Before We Were Yours(24)

Miss Tann frowns. “Well…that one didn’t get the looks in the family, did she? She’s rather common. I suppose we’ll find a taker for her, though. We almost always do.” She pulls back, putting a hand over her nose. “Good heavens. What is that smell?”

Miss Tann isn’t happy when she sees up close what a mess my sister is. She tells the officers to put Camellia on the floorboard of the car and the rest of us on the seat. There are two other kids on the floorboard already—a blond-headed girl about Lark’s age and a boy who’s a little bigger than Gabion. Both of them look at me with big, scared brown eyes. They don’t say a word or move an inch.

Miss Tann tries to take Gabion out of my arms before I climb in. She frowns when I hold on. “Behave yourself,” she says, and I let go.

Once we’re all in the car, she holds Gabion in her lap, standing him up so he can see out the windows. He bounces and points and babbles, excited. He’s never been in a car before.

“My, my, look at those curls.” She slides her fingers along my baby brother’s head, pulling his corn-silk hair upward, so it has peaks on the top like the baby dolls at the county fair.

Gabion points out the window, cheering. “Ohsee! Ohsee!” He’s spotted a little girl having her picture made on a black-and-white pinto pony in front of a big house.

“We just need to wash the stench of the river from you, don’t we? Then you’ll be a fine little boy.” Miss Tann’s nose crinkles up.

I wonder what she means by that. Who’s going to clean us up and why?

Maybe the hospital won’t let us in this way, I tell myself. Maybe we have to wash up first…to see Queenie?

“His name’s Gabion,” I say, so she’ll know what to call him. “Gabby for short.”

Her head turns quick, the way a cat’s does when it’s seen a mouse in the pantry. She looks at me like she forgot I was in the car. “Restrain yourself from answering questions unless you’re asked.”

Her arm snakes out, fleshy and pale, and surrounds Lark, pulling her away.

I look down at the two scared kids huddled together on the floor and then at Camellia. My sister’s eyes tell me that she’s figured out what I already know, even though I don’t want to.

We’re not headed to the hospital to see our mama and daddy.





CHAPTER 7


Avery

The retirement home lies bathed in soft morning sunlight. Even with the newly added parking lot on what was once a sprawling front lawn, Magnolia Manor speaks of a bygone era—of the elegance of afternoon teas, and glittering cotillions, and formal dinners at the long mahogany table that still stands in the dining room. It’s easy to picture Scarlett O’Hara fanning herself beneath the moss-draped live oaks that shade the white-columned veranda.

I remember this place’s former life, if only a tad. My mother brought me to a baby shower here when I was nine or ten. Driving over, she shared the story of attending an important cocktail reception here for a cousin who was running for the South Carolina governorship. A college girl at the time, my mother had anything but politics on her mind. She wasn’t at Magnolia Manor for thirty minutes before she noticed my father across the room. She made it her business to find out who he was. When she learned that he was a Stafford, she set her cap.

The rest is history. A marriage of political dynasties. My mother’s grandfather had been a North Carolina representative before his retirement, and her father was in office at the time of the wedding.

The story makes me smile as I climb the manor’s marble steps and punch the code into the incongruously modern keypad beside the front door. Important people live here still. Not just anyone is allowed to enter. Sadly, not just anyone is allowed to exit either. Behind the manor, the expansive grounds have been carefully fenced in decorative iron too tall to climb over. The gates are locked. The lake and reflecting pool can be looked at but not reached…or fallen into.

Many of the residents must be protected from themselves. That’s the sad truth of it. As they decline, they move from one wing to the next, slowly progressing to higher levels of delicately provided care. There’s no denying that Magnolia Manor is more upscale than the nursing home May Crandall lives in, but both places face the same underlying challenge—how to provide dignity, care, and comfort as life turns difficult corners.

I wind my way to the Memory Care Unit—here, no one would even think of crassly calling it the Alzheimer’s Unit. I let myself through another locked door and into a salon, where the television plays a rerun of Gunsmoke turned up loud.

A woman by the window stares at me blankly as I pass. Beyond the glass, the climbing roses are dewy and fresh, pink and filled with life.

The roses outside Grandma Judy’s window are a cheery yellow. She’s sitting in the wingback chair admiring them when I walk in. I stop one step inside the door and steel myself before drawing her attention from the plants.

I prepare for her to look at me the same way the woman in the lounge did just now—without a hint of recognition.

I hope she won’t. There’s never any telling.

“Hi, Grandma Judy!” The words are bright, and loud, and cheerful. Even so, they take a minute to garner a reaction.

She turns slowly, leafs through the scattered pages in her mind, then in her usual sweet way says, “Hello, darling. How are you this afternoon?”