Page 50 of They Say a Girl Died Here

“Yeah. You always are, Anna.”

Grandma finally turned toward them, her worried eyes on Anna. “Can you take me to bed, Anna?” She looked across to Mom. “The nurse won’t help me. I think we have to ask them to send another one.”

Mom flinched, a stab of pain. Abandonment. Umbilical tears. Umbilical tears. “You do it if she wants you. I’ll finish here.”

“Okay, Grandma. Let’s go.” Anna took Grandma’s arm, helping her out of the chair. Mom’s face softened into something between envy and hurt.

“She’s better with you anyway. At least she knows who you are when she’s like this.”

“She knows who you are, Mom. She knew you were a nurse. She knows you look after people.” They took a few steps toward the door, Grandma shuffling as if she couldn’t remember how to use her legs. Anna glanced back at her own mother. “Will you try to see Lucas again?”

Mom kept her eyes on her task, rearranging the shelves. “I don’t think he’d want anything to do with us, do you?”

She looked small, younger, despite the aging tiredness in her face, and it frightened Anna. It was like she was vanishing. Mom could be a bitch, but she was tough. Mom couldn’t break.

“I’m sorry I’m such a fuckup.”

Mom paused, gave her a sad half smile, and shrugged. “Me too, Anna. Me too.”

58

Anna took Grandma into the little downstairs bathroom and watched as she brushed her teeth, then waited outside while she used the toilet, wondering if she’d have to go in and help her. There would come a day when that probability would become a certainty, but for now, Grandma managed on her own. When she emerged, she’d even put moisturizer on her face, streaks of thick white cold cream still visible under her vacant eyes. Maybe the habits of a lifetime could be done on autopilot.

She thought Mom might come to get Grandma undressed, but she didn’t and Anna found it didn’t worry her. After the struggle and blood of helping Jezebel give birth, gently helping Grandma out of her housedress and into her flannel nightie was just one more part of the circle of life. She murmured encouragement as Grandma lifted one arm and then the other, physically able to do what she was told, even if her mind was failing. She had a flash of a memory of helping Caroline get into her pajamas when she was a toddler. So similar and yet so different. Caroline had been all firm, rubbery limbs full of wriggling energy for a life to be lived, and Grandma was frail, skin pulling away from flesh that was pulling away from bones, as if by trying to leave the skeleton behind, death and age could somehow be cheated. Grandma had always been so formidable. How she must hate being reduced to this.

“There you go.” Anna eased Grandma into bed, the old woman complying, and pulled the covers over her. It was as hot and sticky as every other night of this endless summer had been, but Grandma felt the cold. As she made her comfortable, Grandma liking to fall asleep half-upright even if she ended up lying down, Anna saw the notebook was wedged under her pillows. Grandma’s vacant stare didn’t flicker as Anna sat on the bed beside her and turned the pages.

There was all the stuff she had seen before, the prayers and then the comment about the food Dr. Burdett had brought around for dinner—It was tacos and then it was potpie and I am not mad. It was tacos before—which made no sense because the doctor had only come for dinner once and it was definitely chicken potpie that he’d brought with him—or was it lasagna and was Jamie in the pool or in the room or in the tub and why was she so confused—and then she scanned forward to the section that had chilled her. It still did.

A GIRL DIED HERE A GIRL DIED HERE A GIRL DIED HERE A GIRL DIED HERE

All these dreams in my head all these dreams the same but different

Ghosts in my head

Ghosts in my head

In my head

She turned the page and her breath caught. One word filled it. Her own name, scrawled over and over again.

Anna Anna Anna Anna Anna Anna Anna Anna Anna Anna

“It makes my head hurt to write.” Grandma stared at the wall ahead of her, not even glancing at Anna. “But I forget.” Anna looked down at the page. Why was Grandma so focused on her in these lost times? Had what happened to Anna upset her so much? She remembered the blood in the basement and felt queasy. Could she trust what she was seeing? Could she trust herself?

“Did you write this, Grandma?” she asked. “Is this real, Grandma?”

“Real…” Grandma’s head tilted. “Real changes,” she whispered. “I’m losing myself and I don’t remember. I have to try to write it down. But they’re in my head. It’s in my head. All the time. And it’s so important. I’m so afraid.”

Anna took her hand. “Who’s in your head, Evelyn?” Her heart thumped. Her skin tingled. “Is it Lila and Bonnie? Are they inside you?” They say a girl died here. Was it so crazy to think that the dead girls were haunting this place and trying to talk through Grandma? Was there something about her Alzheimer’s that maybe let them inside her?

People claimed to have communed with the dead for centuries. Every civilization reported spirits of their ancestors visiting, haunted houses, poltergeists, ghosts. She’d just witnessed the gloriousness of new life coming into this world. Surely all that energy still existed after the body was gone. Like Melissa had said in the graveyard. Did some get stuck here?

She squeezed Grandma’s hand, as if she could drag her back to sanity from her fugue state. “Did the girls die in this house? Is that what they’re trying to say?”

Grandma let out a low moan, her fingers twitching in Anna’s grip, and then after a moment, she started to hum.

“Grandma?” Anna was a little firmer. “Please. I want to understand.” She tried to get Grandma to meet her gaze, but even when she put her face directly in front, Grandma’s lost eyes looked away.