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I sat with it pressed to the back of my head until I began to feel steadier. Then she helped me to my feet and walked me downstairs without another backward glance toward the old man in the chair. She walked me out onto the porch, where she sat me firmly in a rocking chair.
    “Just wait out here while I sign a few things and then we’ll head home,” Karen said, and headed back to the reception desk.
    I stared out across the lawn of the Winchester House for the Aged, wondering what it was that my grandfather saw out of that upstairs window that I was missing. I was trying to shake from my thoughts how desperately he had begged me to send him back, though “back where,” of course, I had no idea.
    A voice drifted out of the open window behind me.
    “… wasn’t due for another dose for at least two hours.”
    “Well, then I’d question whether what you’re giving him is strong enough to do the job.”
    “But Mrs. Hunt, he hasn’t had a single spell, not once in five years. Why the last time was when your sister came to—”
    “—Yes, I know when his last spell was, thank you,” Karen said, sounding for the first time like the lawyer she actually was. “And I’m quite sure I’d asked you not to mention my sister’s visit.”
    “Yes, of course.”
    “Just do what is necessary to ensure that this doesn’t happen again. I won’t have my father upsetting himself or anyone else. Do I make myself perfectly clear?”
    “Certainly, Mrs. Hunt. We will continue to do everything we can,” the nurse replied.
    “Thank you.” Karen’s boots tapped out a sharp staccato as she marched out. She softened her stride as she stepped onto the porch and looked down at me.
    “Ready to go home?”
    “Sure.” I shrugged in what I hoped was an off-handed way. I didn’t want her to think I’d overheard her conversation. I stood up carefully and followed her to the car. She’d just gotten belted with the key in the ignition when she stopped and looked at me.
    “So are you sure you’re okay?”
    “I’m fine, really,” I insisted, not sure if I was telling the truth or not.
    “Oh my God , look at your hands!”
    I did, and realized that both of them were beginning to bruise, bleeding in a few spots where my grandfather’s unclipped fingernails had dug into my skin. I hadn’t felt the pain, probably from the shock of the whole experience and then the bump to the head, but now that I had perceived their appearance I also noticed that both of them were aching dully.
    “Ow,” I said in surprise.
    Karen heaved a long sigh and turned the key. “What a family reunion, huh? I’m sorry. I guess you can see now why I was so reluctant to bring you to see him. He is very rarely like that, so I’m sorry you had to see him on such a bad day.”
    “Is that what he always says? When he … freaks out?”
    “No. I have heard him say something similar before, but it’s different every time. He’s just so far gone now, that it rarely makes any sense.”
    “He thought I was my mom. He called me Elizabeth.”
    Karen’s eyes flashed anxiously first to my face, and then to my hands again. She opened her mouth to say something and instead bit her lip. We drove home in loaded silence.
    I’d never been around anyone who was mentally unsound, and it wasn’t an experience I wanted to repeat now that I’d had it. I’d heard friends talk about grandparents or great-aunts with Alzheimer’s disease and dementia, but this was different than what they’d described. There had been a real urgency, a real sense of purpose to my grandfather and his strange words, though they made as little sense as the ramblings of any senile person. Somehow I couldn’t convince myself that he was simply losing his mind as a natural part of aging. I would never forget the way he had stared into my eyes, and I felt uncomfortably haunted by the fact that I couldn’t help him when he’d begged it of me.

Chapter 3—In the Cards

    Chapter 3—In the