You smile that kind, gentle smile of yours, the one that reminds me so much of Mary. “Grampy, as long as I’m with you, I’ll be okay.”

Well, that gets me. I pull over to the side of the road, and I don’t know if it’s this strange disease working its way through my brain or the forty-year anniversary of Mary leaving or your father’s birthday or something else, but as soon as the car settles in place on the shoulder and I put it in park, I weep. I’ve gone from laughing harder than I can remember to all-out ugly crying. I lean forward and put my forehead on the steering wheel.

I hear the click of your seat belt and feel your small hand on my shoulder. Your forehead lands gently on my back. Your little arm slinks around me. “Grampy.”

“Yes, Pearl?”

“I really do think you’d be much happier if you married Ms. Pena.”

And with that you turn our tears into laughter. I start first, my shoulders shaking. I wipe my nose on my sleeve, and you shout, “Ew!” That makes me laugh even harder.

“Grampy, I’m serious about Ms. Pena.”

There’s a little pinprick of pain at the future that this diagnosis has stolen from me. I try to say, “I know you are,” but I can’t stop laughing, and soon you’re laughing too. I put the car back in drive, and you scooch over and hastily put on your seat belt. I’m still laughing, gently this time, persistently. Shaking my head, I pull out onto the road.

“You are something, Pearl,” I say.

You give me a look that says you know precisely what you are and precisely what you are doing, and that I shouldn’t worry because you’ll take care of me for as long as I live. Even if it’s only anytime to three months.

I should tell you about the diagnosis. I reach up and touch the knot again, thinking this is how an old tree must feel when its trunk begins to rot. I decide that some things can wait a little longer.

“Ms. Pena, huh?” I ask.

“You are very lonely, Grampy.”

“Lonely?”

“You’re home all day by yourself! You don’t have anyone to paint with or read to or play at the park with.”

“I have you,” I say. The uncontrolled laughter from a few minutes ago has cut a path into a kind of lightness, a sense that even when facing the worst, there is something shining.

“Not during the day. Do you think she’s pretty?” you ask.

“I told you, I think she’s beautiful.”

“I think she’s beautiful too. So are you going to ask her out?”

“Pearl, this is what I’ve been trying to tell you. We’re leaving.”

“I know.”

“We’re going back to where I grew up,” I continue. “I don’t know when we’ll come back.”

You are very quiet after that, and miles pass by before I finally ask if you’re okay.