Part 33 (2/2)

GBME: You never know.

The Booking Process Takes a lot of time. Retinal scan: check. Personal info: check. Photographing, face forward, right, left: check. Fingerprinting: check. Every step, all new to me, just another day at jail for the intake officer. Now a nurse comes to take some blood and ask a lot of questions about my medical history.

”What's the blood for?”

The question seems fair, but the mastiff-faced nurse seems totally put out by it.

She rolls her big bug eyes.

To identify certain diseases, of course.

She squints at my pupils. Screen for substances ...

The familiar nervous p.r.i.c.kling begins at the base of my skull, creeps upward. ”Like what?”

Mastiff Nurse: Why, you worried about something in particular?

GBME: You really need to learn when to keep your mouth shut.

”Uh, no. Just curious is all.”

My face flushes embers.

It must be cranberry red.

Mastiff Nurse: Are you currently taking any medications?

GBME: A simple ”no” will do.

”Would you please shut up?”

Mastiff Nurse: Excuse me?

GBME: I'll shut up if you will.

Andre

If You Will Only pause, as you hurry through your days, take a minute to look at pa.s.sersby, beyond cursory skin-deep a.n.a.lysis, all the way into their eyes, what beauty you might find woven from the life threads there.

If you will only look past my clumsy attempts at love, sound the depths of emotion in my heart, what haven you might find in the soft surf of my harbor.

Birthdays Have never really felt like such a big thing. Certain ones stand out-my fifth, when my gramps took me to Disneyland and Cinderella kissed me. I thought she was the most beautiful lady in the universe.

My eleventh, when we went to San Francisco and watched a street dance compet.i.tion in Golden Gate Park. I'd been practicing on the sly, but wasn't nearly as good as I thought I was.

Seeing those b-boys do one-armed handstands made me believe I could do one too. I tried, landed on my head. Never knew a tiny head wound could bleed so much.

My sixteenth, when I got my driver's license and the Quattro on the same day. Mom wanted my first car to be a safe one.

Today is my eighteenth birthday. Jenna and I are celebrating tonight. It's someone else's party we're going to, but that's okay. I haven't seen her in over a week, and I can't believe how much I've missed her. Don't know if absence actually makes the heart grow fonder, but it definitely makes it ache. Should love be painful?

I'm getting ready when someone knocks on my bedroom door.

Mom. May I come in? Birthday present?

I'm s.h.i.+rtless, but she's seen me that way a time or two.

”Of course.” I step back and she brushes by.

Your father had to fly to Oakland. Your grandmother has been ill.

She's out of danger for now, but they are moving her into a nursing home.

I thought you might try and get down to see her as soon as school is out. Your grandfather would like that too. He's asking about you and your plans for next year.

Gramps, too? ”Why didn't anyone tell me that Grandma Grace was sick? Is she going to be okay?”

When people get older, their bodies deteriorate. You can make the outside look better, but you can't always control what's going on inside. She has brain cancer. Inoperable. But she's not in pain.

Guilt smacks me in the face. How long since I've even called to say h.e.l.lo? ”How long does she have?”

A Few Months That's it. The truth of death grabs me by the shoulders. Shakes.

Mom comes over, puts her arms around me. She hasn't held me like this since I was little. I'm sorry.

I know you were close. And I'm sorry I had to give you the news on your birthday.

She would want you to go to your party, though. For Grace, death is a beginning. She's a woman of strong faith. I wish I was. It would make the day-to-day living easier.

Easier? How much easier could it be for her? What is she afraid of? ”Are you afraid of dying?”

Her arms fall away, as if they have been around me too long.

She smiles. Only when I think about it.

She has always seemed ageless to me, like time has no way of touching her. I understand now that no one is immune to time's embrace. One day I will lose her. She goes to the door, hesitates. Happy birthday.

Before he left, your father made a deposit into your savings account.

Use some of it for a mad splurge, okay?

”Okay.” One day I will lose them both.

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