The Wish Stealers (25 page)

Don’t let the teardrops rust your shining heart.

—Holly Cole Trio

D
ad!” called Griffin, running to her father in the hospital corridor, hugging him close. With a crumpled shirt and matted hair, he looked like he hadn’t slept in a week. “Are you okay?”

“I’m great. Do you want to see your new baby brother?”

“Dad, is Grandma okay too?” she asked.

“She’s sleeping right now. We’ll go see her after you meet your brother, okay?”

“Okay,” she said.

Together they walked down the long antiseptic-smelling corridor. “This is it. The east wing. New arrivals!” he said. “Room 302.” She walked faster and faster. Poking her head
inside the room, Griffin gazed at her mom sleeping with a bundle in a crib next to her.

“Mom!” said Griffin.

“Griff,” said her mom, lifting her head from the pillow, smiling. “Come here,” she said, reaching out her hand.

“Are you okay?”

“Couldn’t be happier! It seems Caelum was ready to come into the world,
immediately
!” She laughed and kissed Griffin on the forehead, smoothing back her hair.

“Can I look at him?” she asked.

“Of course,” said her mom.

Leaning over the plastic box next to her mother’s bed, Griffin whispered, “Hi, Caelum.” She touched his tiny pink hand, five velvet fingers. “He’s so soft!”

“Like when you were born,” said her mom.

“Really?”

“Really,” said her mom, smiling and leaning back against the pillows.

“Do you need anything?” asked Griffin’s dad, holding his wife’s hand.

“Just rest,” she said.

“Of course,” he said, kissing her. “Griff, let’s let Mom sleep a little. It’s not every day your mom gives birth to a ten-pound baby almost in the middle of Main Street!”

Dr. Penshine giggled.

“Let’s see Grandma and then have some dessert together in the cafeteria. Then we’ll come back, say goodnight again to mom, and go home, okay?”

“How long will Mom and Caelum be in the hospital?” she asked.

“Two nights,” said her dad. “Standard procedure.”

“And Grandma?” asked Griffin.

“I don’t know,” said her dad.

“Oh,” said Griffin, holding back tears.

He put his arm around her as they tiptoed away from Dr. Penshine and Caelum, who were now both sound asleep.

A good parent is the greatest treasure.

W
here’s Grandma’s room?” asked Griffin.

“On the eighth floor,” said her father. “The doctor made an exception to let you see her in intensive care when I told him how close you two are.”

They rode the elevator to the eighth floor and walked to room 807. Unlike her mom’s room, this room was very dark. Grandma Penshine was not propped up in bed, but looked shrunken under the white sheets. Up and down went her chest, IVs taped to her arms. Griffin shuffled to the side of the bed.

“Grandma?” Griffin whispered, taking her grandma’s soft hand in hers. “We love you.”

Suddenly Griffin felt her grandma’s palm press inside hers. A nurse talked quietly with her dad in the doorway. “Griff, I want to look at Grandma’s X-rays with the doctor. Stay with her, okay? I’ll be right back.” He left the room.

“Grandma,” Griffin whispered, “did you see the sky today?”

“Yes,” she whispered. “I still see it.”

“Yes!” said Griffin, squeezing her grandma’s hand harder.

“It was perfect blue, like satin streamers,” breathed Grandma Penshine, and slowly her soft brown eyes opened.

Griffin hugged her.

A peaceful smile spread over Grandma Penshine’s face, and she looked at Griffin. “Come closer,” she whispered.

Griffin bent her head down so she was cheek to cheek with her grandma.

“In my bedroom,” her grandma said, and took a deep breath, “there is a box on my bureau. Look inside it.”

“What’s in it?” asked Griffin.

“You look and see. I love you,” she said, her chest heaving another breath.

“Grandma?” said Griffin.

She squeezed Griffin’s hand.

“Will you get well?” asked Griffin. She tried not to cry,
but her tears started falling, like raindrops dotting her grandma’s sheets.

“I am well, Griff. Just old. Half as old as a Galápagos turtle,” she said, taking a deep breath. “My bones are getting fragile, but I can’t complain. They’ve done such a good job all these years. Plus, it’s almost time to see your grandpa and all our flowers again. I’ve been having the most beautiful dreams about two white doves; at night they land on my windowsill, singing so sweetly. Don’t you waste one wish for me to get well when my heart feels so good. It’s your turn to make wishes for yourself. I already made all my wishes, and they all came true. I love you forever, my wish giver.” She closed her eyes and fell asleep.

Go confidently in the direction of your dreams!
Live the life you imagined.

—Henry David Thoreau

D
r. Penshine and Caelum came home from the hospital on Monday, but Grandma Penshine was still in intensive care.
Why did Grandma call me a wish giver? Why did she want me to look in the box on her bureau?
thought Griffin as she folded baby clothes in Caelum’s nursery. Griffin’s mom placed the “baby” penny in a silver baby cup that had once belonged to Griffin’s dad. “A lucky penny! What a nice way to start life, don’t you think?” said her mom, bending over Caelum cooing in his crib.

“Yes,” said Griffin, inhaling the sweet scents of the nursery. Everything smelled like baby powder, lotion, and
new things. Griffin’s parents let her take the day off from school to welcome Caelum and her mom home. In the afternoon she’d visit Grandma Penshine at the hospital.

“Griff, could you help Dad pack some of Grandma’s things to take to her at the hospital? She really wants her favorite socks and a deck of cards,” said her mom.

“Sure,” she said.

Griffin’s dad grabbed a duffel bag before driving to Grandma Penshine’s house. Griffin could not wait to look in the box on her grandma’s bureau.

Carrying a bag, Griffin went with her dad down the hall into her grandmother’s bedroom. The floor creaked. Griffin turned on the lamp in the bedroom, illuminating the flowered wallpaper and cozy blankets on the bed. She wanted nothing more than to curl up next to her grandma and play pistachio poker. But the bed was empty. Inside the room, while her father packed some things, Griffin spied the inlaid mother-of-pearl-box on top of the bureau. She picked up the box and brought it to her grandma’s bed. Slowly she opened the box. Inside were four things: a blue sapphire ring, the skein of old yarn, a large flat white stone, and one supershiny Indian Head penny.

Griffin heart raced. The ring looked identical to Mariah’s ring except that the stone was blue. The yarn was exactly like
Mariah’s gray spool. The smooth white stone was the same shape and size as Mariah’s black stone mirror.

“What do you have there?” asked her dad.

“Nothing,” she said, and gulped.

“Can you help me over here?”

“Yeah. Dad, I want to bring Grandma’s favorite box to the hospital to show her, okay?”

“Okay,” said her dad. “We’ll drive straight there.”

In the car Griffin kept the box sealed closed on her lap.
Why does Grandma Penshine have the same yarn as Mariah? Why does she have a ring just like Mariah’s, except it’s blue? Why does she have a stone just like Mariah’s except it’s white? Why did she save one supershiny penny?
The penny was as bright as the first one Mariah had given her.

Once they arrived at the hospital, Griffin and her dad took the elevator to intensive care. Griffin hurried in front of her father, clutching the box, until she reached room 807. Griffin stopped dead inside the room. It was empty. She gasped, and tears welled in her eyes. The hospital bed was perfectly made with an ugly mustard-colored blanket tucked tightly between the white sheets. The room had a plastic sterile smell. Griffin didn’t move. Her father came in behind her. “Huh?” he said.

“Dad?” whispered Griffin. Chills shot up her spine.

“Maybe they’ve moved her. Surely we would have been called if anything had happened.”

Just then a nurse bumped into them. “Mr. Penshine?”

“Yes. My mother was here in room 807.”

“We just moved her to the second floor. She’s doing so much better. She woke up, talked a bit, nibbled some toast, even told a joke.”

“Good news,” said her dad with a deep sigh.

Griffin reached for her dad’s hand.

“What room is she in?” asked Mr. Penshine.

“Follow me. She now has a full river view. The staff here call the rooms on this side of the hospital the riviera!” said the nurse. They followed her to the other side of the building. “I’ll go get her doctor for you folks.”

In her new room Grandma’s chest billowed up and down. She dozed in a deep slumber. Griffin’s dad bent over and kissed her on the cheek.

Relief flooded through Griffin as she ran to her grandma’s bedside.

“I need to go talk to the doctor. You stay here with Grandma.”

Griffin took her grandma’s hand. “They put you in the riviera rooms,” she said. “They knew you’d want to hear the river.”

Griffin walked to the window and slid it open. A light breeze blew through the room, and Grandma whispered from her bed, “Griff.”