5

I DON’T GO TO SCHOOL THAT MORNING AND INSTEAD stay with Mrs. Hammons from next door while Mom goes to the hospital. She’s gone for three hours and twenty-four minutes, and the whole time I feel like I’ve got a shaken-up Coke in my chest ready to explode. When Mom gets back, I make us peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch.

“Are you sure you want to go?” she asks between bites.

“Of course I’m sure.” Mom always says talking with confidence can actually make a person feel confident. It was worth a try.

We stop by Grampa’s house on the way to the hospital. On the drive there, Mom warns me that Grampa’s not exactly like his old self, that he has some trouble talking, that his body isn’t moving quite right, that he’ll need help with his recovery. None of the things she tells me to be prepared for are good things.

She cuts the engine and says, “Let’s see if we can find a few things Grampa can use in all his mess of stuff.”

From the street, no one would guess how many treasures are tucked away inside Grampa’s house. His hallways are lined with shelves made from dresser drawers and filled with his collections. Usually, I think of Grampa’s house as sort of like my one big heart find; no place on earth speaks to my heart so clearly.

Every object has a place and a reason for being there. Even his “miscellaneous” shelf has a certain kind of order. A stack of old horseshoes, a row of mason jars filled with his glass marble collection, a small brass fawn, three antique thimbles. It’s my favorite because what each item has in common is that it doesn’t fit in anywhere else and still Grampa loves it.

Grampa’s room used to be Mom’s when she was a kid. The door to the room he shared with my gramma stays closed. I’ve only peeked in once. All my gramma’s stuff is still there, her dresser covered in perfume bottles, a dress hanging in front of the closet door that she intended to wear, and her shoes at the foot of the bed.

Mom pulls an old pair of slippers from Grampa’s closet. His shoe rack is made from sawed-off plastic pipes we found by the dumpster at the Home Depot and looks sort of like honeycomb.

“Good idea,” I say. “He loves those.”

“Well, he needs something with no laces.” Mom inspects them. “We’ll get him some new ones tomorrow.”

“But he loves those.” I take the slippers from her and shove them in the bag. She shrugs and moves on to Grampa’s dresser.

“You know some things outlive their purpose—those slippers are a good example.” Mom pauses and points over to the nightstand, where a fishbowl sits half filled with Grampa’s spare change. “That was my fishbowl when I was a little girl. I thought my goldfish lived ten years but turned out your grampa replaced that fish nine times without my knowing.” Mom shakes her head and looks toward Gramma’s room. “Sometimes you have to have hard conversations and let go to get over something. And sometimes it’s nice to get over something together.”

Mom complaining about Grampa is nothing new, but it seems like she could give him a pass today.

“Why no laces?” I’m afraid I already know, but I’d like a change of topic.

“The right side of his body is weak, and he’d need both hands, so…” Mom trails off.

While she was at the hospital, I did some research. Nothing about a stroke is even a little bit whimsical. Oxygen is carried through the bloodstream to the brain. Strokes stop blood flow and that can cause about two million neurons to die. It’s like Grampa’s brain was being smothered.

“Did he have a sudden headache?” I ask.

Grampa shouldn’t have been alone. If he hadn’t been by himself, then I’d know the details. Maybe if I knew the details then I wouldn’t have this growing heavy feeling inside. Maybe I could have helped. And the most awful maybe of all, if I’d been there like I was supposed to be, maybe it wouldn’t have happened in the first place.

“I don’t know, Mabel. I wasn’t there.” Does she mean that I should have been? I whip around to look at her, but she’s still going through Grampa’s drawers. “The preacher at the Presbyterian church found him unconscious just off Avondale Drive.

“This is the worst possible time for this to happen. I’ve got the Home and Garden Show coming up, regionals the next month, and if I qualify, the Expo after that. This is like my Mardi Gras nightmare table all over again.” Mom pinches the bridge of her nose. “Not to mention, the extra expenses.” She stops folding sweatpants and looks over at me. “See if Grampa has any clean socks.”

I pull the wooden drawer out and toss pairs of socks into the bag. How can she think of competitions right now?

“Grampa will have to stay at the hospital for a while, then he’ll be discharged and transferred to an assisted-living facility. I’ve been looking into one called Whispering Pines. Professionals will figure out what therapy he’ll need and let us know when they think he’s able to live on his own.”

My grip tightens around a roll of socks. “Well, there are these things called cluster headaches that can mimic the symptoms of a stroke. Maybe it was that?”

“The doctor is sure it was a stroke. And, Mabel, you have permission to look up your glassware facts online, not random health issues.” Mom saying my name means she’s irritated. She folds a fourth pair of sweatpants, working her way toward a mountain of athleisure wear. I know about athleisure wear thanks to Ashley, who is all about it, but she leans more toward the leisure part and less toward the athletic part.

“Well, maybe…” I start.

“Mabel, enough maybes,” Mom says. “Why don’t you find something you think Grampa would like to have in his room?”

Normally she isn’t full of good ideas, but this is one. I know exactly what to take.

Dr. Jonathan Handsome is a two-foot-tall rooster carved from pine, possibly from a fence post, dating back, we think, to the nineteenth century. My gramma bought Dr. Jon the same day I was born. She cut short a Florida vacation with her sister because I came early. The doctor who delivered me was named John Hanson.

Gramma drove all the way from Dunedin, Florida, with the rooster rolling around in her trunk, so hers could be one of the first faces I saw. The rooster’s named after my delivery doctor and I’m named after her. Dr. Jon ties us all together, me and Grampa, and Gramma, and he’s one of Grampa’s heart finds. Grampa has a few others, but Dr. Jon is his favorite—top of the pecking order.

“Mabel, what’s going on in there?” Mom asks.

Mom comes into the living room where Grampa keeps all his large sculptures grouped under the window right next to the side table of stacked vintage suitcases.

“Oh no. Mabel, we can’t bring that big old chicken,” Mom says.

“He’s a rooster.” I have to sit Dr. Jon down so I can cross my arms and give her a look. Mom sighs. Victory!

On the way to Abner Regional Hospital, Mom goes over what I should expect again.

“He’s a little bruised, he’s got some right-side paralysis, and speech is also a bit of a struggle for him right now. But all the doctors say these are things that with time and therapy will get much better.” And I listen—really, I do. But when I walk into Grampa’s room, what I see is so much worse than what I expected.

Mom sits Dr. Jon on the nightstand. I toss the duffle bag packed full of Grampa’s sweats into a pink chair.

“Hi, Dad,” Mom says. “Look who’s here.”

Mom is talking about Dr. Jon. But Grampa looks at me. He has a big scrape on the top of his cheek and another on his forehead; both are surrounded by bruising. One eye is swollen shut.

“There’s my girl,” he says. Only it sounds more like “Airs my Earl.” He tries to smile, but just one side of his mouth lifts.

I focus on the chair—it’s covered in a rose-colored plasticky leather, and nothing like the soft, worn recliner in Grampa’s living room. Not a lot of maybes around that chair.

When I finally look up at Grampa, he tries to wink, our sign. But he can’t quite do it.

One tear escapes, and I quickly wipe it away. Mom said he’d get better with time. How much time? He looks so far away from his old self, so far away from better.

“Hey, Grampa,” I say. He reaches out his left hand and I take it. He gives my hand a squeeze.

Mom talks the whole time we’re there, and I keep my eyes on the TV.

“I think he’s pretty worn out,” Mom whispers.

When I look at Grampa his eyes are closed. “Bye, Grampa,” I say. His eyelids raise slowly, like even their weight is hard for him to lift. He barely moves his left hand in the tiniest of waves, and I duck out of the doorway so he won’t see me cry.

Mom wraps her arm around me. “We have to give it some time.” I lean my head into her shoulder, and we walk like that, in a little huddle, all the way out to the car.

That night we order takeout and move vases, silk flowers, multiple place settings of dishes, and piles of fabric—all the supplies for Mom’s upcoming table—so we can sit together.

“Grampa has a hard recovery ahead of him. But with our support, he can do it.” Mom gives me a hard stare. “I think Oprah said nothing helps as much as helping someone else. And Grampa will need our help.”

I half listen while Mom talks. When she says that Grampa will need full-time care for a while I start whole listening.

“One of the things we might need to consider is listing Grampa’s house. He may not be able to return to living alone.” Mom takes a bite and stares off into the living room, like getting rid of Grampa’s house is no big deal.

“Sell Grampa’s house?” I ask. “What about his collections?”

Mom sighs. “We’re talking worst-case scenario, but things will have to change. I’m not sure how long it will be before he can drive again. Plus, we could use the extra money for the care he’ll need.”

“But Grampa loves his collections,” I say. “I read that after a stroke sometimes people get depressed. Won’t getting rid of all the stuff he loves make him more depressed?”

Mom shoots me a look and turns away for a minute, then she says, “I know you love your grampa. I do too. I’ve got some tough decisions to make, but the hardest choices can sometimes pave the way forward.” This is definitely something from one of Mom’s self-help books. “Understand?”

I nod, but I don’t understand. “Isn’t figuring out how to take care of Grampa so he could go home and keep his collections the hard decision and sending him to a place where other people will take care of him the easy one?”

Mom sighs. “Okay, Mabel. Grampa’s going to Whispering Pines, an assisted-living and recovery center for seniors. His insurance will pay for most of it and his savings will pay for the rest, while it lasts. Hopefully, he won’t need to be there long. But once he’s discharged, we run into another problem. Where Grampa lives, Lakehaven, has the highest property tax in all Cleveland County. His groceries probably run around two to three hundred, plus utilities are another couple hundred. His Social Security check will cover most of that, but Medicare will only pay for a portion of his outpatient care—occupational, physical, and speech therapy. Grampa doesn’t have that much extra money coming in every month, and neither do we. I don’t have a good handle on the numbers yet, but I think I can cover things as they are for a few months. That’s it.”

I don’t understand a lot of what she says. But it sounds like a lot of money and not a lot of time.

“Want to know any more of the details?” Mom asks. I shake my head.

“If it’s about making money, I can do some hunts to help out,” I say.

Mom starts shaking her head before I finish talking. “Absolutely not. I don’t like it to begin with, but I certainly won’t have you digging through trash alone.” She sighs again. “Some things you just have to let grown-ups handle.”

Before I go to bed that night, Ashley sends me a text: Sorry about your grampa. Mom must have told her mom. I sort of hate how much better it makes me feel to hear from her.

I take my Amberina basket from the windowsill and as I turn it this way and that, I think about Grampa and his drooping face. I think about how hospital rooms don’t have fireplaces or space for miscellaneous shelves. I think about how much collecting means to Grampa. And I decide he’s had enough taken away.

Even though I don’t really want to, I think about Ashley too. If everything can be fixed, why can’t this? Getting Grampa back home and sorting out my friendship with Ashley won’t be easy. But if Grampa’s taught me anything, it’s how to take things that look a mess and make them right again.