Lines That Lead Home

Margaret's hands trembled slightly as she twisted the cap off her vitamin bottle—the orange C tablets her daughter kept insisting she needed. At eighty-two, she'd learned that some battles weren't worth fighting. Barnaby, her seventeen-year-old tabby, wound affectionately around her ankles, his purr like a tiny motor that had somehow outlasted three generations of actual ones.

The screen door squeaked open, and Sophie burst in with the boundless energy of twelve. "Grandma! Ready for my appointment?"

Margaret smiled. Sophie had started calling their weekly hair-braiding sessions "appointments" last month, modeling herself after the beauty magazines she devoured. They settled on the porch swing, Sophie cross-legged on the wicker cushion, Margaret in her rocking chair beside her.

"Your grandma's hair was the color of moonlight," Margaret said, working Sophie's thick dark strands into a French braid. "The night before your grandfather left for the war, I sat right here on this porch while he braided it for me. Said he wanted something to remember."

Sophie twisted around to face her. "Did he write you letters?"

"Every week. Sometimes twice." Margaret's fingers never stopped moving. "He wrote about this palm tree he saw in California, how it reminded him of home. Said he'd count the fronds to fall asleep."

"Can I read your palm?" Sophie asked suddenly.

Margaret extended her weathered hand. Sophie traced the life line with serious concentration, forehead furrowed. "You're going to live to be a hundred."

"That's what the vitamins are for."

"And..." Sophie frowned, tilting her head, "you're going to be happy."

Margaret squeezed Sophie's hand, feeling the silken hair she'd just braided, the warmth of small fingers, Barnaby's weight settled across her feet. Some things, she realized, didn't need palm readings or promises.

"I already am, sweetheart. I already am."