The End Is Her by H Claire Taylor

Author:H Claire Taylor
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: FFS Media
Published: 2020-07-07T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirty

311:12:31:09 until Doomsday

One month and five priestesses later, Jessica was feeling confident about her prospects. So confident, in fact, that the thought of visiting Waverly Hills Retirement Center for her obligatory community service didn’t even bother her.

And it was her lucky day, too. None of her favorite residents had received visitors all week, so she was free to check in and enjoy their presence and wisdom. The overpowering smell of stale urine in the hallways became hardly more than an afterthought.

It was after her visits had concluded, as she was on her way toward the front desk, that the day took a turn for the strange. Rosemary Heathrow’s room was drawing nearer, and she considered the merits of sprinting by it so that if the bitter woman did spot her, she wouldn’t be able to make sense of it before Jessica was already out the front door. Unable to find any flaws in that plan, Jessica committed herself do it, creeping closer to the door, ready to spring.

She sprang.

And she ran straight into someone exiting Mrs. Heathrow’s room.

The collision knocked her back and she apologized before realizing that the man she had just run into was one of two people on earth who never deserved an apology from her.

Jimmy Dean put his back to her quickly, as if he still stood a chance of going unrecognized. But no. She’d recognize him with her eyes closed. Jimmyness hung all around him like smog.

“What? she said, her mind trying desperately to put together the not-so-subtle clues. Jimmy Dean had just left Rosemary Heathrow’s room. “Do you know her?”

Giving up his attempt at veiling his identity, he grabbed her tightly around the arm and dragged her down the hall and around the corner, until they were alone and out of sight next to one of the emergency exits. “You tell no one,” he said.

“Tell no one what?”

“You know what.”

She didn’t know what. Not until that moment, at least. Her top suspicion had been that Rosemary was a member of his church, but if that were the case, he was unlikely to have any problem with people knowing about it. After all, visiting a sick old woman in a stinky retirement home when he had no obligation to would only bolster his reputation as a man of God.

But that clearly wasn’t the case here. She knew that now. His shame tipped her off because she recognized that particular brand of it.

“She’s your mother.”

“My miserable mother, yes.”

A surprising rush of sympathy nearly knocked her over, but she adjusted her stance and wouldn’t let it happen again.

“You have to promise me, Jessica, that you won’t tell anyone about her.”

She stared at him silently because every moment she did so was a moment she had power over him. And, yes, it did feel pretty good. His side of the scales was almost touching the tabletop.

“Rosemary Heathrow is your mother.” She’d read enough of his memoir Railed to the Cross to know that he had a mother,

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