About That Fling (24 page)

His brain was drifting to absurdity, so he reached out and squeezed Nana’s hand. It felt bony and frail, and there was no sign of recognition from her at all.

“Hey, Nana—it’s me, Adam.”

No response. He stroked his finger over the back of her hand, tracing the knuckles and thin bones. Did she even know he was here? The nurses had warned him she’d been unresponsive all week, but still. He’d hoped for some sign.

Behind him, Jenna was still trying to connect with Gramps. “I’ve always wanted a dog myself, but we had cats growing up. A big Maine Coon named Sugarbear and a sweet little black-and-white tuxedo kitty we called Spot.”

“Bald spot?” Gramps ran a hand over his shiny scalp. “Yeah, well, that runs in the family, too. You wait and see, Adam here will be dropping clumps of hair left and right when he gets to be my age.”

“No, I—”

“Jenna is Adam’s girlfriend, Gramps,” Shelly said. “Don’t you think he did better this time around?”

At that, Adam turned to face them, not sure if he was more interested in Gramps’s reaction or Jenna’s. He saw his grandfather grin widely, and Jenna followed suit, looking a little nervous.

“Sure am happy to have you here,” Gramps said, leaving it open whether he meant Jenna or Adam or the whole family. He looked past Jenna to Adam and nodded. “You have her eyes, you know. Edie’s. She sure was proud of what you made of yourself, boy.”

“Thank you,” Adam said, swallowing back the lump in his throat. “That means a lot.”

Gramps swiveled his gaze back to Jenna’s and grinned. “You sticking around for lunch, girlie? Corned beef and mashed potatoes. ’Course it’s not as good as what Edie used to make. Boy, she was one helluva good cook in her day.”

Jenna gave Adam a nervous smile, then turned back to Gramps. “Yes, that’s what Adam said. He told me about the little diner she used to own. How people would come from miles and miles just to have a slice of pie at Edie’s.”

“ED?” Gramps frowned. “Well, now you’re getting
real
personal, missy. A man’s erectile dysfunction is his own business, and they got those little blue pills now that can—”

“Okay, Gramps, cut it out.” Shelly was snort-laughing in the corner, wiping tears from her eyes.

Jenna gave her a perplexed look before turning to Adam. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “You told me he was hard of hearing, but I had no idea—”

“What’d you say about my hard-on?”

Adam choked on a laugh of his own, his hand gently squeezing Nana’s. “Gramps hears just fine, Jenna.”

“What?”

“He got hearing aids a few years ago, so now he hears better than I do. He’s yanking your chain.”

Jenna blinked, then turned back to Gramps. “Is that true?”

“I’m not allowed to yank anything around here,” Gramps said, grinning wider now. “Nurse came by just last week and smacked it out of my hand when I was sittin’ there in the common area enjoying a little adult television. If they don’t want us to watch the Playboy channel, they shouldn’t have it out there.”

“They didn’t have the Playboy channel, Gramps,” Shelly said, still dabbing at her eyes. “Not until you figured out how to hook it up illegally.” She nudged Jenna with her elbow. “In addition to his hearing being perfect, his mind is still sharp as a tack.”

“He teased us mercilessly when we were kids,” Adam said, watching as Jenna’s shoulders started to relax. “If it’s any comfort to you, he only screws around this way with people he likes.”

Jenna shook her head and turned back to Gramps, a smile spreading slowly across her face. A look of fondness had replaced the horrified expression she’d worn moments ago, and Adam gave her hand a squeeze.

“Jeez, you had me worried,” Jenna said. “I think I see now where your grandson gets his sense of humor.”

Gramps grunted. “Well if he’s good in the sack, he gets that from me, too. If he’s lousy, blame his father.”

Jenna laughed and leaned back in her chair, turning to beam at Adam. “I think I like this family.”

“Yeah?” he said. “I think I can speak for all of us when I say it likes you, too.”

Nana’s fingers twitched against his palm, so faintly Adam knew he might have imagined it. He looked down and saw her expression hadn’t changed. Her face was still serene and creased with age, and her hand still felt limp in his.

But her fingers twitched again, this time curling faintly against his, and he knew he hadn’t imagined it. Across the room, Jenna and Gramps and Shelly sat laughing as the tiniest ghost of a smile played across Nana’s lips. Then her hand went limp again, the rhythm of her breathing making the blankets rise and fall in a soothing tempo.

It was enough.

Later that evening, Jenna leaned back against Shelly’s sofa, comforted by the feel of Adam’s arm around her shoulders. It felt natural there, like it had always belonged.

“Here you go,” Shelly said, rounding the corner of the kitchen and handing her a stemless wineglass. “It’s a cab from a winery just a few miles from here. Very juicy, though it probably needs to open up a bit more.”

“Mmm, it’s delicious,” Jenna said, taking a sip. “Thanks again for dinner. It was amazing.”

“Don’t mention it. It was the least I could do after subjecting you to that bland crap at Nana and Gramps’s place.”

“I didn’t mind at all,” Jenna said, taking another sip. “Your grandfather is quite the character. Made me miss my own grandpa.”

Shelly smiled. “We’re lucky we’ve had both our grandparents this long. Most of my friends lost theirs in middle school and high school.”

Adam slid his arm around Jenna’s shoulder and craned his neck to look at his sister. “So what did the doctor say on the phone?”

“Nothing new. He said it could be a few weeks, could be a few hours. Usually at the point where the patient stops eating and drinking, it doesn’t take long.”

“Yeah, but this is Nana we’re talking about,” Adam said. “She’s probably got a little more fighting spirit than the average ninety-year-old.”

“Could be,” Shelly said, dropping into a tufted leather chair beside the television. “Then again, she might be ready to quit fighting and rest for a change.”

Jenna slid her hand to Adam’s knee and gave a small squeeze she hoped he took as comforting rather than lecherous. Then again, he might find lechery comforting. Now that she’d met Gramps, she wouldn’t be surprised.

She turned to Shelly, who was making fast work of her own glass of wine. “Do you have any videos of your grandmother? I’d love to see what she was like before she got sick.”

“That’s a great idea,” Shelly said, thunking her wineglass onto the end table and dropping to her knees in front of a large chest fringed with copper rivets. “I’ve got a bunch of old VHS tapes here. I swear, I’m the last person on earth who hasn’t converted them all to DVD.”

“Luckily, you’re also a packrat,” Adam said, plucking Jenna’s wineglass from her fingers and taking a sip. “You’re also the only person on earth who still has a VHS player.”

Shelly grinned and shoved a tape into the player, while Jenna leaned back against Adam’s arm, feeling warm and safe and stupidly happy. “You like the wine?” she asked.

“I do,” he murmured. “It’s different from what you’ve been introducing me to lately—Sangiovese and Chianti?”

Jenna nodded, surprised he noticed. “The cab is really juicy—a little higher in tannins. Chianti and Sangiovese tend to be a little closer to medium bodied, and the earthy ones are my favorite. Kinda like the one we had with dinner.”

“Juicy versus earthy,” he repeated, taking another thoughtful sip of the cab. “Yeah, I think I see what you mean.”

“You sure you don’t want your own glass?”

“Nope, I don’t want the wine,” he said, planting a kiss along her hairline as he handed the glass back to her. “I just wanted a chance to put my lips someplace yours had been.”

“In that case,” she whispered, “you should work on your contortionist skills.”

He laughed and kissed her forehead this time, pulling her tighter against him so she could feel the ridges of his abs against the base of her ribcage. Funny how aware she was of every spot where their bodies touched, all the little ways they connected. She felt like she belonged here. Like they’d always been together, connected by breath and bone and skin.

“This should be a good one,” Shelly said, sitting back on her heels and hitting a button on the VHS. “It’s from that family reunion six or seven years ago. Remember that?”

“Yeah,” Adam said, nuzzling Jenna’s hair. “Nana wore a red dress that Gramps said made her look like a tart.”

“He meant it as a compliment, I’m sure,” Jenna said, watching as the video flickered to life on the screen and a scattering of relatives appeared, joking and laughing as they juggled paper plates and bottles of beer.

“There’s Uncle Martin,” he said, nodding toward the screen. “Ten bucks says he’s already wasted.”

“No bet,” Shelly said, getting to her feet. “He was wasted before he got there. Speaking of which, I’m going to grab the wine bottle so we don’t have to get up again. You sure you don’t want your own glass, Adam?”

“I’m good,” Adam said, pulling Jenna closer.

She snuggled against him and took a slow sip of her wine as Shelly moved toward the kitchen. Jenna kept her eyes fixed on the screen, watching Adam’s relatives smiling and singing and tossing a Frisbee. “Who’s the woman in the white shorts?”

“That’s my cousin, Ginny. She’s a brain surgeon out in Vermont. We don’t see her much. That guy over there in the Hawaiian shirt is my dad. That was just before he and mom joined the Peace Corps.”

“You must miss them a lot.”

“I do, but I know they love what they’re doing. They’re happy.”

Jenna nodded, transfixed by the sight of Adam’s dad throwing his head back and laughing the same way Adam did sometimes. The scene swiveled left, landing on a woman in a brown peasant skirt who waved at the camera, then stuck her tongue out and crossed her eyes. They were the same as Adam’s eyes, the same speckled green Jenna had come to know so well in the last few weeks. She nestled deeper against his chest, savoring the feel of his fingers stroking her hair.

The camera swung right, landing on a couple locked in a passionate embrace beneath an oak tree. The man dipped his hand into the curve of the woman’s back, pulling her tight against his body just like Adam did when he kissed.

Jenna blinked. It
was
Adam. And the woman arching her body against his was Mia, her long red hair trailing down her back as she twined her fingers around his neck, her wedding ring glinting in the sun.

“Oh,” Jenna breathed, staring at the screen.

Behind her, Adam tensed. The hand that had been stroking her leg stopped in mid-caress, his fingers frozen on her knee. “Shit. Hey, Shel? Where’s the remote?”

“What? Oh.” Shelly scrambled from the edge of the kitchen, dropping to her knees in front of the television. She fished around on the floor, fumbling with a silver controller.

“Dammit, wrong one.”

Jenna couldn’t look away. She wanted to—God, she wanted to—but there was something pulling her eyes to the screen like magnets. She couldn’t blink. She couldn’t breathe. All she could do was stare at the young couple kissing, so passionate, so young, so in love.

“So disgusting,” Shelly said, dropping the silver remote and picking up a black one. She aimed it at the television and hit a button. The image lurched into fast-forward, and Jenna watched the blurry figures moving at warp speed as Mia realized they were being filmed and turned laughing toward the camera, waving them away. The image shifted to another scene, a set of school-aged kids chasing each other with squirt guns. Shelly took her hand off the button and the image slowed to normal speed.

“Sorry about that,” Shelly said, giving Jenna a sympathetic look. “That’s the kind of shit you can’t unsee, huh?”

“It’s fine,” Jenna said, blinking at last.

“I’m so sorry,” Adam murmured into her hair. “We were newlyweds there. I didn’t realize—”

“Don’t be silly,” Jenna said, taking a sip of her wine and trying not to notice the way the glass shook in her hand. “It’s not like it never occurred to me you might have kissed someone else before me. I have a past, you have a past, we all have a past.”

“Yeah, but how often does Adam have to watch videos of you polishing some guy’s tonsils with your tongue?” Shelly set the remote down as the camera settled on an image of Gramps passing a soda to a younger, healthier-looking Nana. Jenna watched, feeling numb as Gramps glanced around, then reached around his wife to give her backside a firm squeeze. Nana laughed and swatted him away, looking rosy and vivacious and not the least bit eager for him to stop.

Jenna took another sip of wine, her eyes fixed on the television. Had Nana been diagnosed yet at this point? Did she know what lay ahead for them?

She blinked back the tears, pretty sure Gramps and Nana were to blame.