The Summer of No Regrets by Katherine Grace Bond

Author:Katherine Grace Bond [Bond, Katherine Grace]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: ePub Bud (www.epubbud.com)
Published: 2012-06-19T04:00:00+00:00

“Could you possibly be more nervous than I am?” I surprised myself by saying this aloud.

He gave a short laugh. “Yes.” He surveyed the carpet. “I realy blew it, didn’t I?”

All the anxiety drained out of me. “I like you so much,” I said.

He rewarded my brazenness with a broad grin. “Same back,” he said.

chapter

twenty-four

Outside the waves tumbled over themselves. Luke gazed into the fire, now the only light in the room. “Remember when I said I was looking for Eden?”

“Yeah.”

“This feels like Eden.”

I looked around. “The Jacuzzi fireplace suite?” He chuckled. “No, not that. I mean here with you.” A wisecrack about forbidden fruit leaped to mind. I squished it. But a wave of joy washed over me.

Luke put his feet up on the leather ottoman. “What’s your Eden, Brigitta?”

For some reason I began teling him about Cherrywood, about Nonni and Opa and the birds and the raspberries and the hot cicada-filed summers. I told him about their “spirit-filed” church services and about Nonni singing me to sleep.

“What happened to them?”

My throat tightened. “Strokes. Both of them. Opa went first.”

“That’s rough,” he said. “My grandmother, too. She had a bunch of strokes before she died. It was hard to see her like bunch of strokes before she died. It was hard to see her like that.”

“Yeah.” I stared at my lap. Aunt Julia had said Nonni wouldn’t recognize me or Dad, that it was sily for us to go see her, that the nursing home was providing everything she needed.

The memory pushed at me. I pushed back.

“Hey,” said Luke. “I shouldn’t have brought it up.”

“No, it’s okay. It’s been over a year.”

I’d never told this story before. It was like a bruise—as long as I didn’t bump it, I was fine.

Luke tipped his head. The firelight made shadows on his face.

“You sure?”

I focused on the armchair upholstery buttons. It would be lame to talk about it—like I was looking for attention. But my mind’s eye could see the lockdown wing at the nursing home, the color-coordinated halways, the doors that clicked shut behind us. And Nonni. A different Nonni. Her eyes were all wrong. One side of her face was frozen. She’d shuffled forward with the nurse holding her arm. “Six-one-six-one-six-one,” she mumbled.

An address? A phone number?

Luke put his feet on the floor and leaned toward me, forearms on his knees. “Are you okay?”

I shook my head. “She was just so lost,” I whispered.

“Yeah,” he said quietly. “I know.”

Did he? I longed to tell it all the way through: Nonni—who I loved like my own hands—her eyes darting around the room.

Crying out, scared when Dad touched her. He’d left me then.

Gone to see the nurses and left me alone with her.

“The room had this maroon walpaper with flocked roses on it,” I began tentatively. “I felt marooned.” Luke nodded.

“But I knew she was in there. I knew Aunt Julia was wrong about Nonni being ‘too far gone to care.’”

Luke moved his chair closer. The memory was too fierce to stop.

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