She should answer it, let her know she’s okay and that she’ll be back at school on Monday. Especially after ushering her friends out the door yesterday at GG’s wake.
Abby gnawed on her lip, deciding against it. She wasn’t in the mood to tell her she was fine when she wasn’t, and Abby didn’t want to talk about how she really felt. And Cammie would insist she did.
Pushing the ignore button, she dropped the phone onto her mattress and stared up at the ceiling, shoving aside the voice in her head that told her she was wrong for not answering. But could anyone blame her for not wanting to talk right now? She wasn’t ready to act as though she was okay, and anything else would lead to how she was really doing. No amount of talking about how she was broken inside would make her loss disappear. It was better to shelve her feelings until she could handle them.
Abby blinked her tired eyes as her thoughts drifted to GG’s letters and the journal, and for a moment, she wondered if she had dreamt it all.
She swung her legs over the bed and shuffled her way to her closet, where she retrieved her bag and fingered the book inside, confirming its existence. Plunking it back down, she turned and squinted at her alarm clock.
Ten o’clock. She slept in, an anomaly in her house. Usually by now, her father was banging around in the kitchen, flipping pancakes, and singing. If everyone had yet to wake, his ear-piercing rendition of Sinatra was enough to make you get up and close your door to drown out the noise. But today, nothing—no scent of sweet breakfast cakes and maple syrup, no cheerful song.
With a feeling of dread, Abby threw on a pair of yoga pants and a t-shirt. As an afterthought, she hurried to the closet and retrieved the messenger bag. She secured it over her head, pulling it across her body. She felt better with it on her instead of it hidden in her room.
With a fresh wave of determination to uncover the truth, she headed for the stairs. As she descended, she heard voices. Though they whispered, the harsh tone conveyed an argument. Part of her wanted to turn back, to avoid any involvement in their disagreement, but her rumbling stomach dictated the movement of her feet. She’d skate by the argument, have breakfast, and spend the afternoon reading journal entries.
Her feet hit the landing, and she halted as she came face to face with them. Her mother’s hair stuck out in dark tufts, and while her grandfather was dressed for the day in pants and a t-shirt, her mother still wore her pajamas.
Her grandfather shook his head, his face flushed, and his German accent thickened with his anger. “I can take care of myself. I can go home. I’m no burden and—”
“Dad, I want to. Please, don’t argue. I don’t want you going over to that empty house all alone. I hate the thought of you being by yourself. Besides, you’re not even supposed to be driving. Your eyesight is terrible.”
Her grandfather pointed a bony finger at her mother. “You think I can’t take care of myself without Gloria. I’m not stupid, and I’m not a degenerate.”
Abby noted the moisture in her mother’s eyes and glanced to the floor. They hadn’t noticed her yet. Hovering at the bottom of the stairwell, she contemplated turning around and sneaking back up the stairs.
“We do want you here.” She began to turn as her mother continued, “And Abby would love to have you around.”
At the sound of her name, Abby’s head snapped up. She swiveled back to face them. They both glanced her way, her mother gesturing to her with her arms.
Too late. She’d been spotted.
She shuffled on her feet as her mother widened her eyes.
“Um, yeah. Of course, I do,” Abby said.
“See!” Her mother pointed. “Why is that so hard to believe? The four of us, it’s all we have. Bill’s parents passed a long time ago. There is no one else,” she said, gesturing toward Abby’s father who appeared from down the hall.
He moved to her mother’s side and placed a supportive hand on the small of her back, a calming presence in the storm of her mother’s frustration.
“We can discuss what you want to do permanently later, but for a couple weeks, you should stay with us,” she said.
“I agree.” Her dad chimed in. “We want you here and not because we think you need taken care of.”
“I can drive just fine,” her grandfather said. “You know, I’ve lived through—”
Her mother held a hand up to stop him. “I know. You’ve lived through worse things. You don’t have to allude to the war any time you feel the need to defend yourself, especially when you never actually talk about your past. It’s probably the one and only time you ever bring it up, which isn’t fair.”
Abby’s ears perked, her discomfort at the conflict around her dissipated with her curiosity as she watched on.
Her grandfather’s gray brows lifted like caterpillars. “You know nothing about my past.”
“And whose fault is that, Dad? You never talked about it. Not with me or Mom. How are we supposed to know how you feel about it all? All we have to gauge your feelings about anything meaningful is your silence.”
Her grandfather’s mouth tightened, the wrinkles compressing like cinched plastic. He harrumphed, saying nothing.
“See? Even now, nothing. You let your anger show for a whole second, and you’ve already reigned it back in. I suppose you won’t let us see your loss this time around either. Doesn’t matter if you spent sixty years with mom or one hundred—”
“Mom!” Abby blurted. Her gaze darted to her grandfather, then back to her mother as her stomach clenched.