Of course I remembered. Graham crackers and orange Kool-Aid in the basement room. Wooden fire engines. Maps in impossible colors. Sitting on the carpet in a circle around a lit candle, while the lady spoke in an unnaturally gentle voice. I kept my eyes on the candle flame, the only interesting thing in the room. At the end she said: “Now it’s time to change the light,” and lowered her candle snuffer over the flame, trying to fool us into thinking she was only “changing” the light, not putting it out.

“Thanks, Grandma,” I said. “But I’m not going to start believing in God because I’m desperate.”

“You mean like I did when your mother was born?”

“That’s not what I meant!” I shot back. That’s exactly what I meant.

After a pause, Grandma asked, as casually as if she wanted to know whether I was hungry: “Do you feel desperate sometimes, Maddy?”

I shut my eyes. “Not really.” The nausea had come back. Both feet were half-numb and prickling painfully, like when the blood rushes in after they’ve gone to sleep. “Does Mom know what happened when she was born?”

“She knows about her birth, yes. I’ve told her the whole story. Not that she necessarily . . . sees it the way I do.”

“Mom isn’t into that stuff. She would never change her mind, even if her baby is sick.”

Grandma laughed. “Your mother has always had her own ideas, ever since she was small. Like you.”

“I don’t agree with everything Mom says, you know.”

“Of course you don’t.” Lightly she added: “You have a first-rate mind, Maddy. Don’t dismiss things just because they’re out of the ordinary. That’s all I would say. There’s more of everything than we think.”

Are all old people so cryptic? More of everything than we think? I liked the sound of it, but I knew liking the sound of something was not enough, and I knew the conversation had to end. It was not just that my feet were hurting and I was ready to sleep. There was something in me that wanted to poke its nose into the world and be seen and be stroked, but if anyone tried too hard to coax it out, it burrowed back inside and hid. I feigned sleep. After a minute or two, my grandmother eased herself off the bed and tiptoed out.

•  •  •

“Long story short,” I announced at dinner, “I’m going to church tomorrow.” Third week postchemo, I was still weak but on the up and up, or at least on level ground with rising potential. As soon as I’m almost myself again, they knock me flat with another treatment.

“Oh?” My mother glanced up.

“With Grandma. Dr. O says I can go out if I want.”

“Are they driving you?”

“Is that all you want to know? My method of transportation?”