Evan sat cross-legged on the end of the hospital bed. Glory reclined with the back of the bed raised as high as it would go, and between them was the little wheeled table that Glory used to eat in bed. Sprawled across it was a tarot deck, and Evan was studying them carefully. They frightened him on a deep level, but he also knew that he was being ridiculous—and damn it, he was going to knock it off and enjoy the time with his dying grandmother.

He looked at the blue backs of the cards Glory had laid face down.

"Is there a specific order I have to flip them over in?"

"Yeah, start here, in the top left corner. Go clockwise."

He flipped the cards over. He had a four of cups, reversed, which Isobel had mentioned before. He also had a wheel, a page of cups and a ten of swords. None of them had any real meaning to him, but Glory nodded and made a little "humph" noise.

"Something big is coming, kiddo. See this card, upside down, means something is ending. All this other stuff leads to potential and some kind of heartbreak or betrayal. I would stop sleeping with Tanya to start."

"What? Tanya and I aren't sleeping together anymore, it was just the one time."

"You don't have plans to do that anymore?"

"No."

Glory sat up and leaned in. "Then why are you screwing around on Isobel?"

Evan's eyebrows furrowed. "I'm not."

"Oh? Then how come you aren't getting serious? I know you two slept together. I know how that goes."

"It was a week ago, Gran. I'm letting her figure out what she wants."

"Did you tell her you love her?"

Evan paused with his hand on the table. "Gran, I do not want to talk about this with you."

"Who will be with you when I'm gone?"

Evan furrowed his eyebrows. He felt his heart split down the middle, but tried not to show it.

"I don't know."

"Evan, one time you were left alone in the house for two hours and you tore up the mail and nearly had a nervous breakdown. You can't be left alone. You need a family."

"And what's to even say Isobel is family? Huh? What if she doesn't want to be with some dick bag like me?"

"You ain't a dick bag, you're a meat head. Big difference."

Evan said, "Thank you, Gran. You're always there for me."

"Yeah, I am. Y'know, we don't talk much, but we've got each other. I feed you. I help you with laundry and shit. We spend time together. You're a grown man and you can handle yourself, but you need someone to be around you or you'll implode."

Evan was silent. He picked at the corner of the tarot card and listened.

"You are the one who has been left behind, Evan. When everyone else moved on to whatever shit they were doing, you stayed. You stayed and you took care of me. But don't let me be a crutch. Don't hide behind me. Take care of yourself too."

Evan looked up at her. "Gran, I honestly don't know what I'm gonna do when you're gone. I'm freaking out."

"Don't freak out. Death happens."

Evan's chest was being crushed. He was being broken. But he took a breath and shook it off.

"So, what exactly is it that you want me to do?" he asked. "I can't help but feel like you are asking me to do something."

"I'm asking you not to close yourself off and run away. I know you're going to be crushed. I also know that there's more in this world and in this life than being a tough man, no matter what your grandfather said. Life isn't a fight, it's a . . . What would Isobel say? A cohabitation experience. You may fight sometimes, but you shouldn't be focusing on the fighting, just the everyday."

Glory sat back, and she started to look a bit pale. Evan sat up straighter.

"Gran?"

She looked at him. "No big deal, just feeling a little tired is all."

"You want me to call someone?"

"No. No, I'll be alright."

Evan nodded. "If you say so."

He glanced at the heart monitor. It seemed fine. If there was an issue, a nurse would appear as if by magic, and they would come poke something or add something to her IV.

This whole death thing was being over dramatized.

But even still, he knew there were questions he should ask.

"What do you want for . . . For you? Your body, I mean."

"I don't want anyone to spend the money trying to bury me. Isobel and I did some research on that shit and I have come to the conclusion that it's all a racket anyway. So just cremate me and put me in a cookie jar or something. That would work perfectly."

Evan nodded.

"Sure. Anything else?"

"I don't give a damn. I won't be around to see it, so I'm not about to be picky. Do something nice, I guess."

Evan nodded again, this time with finality. He started cleaning up the tarot cards, stacking them carefully. Something told him to stack them so that there were no reversals, and so he did, making sure they were all right side up before wrapping it in the cloth again. "Yeah, sure, alright Gran. I can do that."

"Good," she said. "Good. Now, I think I'd like to take a nap."

"Yeah, sure, Gran. You should do that. I'll ah . . . I'll do that too."

* * *

When Evan woke up from his nap he looked over at Gran. She was still asleep. He was exhausted, but even he knew that something wasn't quite right. This feeling inside him just would not go away. He was full of anxiety. He was on edge, and he almost wanted to leave right then.

He grabbed his cell phone and walked out of the room to the nurse's desk. There was a nurse there. She looked up when he walked over, fully attentive.

"Hi, what's up?" she asked in a concerned voice.

He said, "Hey, I think something is wrong with my Gran. Could someone come check her out?"

The nurse nodded. "Yes! Sure, let me page someone, I have to stay here."

"Sure, thanks."

He walked over to the room and went back inside. He looked over Glory, all small and frail and still. Her heart monitor said she was alive, but her heartbeat was slow, steady, rhythmic. A little too steady. Not slow enough to where the machine was worried, but slow enough to where it made him second guess.

Evan texted Isobel. He asked her to come down, just in case. She said she could be there in twenty minutes.

What else was there to do? He sat down and waited.

And waited.

And waited.

It took at least half an hour for a nurse to finally show up, and by then Isobel still hadn't arrived. The nurse checked her fluids, her pulse, her monitors. Evan became more anxious, and stood up to pace. She asked, "Did you try waking her up?"

"No, I wasn't sure if it was nothing. I just . . . I have this feeling."

The nurse gave him a look he couldn't quite name, then said, "I think I'm going to go ahead and call the doctor if it's alright with you. Because I think I know that feeling you are feeling. Let us know if she wakes up, okay?"

"Yeah, sure," he said earnestly. She left, and the two were left alone.

As the nurse left, Isobel walked in. She was a mess, her hair was all flyaway and her cheeks were a hectic glowing red. "Hey," she gasped. She slid her coat off, then after she tossed it on a chair, she said, "Sorry I took so long. My car was acting up. What's wrong? What's going on?"

"I don't know. I just . . . I got this feeling I should call you," he said. "I think I'm just being crazy, but I can't shake the feeling like something is wrong.

He felt deeply disturbed. He had never felt such a pang of intuition before, and it was alarming. Was he imagining that Gran looked so empty? Was he hallucinating that she was so small, so frail? And was he just being paranoid about the heart rate?

But when Isobel really looked at Gran, he felt like suddenly he wasn't just being crazy. Her eyes went from focused to sad, and her head turned. "Oh. Oh, Evan, I don't think you are being crazy. I think you might be having an intuitive moment."

"What do you mean by that?"

Glory chose to finally wake up right then. Her eyes opened just a crack. She looked over at Isobel, and then at Evan, and ever so slightly smiled. Isobel walked over to her and took her hand, sitting on the same side of the bed that Evan was on. His eyes flicked from Isobel to Glory.

"Glory, what do you need from us?"

With weak, tired effort, Glory lifted her hand and pointed to the tarot cards. From the cards, she pointed at Isobel.

"You want me to take them? Glory, I can't. They are yours."

Glory shook her head, and smiled.

Evan felt his heart stop, then begin to crush itself. It was as if an invisible hand had reached inside him and squeezed, so that breathing was a task that required almost all of his energy.

"She can't be—" he began, but Isobel put her hand on his shoulder. She never let go of Glory's.

"I'll take care of him," she said quietly. She gripped Glory's hand and shook it. "Don't you worry about a thing. I'll make sure everything gets handled. Correctly."

Glory nodded once, and smiled.

"Good girl," she whispered. "Goody-two-shoes brat."

"Mean old bat" Isobel whispered back. She looked at him. "Evan, anything you want to say to your grandmother?"

He couldn't see, and he couldn't breathe, and he couldn't speak. He couldn't believe this was actually happening. He did manage to rasp out, "Sorry about busting your kitchen window out with a baseball in the third grade."

Glory smiled a big, happy smile. "Be good. Love you, meat head."

And then she went back to sleep. It took a while, but slowly, the heart monitor slowed, and slowed some more. Glory's breathing became shallower and harder to hear, and her pulse became fainter.

A nurse came in, and then another, and they asked Evan if she should be resuscitated. The doctor even appeared.

Evan looked at Isobel for an answer.

Isobel shook her head.

"No. No, we said our goodbyes. I don't think she wants to be . . . I think she's done," he said.

The nurse said, "I will go get the case worker."

"Yes, please," said Isobel.