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“Miss Miriam, you’ve got quite a welcoming committee here,” Adam said with a smile, reaching across her lap to unbuckle her seat belt. She lifted one red-tipped hand, settling her fingers over his shoulder, keeping her gaze on Mom.
“Two people is not a committee,” she said, her expression so pinched with disdain that I nearly burst out laughing. Mom just sighed.
“Diana and William are flying up this afternoon. They’re probably in the air by now. Richard—that’s my older brother, he lives in L.A.,” she said, looking toward Adam, who had finished unlocking Mimi’s seat belt and was helping her swing her legs toward the door. He nodded back, and Mom continued, “Richard stopped off to see friends in Portland on his way up. He says he’ll be here this evening, but then again, he said that yesterday, so . . . we’ll see.”
Mimi frowned. “What about Jillian?”
Uh-oh,I thought.
Mom shook her head. “Richard isn’t married to Jillian anymore, Mother.”
“Not Jillian, then,” Mimi said, waving a hand impatiently. “The one after Jillian.”
“He’s not married to her anymore, either.” Mom chuckled a little. “Or the one after that. Richard is three for three on divorces, Mother. And his boys are spending the holidays with their wives’ families. But look, your granddaughter is here.”
Mimi made aharrumphnoise, but the corners of her mouth lifted as she looked at me. “Well, hello, granddaughter,” she said. “That’s a lovely blouse.”
“Thanks, Mimi,” I said, and then shivered violently as a sudden gust of wind blew straight through the thin material of my sweater. Everyone laughed.
“Let’s all go inside, we’ll just need to unfold the ch—” Mom began, then stopped and looked aghast as Mimi scooted forward, one hand still resting on Adam’s shoulder, and stepped down from the van as nimbly as a cat.
“Don’t fuss, Theodora,” the old woman said, the smile gone from her face. “I’m perfectly capable of walking on my own.”
That’s the problem,I thought, watching my mother’s unhappy expression as she watched her mother walk toward the house, one hand nestled gently into the crook of Adam’s arm. It was hard to believethat Mimi was dying. Her white hair was still thick and glossy, her cheeks pink, and though she had the deeply lined face and slightly shrunken look of a person who had lived for eighty-five years, she moved with the confidence of someone half her age. The running joke at Willowcrest was that she had a different kind of mobility issue from most residents: she wastooagile, surprisingly quick on her feet. Some dementia patients lost their coordination at the same time as they lost their minds, which came with its own risks—bad falls, broken hips—but this was its own problem. Mimi had a habit of slipping away when somebody’s back was turned, wandering into other residents’ rooms or rattling for entry at locked doors. Once, just a few days after moving in, she’d managed to sneak into the cafeteria as it was closing after lunch and walked away with one of the tubs from the salad bar. She’d consumed fully half of it by the time someone noticed that Willowcrest’s newest resident was sitting alone in one of the inner courtyards, eating egg salad out of a bucket with her bare hands.
But that was funny, not dangerous. Willowcrest was safe for someone like Mimi precisely because it seemed like you could leave. On the surface, it was a posh little village, with shops and restaurants and even a Victorian-style greenhouse where you could spend an afternoon reading under a palm tree. A place designed to make people feel free while also effectively and quietly imprisoning them. A resident like my grandmother could manage something like the egg salad incident, even enjoy her resulting reputation as a bit of a troublemaker, while we and the staff knew she’d never even gotten close to one of the few and firmly locked exits.
The only problem with Willowcrest was that it wasn’t home.
And Mimi deserved to be home for Christmas, in the house where she’d been a child, a wife, a mother—and where she’d returned at the end of her long life, after decades away, as if she’d known it would be over soon. It was why we were here, and why everyone else would be, too. My mother and her siblings rarely spoke, and rarelyagreed on anything when they did, but somehow they’d managed to plan this holiday reunion at the house that would eventually become just another asset to fight over. Maybe because everyone understood that it was now or never, that we wouldn’t get another chance. Even if her body lived to see another December, Mimi would be gone by then. Lost in the fog like one of the shadowy boats drifting out there on the bay, sounding its mournful horn as it drifted past unseen. I thought of the way she’d looked at me, the way she’d said,Hello, granddaughter,with that cheeky smile. “Granddaughter,” and not my name—because she’d forgotten it.
It all comes full circle, I thought, watching her approach the broad stone steps. It was a journey she must have made thousands of times, passing over the threshold of her family home. She glanced up at Adam, who smiled down at her, and tightened her grip on his arm.
“I’ve got you,” he said.
Mom, who had been clicking her tongue almost unconsciously from the moment Mimi began walking, made a little squeak like she was being strangled.
“Mom,” I said, my voice floating out low and cautious through gritted teeth. “Let it be.”
But I didn’t need to say anything: Mimi was up the steps in seconds, still holding tight to Adam’s arm, waiting for him to reach out with his free hand to open the door. I felt Mom relax next to me—and then she chuckled. “They sure don’t make nurses like they used to.”
“He’s not a nurse,” I said automatically. “You need a degree for that. He’s a personal caregiver.”
Mom raised her eyebrows and gave me a sidelong glance. “Well, I wouldn’t mind if he gave me some personal care.”
“Mom,” I hissed, but started giggling. Adam looked back at us with a knowing grin. It was impossible to tell if he’d heard. If he did, I guessed he didn’t mind.
As she stepped over the threshold, Mimi paused once more. Thewind rose as she turned into it, whipping her hair back from her face. The open doorway framed her in darkness as she stood, gazing east toward the trees and the sea beyond. She looked beautiful and blissful, as if the years had receded to reveal the young woman she used to be. And inside my head, a single thought passed like a whisper.
She’s home.
3.
1942
Summer
She is thirteen years old. Just a girl and young like a sunrise, with pink cheeks and blue eyes and hair the color of dark honey. Her face holds the promise of incredible beauty beneath its childish roundness. People look at her as though she’s a flower, just waiting to bloom. She is small-boned but long-limbed, with her mother’s slim ankles and shapely legs. Mother was a chorus girl before she became Papa’s wife, and Miriam has her prettiness, her grace.
