Today feels worse.
Nothing looked quite right, felt quite right. The bright blue California sky seemed pale; the cranberry bread she’d grabbed at the bakery across the street was flavorless. Her typical edginess didn’t usually result in blunted senses, but today everything seemed somehow dulled.
“Maybe I’m sick. What do you think?”
The tabby cat on the windowsill flicked her tail.
The downstairs buzzer sounded, and Rebekkah glanced down at the street. The delivery driver was already headed back in his truck.
“Occasionally, it would be nice if deliveries were actually delivered rather than left behind to be trampled or wet or taken,” Rebekkah grumbled as she went down the two flights of stairs to the entryway.
Outside the front door on the step on the building was a brown envelope addressed in Maylene’s spidery handwriting. Rebekkah picked it up—and just about dropped it as she felt the contours of what was inside.
“No.” She tore the package open. The top of the envelope fluttered to the ground, landing by a bird-of-paradise plant beside the door. Her grandmother Maylene’s silver flask was nestled inside the thick envelope. A white handkerchief with delicate tatting was wrapped around it.
“No,” she repeated.
Rebekkah stumbled as she ran back up the stairs. She slammed open the door to the apartment, grabbed her mobile, and called her grandmother.
“Where are you?” Rebekkah whispered as the ringing on the other end continued. “Answer the phone. Come on. Come on. Answer.”
Over and over, she dialed both of Maylene’s numbers, but there was no answer at the house phone or the mobile phone that Rebekkah had insisted her grandmother carry.
Rebekkah clutched the flask in her hand. It hadn’t ever been out of Maylene’s possession for as long as Rebekkah had known her. When Maylene left the house, it was in her handbag. In the garden, it was in one of the deep pockets of her apron. At home, it sat on the kitchen counter or the nightstand. And at every funeral Rebekkah had attended with her grandmother, the flask was there.