I would say yes. You know how badly I’ve wanted you to come for an extended visit.”
I shrugged. “There was just never a good time.”
Nana harrumphed. “Never a good time for your parents, you mean. To think, my own son is too busy to remember what’s most important in life.”
“You know they love you, Nana.”
“If love looks like too-busy-to-call-your-own-mother, then yes. I’m sure they do in their own way.”
I spotted my bag and yanked it off the spinning carousel, with Nana helping me to get it upright.
“Are you hungry?” she asked as we headed out to her car.
“Famished,” I admitted with a smile. And I was. Surprisingly, my appetite had returned. I wasn’t sure if it was a result of being with my nana or having recently spoken with Amon or if it was just suddenly feeling more like myself, but I was hungry enough to eat an entire cow, which wasn’t too far off from the realm of possibility on my nana’s farm.
After we stopped at a diner, we were back on the road and found that we both had a hankering to listen to Elvis. Since her old car didn’t have satellite radio and most of the roads we were driving on were too far from any normal stations, we sang. Fortunately, Elvis recorded so many songs that we never had to repeat any. I looked up the lyrics on my phone and we sang our hearts out the entire drive to the farm.
There was something freeing about being on the road. I felt more like myself than I had in months, and I knew that was because I was embracing the same things Amon loved—laughing, feasting, and being with people who cared about you.
By the time Nana pulled up to the farm, it was getting late. She introduced me to her new dog, Winston, named after Winston Churchill, who she swore looked just like him. I didn’t see the resemblance. Winston got up from his sleeping spot on the porch, tail wagging, and sniffed my hand. Nana went to check on the other animals while I wrestled my bag into the house. I knew she’d be tired when she got back. Nana was an early-to-bed, early-to-rise kind of gal.
Still, instead of going directly to her room, she made me a cup of chamomile tea, sweetening it the way I liked with cream and honey and adding a little shortbread cookie on the side. Then she headed to the living room, as if sensing I needed to talk. I set my bags in the guest room, grabbed an old quilt, and cozied into a worn recliner while she took to her favorite rocking chair.
As she sipped her tea and rocked, her twinkling eyes studied me in the dim room. “What’s bothering you, Lilypad?” she asked.
A stream of words crossed my tongue but melted away like chocolate over a flame. “I…It’s hard to talk about,” I said finally.
“Is it your parents? College?”
“No.”
“Ah…it’s a young man, then.” I grimaced and then nodded once. “Tell me about him,” she encouraged.
Could I? If anyone would understand or believe me, it would be her. Anubis hadn’t said I couldn’t tell anyone. He probably just assumed that no one would accept what I said anyway and it wasn’t like sharing my story could change anything.
“Did he have a strong chin?” she asked, interrupting my thoughts.
“A…a what?” I replied.
“A strong chin. You can always tell a good man by the cut of his chin.”
I couldn’t help it. I laughed. “Nana, what are you talking about?”
“No, I mean it. A weak-chinned man is a man you walk away from.” She slashed her hand in front of her as if karate chopping the man down.
“Are you sure you aren’t talking about horses or cows?” I teased.
Nana leaned forward. “Your grandpa, rest his soul, had a rugged chin. He was a strong man. A good one. Never seen the like of him since.”
I folded my arms across my chest and regarded her with a smile. “Is that how you picked him? Based on his chin?”
“Well, there was that and the steamed windows.”
“Steamed windows?”
“Every time we got to kissing, we steamed up the windows.”
I choked on my tea and set down the cup. “I did not need to know that about Grandpa.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
A little embarrassed, I shrugged slightly and admitted, “There might have been a few steamy windows and he does have a rather rugged chin now that I think about it.”