1105 Yakima Street - Debbie Macomber [44]
“That’s right. As you can imagine, Mom and Ben are eager to go home.” It was all her mother talked about these days—how soon she’d be back in her own kitchen.
“Of course they’re eager,” Will said. “And I’m sure you and Jack are, too. Having them live with you couldn’t have been easy.”
Her brother didn’t know the half of it. Olivia and Jack had each gained at least five pounds with all the desserts Charlotte had baked in the past few weeks. Charlotte made it difficult to say no; she was persistent and obviously felt hurt when they tried to decline her cookies, pies and cakes. Olivia’s plan to freeze Charlotte’s bounty hadn’t worked; for one thing, they’d quickly run out of room. As well, the house had been thoroughly cleaned from top to bottom, and nothing was back in its proper place. When asked, Charlotte would gaze blankly at Olivia and assure her she’d put everything exactly where she’d found it. Olivia understood that her mother was only trying to help. She and Ben were considerate, too, giving her and Jack their privacy in the evenings by staying in their own part of the house. And they kept Harry’s litter box in their en suite bathroom; most of the time Olivia wasn’t even aware of his presence.
“From what I hear, Jack enjoys Mom’s cooking.” Will didn’t attempt to hide his smile.
“We both do and that’s another problem. Mom takes great pride in feeding us huge meals. We haven’t eaten this well since last Thanksgiving. The problem is, the feast’s continued for five solid weeks. Mom’s made it her mission to cook all our favorite meals—chicken-fried steak, mashed potatoes, every kind of dessert. I’m just glad we haven’t gained twenty pounds each.”
“Olivia, you shock me. Where’s your willpower? I’ve always thought of you as the one with self-discipline.”
“Me? I blame Jack. He keeps saying we should enjoy this while it lasts. Not only that, I hate to hurt Mom’s feelings.”
“Well, they’ll be going home soon.”
“I’m not so sure…” Olivia hesitated. “I know we’ve already talked about this, but these past few weeks have opened my eyes. It’s made me realize that the situation is more urgent than we thought. We’ll need to do something sooner rather than later about finding an assisted-living place.”
The smile disappeared from her brother’s face, and Olivia knew what he was thinking. They’d decided a couple of weeks ago that Charlotte and Ben should go back to the house for the time being, while the two of them investigated other housing options. Will had even added a few extras to the kitchen upgrades as an early Christmas gift.
Olivia and Will hadn’t lined up any seniors’ residence visits yet, although they had a list of possibilities provided by Jack.
“What happened?” Will asked.
“Well, things appear to be escalating. For example, Mom washed several loads of the same clothes twice. She’d taken them out of the dryer and put them in the laundry basket and then the next morning rewashed the same load.”
Will frowned. “She forgot she’d already washed those clothes?”
Olivia nodded.
“That’s just a mistake.”
“I’d think so, too, but as I said, it happened more than once.”
Will leaned back in his chair and laced his fingers together. “Anything else?”
“I didn’t keep a list, although now I wish I had. There’ve been a bunch of little things and some not-so-little things. Here’s another example. Grace put aside a mystery at the library Mom said she wanted to read. Then Mom claimed she’d never heard of the book or the author. Then she misplaced it two or three times. Jack found it in the refrigerator once and—”
“The refrigerator?” Will seemed to find that especially humorous.
“We all got a kick out of it, but when she misplaced it again, Ben found it tucked between the mattress and the box spring.”
“Like she was hiding it?”
“Exactly.”
Will shook his head.
“It might’ve gone undetected except that we started getting late notices from the library—and Ben kept complaining that the mattress was hurting his back. So he decided to look and…there it was.”
“Did Mom remember putting it there?”
“No. In fact, she