Free Too Far Under by Lynn Osterkamp Page A

about
we drop the former-relationships argument and head home. I have a
plane to catch tonight.”
    “Deal,” I said. But I didn’t need to be
psychic to know that we’d be revisiting the Mia and Brian part of
our relationship in the weeks to come.

Chapter 9
     
    Right after Pablo dropped me off at home, I
drove over to Shady Terrace so I’d have time to visit Gramma before
Tim Grosso’s relocation meeting for the residents’ families. She
was in her room just waking up from an after-lunch nap. I sat down
on the side of her bed and gave her a slow, gentle hug. She doesn’t
always recognize me, and when she’s waking up she’s more confused
than usual, so I wanted to be careful not to startle her.
    “Hi, Gramma,” I said. “I’ve been missing
you.”
    “Where was I?” she sounded worried.
    “It’s okay. You were right here. But I
wasn’t. I went to a wedding in Estes Park and then Pablo and I
stopped by Faye’s gallery.”
    She squirmed, got to her feet, and started
toward the door, looking troubled. “Faye’s gallery. I need to
finish my paintings.” These days Gramma lives more in the past than
the present, so she sometimes thinks she has a deadline to meet
getting paintings ready for a show. Back in the day she was usually
more excited than anxious about an upcoming show, but now the
agitation and confusion that accompany Alzheimer’s throw her into a
panic at the idea.
    I put my arm around her shoulders. “Don’t
worry. Everything’s fine. Faye has plenty of your paintings at the
gallery. Would you like to get some ice cream?”
    “Chocolate?” she asked.
    We walked together to the activity room where
they have ice cream, juice and other snacks available for the
residents any time. Several other residents were watching a
travelogue on the large-screen TV. I told her I had to go to a
meeting and left her there eating her ice cream with them, while I
went off to find out what Tim had come up with to help us deal with
Shady Terrace’s closing.
    Twenty or so family members were already
gathered in the faux-town-square lobby when I walked in. To my
surprise, one of them was Derrick Townes. I took a chair next to
him, reminded him that we’d met Friday night at Faye’s gallery, and
told him how worried I was about having to move Gramma.
    “I know,” he commiserated. “My dad’s been
here ever since his stroke last year. He’s on Medicaid so we were
lucky to find this place. It wasn’t easy. I don’t know what we’ll
do now.”
    I thought the Townes family was rich. Why
would he be so short of money that his father had to go on
Medicaid? At least Gramma has money to pay for her care, which
gives her more choices. I silently thanked Grampa’s financial
management skills.
    The room had filled up by then and Tim was
passing out copies of a Boulder County Senior Housing Guide that had information about all the long-term-care facilities in the
county. I opened the booklet and began reading through a list of
things to look for when touring a facility, like whether there are
unpleasant odors, whether the residents are appropriately dressed
and so on. My heart sank. Where was I going to find a place that
measured up to all these criteria? And if I did find such a place,
would it have openings? I was getting more and more scared for
Gramma.
    Tim got the meeting started by directing our
attention to charts in the booklet that listed various living
facilities, showed their locations on a map, and gave information
about costs, services, levels of care and such for each place. “I
would recommend that you decide on some places to visit,” he said.
“If you call our office we can give you information on how various
places did on their health department surveys and whether there
have been complaints against them.”
    “But we aren’t in a position to be picky are
we?” a plump blonde woman asked. “Aren’t most of the places
full?”
    “Some are,” Tim admitted. “But quite a few
have