Best Laid Plans

When she joins me a minute or two later, I reach for her arm and meet her gaze. “Listen, he has good days and bad days. I never know which it’ll be. That’s the thing about walking into his suite—it’s a little like answering a call. You hope for the best, but sometimes it’s the worst.” I take a breath, bracing myself for an eventuality. “Well, it hasn’t quite been the worst yet, but someday it will be.”

She nods, her big brown eyes filled with understanding. “That makes sense. There’s a great unknown factor to what he’s going through.”

“Sometimes he’s in another place entirely. Another time . . .”

“Does he know you?”

I swallow roughly. “He still does. I’m grateful for that. Sometimes he thinks it’s another year, or that my grandmother is still alive.”

“That’s hard for everyone.” She offers a small smile, keeping her eyes locked on mine. “Tell me what you want me to do or say if that happens.”

My breathing steadies, and it’s because of her, how calm she is, how she’s not weirded out by any of this. “Just be yourself. I try to talk to him like I talk to anyone, and I remind him of when and where he is if he doesn’t seem to know.”

“That’s easy. I can do that. We can do that.”

I breathe a big sigh of relief. She’s a natural with people. She knows how to talk to anyone, how to meet a person on his or her level without talking down or looking too far up. She’s an eye-to-eye, face-to-face person.

We reach his suite, and the nerves quell a little bit more. I take a steadying breath and say a prayer that it’s a good day. After I knock, I walk in with Arden by my side.

Pops is parked on the couch, his gray hair neatly combed, his reading glasses perched at the end of his nose, peering into a book—101 Places to See Before You Die.

My heart leaps into my throat, tightening like a fist around it. I hate that last word, and I hate, too, that he likely won’t see any of those places. “You have a new book, Pops?”

He looks up. “Emily gave it to me the other day.”

And we’re back in time. The fist tightens harder, gripping my heart. Arden takes my hand and squeezes it.

“You mean she gave it to you a few years ago?” I remind him gently.

He scrunches his wrinkled forehead. “She said we should check out some of these places sometime.” He sets the book down and stares at Arden with hard eyes. “Is she a new nurse? A new aide?”

He doesn’t like it when the rotation changes unexpectedly on him.

I shake my head, smiling. “This is my friend Arden.”

His ruler-straight mouth shifts to a grin. He stands, smiles, and extends a hand.

Arden walks over and takes it. “Hello. I’m Arden East.”

“Michael Sullivan, and you are a lovely lady. Gabe’s mentioned you a few times.” He flashes me a devilish grin. “You’re the one he thinks is quite pretty.”

What was I thinking? My pops knows nearly everything. I am a great and complete idiot, because he has the power to spill all. I hope to hell he doesn’t give her the keys to figure out what’s going on in my heart.

But on the plus side, he seems fully present now.

Arden simply smiles. “Thank you so much. But the problem is, Gabe never mentioned to me how handsome his pops is. Do you think he was holding that back on purpose?”

My grandpa winks at her. “I think I’m falling too.”

Too.

I told him she was special, but I never told him I was falling. I’m going to pretend he didn’t say the word too. Or the word before it. Falling.

But in my head, I can’t pretend, because it tugs at me. It feels like a whisper of the impending truth. Like I’m heading in that dangerous direction. I’m no idiot—I know I have Feelings for her with a capital F—but in the last few days they’ve grown stronger, more intense. Maybe they are cruising into Falling Town, and we all know where that road leads.

I’m going to pray that my pre-visit prep with Arden will keep Pops from spilling the beans.

He wiggles his brow then pats the couch. “Sit. Join me.” He looks at me as I grab the chair across from them. “Gabe, why didn’t you ever bring your girlfriend here before? She’s much prettier to look at than you.”

Girlfriend. He’s going to kill me. “You are such a dirty dog, Pops.”

Arden laughs and turns to him again. “Do you think he takes after you, Michael?”

He chuckles. “I had a way with the ladies. One in particular. I miss her so.” Now he’s most definitely in the present.

Arden seizes the opportunity, tapping his book. “I love this book. Where have you been? Where do you want to visit most?”

“So many places. I’ve been all over America. Been to Mexico. To Alaska. But after reading, I think I’d like to go to one of those ice hotels. Mostly, I want to see if it’s as crazy as it sounds.”

“It does sound nuts, doesn’t it? Every time I read about one, I shiver inside. Do you feel that way?”

“That’s exactly how I feel. Maybe I ought to focus on traveling to Fiji since it’s so much warmer.”

“You could get a hut on the ocean and read or fish all day long.”

His blue eyes light up, and he’s more animated than he’s been in ages. “I’d go to Thailand next and try the street food.”

“Have you seen the entry on Morocco? There’s an entire city in that country called the Blue City. Everything—all the walls, all the buildings—is blue.” She takes the book and flips through the pages, finding the entry and showing it to him.

He smiles then looks up at me, speaking in a faux stage whisper. “I think your girlfriend wants you to take her to the Blue City.”

“I’ll have to look into it.”

He turns his focus back to Arden. “You’re the bookstore lady?”

“Yes, I am. In fact, I brought you a book today.” Dipping her hand into her purse, she gives him the Dashiell Hammett.

He chuckles. “The Thin Man. Can you believe they changed the dog for the movie?”

“I simply cannot.”

He flips to the opening chapter and reads the first few words. “I was leaning against the bar in a speakeasy on Fifty-Second Street . . .” He stops to look up from the pages. “I bet it’d sound prettier if you read it.”

“I thought you’d never ask.”