Every Waking Moment (13 page)

THE ONLY WAY
Treha could hit the button was to let Ardeth slump to the floor, so she’d grabbed the pillows from the bed and placed them under the woman’s head. After she reached the button, she returned to Ardeth’s side. “It’s going to be okay, Mrs. Ardeth.”

“No, it’s not. I heard it snap. When I fell, I hit bone. This is the end, Tiffany.”

“It’s not the end,” Treha said sharply.

One of the nurses was the first to find them. She tried to help Treha get the woman in a comfortable position. Ms. Millstone rushed to the phone and dialed the EMTs, then seemed paralyzed by the situation.

“Treha, you need to move that bucket out of the hallway now,” the woman finally snapped.

When Treha moved, Ardeth gave a yelp of pain.

“Let’s just hold her position right there,” the nurse said. “No sudden movements.”

Millstone turned and propped the door open, then pushed the bucket out of sight down the hallway. The nurse spoke to Ardeth, assured her help was on the way, then told Treha she was doing a good job. “We’re going to make a nurse out of you yet.”

Instead of Millstone returning, Mrs. Howard came into the room and knelt to take Ardeth’s hand. She didn’t ask questions, just spoke kindly and gently, and Treha felt the woman’s response
 
—a relaxing of the muscles.

“Her leg is shaking,” Treha said.

Mrs. Howard nodded. “Did you see her fall?”

“No. I was pushing the bucket down the hallway and I heard her crying. I found her like this.”

“My bones are so brittle,” Ardeth said.

“It’s all right, Ardeth. Help is on the way.” Then to Treha, she said, “You did a good thing. You got her help when no one else heard her.”

“But I’m not supposed to talk to anyone.”

“The only reason you talked to Ardeth was to help her. No one will have a problem with that.”

Treha felt a presence in the room before the shadow covered them. She looked behind Mrs. Howard to see Ms. Millstone looking down, hands on hips.

“Get up from there,” Millstone said.

“I think we should wait for the EMTs,” Mrs. Howard said.

“I’m not talking about Mrs. Williams; I’m talking about Ms. Langsam.”

“But she’s keeping Ardeth comfortable. There will be more pain if you move her.”

“I want you out of here now,” Millstone said.

The nurse and Mrs. Howard held Ardeth as best they could as Treha slipped from underneath her. There were sirens in the distance that were drowned by Ardeth’s cries. She reached out and Treha patted the woman’s hand.

“To my office,” Millstone said. “Go.”

Treha walked out of the room and saw the mop and bucket
at the end of the hallway. “Do you want me to mop the floor in the
 
—?”

“To my office!” Millstone shouted.

More crying and moaning from Ardeth. The ambulance pulled up to the front and the EMTs rushed through the door. Treha pointed them to Ardeth’s room and they hurried down the corridor with their equipment in tow.

Treha walked into Millstone’s office and waited, unable to sit for fear it wouldn’t be approved. From the hallway she heard murmurs of curious residents. She finally sat on the floor with her back against the wall and, as much as she could, stared at the bookshelves, the spines in perfect symmetry.

She drew her knees to herself and hugged them, breathing in the glue and new carpet. It was even stronger down here but she didn’t want to sit in the leather chair and have Ms. Millstone scold her.

When Millstone finally arrived, she flipped on the light and glared at Treha. “Why are you in the dark? And why are you sitting down there? Get in the chair.”

Treha obeyed while Millstone took a folder from a stand on the credenza behind her.

“Is the address we have on file your current one?”

“Yes.”

“That’s where we’ll send your final check.”

“But I pick it up here.”

“Ms. Langsam, you’re not employed here any longer. I told you the rules and you violated them. End of discussion. It’s all documented, very carefully.”

Treha looked at the page, upside down. “I didn’t talk with anyone. I just tried to help Mrs. Ardeth.”

The woman was busy signing things, then turned the file
around. “Sign here and initial these pages. This says you understand the reasons for termination. It’s standard procedure.”

“Don’t sign anything, Treha,” someone said behind her. Treha turned to see Mrs. Howard in the door. She stepped inside and moved toward the desk. “You have no right treating her this way. She helped Ardeth. You should be giving her a medal.”

Millstone glared at Mrs. Howard, but before she could speak, the office manager appeared. A petite woman with large glasses. “Mrs. Williams’s daughter is on the phone for you, Ms. Millstone.”

She glanced at Treha before picking up the phone. “This is Jillian Millstone. Thank you for returning my call. I wanted to inform you that your mother has had an accident. A fall . . . No, she’s all right. They’re transporting her to the hospital now. . . .”

Mrs. Howard turned to Treha and whispered, “This is not fair. There’s no way she can legally terminate you for helping someone who fell. Don’t sign anything. Do you understand?”

Treha nodded. Mrs. Howard scanned the credenza behind Millstone as if she were looking for something.

Millstone hung up the phone, then picked it up again and dialed three numbers. “Mr. Davis, would you
 
—? I’m sorry; that’s right. Mr. Drennan, would you come to my office immediately?”

“Jillian, don’t do this. Treha was helping you. She’s an asset here, not a liability.”

Millstone came around her desk and pointed at Mrs. Howard. “You are no longer welcome here. Find another place to meddle.” She picked up an envelope behind her.

“How can you be so insensitive?”

“And how can you be so hard of hearing? We don’t need you. Why don’t you understand?”

A younger security guard walked in, keys jangling, a grim look on his face. “You wanted to see me, ma’am?”

“Escort Ms. Langsam to her locker and then out of the building.” The woman handed the envelope to Treha. “This is a restraining order. You are not to come within one hundred yards of the building after today. It’s all in there. You can read it.”

Treha took the envelope but left it sealed. She looked at Mrs. Howard, then back to Millstone. “Why do you hate me?”

“I don’t hate you. Now follow Mr. Drennan and get your things.”

The security guard stepped inside, touched the brim of his hat, and nodded. He put his thumbs in his belt and stood dutifully, glancing at Treha.

“Can I say good-bye to them?” Treha said.

Millstone shook her head.

“Just to Elsie?” Treha said flatly.

Millstone glanced at Drennan and the man took Treha’s elbow as if he had done this type of thing before, as if the movements were choreographed.

“Come with me,” he said.

Treha typed with the fingers of her free hand. She glanced at
Excellence
. Her head was light because of the glue and some sort of aftershave Drennan wore, or maybe it was his deodorant. A sweet and sweaty bouquet that followed him out the door as his keys jangled.

Treha glanced back at Mrs. Howard. “Would you tell them good-bye for me?”

Mrs. Howard nodded.

As she passed the front desk, there were averted eyes, inner conflict at seeing a coworker banished. Nothing to say but go
back to your duties as assigned and hope it didn’t happen to you.

The contents of her locker fit neatly into a white kitchen trash bag. Treha stared at it on the floor of the empty locker. This was all the space she needed to house her life. There were extra scrubs and a hairbrush and below were a couple photos the residents had given her in the past few months. A roll of duct tape. A pair of headphones that didn’t work.

“I’m sorry this is happening,” Drennan said.

She picked up the bag and handed him the roll of tape. Her last gift. “I don’t need this.”

“Okay,” he said. “Thanks.”

Treha closed the locker and walked outside, shoelaces dangling. He didn’t hold her elbow. He didn’t have to.

MIRIAM KNEW
this was not the time to have a confrontation with Millstone. Besides, she knew if she said anything, it would end with her jumping over the desk and wrestling the woman to the ground. She had heard all the tricks of counting to ten, and she had used many with some of the more belligerent residents, but turning her back and walking away was the only real coping mechanism now. She walked out the front door and the security guard pointed to the front gate, where she found Treha by the sidewalk.

“Is this one hundred yards, do you think?” the girl said.

“You’re fine. Treha, don’t let her get to you. This is not over.”

Her eyes seemed to be going full tilt now, her body swaying.

“I need to tell Elsie what happened. I’ll call her, and then we’ll leave together.”

“You can go back and see her,” Treha said.

“Are you sure you’re all right?”

She nodded. “Tell her I’m sorry I won’t get to talk with her anymore.”

“You’ll get to talk with her again. Trust me.”

Miriam walked briskly inside and went to Elsie’s room, halfway expecting Millstone to slap her with a restraining order too.
She found Elsie still in her chair, her eyes closed. When she turned to leave, Elsie spoke.

“I was praying, not sleeping. Tell me what happened.”

Miriam told her and Elsie pursed her lips and shook her head.

“This may be my last chance to talk face-to-face for a while,” Miriam said. “Millstone has drawn a line and I think I’m on the other side of it.”

“It’s moments like this that make a God-fearing woman want to learn a few good curse words.”

“Elsie, what can you tell me about Dr. Crenshaw? What did he know about Treha’s past?”

Elsie looked out the window. “He was torn up about something concerning her. Regrets. I never figured it out, but I did help him find forgiveness. Physically Jim Crenshaw was a mess. He’d abused his body for decades. But spiritually he was worse. He was adrift.”

“Peace in the Valley.”
That was the song she had heard on the radio earlier. How had she remembered? Something about sorrow and sadness and trouble leaving because there will be peace in the valley.

“What regrets?”

“He said he had done things as a doctor he wasn’t proud of and wanted forgiveness. I told him he could have that.”

“And you think this had something to do with Treha?”

“This is the part . . . Jim said he was the reason Treha came to work here. He found her.”

“That can’t be. As I recall, she answered an advertisement. She had printed it and carried it with her when she showed up on our doorstep.”

“Do you know how she found it?”

“I assumed it was online or Buck put it on a board at a grocery.”

“Jim sent that to her. He suggested she apply.”

“But how would he have known her? Or where she lived?”

“I never asked.”

Miriam’s mind spun. “Elsie, did he keep a file on Treha? Things written down that might help?”

“Not that I know of. Why?”

“I thought he might have mentioned it. Did he ever talk about a man named Davidson?”

The old woman shook her head, making the skin under her neck jiggle. “I think he didn’t share more because he was protecting somebody.”

“Who?”

“I don’t know. Maybe himself. Maybe me. Maybe he was just so ashamed of what he did that he didn’t want me to think less of him. I told him there was nothing he could do that would keep God from loving him. And if he was good enough for God, he was good enough for me. But that didn’t help.”

Elsie reached for the quilt behind her and pulled on a yellow strand that had gone rogue. “This was given to me by the ladies’ missionary society at my church. For years we would make care baskets for missionaries in Africa, India, Burma
 
—they call it something else now.” She pointed a crooked finger at a panel. “Each of these little squares has a verse reference. Like this one here. Isaiah 40:8. ‘The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God endures forever.’”

“Do you know all of these by heart?”

“When the mind is sharp, I can get pretty close. Here’s Psalm 119:11.” She closed her eyes and lifted her right hand like some conductor ready to lead a biblical orchestra. “‘I have
hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.’ That one is a comfort, but the truth is all the hiding in the world doesn’t keep you from sin; it just lets you know it’s there.”

Now Miriam understood the straight and curved lines on the patchwork that had made no sense when she saw them upside down. Like her life. And Treha’s. “It’s beautiful,” she said.

“No, it’s full of flaws. Missed stitches and crooked squares fashioned by arthritic hands. That’s what makes it priceless to me. It’s more meaningful because every time I look, I see those ladies working and talking and laughing and praying. We solved a lot of the world’s problems in those sewing circles. The beauty is in the flaws. I tried to tell Jim that.”

“He wouldn’t listen?”

“He listened and I think he understood.” Elsie touched a few more panels like she was caressing the face of a friend. “I don’t know everything Jim did, but I saw a tortured soul set free.”

“What do you mean?”

“He was cool to my faith at first. Stayed away for a while, didn’t want to hear it. I can take rejection as long as you’re really rejecting the message and not my bad breath or the way I’m presenting it. As time went on and we built trust, he came around and wanted to know what gave me hope.”

She touched another panel. “‘Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.’”

“Your recall is amazing.”

“That’s not the important part. The important part comes last. Give people the reason for the hope you have, ‘but do this with gentleness and respect.’” She punctuated each word with a finger on the quilt. “If only Millstone could follow that. And
if Christians would wrap their truth like that, I expect we’d give the truth to more hungry people.”

“I appreciate what you’re saying. I believe, but I struggle with it.”

“Mmm-hmm. I’ve known since we met that you’re searching for more than retirement. You’re searching for something you can’t find anywhere but in here.” She pointed at Miriam’s chest.

Miriam stared at the quilt and the squares. In their imperfection they somehow seemed perfect, placed in the design by loving hands that cared about an old woman alone in a room with cheesy music and a faith so real she could taste it.

“What about Jim?” she said. “What happened?”

“We were sitting at the breakfast table. I remember as clear as you sitting right there. He wasn’t eating his grapefruit. His coffee was cold. Just staring off. I said, ‘Jim, you look like you’ve come to a decision.’

“‘I sure have,’ he says. And he gave me that smile of his and I knew what had happened.”

She pointed at another square on the quilt. On it was stitched
Ezekiel 36:26
. Elsie closed her eyes again. “‘I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.’ That’s what happened. We prayed together. We cried together. And God began to work in his heart to change things. To help him deal with his regrets.”

“That’s why he had hired Devin to come record him.”

“That’s right. And then he was gone. He was reading his Bible, soaking it in, asking more questions . . .”

Elsie yawned and Miriam stood. “I’ll leave you to get some beauty rest.”

“Too late for beauty, my dear. I’ll settle for sanity and continence.”

Miriam put a hand on her shoulder. “Thank you, Elsie. Hang in there with Millstone.”

Elsie clasped hands with her, and Miriam was surprised at the fierce grip. “You take care of that girl.”