"Grandma's hands
Clapped in church on Sunday morning
Grandma's hands
Played a tambourine so well
Grandma's hands
Used to issue out a warning
She'd say, Billy don't you run so fast
Might fall on a piece of glass
Might be snakes there in that grass
Grandma's hands"
Joseph Solomon (cover) – "Grandma's Hands"
Celeste shook out a clean white fitted sheet across a double bed inside the assisted living facility in Metairie, not too far from Bayou Metairie. She liked working there. A natural neat freak, Celeste loved to clean and found it meditative. There were only twenty residents in the upscale facility. Eighteen were white, one was Korean, and the only Black woman who stayed there was Celeste's favorite.
Miss Irma was nearing one hundred and suffered from some memory loss. At her advanced age, she took on the signs of mild cognitive impairment. She often had her lucid moments and would turn into a chatty delight. On the not-so-lucid days, she stayed quiet and brooded in her private room, staring out of the window. Celeste only worked there four days a week and never saw Miss Irma with visitors. Her records stated she had a grandson who lived in another parish further north.
She finished making Miss Irma's bed and retrieved her client from the dining room for a nap. It was a good day at the facility and working kept her mind relaxed and ready for Fat Tuesday to roll around. She'd been paid in full for all the second line parasols and baskets she made. Six thousand dollars richer, she plotted on how she could make more money using her talent and quitting the chicken processing plant. She had an idea cooking. A little illicit, though. In fact, she was going to set-up a new income stream right after work in her home.
"Okay now, Miss Irma. I'll just roll you in here and get you nice and cozy. Did you enjoy the lasagna today for lunch? It smelled good while it was cooking," Celeste said.
Miss Irma clasped her hands in her lap and remained quiet. She'd been quite a beauty in her youth from the pictures on her dresser that Celeste checked out often. Even with a few liver spots on her hands and the wrinkles on her delicate pale skin, Miss Irma stayed a pretty woman. Her thinning white hair looked matronly pinned into a small bun, and a nurse had dressed her in a lovely pink floral print house dress.
"Here we go. Would you like to sit on your bed and rest, or look out of your window at the garden?"
Miss Irma pointed to the window. Celeste pushed her closer to it. She lifted the window open and checked to make sure the locked screen stayed secure. The overhead fan whirred, creating a subtle buzzing sound. She left the woman alone to take away her dirty linens and drop them off with the rest of the sheets she had collected on her floor of the two-story building.
Celeste tightened her large head wrap at her nape and hurried to check on the other charges in the rooms next to Miss Irma. She helped another co-worker move an old mattress out of a room to make way for the replacement that arrived that morning. Stepping outside to take a smoke break, she checked her smartphone for messages.
Nothing.
She dropped her cigarette on the ground and mashed it with her shoe. Another hour of work and she'd be able to clock out, go home, and soak with perfumed bath salts. Taking a walk around the back of the property to enjoy the marigolds and hibiscus flowers in the garden, she heard the distinct voice of Miss Irma talking. It was a conversational tone peppered with laughter. Celeste could make out her shape from the screen. Miss Irma's back was to the window.
Curiosity moved Celeste back inside, even though her break wasn't over. Pretending to head for a supply closet, she passed by Miss Irma's door and caught sight of a man sitting on the old woman's bed. Celeste hadn't received any visitor notifications for the day, but her curiosity compelled her to enter the room and find out who it was.
Oh, wait a minute.
Celeste stood rooted when sensual green eyes looked back at her.
Terry.
"Hi," Celeste said.
She rubbed her arm absentmindedly while staring at him. He stood from the bed. His full lips peeled back to reveal his beautiful teeth.
"Small world," he said.
"You're related to Miss Irma?"
"Yes."
Miss Irma reached for his hand and squeezed it.
"Please don't leave yet Papa," Miss Irma said.
Terry patted her hand and sat back down on the bed, facing her.
"I'm not leaving."
"Let me get outta y'alls way then," Celeste said.
She busied herself with other chores and periodically walked past Miss Irma's door. At one point, the old woman began crying softly and Terry dropped to his knees in front of her wheelchair and rested his head on her lap. Miss Irma rubbed his hair, and he spoke sweetly to her until she stopped weeping.
"Is everything alright? Does Miss Irma need more water or anything?" Celeste said, trying to be helpful.
Terry's eyes filled with tears too, and he wiped at them quickly. God, she wanted to hug him. She wondered what could make that big pretty man cry gentle tears. A health aide nurse stepped in and rolled Miss Irma into her private bathroom to change her incontinence pad and administer her afternoon round of meds.
Terry approached Celeste, and they moved to the hallway. He leaned against the wall and she stood in front of him.
"I gave her some bad news about her grandson. He passed away while being held in jail. I tried to help him out with bail and some stupid shit went down with the cops. He was murdered before I could get him out."
"Oh, my God…I am so sorry."
Celeste wrung her hands, willing herself not to reach out and touch him. It might seem inappropriate if she did.
"Now that Mike is gone, I'm all that she has left. Actually, she and I are the last ones alive in our entire family."
Terry cut his eyes away to look at the floor. His brows furrowed and his shoulders drooped.
"I had hoped to get Mike up here to visit sooner, before he was arrested. We planned on enjoying Mardi Gras here this year but I was busy working and getting my shit together…time always seems to get away from me," he lamented.
He gazed at Celeste, and his soulful eyes filled her with empathy for him.
"You're lucky to have such a big family," he said. "Travis invited me to watch your tribe practice to help keep my mind off Mike and my troubles. I wish I had a family like that."
"Sometimes it can be a bit much. Everyone knows your business, and it's hard to get away with anything in private because there's always a meddling brother, sister, cousin, aunt, uncle, or even a play cousin all up in your mix."
"Sounds like heaven," he said wistfully.
The health aide returned Miss Irma to the bed and helped her settle into it.
"I better get back in there. Gotta spend as much time as possible with her before I head out again."
"When are you leaving?"
"In a few days. I'm staying at a B&B . I wanted to see the carnival season here, in honor of Mike." He glanced at Miss Irma, checking on her. "Travis's older brother knew me in the marines a few years back. He told me to come out here when I was done. I could visit her more often."
"So you're ex marine now?"
"Yeah."
"Papa, come here. I want to talk with you," Miss Irma called out.
Miss Irma held her arms out toward Terry. Celeste pulled out her smartphone from the side pocket of her dark blue tunic uniform.
"You have your phone?" she asked.
Terry pulled his phone out. She tapped her screen and showed him her phone number on display.
"Take my number and call me. I can show you a good time on Tuesday."
He grinned, tapped in her number on his phone, and shoved it back in his pocket.
"I'll do that. Let me take you out to dinner first. Your choice of where to eat."
"Surprise me," she said.
"Is Monday night good for you?"
"I'm off Monday and Tuesday."
"Expect my call," he said.
He strolled back into the room and pulled up a chair to sit near Miss Irma.
Celeste walked away with a smile stretching her cheeks from California to South Carolina. She worked dutifully uninterrupted, humming and grinning, thinking about a pair of green eyes and broad shoulders. After clocking out, she went back to Miss Irma's room to see if Terry wanted to grab a bite right then instead of waiting for Monday. She wanted to speak to him more and listen to that central Louisiana drawl he had. The marines may have had him clean up his accent a bit, but she caught a Cajun twang to it. It was probably where he inherited his light eyes from. Some white ragin' Cajuns in plantation country.
Silence permeated Miss Irma's room. Terry had already left. Celeste walked closer to the bed.
"I'm sorry to hear about your grandson, Miss Irma. My condolences to you and Terry, ma'am."
Miss Irma's eyes shined like newly minted silver dollars.
"My grandbaby was a kind soul. I don't understand why someone would hurt him. But Papa said everything would be okay."
"Is Papa Terry's nickname?"
Miss Irma looked confused by the question.
"Papa is Papa. My great-granddaddy."
Celeste balked at that and patted Miss Irma's hand. She had to be confusing Terry with a long dead relative. Cognitive decline did cause confusion.
"You mean he's your great-grandson?"
Miss Irma's eyes turned hard like peach pits.
"He's my great-granddaddy."
She pointed to her closet door.
"Go in there and fetch me my box," Miss Irma commanded. "The one on the floor."
Celeste wandered over and pulled open the door. There were four boxes stacked on top of each other. Miss Irma waved her hand.
"The one on the bottom…yes…that one, please."
The old woman was so lively that Celeste took advantage of her energized state. She lifted aside the other boxes until she could open the one Miss Irma wanted. There were three brown, cracked and taped photo albums inside. She picked up the box and brought it over to the bed. Miss Irma patted the side and urged Celeste to sit next to her. She handed the photo albums to Miss Irma, and the woman flipped through pages in two of them slowly. Frustrated, she searched through the third album. Jackpot.
"See here? This is my mother Candice Simmons and her husband Leon Simmons. And on this page…see it here? These are my paternal grandparents, Elise and Gabriel Simmons."
With each flip of the page, Celeste went back in time with the memory Miss Irma still had left. Her short-term memory may have fluctuated, but Terry's visit ignited that long-term one.
"The men look so handsome in these suits," Celeste said. "And the women are gorgeous. Their hairstyles are everything."
Miss Irma beamed.
With a shaky hand, she flipped through a few more pages until she pointed out a large photo.
"This him! This him!"
Miss Irma stroked her slender fingers across the image.
"My great-granddaddy…Papa… Terrence Richmond Guidry."
The picture had the sepia tone of the mid 1800s with cracked and frayed edges. The man looked handsome in a bowler hat and a casket sharp three-piece tweed suit with a dark bowtie. Seated next to him was a pretty dark-skinned woman with small features in a cherubic face. She looked like a petite angel next to her husband, wearing her Sunday dress with a straw hat and white gloves.
Celeste lifted the album closer to her face.
Terrence Richmond Guidry looked like Terry. A lot. Practically his twin. She shook her head slowly. Genes were funny that way because there was a giant picture in Celeste's parent's house that showed off her own grandmother on her father's side that resembled her.
However, the eyes looking at her in the old photo caused a shiver in her arms. Their shape. The thick eyebrows. Long lashes. The way they hypnotized the looker even on two-dimensional albumem paper. Someone born two hundred years ago was long dead. Period.
"He looks a lot like Terry," Celeste said, to humor the woman.
Miss Irma grunted her dissatisfaction with the reply.
"Papa and Mama Dee were together for forty years until her death. He never married again and looked after their children and grandchildren…their great grandchildren too. When I was a tiny wisp of a thing, he always put me on his knee and cut apples up for me to eat in little pieces. Told me I was his pretty Lil Marigold. That's why I like looking at those flowers outside. They remind me of him when he's away. He can't visit me as often as I'd like, but when he comes, he still calls me his Lil Marigold. He say Mama Dee loved marigolds because he used to court her with them every Sunday before Mass."
"Hmmph," Celeste replied.
Miss Irma turned the page and showed another picture of Terrence sitting at a table without a hat, his puffy hair parted on one side.
"These are nice photos, Miss Irma. I have to go now. I'll put these albums away."
Celeste packed the photo albums back up and put the box back in the closet with the others.
"See you on Wednesday, ma'am."
Miss Irma's gaze stayed fixed on the window. Waiting for Terry's return. Celeste felt sorry for her and left the room quietly.