Dying Wishes

by Judith K Ivie

  The trim blonde held one hand up to her mouth and whispered, “I thought you and your guest might like the apple tart. It was made fresh this morning with local fruit, and it’s still warm. I had Pete put two servings aside for you just in case we had an early run.”

  “Yum, yum. Thanks, Sandy.”

  I followed Ginny to a corner table in the section reserved for staff during mealtimes. We draped our sweaters over the backs of two chairs to hold the spots before joining the cafeteria line at the serving counters. The entrées all looked delicious, but mindful of our waistlines and the luscious desserts waiting for us, we each chose a veggie plate with cottage cheese. Ginny had a pleasant word for each staff member in turn but still managed to get us through the line and seated in record time without appearing to hurry.

  “How’s business?” she demanded as soon as we were settled. “Are we making any money this month?”

  I laughed. “I’m doing fine, thanks, and isn’t this lovely weather we’re having? Margo sends her love and says she’ll see you next month as usual.”

  Ginny made a face. “Okay, okay, amenities first, then business. How’s Strutter and that delicious baby girl of hers? Her son has grown half a foot in the past year.” She paused. “So did we make any money?”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake. Things are a little slow right now, but they always are in October. We’re right on track with rentals, and a nice young man signed a sales contract this morning for Mrs. Roncaro’s old Phase One unit in Building Seven. Her death was quite a surprise, wasn’t it? She always seemed so fit, even flirty, to me.”

  Ginny munched on a carrot stick. “Yes, sometimes it happens that way, especially lately. It seems as though the ones you’d never suspect had any serious health problems …” She looked as if she had more to say on the subject but stopped herself. “Anyway, I sure hope this fellow’s folks are happy about it. It’s gotten so I hold my breath every time new residents move in. Even though they sign the paperwork, I get the feeling they would really rather stay in their homes and are just moving in here for the sake of their kids.”

  “I know what you mean. Vista View is a terrific facility, even though the redundant name sets my teeth on edge. Most of the buyers have lived in this part of Connecticut their whole lives, Wethersfield and Cromwell and Rocky Hill, so at least they don’t have to move to an unfamiliar area. Still, transitions are hard. Leaving your house has got to be one of the toughest.” I forked a cucumber slice into my mouth and eyed my apple tart lustfully.

  Ginny looked thoughtful as she pushed some tomato wedges around her plate. “It sure will be for me. I’ve lived in my house on Ridge Road for nearly forty years, raised my boys and nursed my dad through his final illness there.”

  “What do you mean, it sure will be? Are you planning on making your place of employment your place of residence?” I teased her.

  The smile she produced didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Not exactly. Roger and I are thinking seriously about moving to North Carolina to be near Denny and the grandkids. Rog says the winters here are getting to his arthritis, and I never planned on being a long-distance grandmother. It doesn’t look as if Denny and his wife plan to move back here, which is what we were hoping, so the only other option is for us to move down there.”

  For the first time I noticed the gray streaked liberally through Ginny’s short brown curls and the laugh lines that creased the freckled skin around her eyes.

  “I never thought of that,” I admitted. “Denny has lived down south for several years now, hasn’t he? And Greg is where?”

  “Teaching English as a second language in one godforsaken third world country after another.” Ginny’s younger son was finishing up his second stint with the Peace Corps. “It’s better than spending years carrying a rifle somewhere in the Middle East, I guess. I just miss him, is all. Rog and I both miss him like crazy.”

  I put down my fork. “Wow. I can’t imagine this place without you, Gin.” I looked around at the groups of contented residents enjoying their nutritious lunches and each other’s company. A small vase of fresh flowers brightened every table. Staff members moved efficiently about their duties. Even the tall windows that made the room so light and airy gleamed with recent attention. It was all Ginny’s doing, I knew. “Have you really decided to go?” I picked up my fork and poked at my cottage cheese.

  “Just about.Rog is tired of all the traveling his job demands. He’s been offered an early retirement package we’d be crazy to turn down in this economy, and as much as I love this place, I’m a whole lot wearier at the end of the day than I used to be. I hate to think about it, but what do you think our chances would be of getting a decent price for the house?”

  I swallowed my dismay and tried to think professionally about her situation. “Well, the market has been fairly stable now for a couple of years, and property values are holding steady after bottoming out a while back. You are Rog are among the lucky ones because you’ve owned your house for so long. Whatever you wind up getting for it has got to net you a handsome profit over what you paid for it in the 1960s. The mortgage is long gone, right?”

  Ginny sighed. “I wish. The good news is, by refinancing a couple of times, we were able to send Denny and Greg to college and keep the student loans to a minimum. The bad news is, the refinancing fees and so on, along with the equity we took out of the house, mean we still owe the bank a considerable sum. We’re not underwater on the loan, by any means, but it’s not where we had planned to be at our age.”

  “I hear that from a lot of our customers these days. Honestly, Ginny, I don’t know how to advise you. Strutter and Margo are the realtors. I’m basically the office manager. Talk to one of them. They can give you the real skinny.”

  “I’ll do that. Speaking of skinny …” She pulled her apple tart in front of her. “I was never going to lose that last ten pounds anyway.” She dug in and rolled her eyes in ecstasy. I abandoned my veggie plate and happily did the same.

  ~

  “Oh, great,” I said to Margo. “Now the AARP is after me to join.” I threw the offending junk mail on the kitchen table and opened the refrigerator door. “White wine or Diet Coke?”

  Rhett Butler, Margo’s chocolate Labrador retriever and her constant companion, sniffed at the cats’ dishes curiously, then flopped on the kitchen floor. Gracie, wandering downstairs to say hello, froze in the doorway leading to the hall. Rhett got up and went over to be friendly, which never worked, and Gracie fled back to the sanctuary of Armando’s bedroom.

  Margo wrinkled her perfect nose and padded over in her stocking feet to peer over my shoulder. Manolos were a must for the work day, but bare feet were more her style among friends, the better to display her impeccable pedicure. “Coke, please. Anything’s better than that awful stuff in the box you keep in here.”

  I pulled out two cans and shut the door. “It’s just for cooking,” I protested.

  “Uh huh. Don’t you know you shouldn’t cook with a wine you wouldn’t want to drink by the glass? It’s the gospel accordin’ to Ina Garten. Let’s take these out on the deck. It’s such a lovely evenin’, we shouldn’t waste it.”

  On the deck that overlooked tall trees and a brook that ran between The Birches and a neighboring street, we arranged two Adirondack chairs and put our feet up companionably on a small table set between them. At the foot of the shallow, sloping lawn, a brown rabbit spotted Rhett and turned to stone in its tracks.

  “That statue imitation won’t fool the coyotes,” I admonished him, “but at least you won’t have to get old.”

  Margo snorted, an inelegant habit of hers when something amused her. “My, my, we are in a mood about the birthday, aren’t we? Just what is it that has your tail in a knot, Sugar?”

  I smiled at my friend. For all of her southern belle fluttering, Margo is one of the most sensible people I know. “Nothing that every woman about to turn fifty hasn’t felt before me, I’m sure. Laugh lines. The beginnings of a crepe-y neck. Thic
kening waist. And hot flashes. Oh, yes, they’re starting already. All things considered, I can tell it’s not going to be pretty. You, of course, seem to be immune to the ravages of time.”

  Margo’s sympathetic chuckle didn’t totally conceal a small smile of satisfaction as she smoothed her linen sheath over her slim thighs. “I think both of us have a few good years left, thanks to all the exercise we get runnin’ around with clients and good skin care products. But those hot flashes, whew! I’m right with you on that one. I don’t think I’ve had a decent night’s sleep in three years.”

  I stared at her. “You never told me that. Three years?”

  Margo frowned at the rabbit, who now hopped cautiously along the edge of the lawn, tearing out great mouthfuls of grass as he went. “It’s not the sort of thing a lady mentions in polite company, as my dear mama used to tell me.”

  Margo had been raised in true debutante style, the only daughter of two pillars of Atlanta society. When her brand new husband turned out to be a serial cheater, Margo took comfort in the arms—and bed—of the mayor’s son. That wouldn’t have been so bad, but she chose to do it in her hostess’s bedroom in the middle of some la-di-dah fundraiser, which provoked quite a scandal. Margo had been banished from the family homestead to make her way in the world with nothing between her and abject poverty but a generous trust fund. “I may be a black sheep, but I’m still Daddy’s little girl,” was how she put it to me when we met at the Hartford law firm where she, Strutter and I had toiled briefly a few years back.

  “Since when do I qualify as polite company? I thought we were way past that stage.”

  “For sure,” she grinned at me, “and there are certain positive aspects to these hormonal temperature swings, as John will attest.”

  John Harkness is the chief of detectives at the Wethersfield Police Department and Margo’s husband of two years. Despite their obvious attachment to each other, I’d had my doubts that anyone could keep our libidinous Georgia peach contentedly monogamous, but Lieutenant Harkness seemed up to the job.

  “Such as?” I prompted.

  “I’ll give you an example. Television bores me witless, as you know, but John loves to watch the ball games, and I like to keep him company. He usually winds up sprawled on the couch while I tend to my nails or needlework or crossword puzzle in that big chair under the lamp.”

  “I know the one you mean.”

  “So the other night, that’s what we were doin’ when a big old hot flash rolled over me like a storm surge. About the same time, Ortiz caught a good pitch and slammed the ball right over the left field fence. Naturally, John got all excited and turned around to tell me about it.” She giggled.

  “Naturally. For some reason, they persist in thinking we care. So?”

  “Well, there I was in that big chair, naked as a jaybird, except for my Jimmy Choos, and fannin’ myself with the TV Guide.”

  I whooped at the mental image. “I assume you distracted him from the game?”

  “Whoo-ee, girlfriend. Good thing that chair is well constructed and roomy enough for two. So you see, there’s a silver lining to this change of life thing,” she finished up as she drained the last of her soda. “We both have a lot to be grateful for, and we both have husbands who will be wantin’ their dinners before too long. So quick, what’s new with Ginny?”

  I was happy to abandon the subject of my advancing years and eagerly filled her in on my lunch conversation with Ginny Preston. “She had some surprising news, too. She’s considering leaving Vista View to move to North Carolina and be near her grandchildren. Rog says the winters are getting to him, too. I hate to think of that happening. Ginny is the soul of sociability and efficiency, and I know the residents will miss her. I will, too. Nothing is really final,” I concluded, “but she and Rog seem committed to going, even though they’d much rather stay in their house on Ridge Road. She says she gets that feeling about a lot of the new Vista View residents who are moving in. You know, it’s a great place and all, but they’d really rather stay in their homes.”

  “Mmm, but what’s the alternative? Being dumped like aging baggage on your kids or some other resentful relatives? Avoiding that eventuality is why most of the Vista View residents move in there to begin with.”

  I nodded. “It’s not like the old days when children wouldn’t think of sending their parents off to a nursing home. Now it seems as if they can hardly wait, but then, everybody has full-time jobs, so you can hardly blame them. Maybe it’s the facility classification that’s so unsettling. You know, Phase One, basically still good to go. Phase Two, trouble ahead. Phase Three … well, strike three and you’re out, right? It all seems so calculated.

  Margo looked thoughtful. “Maybe we should do it like the Eskimos do it. When Mom gets past it, they stick her out on an ice floe to freeze to death or starve, whichever comes first.”

  “Oh, they do not do that! At least, I don’t think they do. Do they?” I shivered at the thought.

  “There’s no help for it, Sugar. Out with the old, in with the new … and on with the dinner.” On that note, she and Rhett departed, and I went upstairs to placate Gracie.

  Two

  On Friday evening Armando and I were due to meet my son Joey, his wife Justine and my daughter Emma for dinner at Pazzo, a casual restaurant a few miles from The Birches. It had been Joey’s suggestion, which was unusual enough in itself. Coming as it did just weeks before my birthday, it made me suspicious of an ambush-style surprise party. It had taken me decades to persuade my family members that I really, really did not enjoy contrived festivities centered around birthdays and Hallmark holidays like Mothers Day, and I fervently hoped they weren’t backsliding.

  “Nope,” Emma had reassured me before redirecting my anxiety. “He has news.” She wiggled her eyebrows meaningfully. We were sharing a quick coffee break Thursday morning on the back steps of the converted barn where she and her real estate lawyer bosses, Jimmy and Isabel, had office space on the floor above Mack Realty. Emma was a paralegal.

  “You already know this news?” I prodded.

  “Not from Joey. He’s making me wait along with everyone else for the official announcement, but come on, Ma. What news would your recently married son consider momentous enough to call a family meeting?”

  “You mean …?”

  She rolled her eyes. “So would you prefer to be called Nana Kate, or would a simple Grandma do it for you?”

  Another woman probably would have turned cartwheels of joy at this development, but my heart sank. Joey and Justine had been married only a few months, having done the deed quietly and without family fanfare at a JP’s office. Their relationship thus far had been stormy enough, to put it mildly, without adding the strain of an infant to the situation.

  “Oh, Emma. Are you sure?”

  She paused before answering me. “Well, they slunk off to a civil ceremony right after the Fourth of July, and we haven’t seen them since, just phone calls.” Joey and Justine lived in Ware, Massachusetts, an hour’s drive from Wethersfield. “I’m betting that Justine’s more than a few months gone.”

  My head swam with protests. “But Joey’s job takes him away from home so much, and Justine just got that big promotion she’s been working toward for years.” Joey drove big rigs for the supermarket chain where Justine had recently been made an assistant manager. “They just bought a house. How on earth will they manage?”

  Emma shrugged. “Like everybody else does, I guess. Joey may be a maverick and kind of a flake about some things, but he’s got his head on straight about money. You and Daddy made sure we both did.”

  That was true enough. My first husband Michael and I had gone separate ways amicably after twenty-two years together. Each of us had remarried in the last few years, and I was glad for all our sakes that we remained good friends. We’d made plenty of mistakes, to be sure, but somehow both our kids had turned out level-headed and hardworking. Hey, these days having offspring who weren’t in jail and were ga
infully employed were reasons enough to celebrate.

  “How are Michael and Sheila taking the impending announcement? I assume they’re as suspicious as we are.”

  Emma squirmed uncomfortably. “Actually, I think the cat’s out of the bag already as far as they’re concerned,” she hedged.

  “You think, or you know?”

  She put down her coffee and turned to face me, the hazel eyes so like my own meeting mine. “Daddy drove up there last week to help Joey put in a couple of thermal windows. Justine came home from work early and disappeared upstairs, and Daddy told Sheila later that Justine looked as if she’s put on some weight. Naturally, Sheila caught on right away.”

  We chuckled at the cluelessness of men about these things and went back to our respective offices.

  At four-thirty I packed up my Vista View sales materials in preparation for the morning and headed down Garden Street to the Wethersfield Green. Two minutes later I pulled into the driveway of a snug Cape Cod style house tucked behind the Silas W. Robbins House on Broad Street. Now a stunning bed-and-breakfast cum antiques showcase, the Robbins House drew visitors from across the country to enjoy the meticulously restored ambience of the Victorian structure. Ada and Lavinia Henstock had grown up in that house, the daughters of the Honorable Reuben Henstock, Esq., and had retained ownership until two years ago, when my partners and I sold it to its present owner. But that’s another story.

  Their new digs afforded them proximity to their lifelong home but in a setting that was manageable for the octogenarians. The B&B owner benefitted from the sisters’ knowledge of the house and town history. The arrangement worked well for everyone.

  Ada answered my knock quickly, as if she had been waiting for me. She opened the door wide but held a finger to her lips and glanced nervously over her shoulder at the staircase behind her as I gave her a hug.

  “I was hoping you’d come by before Lavinia awakened from her nap, and here you are.” Ada was all but whispering as she ushered me into the cozy living room that took up one side of the first floor. A dining room and kitchen occupied the other side, and a full bathroom was tucked behind the stairs.