The Healing

Chapter 6





Gran Gran awoke the next morning in her chair, her body stiff. She looked down at Violet who slept serenely on her cot and knew right away that something had settled within the girl. Sure enough, over the hours that followed there were no screams, and the odd movement of her head had stopped. There was only deep, hard sleep, as if the girl were nestled in some healing cocoon of calm.

At last Gran Gran felt she could leave Violet’s side and lay herself down on the cot in the kitchen. She had barely shut her eyes when she fell into a black, dreamless sleep, and when she woke several hours later she realized that for the first time in ages the muttering voices had been absent. There was only the dark and the quiet, and she thought, if death were like this, then dying would not be so bad.

After another day, Gran Gran was able to get the girl to rise from her bed. She even began to take her meals at the table. But Violet had yet to utter a single word.

The old woman was patient. She had seen enough to know a body had to work this out on its own schedule.

Violet was so quiet during the day there were moments Gran Gran forgot the girl was nearby, until she looked around and found her standing close, studying the woman with those color-shifting eyes, her stare so penetrating it filled Gran Gran with a cold unease.

The old woman would take the girl by the shoulders and gaze deep into those fearsome eyes. “I can see, Violet. You still patching and knitting. That’s good. That’s real good. You doing what you got to do.”

Although Violet wouldn’t let Gran Gran out of her sight, neither did the girl ever touch the woman, and she flinched when the old woman forgot and reached for the child’s small, china-fine hands. In fact, Violet mostly kept them hidden—in a pocket, behind her back, or under the table.

She was giving off a second sign, Gran Gran figured, like the shaking of the head had been. Though the old woman could not get a feeling for the meaning, it wasn’t hard to venture a guess.

The old woman predicted the girl’s ailment would settle in her hands for a while before finally emptying out the tips of her fingers. When she had healed from the tribulation of her mother’s death, she would again be able to touch and in turn be touched by another.