Grand scrubs at his hair as he looks around the motel room.
I used to imagine living in an old Victorian house with fancy porches. In a sleek wood-and-glass house set in wide fields. Or in a loft conversion with high ceilings, and a bathtub in front of long windows. Now all I want is to be back in Grand’s living room with its musty smell and fraying furniture. “It’s no different or worse than anywhere else,” I tell him.
He surveys the empty cracker boxes, the clutter of yogurt containers. “You eaten lately?” he asks.
“There’s a Timmy’s down the street.”
I’ll have a bacon-and-tomato sandwich. And a bowl of chili. And a muffin. An iced cappuccino. Maybe two of everything. I don’t remember ever being this hungry.
“Remember my chili?” Grand asks when we’re seated at a sticky table with our food in front of us.
“Sure.” Now that I think of it, it’s probably the only hot meal he has ever made from scratch. “With Yorkshire pudding.”
“Your grandmother got me into that habit. But you wouldn’t remember her.” He stirs his chili. Asks me without looking up, “Does your mother ever talk about her?”
“She says I’m tall enough to be a dancer like Gran. And that I have her widow’s peak.” I touch my brow. “Not much else though.”
“All true.”
“What happened to her?”
He puts down his spoon. “You were so little. Three? Four?”
I shrug. He wants to talk about old times. I want to know what’s going to happen from here on in. “I don’t know.”
“It had something to do with all the drugs she was on. Too much. The wrong combinations. There was an autopsy, of course.” He dabs at his mouth with his handkerchief. Then his brow. “Nowadays they might call it an accidental overdose.”
I feel a chill, picturing the medication bottles lined up beside my mother’s bed. “What kind of drugs?”
“I don’t remember their names now. So many at one time or another. Anti-psychotics.”
Like Mom’s.
My spoon clatters as I put it down. I wrap my arms around myself. I’m suddenly not hungry anymore. Mental illness is genetic. Everyone knows that.
“Your mom never told you?” he asks.
“That my grandmother was nuts too?”
“Leni!”
“Well, if she was taking those drugs, she must have been.”
He looks at his bowl as if he is trying to figure out how it got there. Then he looks back at me. “You don’t remember her at all?”
“Not really. Just smells. Lemon, I think. And licking cake batter out of a bowl. A nonsense song about mares and does.”
He starts to hum something or other, then stops when he notices people staring. People probably thinking, Crazy old man!
Mom would get into a shouting match with them. For staring. For laughing. Not that she ever needs a reason. Fight or take flight, that’s what Mom does. Two of the most basic instincts when humans are under stress.
Grand’s cold hand reaches for mine. “We…I should have told you long ago.” He looks tired. His eyes are watery, his lids red. “Your grandmother? The other Helen? Of course, you would know you were named after her. We married right out of high school. She was wild. Exciting. Tireless.” He speaks with a mix of pride and sadness as he describes how she was also committed and driven. Dancing six, eight, ten hours a day. Dancing with bleeding feet and not enough sleep.
He uses donut holes as punctuation when the story gets too hard. Or when he forgets his place or the words just won’t come. His shirtfront gets whiter and whiter with powdered sugar.
My chili is cold now. I can’t touch my sandwich.
It is hard hearing about my grandmother’s breakdowns and recoveries, the friendships she blew, the fights she got into. “Things settled down for a bit when we had Grace,” Grand tells me. “Helen was determined to do everything right. But that soon led to manic housecleaning, overprotectiveness as Grace got bigger, confrontations at school.”
I clench my jaws. This all sounds so familiar.
“Things were harder—and easier—when your mom got older and was busy with her friends and out of the house most of the time. And when your mom started to act up, get into trouble, I assumed it was the usual teenage stuff. Rebelling against her difficult mother…all that. Though I probably knew on some level what was going on. I couldn’t face it, I guess. I should have. All my time was spent taking care of Helen.” He studies my face. “You didn’t know any of this?”
I shake my head. I don’t trust myself to speak.
“Then Grace met your dad. What was she? Seventeen? Eighteen.” His gaze is focused on the past. Not me. “They moved away. I should have kept up with you both better, but I still had Helen to care for. Then your dad left. Your grandma died soon after. I saw a bit of your mom and you. But not enough. I guess I was aware that things weren’t quite right. But the sicker your mom got, the less I could do.”
He looks up at me, challenging, apologizing, “I should have done more. I know. But I couldn’t. I had nothing left.” He drags a handkerchief from his pocket and dabs at his eyes.
“Me neither.” It comes out as a whisper.
Grand leans forward as if he hasn’t quite heard.
“Me neither, Grand,” I tell him. “I can’t do it anymore.”
He takes a wheezy breath. He pulls himself up straight. He shakes his head slowly, staring at me. He reaches across the table, runs his palm down my face, flat-handed as if wiping away tears, dirt. “I know, pet. I know. But perhaps we can do it together.”
I rest my cheek against his open palm. Feel the warmth against my cheek.
“Think we could give it a try?” he asks. “Bit of a dragon, that social worker. I’ve always tried to stay clear of them. But she did have ideas.” He pulls out a sheet of paper. “Some resources that we could try. Groups for people like us. The ones taking care of those who can’t take care of themselves. Seems there’s more help out there than there was in your grandmother’s day.” He studies the notes for a moment. Then looks up at me. “So?” he asks. “What do you think?”
I take the paper from him. Scan it quickly.
He can’t do it alone. Neither can I. But we’d have each other. And Mom would have us both. “Okay.”
His mouth trembles as he smiles at me. “Good girl.”
As we leave, he puts his arm around me. I inhale the familiar smell of motor oil. Dust and age. Nicotine. “You’ve got to quit smoking,” I tell him. “I need you to be around for a long time. Mom and I both do.”
“One thing at a time, pet. One thing at a time.”