"Michael Flynn - Melodies of the Heart" - читать интересную книгу автора (Flynn Michael)

At her age, that was largely true. I sighed. "Perhaps at Khan's clinic,
then. There really are some tests we should run."
That seemed to calm her somewhat, for she closed her eyes and her lips
moved slightly.
"Have you experienced any loss of appetite, or episodes of drowsiness?"
I asked. "Have you become irritable, forgetful, less alert?" Useless
questions. What geezer did not have those symptoms? I would have to
inquire among the staff to find out if there had been a recent change in
her behavior.
And she wasn't listening any more. At least, not to me. "Thank you,
Doctor Wilkes. I was so afraid. . . . That music. . . . But only a stroke, only a
stroke. It's such a relief. Thank you. Such a relief."
A relief? Compared to madness, I suppose it was. She struggled to her
feet, still babbling. When she left my office, hobbling once more over her
walking stick, she was humming to herself again. I didn't know the tune.


Even though we're drifting down life's stream apart
Your face I still can see in dream's domain;
I know that it would ease my breaking heart
To hold you in my arms just once again.
 It was dark when I arrived home. As I turned into the driveway I hit the
dashboard remote, and the garage door rose up like a welcoming lover. I
slid into the left-hand slot without slowing, easing the Lincoln to a halt
just as the tennis ball, hanging by a string from the ceiling, touched the
windshield. Brenda never understood that. Brenda always came to a
complete stop in the driveway before raising the garage door.
I could see without looking that I had beaten her home again. And they
said doctors kept long hours. . . . When I stepped from the car, I turned
my back on the empty slot.
I stood for some moments at the door to the kitchen, jiggling the car
keys in my hand. Then, instead of entering the house, I turned and left the
garage through the backyard door. I had seen the second story light on as
I came down the street. Deirdre's room. Tonight, for some reason, I
couldn't face going inside just yet.
The back yard was a gloom of emerald and jade. The house blocked the
glare of the street lamps, conceding just enough light to tease shape from
shadow. I walked slowly through the damp grass toward the back of the
lot. Glowing clouds undulated in the water of the swimming pool, as if the
ground had opened up and swallowed the night sky. Only a few stars
poked through the overcast. Polaris? Sirius? I had no way of knowing. I
doubted that half a dozen people in the township knew the stars by name;
or perhaps even that they had names. We have become strangers to our
skies.
At the back of the lot, the property met a patch of woodland—a bit of
unofficial greenbelt, undeveloped because it was inaccessible from the
road. Squirrels lived there, and blue jays and cardinals. And possum and
skunk, too. I listened to the rustle of the night dwellers passing through
the carpet of dead leaves. Through the trees I could make out the lights of
the house opposite. Distant music and muffled voices. Henry and Barbara