Free When Love Calls by Celeste O. Norfleet

the counter. She saw that the breakfast and/or lunch dishes hadn’t been washed, so she put the stopper in, turned on the water and added dishwashing liquid. When the sink filed with soapy water, she added the dishes and let them soak.
    “Grandma,” she called out again, then went upstairs and peeked into her bedroom, expecting to see her grandmother lying across the bed taking a nap. She wasn’t. The television was on and the bed was still made. “Grandma,” she said, continuing to walk through the other three bedrooms on that floor.
    Each was neatly preserved, dresser, desk, curtains, bed perfectly made, but still no Allie.
    Alyssa started to panic.
    “Grandma,” she yelled, now fearful that she’d fallen and hurt herself, and since Alyssa didn’t call her the night before, she could possibly have been lying on the floor passed out for over twenty-four hours. “Grandma Allie.”
    She ran downstairs to the basement, swinging the door open, dreading the sight of her grandmother lying at the bottom of the steps with her laundry basket tumbled on top of her. “Grandma,” she yelled, rushing down the steps to see that everything was in its usual perfect place.
    She hurried back upstairs to the front door. The small foyer had a large antique coatrack where Allie Wingate kept her purse on a hook and her door keys on another. Both were still in place. She went back upstairs to the master bedroom’s bathroom, then finally climbed the stairs to the attic.
    As soon as she got to the top, she saw the door at the end of the short hall, wide-open. “Grandma, didn’t you hear me calling you? I was looking all over that house for—”
    She stopped dead. Her grandmother was lying on the floor, sprawled out as if she’d collapsed. She screamed, then rushed over to her side. Her nurse’s training kicked in as she grabbed her grandmother’s frail wrist and felt for a pulse. Finding a pulse, she placed two fingers on her neck and felt a strong, steady rhythm. She was still alive, thank God. As relief washed over her, her instincts phased to the next step, the possibility that she was hurt or injured or had fallen or passed out.
    “Grandma,” she said, quieter with less stress for fear of alarming her. “It’s Alyssa, can you hear me?”
    A slow, sleepy moan escaped as Allie took a deep breath, then opened her eyes and jumped. “Lord, child, you nearly scared the life out of me.”
    “Grandma, can you move, did you fall or pass out? Are you dizzy? How many fingers am I holding up? Can you tell me your name? My name?”
    “Oh, stop all that silliness. I’m fine, except for seeing you here,” she said, placing her hand over her heart. “You like to given me a heart attack. Look at you, you’re as white as a ghost. What happened, is your father okay?”
    “Grandma, you’re lying on the floor, you almost gave me a heart attack. Are you okay?”
    Allie started laughing. “Wouldn’t that be a hoot, the two of us passed out with heart attacks ’cause we scared each other to death?”
    “I seriously need to talk to you about your sense of humor,” Alyssa said as she always did with her grandmother’s warped sense of fun. “Grandma, what are you doing lying out like this on the attic floor?” Allie covered her mouth and yawned, then started to lean up. “No, wait, take it slowly, you might have broken a bone or something.”
    “I’m fine, the only thing that’s broken is a dream I was having, but for the life of me, I don’t remember it right now. Here, give a hand.”
    Alyssa braced back and helped her grandmother sit up. “Are you dizzy?”
    “Child, if you don’t stop all that fussing, I’m gonna toss you out that stained-glass window. It’ll break my heart ’cause I love those windows, but I’ll still do it.”
    “All right, all right I get it, I’ll chill out.”
    “Thank you,” she said, looking around at the floor covered with boxes and papers.
    Alyssa sat down and looked around, for the