes. You, and Zach, and…” She paused, as if she had said more than she should.

Out of the corner of her eye, Laurel saw Mrs. Miracle gently shake her head, seeming to tell Nana not to say anything more. The gesture seemed strange, and she would’ve inquired further if her grandmother hadn’t continued to speak.

“The dream was about you and Zach,” she repeated. “It was a good dream, a happy dream. It does my heart good to see you married to your best friend.”

How right her nana was. Zach was her best friend, and rather than concentrating on what they didn’t have, they needed to focus on what they did have—each other. They had so much to be grateful for, which was something she tended to forget in her pain and disappointments.

    “You’re right, Nana, so right.” Laurel gently hugged her and then headed out the door, hurrying now because she was leaving the house later than she liked to.



* * *



—

Helen watched her granddaughter depart and wished she’d been able to explain her dream. Mrs. Miracle was right to stop her. Mentioning the dream and the baby that was due to arrive wouldn’t have comforted Laurel, it would have done just the opposite. The dream had been lovely, and she’d held on to it as long as she could, wrapping her consciousness around the images, until it had faded from view like fog lifting from Puget Sound.

Mrs. Miracle joined her, and the two women stood together, peering out the window as Laurel climbed into her car and sped away. The Caring Angel gently touched Helen’s arm.

“Laurel isn’t ready yet. Telling her your dream would only have hurt her.”

“I wish I could’ve shared it with her. It was such a vivid dream. I can’t help but believe that it will all come to pass just the way it happened while I was asleep…just the way you told me it would.”

“God often speaks to us in dreams, Helen.”

Helen nodded. Robert had come to her in a dream a year after he’d died, almost to the day. Feeling sad and lonely, she’d gone to bed early and then found she couldn’t sleep. After several hours of tossing and turning, she drifted into a semisleep, half awake and half asleep. Suddenly he was there with her, full of laughter and life, just as it had always been with the two of them, even after all the years of marriage.

    “You’re here,” she’d said to him, although Helen wasn’t sure if she’d said the words out loud or not.

Robert hadn’t answered, although she’d desperately wanted him to speak.

“I miss you so much.”

He’d grinned, letting her know he’d also missed her.

And then he was gone. Gone. Vanished, like he’d never been there in the room in the first place.

Helen had laid there, tears leaking from her eyes, so desperately wanting to call him back. At some point she must have drifted back into a deep sleep. When she woke the following morning, she was convinced she had somehow fabricated the entire episode. She reasoned this sort of thing didn’t happen, that it had all been part of her grief and her imagination. She’d missed him and dreamed he’d come to her.

Suddenly, she rationalized that if Mrs. Miracle was an angel, the way she claimed to be, then certainly she would know the truth of that night.

“Robert came to me one night, didn’t he?” she said, closely watching the other woman’s expression, seeking any telltale sign.

    “He did. It was his way of letting you know he was happy, and that he deeply loved you.”

Helen blinked back tears. “I miss him, even now.”

Mrs. Miracle’s arm came around Helen. “I know you do. That’s the price we pay when we love. It’s joy and loss all wrapped up in one package. The thing you need to hold on to, and Laurel, too, is that while the heart may shatter into a thousand pieces, the soul remains intact.”

Perhaps it was all the emotion that she felt at that moment, all this talk about Robert. Whatever it was, Helen suddenly felt terribly light-headed and needed to sit down. She feared if she didn’t, she might collapse.