To Steal a Weeping Widow

Chapter Forty-Four: Ghosts Can't Go Back

"Conversation" by Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1879), stolen 2000, recovered 2005 - part of $30-45 million heist of three paintings (estimates vary)

Chapter Forty-Four

At Geraldine's age, there were things to be expected.

There were things no amount of money could slow; forces that couldn't be stopped, burdens that couldn't be removed no matter how much influence or power someone had. Things like age, death, decline. Things like nature, grief, and endings.

But Geraldine had never seemed her age.

She'd never seemed frail, or tired, or what others her age might've been. Geraldine was a redwood; she'd only gotten more formidable, invincible, and fire-proof with age. There'd never been a moment when I'd doubted her strength.

So when I turned, expecting the same sturdy roots and unshakeable bark, I was left confronted with the harshest of realities when I saw different.

No one was invincible.

Geraldine wasn't invincible.

I blinked. Nothing changed. I hazily met her eyes, as if seeing a ghost. They were the same shade as her son's, but not the same shade as August's; her blues were thinner, colder, icier. Or... they used to be. Now, they were strained and tinged with gray. Now, they sunk too far into her gaunt face. God, I realized something was wrong; the realization rattled my ribcage and spread like disease. As if the redwood had lost its leaves, its bare limbs left exposed and skeletal, Geraldine looked her age. She looked like a woman who'd stood at the top of the mountain, won against the gods, and now headed back down the other side. Geraldine looked tired, and frayed; a paper doll that'd been played with for too long.

My anger took a step back as concern rushed to the front. Her name fell from my lips again, this time as more of a question.

"Geraldine?" I gaped.

"Good morning, Eleanor," she greeted kindly. "I'm surprised to see you."

Her voice was strong, and I clung to that fact with the cold grip of denial.

"Yes, I-I wanted to stop by," I stuttered, still staring.

"I'm glad you did. The sunrise is always beautiful from this room." She gazed pensively around the sun-hungry room.

It was surging, ebbing, drowning me, spitting me out on sand, reclaiming me over and over. Her eyes were on the sea, but my eyes were only on her. I didn't understand. How was this the same woman from the fundraiser? How was this the same Geraldine? How was this the unshakeable monarch who'd reigned with a diamond fist?

I felt pinging speculation in my brain, ranking the possible reasons for her changes: the season, the flu, a lack of sun. Anything other than the worst possible options.

The worst possible options were...

No.

There was a hot coal in my stomach from my earlier discoveries. It burned, but I couldn't breathe fire. Not right now. No. No, I couldn't. I wanted to, I wanted answers, but I couldn't expose the ailing woman to heat until I knew what ailed her. Not until she was strong enough to answer me the way I deserved to be answered. God, there was fear as I looked at Geraldine. It was enough to shove the coal to the side—at least for now—until my anxious concerns were soothed.

I opened my mouth, then quickly closed it. How did one word the questions I needed to ask?

"Mom?" The call echoed from somewhere else in the house.