“A Grandmother’s Patience.”

This story was originally created in December 2020.

This is my longest short story, at 1500 words (most professors want less so they don’t have to read as much). Obviously, this piggy-backs off my previous story of loss—and losing yourself without saying goodbye.

I'm on the nursing home couch again with the afterimage of cruising down Wallace Street with the wire basket full of marigolds and the twist in the road to the graveyard and then the terrible crunch of metal. How did I get here?

The room smells like dead flowers and Grandma Carol’s cinnamon hearts perfume. Gran sits on her rocking chair wearing a sundress, it would look nice if not for the deep bruises under her eyes and the large gash on her forehead. Gran’s skeletal fingers places a bundle of daisies on the table, "Do you still know how to arrange them, Madeline?" 

           I reach for some daises. Do I? She asked me this years ago, when I still talked to her. The petals feel fresh if a little crisp and some of the stems are too long. With a few snips of the scissors, I present the handful to Gran. I cascade the flowers for an illusion of growth and fullness. As one would stop another would pop up from behind it. 

           "That's good, Mads, you're becoming quite the little star. If you keep this up, you'll be better than me!"

I’m cut from the memory like a snapped piano wire with absolute certainty, something was wrong as my body slams into a train booth. I mimic the rattling of the train, shaking as I adjust.

What the hell is going on? Why am I on some fancy train when I was just with Gran? What train has white and grey basket-weave tile? Most of the interior is too fancy filled with all manner of false niceties, not just the floors. The velvet seats seem to glow in the light. The fabric plush to the touch, as though the wool inside is fluffing itself every couple of seconds.

Everything feels off.

Yet, as fate would have it, life shifts further into the improbable when Grandma Carol approaches my booth, in her red sundress with daisies scattered around the lace skirt, and sits on the opposite bench. 

A mountain of questions—how did I get here, aren’t you dead, why did I ignore you, why did I push you away when you needed me, is this a real train—tumble around my brain but what comes out is, "Where are we?"

"On our way to London. You wanted to show me your flower shop, so I thought why not in late April for the azaleas."

"Yeah, but how did we get here—on this train?"

"You must have been asleep for too long. We flew here silly! How else would we be here?"

"I buried you three years ago?"

"Do I look dead to you? Seriously, Mads, you're starting to worry me." No, she didn't look dead. Gran looks healthy, healthier than I ever saw her, with a smile like automatic doors to kindness and her cinnamon perfume in the air. 

Gran settles down in her seat and pulls out Happenstance by Carol Shields, her favourite book. I have the same copy with the bottom corner of the front page torn off. "Did I give that back to you?"

"Back to me? You never had it. I thought you were only interested in flowers now?"

"But I…" I trail off. We never talked this much before. 

The intercom clicks on announcing that dinner will be served in a couple minutes. I check my phone, 00:00. Midnight? I look out the window, and the sun blinds me. What is going on? 

"Did I hit my head on our way? I don't remember the trip at all."

Gran gives me a look that says what are you talking about, and are you okay. "You took some sleeping pills and passed out. You know how you are on planes with all the motion."

But I can't remember it at all. It seems odd for dementia to set in so early. I'm twenty-seven. Surely, I had more time. If I think hard enough, I remember seeing Gran at the nursing home moments ago. Before she had gotten breast cancer and Alzheimer's at eighty when I was finishing my degree. Slurring her words together and calling me Susie was something that always stayed with me. An aunt later told me grandma grew up with Susie. Thinking about it made me feel like an exposed wound bound to fester. An injury that could be poked by anyone without my knowledge. The last time I saw Gran before she went to a hospice, when I couldn’t look at her without seeing myself—neglected, forlorn, left to die. 

Gran smiles at her book; she looks like how I picture her. Grey hair tied in a bun with a crochet hook sticking out. She catches me looking at her and offers me a caramel. I decline. 

"You're not Grandma Carol, are you?"

"What gave me away?"

"I never visited her towards the end, to tell her about London." 

Someone with the face of my grandma chokes a laugh as its body morphs into a mess of eyes and tendrils, "It comforts some to see someone they knew. I go by many names and genders, some have called me God, Amma, or Iblis, but my true name is Chaos." 

I'm gonna pass out. 

"I'm sorry, trains often help conceptualize the end. But maybe this?"

The train fades from under me, and my childhood home fades in. Just looking at the garden brings a rush of tears. It was when I was still living at home, taking my botany degree, mom had given me free reign of the garden. Saying, "It'll give you some practice for your tests, and maybe the front yard won't look so sad anymore. Your father, bless his heart, killed the lawn so there's no more harm you can do." This is torture, slow and poignant.

Mom let me mess with the garden after one of their fights. My parents couldn't help but dig their nails into each other in a cruel game of chicken. “Frank stop leering, I feel you drooling from across the room.” “Gloria, its Magic Mike, that’s what they wear.” “So, Magic Mike would like an unemployed red-faced drunk?” The fight was like a mid-roll ad for divorce. It took me a long time to figure out who I was without them. I had enough at fifteen and took off to Gran’s couch until I went to university. After a while, I abandoned her too.

The creature bends to stroke a tulip petal as their disembodied voice echoes around me, "Is this better?"

"No this is not better!” It just reminds me of how shitty my parents were, “What the fuck are you?"

The wind picks up in the little garden and blows dirt into my face. The train rattles back into existence as I fall into the booth once more. Chaos taps a tendril on the table. The eyes and tendrils rearrange to create Gran's scowl. "Language." 

It's okay, Mads, just breathe and think about this. There is a normal explanation for this.

I am in a VR simulation, and I can't unplug myself, or I am in a coma, and my brain is sending scary signals to explain why I have a demon in front of me.

           "I'm not a demon. I help transition your soul to rest."

           "But I'm not dead." Chaos stays silent, "Right?"

The tension grows until my skin feels like it is being flayed with a dull knife. Steady now. Slow your breathing and cite the five senses. The table is brown with the grain pointing towards the aisle. Birds chirp outside until the train turns opposite of the birds' path. I grip the table, it's cold, and it creaks against the pressure of my nails. Chaos still smells like cinnamon, like her, and the air tastes bitter with every breath. 

I look at Chaos. "Is this because I couldn’t stay when she was sick, when she needed me, and I never answered her calls? How could I tell her, her support scared me? I couldn't apologize when you were pretending to be her! What the fuck is wrong with me?"

All the times I had visited Gran, and she just wanted me to watch Wheel of Fortune or read her mail to her, and I couldn't do that. She just wanted to love me, and I doubted her. I mean, everyone has good days, but those always end. Always.

"You could try now." Chaos stands in the aisle and gestures towards Grandma Carol in the booth. Her skin is drier and flakey, her eyes are dull, and her lips are blue. She looks tired like she did in her coffin. I grab her hand across the table. Her fingers are stiff, but they grip mine. My jaw locks as I fight for the right thing to say.

"You were always terrible with feelings, my girl."

A wet laughs claws past my lips, "You're right, I'm sorry. I’ll try to be better."

“It’s certainly a start.”