Castaway Cove by Joann Ross Page B

with white sand that looked like spun sugar, and amazingly, there was no one there! We could’ve been the only two people on the planet. . . .”
    When the new bride’s voice drifted off and her cheeks flushed bright pink, Mac had a very good idea of how they’d spent that stolen private time.
    “Well, it’s good to have you back,” he said. “You were missed. . . . So, how’s he doing today?”
    “Pretty well,” Analise said, morphing from blushing newlywed to the efficient, caring RN who kept the wing running so smoothly. “The other day’s outing must have energized him. He’s been quite chatty.”
    “That’s definitely good news.” One thing Mac had learned about Alzheimer’s was that what might have once been small, mundane things were events to be celebrated.
    He reminded himself of that as he walked down the hallway, past the doors with the bulletin boards covered with bright-colored burlap and photos of the residents’ lives in happier, more optimistic times. The boards had begun appearing a few weeks ago and although he understood that it helped staff and visitors personalize the patients, there were times when he found himself wondering if the subjects of all those photographs would have been smiling as brightly if they’d known what was lurking in the hidden shadows of their futures.
    Shaking off that depressing thought, he knocked on the door to his grandfather’s room, then walked in.
    “Hey, Pops.”
    He’d been coming to visit every day since he’d arrived in Shelter Bay eight months ago, and although at first he’d been relieved that his grandfather wasn’t in as rough shape as he’d feared when his father had told him about the illness, there was no way to ignore the fact that there seemed to be less of him than when Mac and Emma had first visited. Despite the good days, the disease was relentless as it slowly stole its victims away. The phrase
the long good-bye
was heartbreakingly accurate.
    On the plus side, Mac was learning the power of memories. How stories of the past made people who and what they are. His grandfather was, more and more, living in the moment. Which Mac, wishing he could forget a lot of his own past, had decided did have its pluses.
    He’d begun hugging Emma a little tighter when he kissed her good night. Held her hand a little longer before she raced into her kindergarten class. And more and more often he found himself pausing to drink in the amazing, fiery beauty of the sun setting over the ocean, or the shimmering arc of a rainbow after a spring rain.
    Or the seductive sway of feminine hips in a flowered dress.
    “So.” He turned a straight-backed chair around, sat down, and put his arms on the back rail. “How’re things?”
    “Same as they were yesterday,” Charlie grumbled. “And the day before. And the day before that. This place reminds me of the Navy. Everything is scheduled the same. Over and over.”
    “Like
Groundhog Day
.”
    When his grandfather’s expression revealed not a hint of understanding, although Mac knew he’d seen the movie, he merely shrugged. “It’s a movie where time gets stuck and the same day keeps repeating.”
    “Yep. Sounds a lot like here,” Charlie said.
    “You went to the aquarium day before yesterday,” Mac reminded him. “And got ice cream.”
    Puzzlement drifted across Charlie’s eyes. Eyes that had once sparkled like sunlight on blue water, but were now more tinged with shadows. He tugged on the sleeve of the cardigan he was wearing despite the warmth of the room. At one time he would’ve filled out the shoulders of the blue sweater, but no more. It now swamped him—yet another change. The broad-shouldered, barrel-chested man who’d spent his life hauling in traps and fishing lines was being whittled away.
    Mac noticed the scrapbook on the table beside the chair. There were new photos that hadn’t been in it when he’d visited last evening.
    “See,” he said, pointing one out. “Here’s you