“I’m fine,” I announced to the crowd, though mostly to Nora, who had to report to Sharon anytime a resident required “excessive” care. That was all I needed.
I raised my glass to her and took a sip to demonstrate my fineness. I smiled. I sipped some more.
Valencia released her stole and petted it back into place on her narrow shoulders. She’d penciled in her eyebrows as inverted Vs today, so even though she sounded fully recovered from the incident, she didn’t look it. “I say you should chew your food better next time, Duffy,” she said. “And you should thank that quick-thinking young lady for saving you.”
“It’s not a big deal,” Josie mumbled, slipping back into her seat. It was clear I’d scared the shit out of her. Her voice had a tremble in it. So did her fingers. For a moment, I felt moved to reach out and hold her hands to keep them from shaking. But she tucked them away in her lap when she caught me noticing, adding, “You can get me back later.”
It’s no wonder what she had in mind. I straightened my shirt collar and tried to reset. “What were we talking about?”
“Peepaw,” Anderson said.
I gave Carl my straightest face.
Nora patted my shoulder and turned to speak to Josie for the first time, but paused when she saw the black eye. “Girl . . .”
“I know, right? I caught the corner of a kitchen cabinet,” Josie said quickly, which sounded like pure bullshit to me, unless her cupboard had a great left hook.
Anderson said, “Welcome to my world. Once a week, at least. Let me see the damage.”
“No, that’s cool. You don’t—”
He crouched down and closed in. Josie held fast in her seat, trying to act casual. Looking everywhere but at him. As for Anderson, he studied her bruise for a hot second, but then his gaze grew imprecise too, and before either of them knew it, they were both looking at me as their safe point of focus.
I flipped them a friendly bird.
Anderson stood with a smirk, saying to Josie, “I’ll get you an ice pack.”
“Ice pack?” I said. “Whatever happened to a cold cut of beef?”
“They don’t do that anymore,” Anderson called as he sauntered off with our dirty dishes. “Meat carries E. coli.”
I leaned back in my chair. “Christ, how did we ever survive?”
Nora chuckled as she took her turn inspecting Josie’s injury, but the laugh turned into a cluck as she pivoted Josie’s face by the chin. “You got yourself good. I’ll bring you some over-the-counter for the swelling.”
“Thanks.”
“Mm-hmm.” Nora straightened up, moving her narrowed-eyed, tender gaze to the whole of Josie. Looked like she smelled trouble, but, same as me, she couldn’t decide if Josie was giving it or taking it. In the end, all she said was, “While you’re here visiting, make sure these boys treat you real nice.”
“That’s the plan,” Carl declared.
Nora gave him a satisfied nod and checked her watch. “Lord, this day is moving.” She looked at me, shaking that pointer finger again like earlier. “You behave now. Don’t be putting on any more shows.”
“I have a matinee in store,” I mumbled as she faded away to her drug cart for the midmorning pill distribution. The room slowly emptied behind her.
The moment we were alone, Carl blurted, “We’d love if you’d stay the week.”
My eyes went wide. “We barely agreed to one night.”
Carl put his hand up to silence me. “But you have to understand that we’re a little worried—”
“Try terrified,” I said.
“Concerned,” Carl amended, like this was an improvement, “because we’re not allowed to have overnight guests.”
Josie propped her elbows on the table, cutting me out of the negotiations as best she could. “Totally get it. But I know we can figure it out, Peepaw. I mean, do they check on you at night? Like, after the lights go out?”
Carl suppressed a smile at hearing his name like that. “Not really, not unless we push our help buttons.”
“Okay. So . . . it’s easy. Why don’t I just come for breakfast like this, hang out, leave after dinner, then I’ll pop in your window to crash. In the morning, I’ll pop back out and come for breakfast again. No one will ever know. What do you think?”
“I think it’s stupid,” I said.
Carl took a break from nodding and hunched forward so he could see me better around Josie. “What’s wrong with it?”
“Besides everything,” I said, “where the hell is she going to sleep?”
Finally, Josie regarded me. “You guys have that recliner in the corner of your room.”
“You’re not sleeping on a daggone recliner,” Carl said.
“Why not?” I asked.
“She’s a lady.”
“So what?” I blustered, though really I was thinking she hardly qualified.
Carl squared his shoulders, jutted his chin. For a moment, he looked like the man in the black-and-white picture taped to our mirror—the man from fifty years ago with the smart haircut and the tight neck and his arm hooked for his new bride’s hand. A real gentleman, that man.
“She’ll sleep in my bed, and I’ll sleep in the recliner,” he said.
And so this is how he shamed me. By being like he is.
“Now wait a minute,” I said. “You know your hip won’t let you walk for days if you spend any amount of time in that chair.”
Carl shrugged. Josie appeared unmoved, which gave me yet another reason to find her distasteful. But that was beside the point. It looked like Carl had no intention of turning her to the streets, and I had no intention of letting Carl be more disabled than he already was. I got sore as a boil on the days I had to push him around in a wheelchair to get him to wherever we were going.
“Oh, fine,” I said, crossing my arms. “I’ll sleep in the damn chair. It makes more sense.”
This offer quieted Josie and prompted Carl to look at me with this unrestricted delight that was both a thank-you and a holy-shit-we’re-going-to-do-this glee. And despite myself, I joined him in it, because how could you deny that breaking the rules was just a little bit fun.
Truth be told, I’d only really given up entertaining myself that way when I got to Centennial. I’d never forget the very first time I toured the place. It was colder than blue-belly hell that day, and the sky was dropping swollen raindrops that would’ve been snow had the temperature given up another degree or two. The overcast afternoon and water-streaked windows lent the inside of the building a distinct snugness—a warm gray without the grimness. They’d turned the fireplace on, and there were board games and soft music and people shuffling this way and that with convincing purpose.