How to Knit a Heart Back Home

by Rachael Herron

  “You lived here?” Lucy whispered.

  Owen ignored her, but tightened his hand on hers. “Mom! Mom?”

  There was a noise, a rustling in the next room. He hit a light switch as they walked into the next room, praying the electric company had forgotten to turn the power off, but no luck. Just a dull click.

  Then they were in a living room of some sort, and the rustling grew louder, then suddenly stilled. The flashlight’s beam lit up a pile in the corner near the fireplace. A tangle of sticks that looked like it had been picked up from outside in the unkempt garden and plopped in the corner seemed to jerk, and then still. Small eyes winked at them. The shushing sound went silent as the nest froze.

  A rat’s nest. A literal rat’s nest. Goddamn the last residents.

  He heard Lucy take a deep breath and stifle a scream. Her hand tightened in his, but she did well—she didn’t bolt.

  “Shit. Mom!” Owen pulled and Lucy followed, stepping on his heels. “Through here, hurry. There’s a sitting room in front. She had flowers in there.”

  He kicked through litter and detritus in the small front hall, and carefully pushed the glass door.

  “Mom?” Owen kept his voice soft.

  “I can’t find the watering can.”

  Irene was crouched on the floor, squatting, her hands on her knees. There was nothing in the small glassed-in space except a few ripped and flattened old cardboard boxes. Even the graffiti artists had been kind here, leaving this room mostly alone, apparently content to break only a few of the small panes of glass.

  “Mom. We’ve been looking for you.” Owen’s voice shook.

  “Help me look for it.”

  Owen hugged his mother. “Are you okay?”

  Irene pulled away from Owen’s embrace and stuck her index finger into his chest. “If you just put things back where you got them . . .”

  “Are you hurt? Are you cold? Of course you’re cold.” Owen looked at Lucy. “It’s freezing in here. And wet. I’m calling the paramedics.” He got out his cell phone to dial 911. “I’m seeing way too much of these guys,” he mumbled. “I used to be the one who got the calls, not the one who called them.”

  Lucy took off the blue sweater she’d been wearing all night.

  “Irene? You want to wear this?”

  Irene shook her head.

  Lucy said, “I knitted it myself. Angora from a spinner out past Mills Bridge.”

  Irene looked at her hands in the dim light from the outside streetlight. “Does she have her own rabbits?”

  Owen rolled his eyes. “We just need to take her with us. She’s not going to make sense.”

  Lucy ignored him and spoke to Irene. “She does have her own rabbits. About two dozen, I think, but they’re all like children to her. You should see the time she spends grooming them. She usually cards the fiber and spins on her wheel, but I’ve also seen her sit there, a bunny on her lap, her drop spindle spinning the fiber off the rabbit, right on the spot.”

  Irene’s eyes crinkled as her face broke into a smile. “That’s something.”

  “I’ll take you out there one day, if you’d like me to.”

  “I used to knit, too.”

  “I know. Do you still knit?” Lucy eased the sweater over Irene’s head, and Owen assisted, directing Irene’s arms into the sleeves.

  “What?”

  “Do you still knit? I can get you some wool and some needles if you like.”

  “I don’t know how.” Irene looked warmer already.

  “Yes, you do.”

  “I can’t remember. I can’t even remember, going back. You know. Like reverse.”

  “Going back? You mean purling?”

  Irene nodded hard. “I can’t do that.”

  Owen took Irene’s hands. Poor thing, they were freezing, stiff. This was awful. Her lips were tinged with blue. It couldn’t be much below fifty degrees in the house, but it was colder in this glass room.

  Lucy said, “Your hands never forget. You still know how. I can show you. Would you like that?”

  Irene stood still, her eyes filling with tears.

  Owen said softly, “Come on, Mama. No crying. We have to get you home. Are you tired? The nice ambulance is going to check on you.”

  Sirens wailed in the distance, and then got closer, the fire engine pulling up in front, the ambulance not far behind. Its flashing lights danced through the glass windows of the porch, and Irene covered her eyes and whimpered.

  “It’s okay, Mama.” Owen had a hard time injecting sympathy into his voice now, though. Anger was setting in. What the hell had she been thinking, wandering away like that? Oh, yeah. She hadn’t. She hadn’t thought in years.

  And Willow Rock. What was he paying them an arm and a leg for, if not to prevent exactly this from happening? He was going to have a talk with them that would leave their ears bleeding, see if he didn’t.

  The firefighters were the first through the front door, tumbling over each other like puppies, and Owen remembered why he loved being a police officer. Order. Precision. Not like a damned volunteer fire department in a sleepy beach town. How could Lucy do this on her off time? Impossible to imagine.

  “Hi, Jake,” said Lucy to the tallest man.

  “Lucy! What’s going on in here?” The firefighter looked down at Irene, still seated on the floor. “Ma’am. You okay? How long have you been in here? Jones, start vitals,” and with a few directions, he had two other people checking Irene over.

  “Captain Jake Keller,” he said to Owen. He was obviously the one in charge. Good. He didn’t look like a complete idiot. “Your mom? How’d she get in here?”

  “Owen Bancroft, and this is my mother, Irene. She’s been in here for at least a couple of hours. I’m going with maybe hypothermia, some dehydration.”

  Jake nodded and gave the female firefighter a few more instructions. Owen glanced at Lucy. The ambulance medics had entered, and Lucy watched them, as if checking their work.

  The paramedics wrapped a heating blanket around Irene and loaded her on a stretcher. She’d gone silent again, and her eyes were closed tight. Owen didn’t think she’d speak again for a long time. Maybe days. More.

  He was so furious he could barely speak.

  “Thanks,” he managed, as the firefighters cleared out.

  The door shut behind them with the distinctive click-snap he’d heard all his life—he’d forgotten that sound, how he’d hear it in the middle of the night when his dad would try to sneak in, unheard, way too late.

  God, he hated this house. He should buy it just so he could burn it to the ground. Raze it. It was all it was good for.

  Lucy pressed her face to the window, watching them carry Irene to the ambulance outside.

  “I should take you home now, then I’ll go to the hospital,” Owen said. Even the very words felt as heavy as lead, dropping like bullets to the ground.

  “You kidding me?” she said. “I’m staying with you. Now that we’ve found Irene, this is officially the most exciting night ever.”

  And the way her smile broke across her face was like dawn, come early.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  And never, ever be scared when knitting. Holding your needles with that much tension will only do bad things to your neck and your poor, muddled psyche.

  —E. C.

  Irene didn’t have to stay long at the hospital—her vitals were surprisingly strong, and she didn’t display any signs of dehydration. They released her at two in the morning and Owen drove her back to Willow Rock, Lucy sitting in the backseat, her needles clicking quietly, as they had at the hospital.

  Lucy had waited for him in the car while he took his mother inside, not wanting to introduce anything unfamiliar into Irene’s bedtime routine. When he’d come back out and eased himself down into the driver’s seat, she’d moved into the passenger seat and looked at him expectantly as he started the car.

  An almost overwhelming urge filled his body, the desire to reach out and stroke
her arm, to touch her face, to kiss the side of her neck and breathe her in. Instead, he stared at the gas gauge, struggling to still his breathing. Wordlessly, he started the engine.

  After another moment of silence, she prompted, “So? Is she okay?”

  It took all his concentration to put the car in reverse. “She’s fine. We changed her clothes and she doesn’t even have any scrapes or bumps. Miss Verna will have the on-call nurse check on her again first thing in the morning.” Owen glanced at the dashboard clock. “Which, since it’s already three, I guess won’t be very long from now.”

  “The medics were great with her, weren’t they? I love watching them when I’m not on call. I learn so much. They’re volunteers, you know. Mostly. I mean, Jake’s paid, but . . .”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake.”

  “What?” Lucy was clearly startled, her eyes wide.

  “She’s been wrapping her own shit and drying it. Keeping it in her dresser drawer and calling it diamonds. They just told me about it.”

  “Wow.”

  “They should have told me sooner. They hid it from me. It’s their job to keep me apprised of everything that happens with her. It’s just one long downhill slide, and I like to know how far down that slide we are.” Owen hated the break in his voice. “How close we are to the very bottom.”

  “Oh, damn.” Lucy slid low in her seat and pulled her knees to her chest. Her hand went to her head.

  “How do you feel?”

  “Me?” In the light of the streetlamp they passed, she looked surprised. And worried.

  “You must be exhausted.”

  “I’m fine. Bed will be good.” Her words fell away.

  Owen pictured her in bed, and imagined himself next to her, kissing her good night, stroking her arms, her sides, making sure she was comfortable. He imagined watching her eyelids droop slowly, watching her breathing slow and grow deep.

  He imagined watching her every night.

  “Careful! That speed bump there’s a doozy.”

  Christ, he hadn’t even been paying attention to the road. Slowing, he took the turn for her street. He wouldn’t push. If she wanted him, if she needed him, he was there.

  He was so there.

  When he said he wanted to see her safely inside the house, she didn’t argue. Then she didn’t seem to want to go right to bed, and even though he wanted to insist that she do so, he controlled himself. He didn’t say anything. They danced around each other, instead. In the kitchen, she made tea and gave him a cup without asking if he wanted it or not.

  Lucy sat on the couch, knitting. He sat on the chair opposite her. How was she not dropping from exhaustion? Shouldn’t she go to bed? But her eyes looked strangely bright, and her cheeks were flushed.

  Instead, he asked, “What are you making?”

  It was the right question. He loved the way her eyes lit up as she smiled at him, holding up the small piece of yellow fabric that dangled from her long needle.

  “I’m swatching. It’s going to be a remake of that ratty cardigan I always wear, the one I told you about, the one where I’ve only found the body pattern so far. Eliza Carpenter designed it for my Grandma Ruby. Even though Grandma was always knitting something for someone else, she never made herself anything. By the date at the top here,” she held up the page she’d placed in a plastic protector, “Eliza wrote this pattern just before Grandma died. It was the last sweater Grandma ever made, and it means everything to me. I just need to find the sleeve directions.”

  He could listen to her talk about knitting terms all night, words that bounced nonsensically around inside his head, as long as that look stayed on her face. Owen loved her smile. “They were really close, huh? Eliza and your grandmother?”

  “Eliza always had women surrounding her, following her. My mom was one of those, even though she was so much younger. It sounds like your mom was one. Mildred and Greta, the two older women you’ve met who are attached at the hip, were in her knit cadre. But Grandma Ruby and Eliza were like sisters. They spoke the same language.”

  Lucy knitted while she spoke, her fingers flashing. How did she do that? She wasn’t even looking at it. Owen never knew that knitting could be so damn sexy, but she made it look good. Nimble fingers. He knew what she could do with those . . . She was still talking. With effort, he dragged his attention back up to her eyes.

  “I think that was the hardest thing for Eliza about moving south. Leaving my grandmother, and leaving her land.”

  “Why did she go?”

  “She needed more help than Cade could give her, more medical attention, and a lot of the older knitters had gathered into this one assisted-living place right on the beach. She was the queen of them all. My grandmother would visit Eliza there once a year for a week, and it was like knitting camp while she was there. Grandma would come home, and it was like her . . . I don’t know. Like her spirit was glowing or something. God, now I sound like my mother.”

  Owen smiled. “Your mom isn’t like anyone I’ve ever met before.” And neither are you, he thought, but he didn’t say it. He couldn’t say it. “Is knitting hard?”

  “You want to learn?”

  “No!”

  “Why not? Threatens your manliness?”

  “As if anything could. Come on, now.” He was rewarded by her laughter.

  “I could teach you and reteach your mother at the same time. . . .”

  “You’re serious?”

  “Hey, knitting is way more soothing than yoga. Yoga’s hardcore. Traditionally, knitting was considered man’s work. Think about it, it’s just loops and knots. How much more manly can you get? And you could always knit a beer cozy or something.”

  “A beer cozy.”

  “Keeps your beer cold, and your hands warm.”

  “Is there seriously such a thing?”

  “I’ve even seen a gun cozy.”

  Owen took a sip of his tea. “That’s a joke, right?”

  “I think the pattern was meant to be ironic, yeah, but it exists. I can make you one for your Glock, if you’d like.”

  “Keep my hands warm and the bullets cold?”

  “Something like that,” she said.

  Her eyes dropped to her work as she turned it, tucking a trailing piece of yarn out of the way, flipping the long, oddly flexible needle around and starting to knit back the other way. He didn’t understand anything she was doing, but it was nice to watch. Soothing, somehow.

  Owen said, “I remember my mother knitting.”

  Lucy didn’t look up at him, just kept her hands in motion, and he felt mesmerized by her.

  He went on. “The click of the needles is nice.”

  Lucy shook her head a little and then said, “I’d really like to help her remember how to do it. It’ll come back to her as soon as she touches the yarn, I know it.”

  “Will you teach her again sometime?”

  “Really?” She sounded eager, like she really meant it.

  “I’d love it if you would. Anytime. Don’t even ask me first. I’ll put you on the list of approved visitors, and you can go see her.”

  “I will, then.”

  “They should have told me about her fake diamonds.” He knew it was apropos of nothing, but Miss Verna’s words nagged at him. “Think about the health violations. Digging around in a toilet bowl? For the love of Christ. I can’t even wrap my head around it. And then to not tell me.”

  Lucy changed the subject as fast as he had. “Jake Keller’s a good guy, huh?”

  Owen frowned. “Well, it’s not like she was hanging from a ledge or anything. . . .”

  “But if she had been, Jake and his crew would have been there. Just like they were at the fire, taking care of Abigail. That’s why I love working with them. . . .”

  Lucy was forgetting something important, though. “We were there,” said Owen. “We saved Abigail. And if my mom had been hanging from a ledge, I would have saved her. They’re just firefighters, and volunteers at that. They’re not gods
.” He thought of something. Something he didn’t like at all. “Are you dating him or something?”

  “God, no! He’s my boss when I’m on call. He’s full-time, one of three firefighter/paramedics. The rest are volunteers. They’re combined, both firefighters and EMTs. It’s just that . . . tonight reminded me of—” Lucy stopped talking and picked up her mug, looking into it as if it held the answers to life’s most important questions.

  “Reminded you of what?”

  “Damn, I need more honey in my tea,” she said, and it sounded like a tragedy.

  “Is it in the kitchen?” Owen asked. “Let me get it for you.” He wanted to take care of her.

  “No, I’ll get it.”

  He followed her into the kitchen.

  She added the honey and leaned both arms on the countertop. “Hell,” she said.

  “Tell me.”

  Lucy stared at the tile backsplash behind the sink. “It reminded me of being on the beach with my grandmother. When she collapsed in front of me, under the lighthouse.”

  In Lucy’s voice, Owen heard the same caliber pain he’d felt as Rob had fallen to the ground, the gunshots still ringing through the cold San Francisco fog.

  She went on, “I called 911, and the medics came. They worked on her. I couldn’t do anything. I didn’t even know CPR, had never taken a course. Turns out, they couldn’t save her. But I couldn’t even try, didn’t know what to do except hold her hand and cry.”

  “Sometimes that’s the best thing you can do.” His words were hollow, he knew it. He took the bear-shaped pot from her hands and added a long stream of golden honey to her tea.

  “I was just scared.” Lucy looked up at Owen, and her eyes sparked, making his heart beat so hard it almost hurt. “That’s why I joined the department. I was always scared. Quiet little bookstore Lucy.” Her eyes darted downward again.

  Owen used the spoon to swirl the honey. “So, pulling people out of burning cars? Holding people back while others have seizures? That’s not brave?”