"How about my birthday? You couldn't remember it last week."
Nina paused and looked disoriented for a moment. Uh‑oh, Ally thought, I pushed her too hard.
"It was October third." A smile abruptly took over her face, as though she was experiencing a live breakthrough. "You were born at Roosevelt Hospital, at three‑forty in the afternoon."
"Mom, this is incredible." She was joyously stunned though it felt like something resembling shock. "It's a miracle."
"Your mother's responsiveness is impressive," Karl Van de Vliet said as he strode through the open door, startling her. "Ellen will run the first battery of monitoring tests later this morning. Short‑term memory and the like. But from all appearances, there's been a lot of tissue regeneration under way overnight."
"Is . . . is this permanent?" Ally asked, not wanting to let herself get her hopes up too soon. And what is he doing?
"No one can answer that question." He looked at Nina and smiled. "But this is not some drug regimen to trick the brain's chemistry, Mrs. Hampton, you have my word. In Alzheimer's, tissue responsible for the production of certain neurotransmitters dies. What we're doing here is enabling your brain to regrow healthy, long‑lived tissue to replace what has become damaged and destroyed by an excess of the wrong . . . Let's just say we're not trying to salvage damaged tissue. We're actually replacing the dysfunctional tissue in the cortical and hippocampal regions of the brain, so we're working with the body. And you're responding wonderfully." He turned back to Ally. "I've got to get back to the lab now. Come on down when you're ready, and we'll finish the paperwork."
She started to say she wanted to ask him to linger a moment and answer a few questions, but before she could, he'd disappeared into the hallway.
"Ally, I haven't felt this alive in months," Nina bubbled on. "Dr. Vee did a minor procedure late yesterday afternoon, using local anesthesia. Then he did something in his laboratory and came back and gave me an injection. Then there was another one this morning. It's supposed to continue for a week or two. Ellen said she'll be giving me one of those little memory tests every day to see if I'm improving, but you know, I already know I can tell a difference. It's just been overnight, but I swear some of the haze is already gone."
"I'm so happy for you." Ally felt a surge of joy. Already she was thinking about some new trips they could take together.