Free By Your Side by Candace Calvert Page B

it.”
    “Thanks.” Macy scooped the crumbs of her egg roll into her napkin. “Maybe I’ll do that.”
    They’d gathered their things and were about to leave the table when a man signaled to them from a distance.
    Macy squinted. “Is that the son of our stroke patient from a couple of days ago?”
    “Bob Harrell,” the doctor confirmed with a sigh. “He wants to talk with me about his mother’s condition. I think he believes there was something else that could have been done, that maybe I should have been able to save her. He needs someone to blame.”
    Macy winced, glad once again that she wasn’t a physician. “What will you say?”
    “That I’m very sorry his mother’s condition is so desperate. And I wish there had been something else we could have done. But there wasn’t.” Her fingers moved to the cross pendant at the neckline of her scrubs. “I’ll tell Bob the truth: that his family is in my prayers. And I’ll make sure he has the chaplaincy phone numbers.”

    “It’s been up there for a long time,” the elderly neighbor explained, tapping the Bank Owned notice in the front window of the two-story tract home. Her mouth puckered, etching wrinkles like ruler marks into her upper lip. “Too much of this lately. That poor young man was working hard to hang on to this place. His daddy would have been proud. Rest his soul.”
    Taylor glanced at Charly, then met the neighbor’s gaze again. “Mr. Archer   —Ned   —knew about his father’s death? The Stockton authorities have been trying to reach him for almost a week without success. That’s why we came.”
    “Ned knows. He told me last Thursday, I think it was. He didn’t let on, but I could tell he was pretty shook up. I can’t say anybody in this neighborhood was surprised, though. We’ve all had a turn bringing Abe home when he wandered off. Sometimes in the middle of the night, wearing nothing but his skivvies and that old hunting cap. He’d get so confused. A blessing, I suppose, that he was taken so quickly.” She shook her head. “That old-timer’s disease is a terrible thing.”
    Alzheimer’s. Taylor couldn’t count how many times she’d heard it said the other way. According to the medical examiner’s office, Mr. Archer had died in his sleep. The neighbor was probably right   —a blessing.
    “The phone numbers they had for Ned don’t seem to be working,” Charly said gently. “Would you happen to have his work phone or new address? E-mail?”
    “I don’t have any of that. And he’s not working now   —hewas laid off a few months back. Couldn’t have been worse timing. His dog died not even two weeks before that. The bank wouldn’t cut him a break. He got the eviction notice, the utility companies shut things down, now this news about his daddy . . .” The woman sighed. “Ned’s never been much of a talker. Even as a little tyke. But I saw it in his eyes; I think he was here to say good-bye to this house. I don’t expect we’ll see him again.”
    Too many good-byes   —Taylor knew how that felt. “There’s no other family?”
    “Not that I’ve ever seen. Abe was a widower. Only the one child.”
    “Did Ned say where he was going?” Charly asked, resting her hand on the porch post.
    “Staying with a friend, he said. Modesto, maybe. I’m not sure.” The neighbor’s brows drew together. “I’m sorry I don’t know more.”
    “You’ve been a big help,” Taylor assured her. “Really.” She handed the woman a Crisis Care card. “If you see Ned again, would you give this to him, please? We’d like to help him in any way we can. It sounds like he’s having a tough time.”
    “Thank you.” The neighbor looked from Taylor’s face to Charly’s as she took the card. “We all need help sometimes.”
    They watched as the woman made her way across the patch of dying grass to her home next door.
    “You did well with that, Taylor. Not exactly what we were expecting, but you handled it