Derailed (27 page)

“Sounds like that fall down the stairs left her a little . . .” I twirled my finger by my ear.

“Harry! That's not polite.”

“Well, I'm just sayin'.”

“Actually, I did ask how she was doin', and he said she's doin' pretty well, but she really misses her old home. Seems like the least
we can do is invite her to see how nicely you've fixed it up, especially if you're gonna be home Friday.”

I shrugged. “Sure, I guess.”

“Then would you make the call? Number's on that slip of paper pinned to the board by the phone.”

I guessed it wouldn't hurt for the old lady to come look, though it might feel kind of weird, guiding her through her old place after we've been making changes to it. Kinda wished Estelle was going to be here. She was better at this kind of thing than I was.

I spent a couple of hours with Mom Friday
morning. No change that I could tell, but she seemed to appreciate my playing some of the praise CDs Estelle had sent. Don't think any of the nurses bothered to play them for her. But then, that's not their job.

I put on the CD that Grace Meredith had given us. Figured if Estelle was making friends with her, the least I could do was listen to a little of her music. Just hoped it wasn't too “contemporary” for Mom. But it was nice, and the woman certainly had a fantastic voice. I could see why she traveled all over the country giving concerts. I'd hate to be on the road that much . . . Wait a minute! That's exactly what I'd gotten myself into. I thought Mom had drifted off, but at the last song, Mom's eyes came open and a crooked smile brightened her face. She raised her right hand and began keeping time with the music with her index finger as though she were directing a choir. As it played, I recognized the old spiritual. Perhaps I'd even heard Mom sing it in church sometime back in the day.

I listened more closely.

Give me Jesus
,

Give me Jesus
.

You may have all the world
,

Give me Jesus
.

When the waves of trouble rise
,

When the waves of trouble rise
,

When the waves of trouble rise
,

Give me Jesus
.

“Waves of trouble,” huh?
Sure felt like I'd been through my share of waves lately, more like a storm! Tossed one way and then another over so many things. But Grace's crystal-clear voice drew me on.

And when I come to die
,

And when I come to die
,

And when I come to die
,

Give me Jesus
.

Was she singing to Mom? Whether or not this was my mother's time, it wouldn't be long till she crossed over. The rhythm she kept with her finger, though it moved only a couple inches at a time, affirmed her sincere request,
Give me Jesus. You may have all the world, give me Jesus
.

Could I say the same?

Now hear the voice that calls
,

Now hear the voice that calls
,

Now hear the voice that calls
,

Come to Jesus
.

Come to Jesus
,

Come to Jesus
.

For Him give up all the world
,

Come to Jesus
.

As the mellow notes of Grace's voice drifted away, I just sat there. I'd already come to Jesus. I believed. I knew that when my number was up, I'd follow Mom in passin' over to be with Jesus. I'd turned away from the booze and had embraced the second chance God had given me to have a new family, to become a father like God to my grandson and receive God as my father. I'd thrown myself on Jesus' mercy when I'd been losing the sight in my left eye, and he'd spoken to me and healed me. We had a relationship.

So why was that simple old spiritual bringing tears to my eyes?

I watched my mom, whose hand had relaxed to her side and whose eyes had closed in peaceful sleep. She was ready to pass over.
You may have all the world, give me Jesus
. Was it really that simple? I wasn't trying to “have all the world.” I wasn't tryin' to get rich or grab everything within sight. No. I was just tryin' to get by. Tryin' to navigate the challenges in my life. Tryin' to make a good place for my mother, for Estelle and DaShawn. And I thought God had my back, but . . . 
Give me Jesus
? Was that all that mattered? How do you give up everything else? How do you give up your responsibilities—even for Jesus—without becoming irresponsible? It sounded almost like the pseudo spiritual pabulum that came from the TV preachers Mom listened to.

But I don't know.

I got up, wiped the tears from my eyes, and stepped over to plant a feather-light kiss on Mom's forehead before I left the hospital.

My cell phone rang just as I got to my car in the hospital parking garage. “Yeah, Bentley.”

“Uh, Mr. Bentley?”

“That's me.” Didn't sound like a telemarketer, so I gave the guy a few more seconds.

“This is Don Krakowski. I'm running a little late. There's more traffic comin' in on the Kennedy than I anticipated. We should be there in another twenty minutes. Hope that doesn't mess you up.”

“No, no.” I'd completely forgotten about Mattie Krakowski coming to find her lost box. “You're welcome when you get here.”

As soon as I got home, I checked the first floor to make sure Rodney hadn't left the place an unspeakable mess. In spite of his other problems, he'd actually always been fairly neat, even as a kid. Today he was out job hunting . . . or something, and his room looked fine. The rest of the apartment was empty.

I ran upstairs. Oops, Corky! “You okay, girl?” She came up beside me, swinging her tail, and shouldered me in the leg like a
safety trying to make an open-field tackle. But she didn't appear to need to go out. I gave her a pat and put some coffee on. While it was brewing, I went down to the basement to see if I could find that box. Corky trailed along just in case something exciting happened. Didn't find any boxes except our own and ran back upstairs. Whew! I was getting my exercise today.

When the doorbell rang, I closed Corky into our apartment and went down to greet the Krakowskis, only slightly out of breath. “Come on in.” I held the door wide as an elderly white lady with a cane surveyed the entryway before entering it.

“Looks just the same, Donny. I thought you said they changed it all.”

“No, Mom. I said they
might've
changed some things.” He smiled and reached around his mother to shake my hand as she made it across the threshold.

“How you doin'? Got some fresh coffee I could bring down if your mom . . .” Duh! She was standing right there. “Excuse me, ma'am. Didn't mean to ignore you. If you'd rather not climb the stairs, I could bring some coffee down here.”

But what are they gonna sit on? Rodney's bed and one chair?

The old lady saved me. “Oh, I think I can manage the stairs if you don't rush me. It's just those basement steps that give me trouble.”

But instead of starting up the stairs, she turned left and opened the door to the first-floor apartment.

“Uh, no, Mom. That's someone else's apartment now. You don't live there anymore.”

She turned and looked at her son with a bewildered look on her face.

“It's okay,” I said. “We don't really have anyone in there right now. My son's using one of the bedrooms, but we've spent the last few weeks working on it.”

Before I finished my explanation, Mattie took my
it's okay
literally and stepped through the door. “Oh, my! Oh, my! This is . . . this
is
different.” She kept shuffling on into the living room. “I like it. It's so bright. Donny, can we put my TV back in the same
place?” Then she turned to me. “I can still get Regis and Kelly, can't I?”

“Uh . . .”

“How about Oprah?”

“Well,” I said, “I'm sure . . . though I . . .” I looked at Don for some help. “. . . I've heard Oprah's gonna—”

Don waved his hand frantically behind his mother's back to get me to stop.

I blew out a breath. “Yes. Oprah too.”

I grinned at Don, and he nodded in relief.

We walked from one end of the apartment to the other with Mattie exclaiming over every room at what a nice job we'd done. To my surprise, she didn't ask whose things were in the bedroom. She peeked in and quickly pulled the door closed, her eyebrows arched high as though she didn't want to disturb anything.

Once we'd reached the sunroom, she turned her piercing blue eyes on me. “So did you find my box?”

“No, ma'am. Afraid we didn't. As you can see, there's nothing left in the apartment, and I didn't find anything in the basement either.”

“To tell you the truth, I'd like to go down and look myself, if you don't mind.”

I looked to Don and shrugged, leaving it to him to answer.

“Uh, Mom, why don't I go down and look. You tell me where you think you left it, and I'll go down and check. Okay?”

“Well, I know where it is. It's on those shelves your father built years ago.”

We returned to the entryway where another door accessed the basement. Don went down the stairs while I stood there, not knowing what to say. Finally, I asked, “Is it nice where you're staying now?”

“No. Other people keep changing the channel on me to vampires and cop shows and things I don't like.”

“That's too bad.” The woman reminded me of my mom, facing life at the end with so little control over what happened to her. Must be hard.

“At least when my hip's strong enough and I move back in here, I won't have
that
problem.”

My mouth dropped open. She wasn't just a little confused; she was expecting to move back in! She looked at me and cocked her head slightly to the side as if she couldn't raise it enough to look up at me straight on. “I'm here to tell you mister . . . mister . . . What was your name again?”

“Uh . . . Bentley, Harry Bentley.”

“Well, I'm here to tell you, Mr. Harry Bentley, that I couldn't be more pleased with how nice you made my place look. Thank you.”

“Mom? Mom!” Don called up from the basement. “There's no box like that down here. In fact, there aren't any shelves beside the stairs.”

“Oh, fiddlesticks. Yes there are.” She turned and shook her head at me. “That boy! Can't ever seem to do any errand I send him on.”

“Well, there might've been some shelves here at some point,” came Don's voice as he ascended the stairs. “I could see some marks and old nail holes, but they're gone now.”

Mattie shuffled toward the stairs, but I stepped around her and put my arm across the doorway to the basement. “I don't think you oughta go down there, ma'am. After your fall and all—”

“Don't be ridiculous. I've been doing my exercises for weeks. I know how to do stairs. I turn around, hold on to both sides, and go down backwards.”

“What?”

“Well, that's the way I do it. Here, move aside.”

Don backed down the stairs a step or two. “She can do it. I've seen her. Just have to give her time.”

Reluctantly, I removed my arm, glad we had liability insurance, and Don retreated, “spotting” her until she reached the bottom. By the time I got down there, she was frowning at the two small units not much larger than a pair of travel trunks that had replaced the enormous old octopus furnace. “It's all different.” She pointed. “What are those?”

“New furnaces,” I said. “One for each floor.”

“They had to put in new furnaces, Mom. Remember, the old one broke? That's why you were going down the stairs that night when you fell.”

“But why didn't they just fix the old one? These little things'll never heat the whole place.”

“They'll do just fine, Mom. They're much more efficient.”

“My, my, my!” Mrs. Krakowski began walking around the basement with small hesitant steps. “You got new laundry too. That's nice.” Then, as though remembering why she'd come down, she gazed at the wall beside the stairs. “The shelves are gone.”

I figured it was my turn to explain. “They had to take 'em out in order to put in new ductwork for the furnaces.”

“Does it still rattle and rumble when the furnace starts up?”

“No ma'am. It's quiet as can be. They run at different speeds depending on how cold it is.”

“Hmmm. Well, where'd they put those shelves?”

I shrugged. “I'm sorry, I really don't know.”

She shook her head sadly and returned to the stairs. “Might as well go, Donny. But that box held my most important family pictures. Had pictures of you when you were just a baby in there. My grandma and grandpa too. Such a shame.” She started climbing slowly, Don right behind her to steady her. “Guess I'm just gonna have to trust and obey.”