“He had a scar,” she whispered, her eyes fluttering open, the familiar phrase the first words on her lips as she awoke.
I smiled, looking up from my book. “Where was it, Grandma?” I asked, taking her hand.
Her eyes were open now, shining as they always did when she stared off into her yesterdays and remembered him.
“On his forehead, like a kiss from an old aunt,” she chuckled, coughed through her smile, and continued. “It was actually a kiss from a stray bullet. ’You’re lucky’ I told him as I cleaned the wound. But he interrupted and said—”
“Lucky I found you,” I finished for her. She nodded.
“That was the first time he touched my hand . . .”
“But not the last,” I offered.
“No, not the last.” She sighed and turned her head on the pillow toward me. She patted my hand. “You don’t want to hear this old story again.”
