I walked into my grandmother’s house.  Could I still call it that?  Or do things, all of a sudden, no longer belong to a person after she’s gone?  

I walked into my grandmother’s house and saw the kitchen filled with people and food.  How could they eat?  They were boiling tea with the tea bags that had belonged to her two days ago.  They were putting food in her refrigerator and drinking from her glasses.  It made me nauseous.  

I made my way through the people to the living room.  The first thing I saw was my grandmother’s worn-out, faded blue recliner.  This was where she always sat, watching M.A.S.H. marathons on TV. as she crocheted afghans, shelled purple-hull peas, or worked on the latest crossword puzzle from the Democrat.  

There was a bright pink spiral notebook on the floor next to the chair.  Stuffed inside were newspaper clippings, cut-out crossword puzzles, and recipes she’d copied down from cooking shows on TV.  She lived alone and entertained herself by watching hours of TV when there was no one there for her to talk with. 

I sat down in the recliner.  It still held the scent of her cigarette smoke.  I curled up into the fetal position and began to remember the last time I saw her, just a few weeks earlier.  I had hugged her goodbye as I left again for college.  She sat, as usual, in her blue recliner in front of the TV, a non-filter Camel burning in the ashtray beside her.  Her hair and her clothes-- and everything in the house--smelled heavily of cigarette smoke.  She held on tightly to my hand when I tried to pull away.  She looked me in the eyes.  “I’ll miss you,” she said.  “I’ll miss you, too.”  

I couldn’t understand why she was being so dramatic about my leaving.  I lived just next door with my family and had spent much of my free time that summer doing things for her since she couldn’t very easily get around on her own; she sent me on so many errands that she began to call me her “gofer.”  But I would be home to visit in a couple of weeks.  I knew I hadn’t spent as much time with her as I had planned to, and I did feel a little guilty, but it wasn’t like I was leaving forever.  I would be back soon, and I’d have plenty of time later to make up for the time I didn’t spend with her.  

My grandmother’s health had begun to decline over the years, but I never thought of it as anything serious.  I just assumed that her loss of health was what came naturally with aging.  It was a slow process.  She gradually transformed from my plump, fun-loving grandma into a thin, fragile old woman.  She went from keeping her house as cold as an igloo to wearing a beanie to keep warm in the summer.  She went from being an avid seamstress, gardener, and cook to having to give up her beloved recliner for a fixed spot on the couch, which she could not move from without someone else’s help.   

But one thing that never changed was her smoking habit.  She smoked until the day she was admitted to the hospital.  Since she refused to go to the hospital unless she felt it was absolutely necessary, no one knew until about a week before she died that she had cancer in her lungs and kidneys.  By then it was too late for the doctors to do anything about it, and she was too weak to receive treatment.  Even after hearing this news, though, the whole situation seemed too unreal for me to worry too much about it.   

Then the phone rang one night when I was sitting in my dorm room. 

“Hello?” I answered.  It was my sister.  

“What are you doing?” she asked.  

“Reading, studying, it doesn’t matter.”  I could tell she wasn’t calling to talk about what I was doing.  

“Mawmaw’s gone,” Audrey said.  

“What?”  

“She’s gone.”  

I mouthed the word no, but nothing came out.  I wanted more than anything to be able to go back in time just for a few minutes, but it was too late.  I would never be able to make up for the time I didn’t spend with her.

Author's Biography

Charlotte Stephens is a college student and aspiring writer from southeast Arkansas. 

E-mail Charlotte at charlottemichelle@hotmail.com

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