Five
Debbie awoke the next morning feeling better than she had in ages. Something about her encounter with Neil put everything in a new light. She decided to employ some of his wisdom to her situation and see what transpired. She would think of Trish, Natasha, and all the rest as women wrapped up in a perpetual fog of unhappiness, unable to see anything clearly. She would consider them as Jesus would—lost people who needed love not confrontation. Though it would be difficult to assert such love when following behind Trish, picking up after her, and tending to the care she’d left undone, Debbie would do her best.
With her new attitude in place, Debbie found the day proceeding smoothly. The fact that Trish also had the day off didn’t hurt matters. Mrs. Whitaker did not assign Debbie to Elvina’s wing but to the other wing that included Harold’s room. He perked up when he saw her, smiling a toothless grin for the first time that she could recall. Debbie took her time pampering him a little, giving him a thorough shave, scouring around for some aftershave lotion to smooth on his face, and dressing him in a new sport shirt.
“Did you ever get married, Harold?”
“No. Never had a girl. Sam did, but I didn’t. He talked about her all the time. His Liv, he called her.”
“Liv? Was that short for Olivia?”
“Don’t know. When he went off to fight, Sam left her and the boy behind. He told me all about them, how he was gonna marry her and be a real father to that little boy. He told me. . . told me to. . .” Harold stopped then as if a switch had been turned off. A strange look distorted his rough features.
“Harold?”
He began to tremble and then looked off in the distance. “Hey, you there! What are you doing out of line? Get back in line right now, or the major’s gonna have it in for you.”
Debbie sighed. Once more he has lapsed into that strange battle state of sixty-some-odd years ago. When she tried to coax him back again, he refused. For a man who sometimes did not delve in reality, Harold had a knack for stubbornness. Sometimes she sensed pride holding him in that time period. Or, perhaps Harold found comfort in a wartime frame of mind, as if the present day proved more painful than D-day. Why he would think that, she had no idea.
“Debbie, I need a favor.” Mrs. Whitaker stood in the doorway with the medication cart. She was of the “old school” of nursing, clad in her pure white dress with the nursing button of her alma mater prominently displayed, white hose, and white nursing shoes. Debbie was thankful the nursing assistants could wear colorful tops and white clogs. Her favorite smock this time of year was the one with holly and berries sprinkled across the fabric. And in January, Debbie liked to wear one covered in flowers to remind her of the coming spring.
“Can you work overtime tonight? I had two call in sick for the evening shift, and we’re running short. If you can work until seven, that would be great.”
Debbie quickly agreed. More time on my mission field, she decided. She would love to have Neil tagging along with her, telling her what to do, being her encouragement, lifting her head up when it sometimes sank to her chest in dejection. Then she realized Neil was merely a messenger. God was the source of her encouragement—her head lifter.
The rest of the day went smoothly with these thoughts singing in her head. Even when most of the day shift went home and Debbie remained behind, she felt light on her feet as if she had barely worked an eight-hour shift already. When Debbie got a break, she decided to pay Elvina a visit. Debbie came in whistling, hoping to put on a record for her and hear her sing. Elvina sat in her wheelchair by her bedside, staring toward the door with her hands folded on her lap as if waiting for something. “Hi, Elvina, it’s Debbie.”
“Oh, it’s my little nurse. How are you, dear? I haven’t seen you in such a long time. Are you working this evening?”
Elvina, with her eyes blinded to everything around her, had never literally seen Debbie, but Debbie knew what she meant. “Yes, for a few hours. For some reason, I’ve been assigned the other hall the last week or so. Do you want me to put on a record for you?”
“No, thank you. I’m waiting for Nathaniel to come. He’s late today. I already hear the dinner carts coming down the hallway.”
Debbie looked at her watch. “It’s 5:30.”
“Tsk, tsk. He always comes at 5:00. Must be there was a lot of traffic.”
“I’m sure he will be here.” Suddenly it dawned on her that she would get the opportunity to see this infamous grandson of Elvina’s, the one who had given her the record player, the one everyone on staff raved about. She wondered why she had always missed seeing the man when working overtime. Oh well. Tonight, the mystery of Elvina’s Nathaniel would be solved. Debbie chuckled to herself until she glanced at Elvina’s nightstand. Sitting on top was a tin of shortbread cookies that looked vaguely familiar.
“What are you up to?” Elvina asked.
Leave it to Elvina to sense something was up. She had eyes in the back of her head. “Oh, nothing. Just wondering if you’ve eaten any of the cookies yet?”
“Are you hungry? Help yourself. I was going to ask the nurses if they would like to have them. To be honest, why Nathaniel thinks I should have cookies, I don’t know. Yes, I do have a sweet tooth, but I’m afraid you sweet things will hurt your backs trying to get me out of bed if I keep eating cookies and candy.”
Debbie wondered if it would be too presumptuous to open Elvina’s drawer and check for throat lozenges. Just then she heard the nurses’ station paging her. She hurried off, not giving it another thought until she returned half an hour later. Debbie went to check on Elvina and see if her grandson had made it in. She peeked in and saw a man with a rugged build sitting by Elvina’s wheelchair. His back was to her, but she plainly saw the shocks of dark hair. He and Elvina were laughing. Debbie sucked in her breath. She didn’t want to give the appearance of being overzealous as so many of the staff had been known to do. She decided simply to stride in, in a businesslike fashion. Maybe she could take the two dinner trays while stealing a quick glance.
Lifting her head high, Debbie marched in. “Let me get those trays out of your way,” she declared, swiping up the trays.
“Oh, Nathaniel, this is the sweet nurse I was telling you about,” Elvina said.
Nathaniel turned. They stared at each other.
“Neil?”
“Debbie?”
She burst out laughing, in keeping with the season of unpredictable joy. The surprise tickled her all the way to her toes inside her white clogs, as did the delightful smile erupting on Neil’s face. “My day is complete.”
“Mine, too.”
❧
Neil couldn’t believe that the nurse his grandmother adored turned out to be Debbie, though he wasn’t totally surprised. Debbie had a fondness for the residents that was unmistakable. He could tell right away the two of them shared a special bond, which he hoped to share with Debbie, as well. When Gram launched into how Debbie made her feel beautiful with makeup and combing her hair, Neil cast a smile in Debbie’s direction. He was getting more impressed by the minute.
“Debbie cares, Gram. She’s a great person.”
She sat up straighter in her chair. “You know her, Nathaniel?”
A blush filled Debbie’s face, making her appear all the more attractive. Though he thought her attractive anyway, with the way her soft brown hair lay on her shoulders. Recalling her hunched over that hot chocolate, the steam in her face, he couldn’t help but stare. The holly and berries printed on her nursing smock, coupled with her cheerful countenance, brightened his day—especially a cold and dreary December one like today.
“This is simply wonderful,” Gram cooed. “Nathaniel has been telling me all about a nurse who had fallen in the road. Was it you, Debbie? You’re still here, aren’t you?”
“I’m right here, Elvina. Yes, I did take a fall about
a week or two ago. If it weren’t for your grandson, I might have been turned into a human waffle under the wheels of a delivery truck.”
Gram picked up Neil’s hand and gave a squeeze. A tear or two trickled out of her eyes. “This is so sweet, I can’t help but cry,” she confessed. “How I prayed you would find a nice lady to settle down with. I just know you two are perfect for each other.”
Neil glanced at Debbie who was using a fork from one of the trays to trace an imaginary line across the bedside table. He could tell that she was trying to decide how to take all this. The truth be known, Neil had been thinking quite a bit about Debbie. He had that trip back and forth from Roanoke, with plenty of time for contemplating and planning. Of course, one could hardly plan out a future relationship. That fell in God’s department. Neil didn’t want to make a mess of things. But he did like the feeling he got whenever he was around Debbie. And presto, here she was—caring for Gram, no less.
Debbie picked up the trays. “I guess I’d better get these into the cart before the cafeteria guys roll it away.”
“Let me get the other tray,” Neil offered. Gram looked on, grinning from ear to ear, as if she had planned this all out and everything was proceeding on cue. The whole notion made him suddenly bashful. The words became tangled in his throat as he walked a few paces behind Debbie down the hallway. At the large metal cart they each slid in their respective trays.
“So you come here every evening to eat with Elvina, I mean, your grandmother?” Debbie asked.
“Most evenings.”
“Small world.”
“Small facility.” He nodded toward the hallway that branched off into another part of the building. “Who would’ve thought you would be working on this floor.”
“Actually I’m only here another hour or so. I usually work days, but they needed an extra hand until seven.”
“I’ll probably be leaving around then. I’d offer you a ride, but I take it you have your car back, right?”
Debbie nodded. He wondered then if they should do something after her shift was over. What does one do on a Wednesday evening? He’d already had his dinner. He didn’t know if she’d eaten or not. Maybe get a pizza? That sounded like teenybopper stuff. They had done the coffee shop scene, even run into each other at the grocery store. He wasn’t about to invite himself over to her apartment again. Downtown Fincastle offered little in the way of entertainment, and meeting at the shopping plaza at Daleville seemed lame. Roanoke held many possibilities but was too far out of the way for a midweek outing. He considered it for a time until he saw Debbie staring inquisitively.
“Something wrong?”
“No. Just thinking.”
“Well, I have to check on the other residents. Have a good visit.”
He sighed, wishing he had come up with something, but let the idea slide for the time being. Instead, he returned to his grandmother to find her sitting there quietly, looking distant, as if in deep thought. “You okay, Gram?”
“Oh, of course. Just thinking about you two gets me thinking about my sweetheart when I was young.”
Neil grimaced. He was never good at talking to her about Grandpa Joe, who had passed away two years ago. Gram seemed to take it well when she learned her husband died in his sleep. But comments like this always threw him for a loop, wondering what to say or how to react.
“My long-lost love.” She straightened then, her gray blue eyes growing deeper in color to a near navy blue. “You never saw what he looked like. A pity.”
The remark puzzled him. “Sure I have. Plenty of times.”
“No, you haven’t. I don’t think your mother has a single picture of him anywhere. No one does that I know of. Your father was too small to have pictures. He was only three when his dad left. I don’t think he gave him a picture, but he should have.”
What is she talking about? This was getting more confusing by the minute. Of course there were pictures of Grandpa Joe. He began to panic, wondering if Gram was having some kind of memory lapse. Maybe some disease lay lurking there for a long time, like that dreaded Alzheimer’s disease, and now it had surfaced. “Gram, I’ve seen many pictures of Grandpa. Mom has them sitting there on the mantel.”
She shook her head. “If only I knew how to say these things right, but I don’t. I do wish you knew him, Nathaniel. You remind me of him. The way you greet people. The way you treat a lady—like helping my little nurse when she fell. He was chivalrous. He would help anyone.”
“Gram, I know it’s hard to lose Grandpa, but he’s in heaven. He was a fine Christian man.”
“I don’t know where he is,” she said hollowly. “I don’t know if he’s alive or dead. I wish I did. If there were one wish I could have, it would be to see him one last time. If only he could tell me why he wrote just one letter and why I never heard from him again. If only I could tell him about your father—what a fine young man he turned out to be, and then the fine children he had, like you. He would be so proud.”
Neil stared, his hands sinking deeper into his pockets. None of this was making any sense. He whirled and walked out into the hallway, scanning the nurses’ station. Everyone was gone, probably involved in evening care to ready the residents for the night. He needed to talk to someone, a doctor maybe, someone who could tell him if his grandmother was suffering a mental defect. Debbie would know. She knew Gram like the back of her hand. At least he hoped she did. He walked down the hall, peeking in each room until he found her.
“Hi, Neil.” She paused. “Is something wrong?”
He waited until she came out into the hallway. “It’s Gram. Something’s not right. She keeps talking about Grandpa like she hasn’t seen him in thirty years. He just died a couple of years ago. And now she’s asking to see him again.”
Debbie sighed. “I’m sorry, Neil. Sometimes a mind can wander in the evening. It’s just temporary. She’ll be better in the morning.”
“I’ve never heard her say these things before. She says there are no pictures of him either and that I’ve never even seen what he looks like. Debbie, I have a picture of Grandpa Joe sitting on my bureau at home. I knew him very well.”
“I don’t know what to say, Neil. If you want, I can try and talk to her.”
“No. It might make her more confused and upset. I just wish I knew what to do.” Neil strode away, staring at the floor tiles. It had finally happened. His dear grandmother had gone senile and when he least expected it. Looking at his watch, he decided to call it an evening before anything else absurd came forth. Heading back to her room, he paused in the doorway to study her. She appeared sweet and innocent, so lucid really, talking about a long-lost love, her sweetheart, as if he were a real person. Maybe he was, in her mind.
When Neil walked into the room, her head turned. “I thought you had left without saying good-bye. That’s not like you.”
“Gram, I’m worried.”
“About what?” She said it as if he were the one going senile.
“What you said about Grandpa Joe. It doesn’t make any sense.”
“I wasn’t talking about Joe. Dear Joe. I know he’s in heaven, bless his heart. I just wondered what happened to your other grandfather.”
My other grandfather? “What? You mean my mom’s dad?”
She waved at him. “No, no, no. Your father’s father. Your real grandfather. Oh, never mind. It’s getting late. Can you send for Debbie? I need to get ready for bed. And you need to go home before it gets too late.” She turned her wrinkled cheek toward him, waiting for him to bestow the nightly ritual of a kiss on her cheek. He obliged, only to have her pinch his own in an affectionate way.
“Don’t worry about things. I’m fine.”
“I’ll try not to,” Neil managed to say.
Leaving White Pines that night, he felt like he was walking in a daze. My dad had anoth
er father who wasn’t Grandpa Joe? If so, he knew nothing about him. Could it be something that had been hidden away all these years, only to come forth now? He kicked up a stone. And why now, when other things were on his mind. He didn’t need this disruption in his life. He was considering things that he had never considered before: being together with Debbie, believing life might, finally—at age thirty-five—be coming together for him. Why did this have to come out now?
Six
Neil drove home in a cloud of confusion and questioning. Not even the flashing Christmas lights in the windows or the outlandish blow-up snowmen and Santas in the front lawns made him turn his head. Instead, he only stared at the road ahead. What other man is Gram talking about? He hoped the cold night air, blowing on him through the car vent, would wake him up to reality. Maybe this was just a temporary lapse in Gram’s thinking and everything would be back to normal when he saw her next. He gripped the steering wheel as he drove onto Interstate 81, heading for Roanoke. Maybe he should call the floor tomorrow and let Gram know he was under the weather and wouldn’t be in. That would give them both time to clear their heads and set things straight. He needed it. Right now his felt like a fog machine had been turned on inside. He couldn’t even see.
Maybe I should talk to Debbie or the head nurse and find out if they’ve switched her medication. Once, they had given Gram a new sleeping pill so she could rest. That night she became completely delirious, climbing out of bed and trying to walk around the room. She nearly fell. Maybe they had given her a new pill, and now the side effects were showing up as a delusion of some man contrived in her mind, some sweetheart, someone she even insisted was his true grandfather, of all things.
His cell phone played a tune, interrupting his thoughts. He struggled for it, buried under gloves and some papers from work. Looking at the number, he saw it was White Pines. This is it. They were going to tell him that his grandmother had indeed taken a turn for the worse, that her mind and emotions were completely off the wall, that everything he knew and loved about her was gone.
Truly Yours Contemporary Collection December 2014 Page 53