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have said, standing in the gate area. “I want you to give me that good-bye wave sort of thing you said your grandmother always did.”
    “Oh, I don’t know. It was the last thing I saw her do before she died.”
    “Please, por favor . Give me your grandmother’s good-bye.”
    “Okay. Here it goes.”
    Vicki would turn her back to her friend, kiss her forefingers, extend her arm backward and wiggle her fingers. Just like Grandma, she would never look back, since that would break the rules of the backward good-bye wave. Her tears dripped shamelessly like drops of melting ice cream as she walked down the long hallway, not looking back, as if doing so mightturn her into stone.
    On the flight to Florida, she pulled her credit card out of her purse and picked up the phone attached to the seat in front of her. She would call Till Midnight to see if someone had saved the tablecloth with the scribbles on it. How ridiculous! She chided herself, especially with all the chocolate stains. No doubt the waiter had dumped it. She put the phone back.
    She opened her purse and pulled out an envelope addressed to a woman living on Sanibel Island in Florida. Vicki had kept this particular letter in her purse for months now and didn’t know what else to do with it, so she flipped the long letter over and started writing on the back.
Dear Grandma ,
You once told me that the letters I wrote kept you up late at night, more so than any of the books in your paperback collection. You said my lengthy, embellished letters added spice to your life and that they kept you going. Well, I wish you had been more patient because my last letter simply got lost in the mail without a stamp. You should have waited a couple more days, and it would have arrived .
I promise to keep you going. That’s why I’m writing, to keep both you and me going .
You won’t believe this story! A twenty-one year old and a seventy-four year old, both full of life, both now dead from attacks in their sleep just a couple of months apart. My mind watches reruns over and over again-episodes of the younger one, and of the older one. In my imagination, I talk to them both as if they’re still alive, and they talk to me .
I can hear the one named Rebecca warning me that we spend half of life counting down to a long-awaited event, and the other half looking back, remembering. I hear the feisty grandmother reminding me not to worry about things I cannot control. I got so upset that time I visited you on Sanibel, and it rained every day. Now I’d give anything for a rain-spent day inside with you, Grandma. No, we cannot control rain or death. I guess this all means there will be no more summer nights of eating Heavenly Hash ice cream with you, Grandma, and, now, no sipping espresso in Spain with Rebecca. And Grandma, just before you died, you told me you had discovered the recipe to instant gratification and that you were going to send it to me. Now I may never know what you were talking about .
P.S. They say you’re not “dead.” You’ve simply “crossed over,” I know it’s true, but it doesn’t make it any easier for me .
    She folded the letter, then opened it again. She had to write about the time Grandma walked the streets of Saugatuck in her pink, fuzzy robe and slippers. She had to write it down because someday, when she would be rocking back and forth with a box of tissues, freckled arms and purple hair, she’d at least have her letters to Grandma to comfort her. They would describe the details her mind might forget, and they would keep Grandma alive forever.
Dear Grandma ,
Remember the time city cousin Michelle from Chicago spent the entire summer scooping ice cream in the shop? We were short employees and needed the help, and besides, Michelle loved you and wanted to spend time with you. The three of us night owls teased each other. Michelle and I used to call you “sexy woman,” and you’d blush, saying, “Now, now girls.” One night Michelle and I worked