How Many Letters Are In Goodbye? (12 page)

I'm sure he's gone too far, blown it, laying it on so thick, but all I can do is smile too. “His gentle angel,” I repeat.

“He said if it wasn't for you and Catherine, he wouldn't know how to keep going.”

Nurse Small shakes her head. “I'm not sure what your granddaddy was telling you, but there's no nurse called Catherine here.”

“Not a nurse, a patient. A resident. Catherine Davis.”

She keeps shaking her head, her hands back on her hips. “He wrote all this? In his letters?”

She doesn't believe us. She has to believe us.

My hand is still on Sergei's shoulder and my fingers stroke the hair on his neck.

“Sergei only met his grandfather a few times, when he was a little boy, before he moved to New York. He wrote to him every week. Nothing would get in the way of him sending his weekly letters. They were the only connection they had.” They're both looking at me. I'm shocked by how real the lie sounds. “We saved up for so long to come here—it broke his heart that we were too late. Please, Nurse Small, it would mean so much to him, to us.”

Afterwards, Sergei tells me he's as shocked as I am when Nurse Small lifts the hinged part of the countertop to come over to our side.

“Two minutes, that's it. I'm not supposed to leave the desk unattended. And you won't be able to see his room because Mr. Stieber is in there now.”

For a large woman, Nurse Small is fast on her feet. She pushes through a set of double doors to the left of the fish tank. After another set of doors, we're in a corridor with tiles instead of plush carpet and walls painted two shades of pink. It smells like a hospital and I don't know how they stop the smell leaking into the lobby. Most of the doors are open and even though we're whizzing by, I can see some of the people inside, in pink leather chairs or low beds nearly on the floor.

The televisions are really loud, competing with each other, but not loud enough to cover the sound of someone shouting. Here in this corridor is the truth—that this place is a nursing home, hidden behind a lie that it's a hotel.

At the end of the corridor, it gets nice again, or nicer at least, because there's floor to ceiling windows looking out onto a garden with a fountain in the middle. There's more of the comfy chairs like in the front, but some of the pink ones from the bedrooms too. A man in a wheelchair looks out through the glass, at the trees finding their way towards the sky in the little patch of green surrounded by buildings. Two women sit next to each other and I think they are having a conversation until I notice one is sleeping.

Nurse Small turns to Sergei. “This is the conservatory. Mr. Shapiro liked to spend time here.”

Sergei looks around, taking it all in, and I suddenly realise that one of these old women, the one chatting or the one sleeping, could be Nana Davis. Would I recognise her? They both look kind of the same. And if it is her, what am I going to say to her? Sergei and I haven't talked about this part of the plan. How could we not have talked about this part of the plan?

“It's just like I pictured,” Sergei says. “I could see him here with Catherine having their conversations.”

“I don't know what he said in those letters, but the only time Mrs. Davis leaves her room is when we take her up and down the corridor to get some exercise,” Nurse Small says.

“Catherine's sick?” Sergei goes.

“She's got severe dementia. Beats me how he was having any conversations with her. I've been here four years and I've never heard her say anything that makes any sense to anyone except herself.”

“Is it possible to see her?” Sergei asks.

Nurse Small checks her watch. “Real quick, then I got to get back to work.”

We're heading up another corridor, two shades of green now instead of pink. We're moving too quickly for my mind to digest what the nurse has just said. I need to stop, to stand still, but we're racing through more sets of double doors. It's as Sergei's holding one open for me that he whispers, “When we find her, say you need the bathroom.” He walks ahead of me then and turns around, raises his eyebrows again to make sure I've got it.

Ahead, Nurse Small pushes open a door to the left and we follow her into a room that's surprisingly spacious. In the middle is a hospital bed, with rails down the side and a green bedspread. On the wall facing the bed there's a whiteboard, with the date and the weather written on it. Next to it, there's a printed sign with the name “Davis.”

My eyes go back to the green bedspread, to the hands on top of it clutching at the covers. The woman in the bed is tiny. Her mouth is open and her eyes are closed. Her hair is long and wavy and white, spread out over the pillow.

“This is Mrs. Davis,” Nurse Small says. “I've no idea how your grandfather even got to know her, or what they could have talked about. She's like this almost all the time now.”

“She has dementia?” I go. She's already told us this, I know she has, but I want to make sure, I want to know Aunt Ruth was telling the truth.

“Alzheimer's. End stages. Although, physically, there's nothing wrong with her. No telling how long she'll stay like this.”

Sergei keeps his voice low, respectful. “Dziadzio always said she was a good listener.”

We stand there for a minute, all three of us. I'm trying to see something in her face, some of me, some of you from your photo, some of Aunt Ruth, but there is nothing recognisable there. Her thin white hair is like any old woman's white hair. Her face is more hollows and shadow than face. She is nothing to do with me, this old woman, this body. Nothing to do with you.

Nurse Small is turning to leave, and after all our efforts, all our work, this is it, this is all there is. I scan the room then for some other clue. The bedside locker is hospital furniture—no books, no photographs, only a green plastic jug of water and matching cup. There's a narrow wardrobe and on the wall next to it, there's a painting of a horse in a field looking towards a river. Nana Davis was an artist, she painted. I don't know how I know this, but suddenly I know it is true.

“Is that her painting?” I hear myself say. “Did she paint it?”

Nurse Small glances back to where I'm pointing at the wall. She shakes her head. “No, those paintings are in all the bedrooms.”

She leads the way back into the two-tone green corridor and we're following her out as quickly as we followed her in and Sergei turns back and gives me a look, mouths something, and then I remember.

“Oh, I'm sorry, can I use your bathroom?”

I don't know what I would have done if she'd said there was a bathroom back at the lobby or that it was only for residents or if she'd wanted to escort me there herself. But that's not what happens. She points me back down the hall we'd come from, back towards Nana Davis' room, and tells me that when I'm finished, follow the hall straight back to reception.

I walk towards where she pointed, past the door to Nana Davis' room. I do actually need the loo, but I don't have time to do both. When I hear the double doors closing, I look over my shoulder and I see the hall is empty so I turn around, go back the way I came. I'm outside Nana Davis' room. My heart is beating a gazillion beats a minute. It's going to explode, that's what it feels like.

What if someone comes in? Another nurse? What if Aunt Ruth decides to visit today? What would I do if she walked in? I take a deep breath. There is no one, no one is coming.

Nana Davis is in the same position—mouth open, fingers clasped. She could be dead, she looks like she's dead. Only if you look at the sheet, the green blanket over it, you can see her chest is rising and falling. Just a fraction, but a fraction is enough.

I have no idea what I'm supposed to do.

“Nana Davis?” I go. Silence. “Nana Davis, it's me. Rhea, your granddaughter.”

Nothing happens. I don't know what I think is going to happen. This isn't a movie, she's not going to hear my voice and wake up and suddenly be okay and conscious and able to have a conversation, and, even if she was, what do I think she might tell me? What do I want to know?

The double doors close again. Voices. It's Nurse Small, I know it is. I can't be in here. I look out the door but it's not her, it's another nurse who has gone into another room. This is my chance to get out of here and I'm just about to when the idea comes into my head. I know it's a bad idea, that I should ignore it and hurry up the hallway and back into the lobby, but my feet don't want to ignore it, and they take me across her room and to the locker, next to her bed.

I open the drawer first. I don't think I'm breathing then, I know I must have been but I don't know how I could be, with my hand rifling around to find something among the sleeve of plastic cups, two packs of tissues, a pair of glasses in a case. I close it, open the door part instead. There's a shelf that separates it into two: two rows of clothes. Nightdresses on the top, something silky, a blouse or a slip.

On the bottom part, there's proper clothes, winter clothes, jumpers. It's a long time since she's worn any of these. I'm about to close the door; I've done everything I can, there's nothing here. And then something makes me push my hand underneath the black cardigan with the gold buttons, something makes me push my fingers right to the back.

I feel cardboard and I pull it out—a cardboard wallet, blue with white writing on the front. The kind that holds photos. I've seen it before, this wallet, or one like it, and it takes me a second to remember it's what I'd expected to find two years ago in Dad's wardrobe. I'd thought I might find it there, I wasn't looking for it here.

I hold the top of my backpack with my mouth, unzip it. Aunt Ruth was always giving out when I did that. When I get it open I shove the wallet in there and my hand feels something else, something unfamiliar. It's a Discman, Michael's Discman. I don't know what it's doing there, I didn't put it there, but I don't have time to figure it out, so I shove the wallet in and zip it back up again.

I'd love to say that I glanced back at her before I left, that I leaned over and kissed her head or even that I said goodbye, but I didn't do any of that and I want to tell you the truth, and the truth is that I slung my backpack over my shoulder and stepped back out into the corridor and hurried back to the lobby as fast as I could without running.

When I get there, Nurse Small is back on the other side of the reception desk. Now that we've got her talking, she doesn't seem to want to stop and she laughs a big laugh as she tells us about how Mr. Shapiro and Mr. Reilly always used to argue because Mr. Shapiro always wanted to watch
Jeopardy!
when Mr. Reilly wanted to watch the news and wasn't it the strangest thing, the two of them passing within two weeks of each other.

The strap of my backpack is burning a hole in my shoulder, as if she can somehow know what is inside, as if she might try and grab it from me. And maybe Sergei senses something, because he looks at his watch then and says something about how we're running late to meet his aunt and I nod and say we'd better go. But Nurse Small won't let us leave, goes into this whole thing asking us where we're meeting his aunt and starts to give us directions about the best way to get there. I think we'll never get to leave, but finally we're pushing through the revolving doors and onto the sidewalk and at last I can breathe again.

It's all I can do to stop myself breaking into a run, and I must be walking fast because Sergei's telling me to slow down and that she could be watching through the window.

At the end of the block, I wait for him. He's laughing, rubbing his hand over his hair so his curls stick up in all directions.

“Jesus, Sergei, I don't know where you get the nerve to do shit like that, I really don't.”

“Me? My nerve? You were amazing, Irish bullhead—I mean Natalie Peterson!”

We're both cracking up. I don't know what's so funny really, but it's as if there's all this nervous energy in my body and I'll burst if it doesn't find a way out. I don't want to just stand there though, I need to put distance between us and the nursing home.

“C'mon, Serg, seriously, I need to get the hell away from here.”

I'm leading the way, heading back the way we came, towards the subway. Sergei's beside me, until he's not, and when I glance back, he's stopped outside an Irish bar.

“What do you say to a celebratory drink?”

“It's not even two o'clock, Serg.”

“It's five o'clock somewhere.”

The bar looks posh, nicer than the places we usually go. “They probably won't serve us.”

“They don't serve us, then we don't drink.”

“Aren't you hungry, Serg? I'm hungry.”

“So, you eat, I'll drink. Or we can do both.”

I thought we were going back to Michael's. I'd been looking forward to it, having his apartment to ourselves, taking the packet of photos out of my backpack, lining them up next to each other on the floor.

“It looks pricey, Serg.”

“Don't worry about it, my treat.” He smiles. “Come on, we deserve a celebration.”

We get seats at the bar and the waitress gives us a big menu. I've already made up my mind to get shepherd's pie before the barman puts down my Coke and Sergei's pint of Budweiser. Sergei's still deciding and I'm listening to the music, Van Morrison. Van Morrison makes me think about Dad. And thinking about Dad makes me think about the Hendrix CDs on my shelf back in Coral Springs, and that makes me think about Michael's Discman in my bag.

“Serg, did you put Michael's Discman in my bag?”

I ask the question in a really normal way. I have no idea, yet, where it will lead.

Sergei rubs his hand over his hair, looks at the menu. “What?”

“Michael's Discman. Did you put it in my backpack?”