Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 122506 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 613(@200wpm)___ 490(@250wpm)___ 408(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 122506 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 613(@200wpm)___ 490(@250wpm)___ 408(@300wpm)
I ought to be disgusted, lying here, abusing myself while on the other side of the wall lies the woman I want to be with in so many ways.
My eyes spring open at the sound of something hitting the floor. Heart beating hard, I lie in the darkness, my senses alert. Mila? I sit, trying not to groan, but I’m not twenty anymore. Can’t get a good night sleep lying on a fucking couch.
“Baba, please slow down.”
Mila’s voice. Other words I can’t make out, but I intuit the tone just fine. Distress.
A strip of light is visible from the bedroom door. She closed it, right, when she went to bed? I know she did—the thud a sign of finality.
Maybe she came out to wake me.
I swipe the sheet away, more concerned for Mila than I am for propriety, though I pause at the door. I’m not eavesdropping, I tell myself. I’m just concerned.
“Baba, please.” Mila hiccups, then sniffs. Tears? “I know, my darling, but you can’t come home.” Pause. “Because the doctor said so.”
I tentatively push on the door, my heart instantly aching at the sight of Mila crying, tears running down her reddened face.
“Are you okay?” I whisper. “I heard a noise.” It’s a pathetic excuse, but it’s all I’ve got. But I’m not leaving her. Not until I know she’s all right.
She points to the floor where a can of mosquito repellant lies, and she tries to smile. A terrible, beautiful, wobbling thing as she swipes the heel of her palm against her cheeks.
I step closer and loosen the gauzy mosquito net. I hadn’t unrolled it last night. Maybe I should’ve showed her how. I pull the swathes over the mattress as Mila continues to croon into the phone.
“I’m sorry, Baba. I’ll be back soon, back from work. And Ronny’s coming tomorrow. She’s going to bring you Turkish delight. They’re your favorite, right?”
The responding voice sounds sad—full of despair—as I shake out the netting.
“Baba, please don’t cry, my love. I’ll be home soon. I promise.”
Before I make to pull the sides of the net together, I scoot lower and take her hand in mine and give it a reassuring squeeze.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, my words warm against the back of her hand as I dust my lips across her knuckles. Fuck, I just want to make this better, but how can I? I couldn’t have guessed her grandmother was the reason she was reluctant to stay on the island longer. And if Evie had known, she wouldn’t have asked. Oliver, though, probably wouldn’t have given a fuck. Still, I feel bad—culpable somehow.
Maybe if she’d just let me in.
“I know, I know,” she croons then, “Don’t cry, Baba, please.” Then, “Oh!” Breath rushes from her chest in a relieved gust. “Thank God, Sarah. Yes, of course. Good night, darling. I’ll see you very soon.”
A pause. Gentle voices. An angry, unforgiving one. And then a burbling laugh and a different voice. “We’ll take it from here!”
“Thank you, Sarah,” Mila replies. “Some days she struggles to remember who I am, yet today, she not only remembered how to use her phone but she found my number too.”
“The mysteries of the mind. What time is it over there?” the tinny voice on the other side of the line asks.
“I don’t know. After one?” Mila glances down to where I hold up two fingers. “It’s gone two. That makes it about eight in the evening in London?”
“Cocoa time!”
“Please wish her good night from me when you tuck her in.”
“I will, my love,” the voice returns. “See you when you’re back.”
“Wait, Sarah? That other nursing home you told me about? I think I’m going to be able to swing it. I’ve had a bit of a windfall.”
Something pinches in my chest as it all begins to make sense. Fuck. What rich, self-absorbed assholes we must seem.
“Right.” Mila’s hand slides from mine and she covers her eyes while massaging her temples. “How long do you think before it goes? Oh. Okay.” Her teeth worry her lip at the answer to that. “Thanks for letting me know.”
The call ends, and Mila just stares at her dark-screened phone. Cicadas chirp in the garden. The bed creaks, or maybe my knees. I reach for her hand again.
“That was my grandmother.” She gives a shrug that hurts my insides. “Baba Roza.” And then she bursts into tears.
“Mila, darling.” I’m on my feet and on the bed, scooping her into my arms immediately. “It’s okay.”
“I know,” she says, swiping at her tears. “It’s just, Baba has dementia.”
“I didn’t know.” Because she didn’t tell me. She didn’t confide in me. But why would she?
“Usually, she can’t remember how to use her phone, but tonight she managed not only to turn it on but find my number too.”
“That’s good, right?”
“Not really,” she says, allowing me to pull her closer. “Dementia doesn’t work like that. It’s a thief, stealing bits of the person you love until all that’s left of them is a husk. I hate it. I fucking hate it! As if I don’t feel bad enough for not noticing how ill she was sooner. As if I don’t feel wretched enough that I had to put her in a nursing home after she fell. It’s a horrible place, Fin. But I had so little choice and even less time to find somewhere, because the hospital couldn’t release her to my care.”