Crimson Death (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter #25)(36)

Mom and Dad stayed in their car, and I swapped batons with Uncle Roy. Him to the hospital. Me with the kids. Team break.

I felt super weird sleeping in Aunt Linda and Uncle Roy’s bed, so I dug through their linen closet until I found a blanket. I cocooned myself on the sofa, fluffing up the hard cushions as best as I could. Then I proceeded to stare at the ceiling. Like I was going to get any damn sleep now.

It’s funny how you can spend weeks, or months, or sometimes even years preparing yourself for a nightmare that’s more “when” than “if.” Then just when you’re fooling yourself that you’ve accepted the world’s end, and you’ll roll with the impact when it hits … suddenly, it might be hitting, and you’re not rolling. You’re collapsing, sitting where you stood, totally overwhelmed by a loss you were never really ready for.

How could I have thought I’d cope with losing Aunt Linda? The reality of it all made me feel helpless. My life stretched out in front of me, made up of hundreds of thousands of hours, which were made out of millions of minutes, which were made up of billions of seconds. And right now, each second pinned me down like rubble. I’d have to somehow get through all those billions of seconds without Aunt Linda being alive anymore.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.





13


I woke up to three missed calls and a text. My stomach plummeted, and I steeled myself to open the message.

Thursday, 7:16 AM

Linda’s doing okay. Bring the kids

when you can.



Okay.

Okay was good.

I moved through a bubble, getting the kids up, dressed, and fed. Neither of them had a clue their mom was in the hospital, it turned out, and I didn’t know how I was supposed to frame this. In the end I just kind of minimized it, passing it off as a minor blip, sounding as chirpy as I could. Which was a hell of an effort, considering I’d had about four hours’ sleep by my estimate. Luckily for me, the kids didn’t seem suspicious. They were too busy chattering about what they wanted to have for Thanksgiving dinner. How Aunt Linda had promised she’d do the potato gratin with bacon pieces, and that they could have a glass of Coke if they were well-behaved.

Shit. I hadn’t even thought about dinner. Someone was going to have to break it to the kids that Thanksgiving dinner wasn’t likely to happen today. That someone was not going to be me, though. I’d been the bearer of enough bad holiday news. In fact, I decided then and there that I wasn’t going to contribute to making this day suck any more than it had to for them. So when Crista wanted to put on her Elsa costume, complete with teeny little kitten heels, even though it was forty freaking degrees outside, I let her. And when Dylan wanted a banana smoothie as a “special” breakfast, he damn well got a banana smoothie. Who cared, at the end of the day? Life was short.

At the hospital, Aunt Linda was lying in bed, propped up by stiff white hospital pillows and the bed itself, which was raised at one end. She was missing her headscarf. Even though she’d been going through chemo for a while now, her scalp wasn’t totally bald. Instead, a few short wisps of the curls that used to tumble down her neck were left behind. Also, her face was totally clean. She never, and I mean never, went without makeup. Even if it was just eyebrows and eyeliner. Bare like this, she looked capital-S Sick.

My parents were side by side on the ugly floral love seat, and Uncle Roy slumped in the chair by Aunt Linda’s head. When he noticed us come in, he gave the kids a tired smile and held out a hand.

Crista and Dylan went straight to the bed. “I thought you were doing chemo?” Crista asked in a voice so small I died a little.

Aunt Linda’s smile was even more exhausted than Uncle Roy’s. “Happy Thanksgiving to you, too, Elsa. I felt a little sick while you were sleeping, so we came here to get me better. Don’t you worry a bit.”

“Does it hurt?” Crista pressed.

Aunt Linda and Uncle Roy exchanged a quick look, then Aunt Linda shrugged. “Nothing I can’t handle. But, Little Miss Munchkin, excuse me. Where is your coat? It’s freezing out.”

I held up the kid’s carryall. “Got it. Sneakers, too.”

“I don’t want sneakers.”

“Elsa wears sneakers after she’s done parading in those heels,” Aunt Linda said.

“She does not.”

“Believe me, she does. Elsa would need to take a Tylenol on the hour to wear those things all day. The blisters alone … And don’t get me started on the practicalities of walking on ice in pumps. Aunt Catherine tried it once. Ask her how that turned out.” Aunt Linda winked at Mom, who burst out laughing.

“That’s a story for when you’re older,” Mom said to Crista. “Much older.”

The rest of the morning was relatively quiet. The kids took their iPads off by the wall and sat on the ground, tearing through movies and games without complaining. I couldn’t imagine myself being that well-behaved when I was little, but then, these two weren’t regular kids. Dylan probably couldn’t remember a time when Aunt Linda wasn’t sick, and if Crista could, it’d be hazy. The hospital was like an extension of their home these days.

The adults rotated between trying to keep Aunt Linda company and going on their own phones while Aunt Linda napped. Her naps weren’t really deep sleeps as much as they were an inability to hold her eyes open for more than ten-minute stints. A part of me wondered if she wouldn’t prefer for the rest of us to leave her the hell alone so she could really rest for once. But then, it was Thanksgiving. You couldn’t abandon your family on Thanksgiving, even if they really, really wanted to be abandoned.