After I’ve checked her blood pressure, we sit together at her kitchen table drinking iced tea. I give her a copy of the recipe she requested, tell her I increased the amount of ginger called for by half. Then I say, “I have bad news, Marvelous. Bad news for me, anyway. I don’t need to come and see you anymore. You’re an expert now; you could teach other people.”

She smiles. “I could, at that.”

“I’ll have to stop seeing you. As a nurse, anyway. I hope I can still come and see you as a friend.”

“Well, of course you can. You are a friend. Since the first day, Myra. I liked you right away. You not a phony like so many.”

“Oh, well.”

She frowns. “You know something? You need to learn to take a compliment.”

“I guess. Yes. Thank you.”

“You need to let the light in.”

“Well, that’s … right.”

She looks around the kitchen, sighs. “My son’s coming tonight; I think I’ll make this recipe you gave me. I don’t know what I’m going to do with that boy. Trouble. You lucky you never had children. They bust your heart wide open.”

“I don’t know. I think I might have liked having children.”

“Well, first you got to get a man. You found a man, yet?”

I look at her, say nothing.

Her eyes widen; she puts her drink down. Since the first day I met her, she’s asked about me and men. And always, I’ve said there’s no one. I’ve also said that I don’t really want someone. But today is different.

“Oh, myyyyyyyyy!” she says. “Little Miss Lonelyheart finally got a fish on the line.”

“It’s not exactly like that.”

“You got the fever, girl, steam coming out your ears. All you done was think about him, and your whole self change.”

“Come on, Marvelous; it isn’t that obvious.”

She turns in her chair, points to a corner of the cabinet. “You see that toaster over there?”

“Yeah.”

“Go look at your face in it.”

I laugh.

“I mean it! You think about that man and then you go and look at your face.”

I stop smiling, look down into my tea, stir it with my finger.

“What? You want to tell me about him?”

“Oh, Marvelous, it’s completely wrong. He’s one of my patients. He’s very ill. I shouldn’t be having these feelings.”

“Honey, ain’t no ‘should’ when it comes to feelings. Ain’t nothing wrong with just feeling anything! ’Sides, you ever seen that movie, West Side Story?”

“Yes.”