Rache

There was an escalator from the main hall of the nursing home to the third floor, where Rache’s room was. Actually, there were four, two at each end, reaching out to embrace the egg-room of four hundred old people, dining under chandeliers that hung down 25 feet from the ceiling above. The fourth and fifth floors went all the way across, with a sitting room in the middle, directly above the dining hall. But the second and third floors stopped and had balconies looking down at the main hall. The only way to get to the second floor was through the elevator. There was just a little balcony on each side where the hallway ended, and you could look down on them, but the escalators went to the third floor, where the balcony made an oval all the way around. Rache’s hall was on the far left side.

At the top of the escalator, Tiffany grabbed me. “Okay. So what happened?” she asked.

“I uh,” I said. “She gave me all her stuff.”

“Wow!” she said. “That’s a lot. How’re you going to get all that home?”

“Mom let me borrow the car.”

“Oh! Things going better with you two?”

“I don’t know. She woke me up weird this morning. Tiffany—“ I said. She waited. “This is really weird. We went over the will just now in there—“

“Yeah?”

“I don’t know. It’s just weird. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with all that stuff. It’s like I’m stealing or something. I don’t know. It’s just…weird.”

“Oh, honey.” She put her arm around me and squeezed. I could feel I was starting to cry again. I held my breath. “Just don’t think about it that way. Think about…You’re not taking the stuff. You’re packing. It’s just packing.” I nodded, still holding my breath. I waited.

I exhaled and wiped my eyes. There was an empty feeling inside of me—a dull, hard little knot. An empty room was waiting for me.