A State Of Grace by Rita Catching

Author:Rita Catching [Catching, Rita]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-07-17T22:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

We didn’t actually leave town at 8:00 because I made Brian drive me up to the cabin so I could pick up some things and look the place over. Dead leaves were collecting on the steps and the deck. A broken fir branch lay across the driveway near the top of the hill. Brian dragged it out of the way while I walked on up to the front door. The air inside was cold and had a stale, unused smell. No one lived there anymore. It made me want to cry. I turned the thermostat up a few degrees and before we left, I made a couple of phone calls, one to St. Ann’s to let Sister Columba know we were coming, and one to Karen to let her know where I would be in case anything important came up at work and also in case she could think of anything I should ask Sister Columba. By 9:15 we were on Route 82 heading north toward the Columbia River Highway where we turned west and pointed our noses toward the Pacific and, I hoped, answers to at least some of my questions.

I-84 dumped us into Portland on the east side of the Willamette River. Brian took the Morrison Bridge and eventually made it onto West Burnside. It was late afternoon, and most of the Rose City was evidently trying to get out of town early. Brian had never actually lived in Portland, but for me it evoked a bittersweet nostalgia. I had lived in Portland for ten years, from the summer after high school, when I fled Walnut Creek, until I let Gary talk me into making a fresh start in Clearwater. That fresh start, I now realized, had been for Gary’s benefit, not mine. I had worked so hard to achieve my day shift job in the ICU at Emmanuel. Whatever had made me think that someone who loved me would ask me to give up something so dear? I had only returned once in those two years. My painful odyssey last August seemed like a hundred years ago, so thoroughly had I banked the coals of that memory.

The St. Ann Convent Motherhouse was set back from a busy street behind a tasteful screen of maple and fir trees and shared the grounds with the associated nursing home. Along the back of the spacious property were a dozen small, picturesque cottages. The St. Ann webpage explained that these were let out as residences for retired priests. Even the parking lot was attractive, with planters of autumn mums and several carved, wooden benches and tables placed strategically under big leaf maples still clinging to a few huge, yellow leaves. Next to one of these tables, an elderly man in a motorized scooter sat huddled in a heavy parka, studiously smoking a cigarette. I smiled at him as I got out of the car, but he seemed to look right past me, focusing watery eyes on something in the middle distance.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.