Of course, I always thought it was just an exaggeration to say 'my heart turned to stone' or 'my blood ran cold.' How could a human heart stop, shudder, crumble and regain itself? How could your body freeze and return to warm?
Yet all of that happened to me and I thought I would never stand, never breathe, never be able to utter a sound. My eyes wanted to sink from the words they read.
However, there was no retreat, no denial, no shaking of the head that would change the reality before me.
I caught my breath and sorted through the remaining papers in the box, reading, growing more and more shocked. Finally, trembling so badly I was sure I would stumble before I stepped outside, I put all the papers back, closed the box, and got to my feet.
No hurricane, no tornado, no earthquake would rock this family as much as what I carried in my hands.
18
At Long Last, Love
.
I climbed the stairway slowly, each step more
ponderous, heavier than the one before. My body was trying to resist as ill were carrying myself toward fire. I did feel like someone approaching the doorway to hell behind which I would surely find the devil herself. Under my arm, the metal box and its horrible information burned.
The late afternoon sun had fallen behind dark clouds. Shadows appeared to grow right before my eyes as I started down the second floor hallway toward Grandma Olivia's bedroom. My heart thumped with each step. I felt drugged, dazed, moving through the corridors of a nightmare. I wasn't even sure I could speak. I thought that when I opened my mouth, all I would do is hiss.
Just before I reached the bedroom door, it opened and Mrs. Grafton stepped out. At first she didn't see me in the shadows. Then I stepped forward into the dim hall light. My appearance gave her a start and she gasped, putting her hand to her heart.
"Oh, I didn't see you standing there," she said. She paused, blinking rapidly as she studied me. "Are you all right?" "I have to talk to my grandmother," I said in a dreary, dark tone.
"She's going in and out," she said.
"Nevertheless, I have to talk to her," I said. Mrs. Grafton shrugged.
"Suit yourself. I'm going down to get something to eat and then I'll be bringing her dinner."
I nodded and she walked away. I hesitated, my hand frozen in the air between the knob and myself. I was hoping that at any moment this really would prove to be only a nightmare. Perhaps when I touched that doorknob, I would wake with a shudder and find myself in bed.
I didn't.
I turned the knob and entered the bedroom.
Grandma Olivia was propped up somewhat on double pillows. Her hair lay in loose strands around her cheeks. Her mouth, twisted and puffy, was slightly open and her eyes were closed. Crippled, felled by this illness, she would have resembled any one of thousands of elderly people stored in old age infirmaries waiting for the clock to make its final tick. However, her diamond rings and bracelets, her rich satin sheets and her linen nightgown loudly declared that this was still a woman of power and prestige. She could issue orders from beyond the grave.
I stood by the bedside glaring down at her, watching her small bosom rise and fall. Her nose twitched and her lips trembled and parted showing some gray teeth. Her forehead formed folds, as painful ugly thoughts traveled with lightning speed behind her eyes and reverberated in that darkness closed up within her.
I waited and then I put the metal box down on the bed beside her and opened it. Her eyelids fluttered, opened and then closed before opening again. She gazed up at me, her eyes gathering light as she became more and more aware of where she was and who I was. Her mouth opened and she uttered some sound. Surely, I thought, some command.
"I've come to ask you some questions," I said, "and I want you to know right from the start that your illness won't stop me from demanding answers."
Her eyes widened, both with surprise and indignation. She started to protest when I lifted the metal box and held it up high enough for her to see. Her eyes shifted, studied the box and then returned to my face, her face grimacing with new anxiety.
"Yes, Grandma, I found it. Grandpa Samuel talked about it enough to catch my curiosity and I went down to the basement where you had buried all your sins and I found it and what was inside," I said, plucking the first document and holding it for a moment. Then I put the box down and unfolded the document.
She started to shake her head, but I continued.
"I know you are well aware of what is on this and the other papers, but I want you to look at it again. I'm sure you buried everything downstairs so you wouldn't have to look at it again, but now you do."
I thrust the paper out, holding it in front of her. Her eyes moved over it and then she tried to turn away, but I reached out quickly and put my hand on her forehead, easily bringing her head back so she had to look at me and the paper.
"Who did you think you were? Did you think you were God? What gave you the right to do such a thing, to control everyone else's pain and suffering, to determine someone's whole life and the lives of those who loved her and she loved? From where did you get this arrogance of power?"
She began to struggle with speech.