Rain (Hudson 1)

commanded. "This is personal."

I looked at my grandmother and then stood up.

"There's no reason to chase her away, Victoria. You know I don't sign anything or do anything without my accountant. Just bring it all to him. Go on," Grandmother Hudson said waving at the papers as if they were annoying flies, "put it all away."

"But Mother--"

"Whatever it is, I'm sure it can wait," Grandmother Hudson asserted.

"Not if something should happen to you," Victoria pursued. "Then we'll just have bigger problems."

"That's a terrible thing to put into her head. Nothing's going to happen to her, and the doctor said she shouldn't be disturbed, especially tonight. He's given her something to keep her calm," I interjected.

Victoria spun on me so fast, I nearly fell over from the wind,

"I thought I asked you to leave. This is a family matter. Your opinions are not of any importance to me."

Through the corners of my eyes, I saw my grandmother watching me with interest. She actually looked invigorated by the exchange between me and Victoria.

"Your mother's health is the most important family matter. I promised the doctor I would see that she was relaxed tonight. Rather than yell at me, you should be grateful," I charged.

Her face turned a dark shade of crimson as the veins in her neck strained.

Grandmother Hudson was smiling.

"I've never had so many people look after my interests," she said. She looked at Victoria. "It makes me want to live forever."

Victoria looked like she was cho

king on a peach pit. "I'm just trying to do the right thing," she whined. "Daddy would have expected me to."

Reluctantly, she put the folders back and closed her briefcase. A few moments later she decided she had to go downstairs to get herself something cold to drink and make some very important phone calls. I never saw anyone as busy as she was and told Grandmother Hudson so.

"I suspect that half of what she does is really unnecessary," she said. "My husband accomplished a great deal more with far less effort."

Her eyelids looked heavier and heavier. I took the cup of tea from her hand and puffed up her pillows. Whatever the doctor had given her to calm her was having its desired effect, I thought. I told her good night and left to do my homework.

A half hour or so later, I heard Victoria come back upstairs and I opened my door a crack to watch her look in on Grandmother Hudson. She stood in the bedroom doorway. I knew Grandmother Hudson was already fast asleep. After a few moments, Victoria went stomping toward the stairway, casting a rapid glance at my door, her eyes red with fury.

I took the sight of them to sleep with me and fretted in and out of nightmares, seeing Victoria everywhere, even back in D.C., running along with Jerad and his pack, who were after me. She carried that damn briefcase and clutched it like a mallet, eager to pound me over the head with it.

Doctor Lewis had arranged for an ambulance to transport Grandmother Hudson to the hospital. She was angry about that, demanding to know why she just couldn't have Jake drive her there in the Rolls.

"An ambulance," she declared, "isn't going to be any more comfortable and will just attract a lot of unnecessary attention?'

I began to understand that Grandmother Hudson thought of illness as weakness, something to be ashamed of, and not something beyond one's control. She wanted to keep her pacemaker procedure secret, go in and out of the hospital without any fanfare, and never tell another soul what had been done.

Once again I tried to get her to give me permission to go along, but she was even more insistent that I didn't. Just when I got into the Rolls to go to school, the ambulance arrived. Jake watched the attendants rush up the stairs.

"Wait until they meet her," he said. "She'll slow them down." He glanced at me. "Don't worry about her. She's not going to die until she's good and ready."

I nodded. He might not be all wrong about that, I thought. She had the grit to stand up to the Grim Reaper and tell him to go back outside and wait to be properly introduced.

For most of the day, I found it difficult to give my classes my complete attention. My eyes were continually drawn to the clock. Some of my teachers probably thought I was bored with their classes and was looking forward to the bell. The lunch hour came and went and my afternoon classes began. I had halfexpected and hoped that my mother would call the school and have someone give me an update on Grandmother's surgery, but no one called.

My horse, Flagler, seemed to sense my distraction and continually wagged her head and challenged the reins during my lesson. For no reason she broke into a trot and I bounced like a rubber doll in the saddle, bringing laughter to Mr. Drewitt's lips. When I dismounted, he told me I was walking like a bowlegged drunken sailor.

I was terrible at rehearsal, missing lines, forgetting stage positions and moves, speaking with a voice barely audible from the first row. Maureen was at this rehearsal and sat with a smile of satisfaction on her face every time Mr. Bufurd had to remind me of something or ask me to project more.