I turned the key in the lock and opened the door quietly, so as not to rouse Pa or wake Gram.
The house was cold, and too quiet.
I flicked the light switch. Nothing happened.
“Gram?” I called into the dark, feeling my way to her bedroom door.
It was open. Her bed was empty and unmade.
“Pa!” I shouted and started flicking every light switch I could find in the dark.
No light. No light and no power.
I raced out of the house and almost ran right into the grill of Tom’s jeep.
“No one’s here!” I cried. “Please! No one’s here!” I shouted it desperately, as if I doubted they would help or care.
Tom and Travis and Miz Tromp were climbing out of the jeep, issuing their words of comfort as if they had any right to, as if they had any knowledge to pull from, when the flashing blue lights appeared. The swirling lamps turned the land into a haunted wood with strange, flickering shadows. They reached for me. They reached for Travis.
I was confused when Sheriff Thrasher appeared. Had I done something wrong? Was I being arrested after all?
“Genuine.” The sheriff got down on one knee and looked at me eye to eye. “Your granny’s in the hospital. If you’ll come with me, I’ll take you to her.”
You’d think, in a moment like that, a person would have a million questions. What happened? Is she all right? But inside me, there was only an icy wall of silence. I got into the police car and noted, dreamlike, that Tom’s jeep was following behind us.
The lights in the hospital were just as bewildering as the darkness at my house. How could anything be so glaringly bright? I shielded my eyes and followed the sheriff down the hall. My pa was passed out in a plastic chair beside one of the doors. The boozy smell of him wafted over me, another dreamy scrap of that night I’ll always carry.
Sheriff Thrasher was about to open the door to Gram’s room when Nurse Cussler rushed up and barred the way. She whispered to the sheriff. I know she meant for me not to hear.
“She died, Mike,” was what the nurse said.
It wasn’t true, of course. It just wasn’t.
I darted between them, pushing past Nurse Cussler’s stupid hearts-with-wings scrubs, and rushed into Gram’s room.
Her mouth was open, her head tilted back just a little. The bright lights gave her a waxy look, and I saw clearly the strange green hue to her skin that I’d noticed a few weeks before. She wore one of those terrible, embarrassing hospital gowns. I wanted to take it off her and wrap her up in her warm terry-cloth robe. Where was her terry-cloth robe? I tore into the wardrobe, moved the table and chairs, opened every drawer I could find. The robe had to be there somewhere!
“Genuine.” It was a man’s voice, I think.
Someone touched me and I pushed them away.
“Genuine.” They tried again.
“Go. Away.” I said it in a voice that sounded strange and far off.
“Honey.” This was a woman’s voice.
A thumb ran over each of my cheeks, wiping away water I hadn’t known I was shedding. I blinked. I shook my head. I found myself looking into Miz Tromp’s dark eyes.
“Honey,” she said again. “You’re safe. You’re okay.” Her words made no sense to me. “You take as much time as you want here with your gram, and then you’ll come home with us, all right?”
That much I understood. They wanted me to leave Gram. They wanted me to go someplace else, a place where Gram wasn’t.
“No! No! I have to find her bathrobe!” I exclaimed. “I have to put it on her. She’s sick. I have to take care of her!”
“She’s not sick, honey,” Miz Tromp said softly. “She’s gone on to the next place.”
I think it was those two words, next place, that broke over me like a storm.
She’s dead. She’s DEAD. She froze to death. The electric went out. The bill was overdue and you knew it. She froze to death, and you were off in Ardenville, looking after folks who weren’t even yours to care for. You kissed that boy. She told you not to kiss him, and now she’s dead. Your gram is dead and she died alone. She took ill in the dark and she surely must have called for you. Who else would she call for? She called and YOU WEREN’T THERE—
Even though my eyes were open, the world went black.
I fell for what seemed like hours. Days, even.
I remember waking up for a time and roaring angrily, “Where is my father?”
“We don’t know,” someone answered. “He left.”
“Yeah,” I said as the darkness took me again.
When I woke up, I felt like one big bruise. Not just in my body, but in my head, too. Heart and soul, everything ached. I couldn’t remember why.
I opened my eyes.
I was resting on an orange sofa, an ugly one made of the sort of itchy fabric generally used for potato sacks. I could see a desk and some bookshelves, some books with titles that made me think I might be in a doctor’s office. I looked around some more and saw diplomas on the wall. Someone Someone, M.D.
I was alone in there. And realizing I was alone was what made me remember.
Gram.
The doorknob turned, and the door made a little gasp as it opened. With a thrill, I realized it had to be Gram! All of this was a terrible dream, and when that door opened all the way, I’d wake up and find myself on the sofa at home. It would be morning, and Gram would be smiling down at me. Time to wake up, Gen.
But it wasn’t Gram at the door, and I was already awake.
I knew a moment of hate, just then, at whoever dared to open that door, and whoever made that door and hung it on its hinges. I hated all the doors that had ever been and all the trees that had been torn down to make them. I hated— “You’re up,” said Miz Tromp, who held a paper cup in her hand. “How are you feeling?” Gingerly, she set the cup on a table and shut the door behind her.
“Gram is dead, isn’t she,” I said. It wasn’t really a question.
“Yes.”
I nodded and asked, “What time is it?”
Travis’s ma looked at her watch. “About nine thirty.”
“In the morning?”
“Yes.”