“And you signed it Princess Lilian of Lichtenstein.”

“I wanted to give my words weight.”

Instead of laughter on the other end came “What other terrible tales did you mother tell you about me?”

“Nothing.” I wanted to ask about my grandfather, but I’d asked once in middle school, with the innocence of a child not knowing she was treading on sensitive ground. The deep hurt on my grandmother’s face made me wish I could take the question back. I’d been relieved when she’d changed the subject.

When I was twelve, I’d spent the entire summer poring through pictures of celebrities on the internet. Considering the circles Violet had run in, I’d been convinced her lover had been someone famous. My mother had a cleft chin. I googled images of Kirk Douglas, but then settled on Timothy Dalton. I daydreamed about him showing up to take me to the Oscars, how he would introduce me on the red carpet as his granddaughter.

He never did come for me, but at least I won the grandmother lottery. “I loved all our outings. You’re going to recover.” I crossed the resplendent lobby, discarding my empty cup on a coffee table, dodging hotel guests who were checking in. “And then we’ll go on new adventures together.”

“Damn right we will. I might not run with the bulls in Pamplona, but I wouldn’t mind a last flamenco in Andalusia with a handsome Spaniard. We’ll find us a pair of them.”

Now that sounded like the Violet I knew.

“Talking about looking irresistible,” she said. “One of the nurses makes jewelry. Next time you come, remind me that I ordered you a pair of earrings. Sunflowers. You know why?”

“Van Gogh?”

“That’s where my interest was born, but then I started liking them for themselves. Sunflowers are adaptable, for one. Seventy species. You plant them somewhere, and they’ll figure out how to grow. They’ll come up in the rich loam of rivers as easily as in arid, poor dirt. The worse the soil, the bigger they flower. They’re scrappy as hell, but they always look like stars.”

I was almost at the front door, out of time. I’d bring up my grandfather in person the next time I flew to New York. I wanted to use the few seconds I left on a different question.