Bilgarra Springs (32 page)

As he walked down the corridor towards the exit, Eamon raised his hand as he passed Christine who was busy speaking with a resident, or more particularly, trying to calm the elderly lady down. She acknowledged him with a nod and a smile. As he walked away he wondered if her husband missed having her at home on a Friday night. He wondered whether her husband realised what a gem he had with her. She had the patience of a saint, which he had seen firsthand with Nan on a few occasions and she appeared to really care about the old people in her care. He had seen others to whom it was simply a job that brought in the pay cheques.

He was grateful for her professionalism and sunny personality. He wasn’t sure how he would have coped if he thought that Nan wasn’t in good hands. His family weren’t in a position to care for her at home any more. She had been living with his mother, Antonia, her daughter-in-law, but just over a year ago she had become too much to handle at home. She had very much become a risk to herself and to everybody else.

She had wandered off one day. On another occasion she had left one of the hot plates on the stove running after she had boiled some milk for Milo. Another day she had badly scalded herself in the shower when she hadn’t bothered to turn any cold on with the hot water. The straw that had broken the camel’s back though, had been when she had been caught with frozen chickens and an axe, trying to cut them into small pieces on top of the chest freezer. It had been a difficult decision for their family to make, especially his mother, but realistically, they had not had any other choice. Her care was beyond their capabilities and the best option had been here.

Nan hadn’t wanted to come and to say that she had been difficult when she arrived would have been a gross understatement. She had been rude to the staff, which was very unlike her. Normally she was well-mannered and gentle. The hardest bit had been when she had point blank refused to speak to his mother when she came to visit. That situation hadn’t changed. His mother still came and sat with her and Nan still turned her face the other way and refused to acknowledge her. At least that is what happened on the days that she knew who Antonia was, which were becoming gradually fewer.

Christine had told them that it happens quite often that the resident blames the family member who previously had care of him or her for being placed in the nursing facility. Knowing that wasn’t making it any easier for his mother though. He knew how hurt she had been, and still was, by the deliberate snub from somebody that she cares so much about and has tried so hard to help. Just another of life’s little injustices to chalk up.

Eamon reached the car relatively quickly and slumped in the driver’s seat. He always felt drained when he left Nan. Tonight more so than usual. Tonight Nan had raised a whole stack of questions and he wanted answers. He scrubbed his hands over his face before resting his head on the Audi’s headrest and closing his eyes.

After a couple of moments he opened them and pulled a notebook out of the glovebox, turned the overhead light on so that he could see where he had written the number on his hand clearly and copied it before he washed them and it was lost. He threw the notebook on the passenger seat and turned the key in the ignition. It had been a long week and he wasn’t looking forward to battling the thousands of cars on the streets of Sydney. As he reversed out, he decided to swing past his mother’s place on the way home. A couple of boxes of Nan’s keepsakes that she couldn’t bear to part with had been stored there when Nan had moved in. He would grab them and rifle through them over the weekend and see what he could dig up.

He wished that he had sat down and spoken to her when she was still capable and asked about her early life. There just never seemed to be time. He would trawl a bit on the internet and see what he could find regarding the series of numbers if his grandmother’s keepsakes didn’t shed any light on it. He investigated and made sense of numbers for a job. Numbers were safe. Numbers were a territory that he knew well. Experience had taught him that sometimes one number was the key to the whole puzzle. He hoped it was that simple this time.