Page 13 of Your Soul to Keep

When my dad first got sick, there was only me at home to help him. Nan and Grampy supported all of us when he lost the fight and could no longer work. All day they managed the restaurant in Mistlevale before one or both of them drove the hour to Sage Ridge late in the evening to sleep at our house.

At seventeen, I wanted nothing more than to spread my wings and fly, but I was bound to the house. Forced to watch my father fade away, an agony doubled by the loss of my mother.

It was only now, watching Nan do the same, that I understood what a privilege it was to see him through his final act.

Thoughts of my father inevitably led to memories of Gabe, and my colossal fuck-up when I walked away from him.

I didn’t give him a chance. Instead, I embraced the loss before it could sneak up on me.

Now a second chance dangled well within my reach. And I was still running.

I rounded the corner, rapped on her doorframe, and steeled myself. “Knock, knock, Nan.”

“Ach, hello pet,” she rasped. “What time is it?”

“Past time for you to get up, lazybones,” I teased as I crossed to her bed and kissed her sunken cheek. I smiled into her eyes and propped the pillows at her back before flopping into the chair beside her.

She tipped her chin up. “How was your smutty book club with the girls?”

“Interesting.”

“Oh?” She perked up.

I leaned back and stroked the delicate curl of a trailing vine. I’d tried to bring as many of the comforts of home as possible.

Plants from home lined her windowsill interspersed with dollar store LED candles flickering in the tiny Belleek pottery village of churches and lace pierced thatched cottages. Sea scented essential oils wafted from the diffuser to compensate for what the fake candles lacked.

It was a poor facsimile to the land of her youth.

“One of the girls is going through some stuff with her family. She’s been just as isolated as me but for different reasons,” I answered.

Nan listed to the side, unable to hold herself steady even with the pillows. I quickly grabbed two more and stuffed them under her arms.

“Better?”

“Grand.” She nodded toward the tiny village. “See those? I gave them to your mother when she married your dad. I kept them safe for her all these years. Now they’re yours.”

I sucked in a breath.

She was deteriorating by the hour. Guilt and panic churned in the hollow between my ribs. I shouldn’t have gone out.

She smirked. “I can read your mind, Shae. I don’t want you here every minute of every day, love.”

“And what if I want to be here with you?” I snapped.

“Sure, you’re here now, aren’t you?” She rolled her eyes. “Here’s me, standing at death’s door ‘til the balls of me legs turn to the front and you’re still giving me cheek.”

I laughed to cover my tears, a harsh bark grossly out of place in the quiet.

Nan patted my hand and reminisced of times long past and those who’d left her behind.

“Your da, now, he was a handful.” She laughed softly. “He was a good lad, gone far too soon. Ach, but he’s with your mum, now.”

She had rarely spoken of my father. When she said his name, tears threatened, and she clamped her mouth shut. Now? She didn’t hesitate.

As if she knew the grieving was near over.

I swallowed the lump in my throat and smiled while the little girl inside me wailed like a banshee. Lurching to my feet, I smoothed her wedding ring quilt across her lap and tucked it around her legs.

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