CHAPTER FIVE
Caitlyn
I wasn’t sure what time it was when I woke, but I knew my alarm hadn’t sounded yet. I had to teach the kids at the arts center starting at seven. Strangely, I woke up feeling giddy and I wasn’t sure why. Then the events of Sunday night came rushing back in quick succession, and I pinpointed the source of the weird butterfly feelings in my stomach.
Ugh… him.
I got out of bed, brushed my teeth, and checked in on Gran before heading out the door. She was still sleeping soundly. Initially, I thought that strange as she was usually up with the sun, but I figured she had stayed up way past her bedtime to watch her “stories” as she called them. I blew her a kiss and closed the door to let her get some more rest.
I jumped in my Beater Kia, as I liked to call it, cause the damn thing barely ran, and headed out. The Youth Center for the Arts, a space where disadvantaged and troubled youth got arts training as therapy, had visual arts—one of the subjects I taught—performing arts, media arts and just about every kind of creative expression possible.
When I arrived, my students were happy to see me. As usual, their smiling faces were enough to motivate me to walk into the room and focus all my attention on them. They always lifted my spirits. Despite the fact that many of them had come from abusive homes where they watched their parents suffer through drug addiction, domestic violence, and incarceration, they really wanted a chance at a new life. Each one of my students had a dark story to tell. Each kept some horrific truth buried within them. Yet they still had hope.
I understood their stories so well and saw in their eyes much of what I saw in my own. I taught the one thing I had forever used to escape the feelings of pain, fear, and sadness clouding my daily existence. Seeing your father shoot your mother was not something you ever forgot. Living without both of them was debilitating at times. If I could give each of my students art as a means of coping, I knew I was doing my part to enrich humanity.
I taught them to use their creativity, color, depth, and perception to escape the constant nagging pain of sorrow and disappointment. I felt like I was giving them a steel armor and sword to protect themselves from what society would continue to deliver and constantly awaken within them. Somehow, they knew I was one of them, and luckily, they listened and heeded my advice. I saw so much progress, not only in their artwork but also in their worldview and self-perception. Touching people like that, giving them skills, was something I adored.
After I finished my shift at the center, I went back home. I wouldn’t need to be at the diner until the dinner shift and Mondays were slow, so I took advantage of the few hours I had between jobs. When I pulled the Beater Kia up the drive, a shiver of dread raced up my spine. Something seemed wrong. I couldn’t pinpoint it, but the air was charged with an electricity that had my heart beating out of my skin. I raced up the walkway, fumbled for my keys, and burst through the door.
“Gran, I’m home!”
The house was deathly silent. I had expected to see her either cooking some light lunch for us in the kitchen or watching her favorite programs. Sometimes, I would find her in our garden, as she was always trying to grow impossible plants in the landscaping.
“What about rutabaga? Do you think that’ll grow, Cat? I love a good roasted rutabaga,” she would muse.
“Gross, Gran.” Fancy cabbage roots, no thanks.
“Don’t turn your nose up to em, Cat, they’re delicious,” she scoffed.
Alas, she was able to get a few sad-looking roots to grow, but they tasted bitter and unappetizing. We both had a good laugh. No, rutabaga didn’t really grow too well.
Today, there was nothing but silence. Horrible, sickening silence. I ran as fast as I could to Gran’s room, only to find her still asleep. I must have stood there for a half hour, just making sure that she was still breathing. Finally, when I was convinced that she was breathing well enough, I gently woke her.
“Hey, Gran, it’s three in the afternoon. Do you want to get up or sleep the day away?” I teased.
Her eyes slowly opened, but she looked sick and disoriented.
“What? I didn’t know it was so late,” she slurred, her voice listless, “must be really tired, I guess.”
She slumped deeper into her pillow and closed her eyes again. For the first time in my life, I saw her as being frail and old. When I noticed that she was having some trouble breathing, I panicked and immediately called 911. I was probably being overly dramatic, but I didn’t want to risk losing her because I hadn’t gotten her the help she needed.
When they came to take her to the hospital, she laughed at me for taking her laziness too seriously. I knew she wasn’t being lazy. There was something wrong.
“It’s nothing. I’m old. Old people sleep in from time to time,” she grumbled, “it’s probably just gas.”
“I hope so. What a story that would be if I called in the calvary because you had a mean ol’ fart brewin’.” We both chuckled, but the effort caused her pain, and fear bubbled in my chest as they loaded her into the back of the ambulance.
“Be careful with her,” I instructed.
They smiled, not in a condescending way exactly, because they knew my sentiment. However, they could do their jobs without me, I was sure.
I jumped into the Beater Kia and followed behind them. Worried the entire twenty-minute drive to the hospital, when I arrived, they didn’t let me see her.
“She’s going in for some tests,” a nurse at the front desk informed me.
I attempted a smile, but my insides were ripping apart with stress and worry. Gran was all I had. I spent almost an hour playing Candy Crush on my old, crappy Samsung, freaked out because the whole “in for tests” thing was taking so much longer than I thought it should. I called Ma’s Diner and told them I would be late when I hadn’t heard anything more than “she’s resting comfortably, but can’t be disturbed.”
Deep in my heart, I knew something bad was happening to my grandmother. Finally, I was able to see her for a few minutes. She only opened her eyes briefly. The doctors were not able to give me any kind of indication that she would be alright and they wouldn’t let me stay with her longer than fifteen minutes. By the time two hours passed sitting in the waiting area, I’d had enough. Either I was going to get some answers, or I needed someone else to come sit with me before I had a mental breakdown.
I called Ma’s back and told them I wasn’t coming in that night.
“Shoulda figured you’d skip town with your pile of cash,” Ma barked.
If I hadn’t been so worried, I would have laughed. “Ma, it wasn’t that much money.”
“Sure was a hell of a lot back in my day,” she snapped.
“We’re not back in your day. In this day and age, it’s just a nice little extra. If you really need me, call, but Gran is in the hospital, and it looks like it might be something bad.”
The old woman softened then. “Take your time. We’re fine here. Hope your Gran perks up. She’s a fighter.”
“Thanks, Ma,” I said as I hung up and called my best friend.
Tammy was like a sister and helped me with everything, and had since we were kids. She was especially good to have around when tragedy struck. We met in Girl Scouts; she lived around the corner and I practically grew up at her house. I learned to braid hair in beautiful African styles, and we both were schooled in how to make the perfect gumbo by her Creole auntie. I knew she would be getting off work soon, so I tried not to panic her by letting her know that Gran was in the hospital.
“Why aren’t you working?” was how she answered the phone, “what’s wrong?”
“Why does there have to be something wrong?” I asked, trying not to sound freaked out.
“Cause you don’t call me during work hours. You call me after for cocktails or to come and chill with you, so this is something. What is it?” She didn’t have much patience at times. She wasn’t rude, just over protective.
“Gran’s in the hospital, and they aren’t saying much. She’s been spaced out all day, and I can’t get her to talk to me. Doctors are doing tests and stuff, but it doesn’t sound good.” I tried to hide the fear in my voice, but she knew. She always knew.
“I’m coming over right now. What hospital?” As soon as I answered, click. The phone went dead.
She got there in record time, panting and sweating when she reached the lobby. I loved her. I knew she adored my grandmother as much as I did. Ambling in a few paces behind her was Ricky, my next-door neighbor. He moved in a few years ago with his husband. While his hubby spent most of the day at his job, Ricky worked from home, which meant he was always available for a cup of tea and lively conversation.
“Hey, Cat, cavalry’s here,” he said with a big hug.
“Alright girl, where are these no-good doctors who can’t tell you shit about Gran? I’ll get them doing their jobs, no good, overpaid…” She was pretty fired up.
I tried to calm her down. “I think they’re doing their best, Tam.”
“Ain’t good enough.” She was ready to march down the hall when Gran’s doctor, Dr. Pushkin, walked into the lobby.
My heart sank. This was gonna be very bad if they’d had to call him in. Mondays were his day off. Dr. Pushkin had been Gran’s doctor for as long as I could remember. She had high blood pressure, and had been diagnosed with breast cancer seven years ago. They caught the cancer in time, cut it out, chemo’d the shit out of it, and it was officially gone nineteen months later.
Gran had gone in for scans every year after that, with nothing showing up. Since she was a stubborn little lady, she stopped the scans last year, saying she was too old to know, good or bad, she just wanted to enjoy her life. Somehow, she had convinced me that was okay. Now, I regretted not tying her up and dragging her ass to the appointments.
A middle-aged man in his late fifties, Dr. Pushkin always struck me as being mousy and small. It seemed strange that he was such an authority on medical matters when he was so light and wispy looking. While I should never judge anyone’s abilities based on their looks, the painter in me just saw him as an odd character. His temperament was always gray, regardless of the circumstance. He delivered news — whether good or bad — in the same monotonic manner. This time, his usually bland expression had a darker, more foreboding, quality. One I knew held the worst of all possible news.
I stood up to greet him, and he breathed a heavy sigh, another sign that danger lurked ahead. He waved for us to sit down as he pulled up a chair next to me.
“Caitlyn,” he started, “please be seated.”
I sat down silently.
He cleared his throat as if he were about to deliver a death sentence.
“I’ve had the chance to look over your grandmother’s preliminary tests, and I’m waiting to hear back from the oncology lab, but based on the MRI and CT results, it looks like your grandmother’s cancer has returned. I believe that it has possibly metastasized into the lungs and brain. She’s showing overall body weakness at the moment, diminished mental capacity, and limited lung function. The scans are indicating that there are several dark masses in both her brain and lungs, as well as other areas of her body. As I said before, nothing is definitive until I am able to see the oncology report.” He paused, waiting for this news to hit me like a freight train to hell.
“Oh,” was all I could muster.
Luckily, Tammy had more of her wits about her than I did.
“So, what are our next steps? Does she need chemo again? And when can we bring her home? I’m sure she would prefer to have her treatments at home.” Tammy had her iPhone out and was ready to tap out notes or anything Dr. Pushkin said that I definitely would never remember.
“I can’t say too much at the moment, only that we will be keeping her overnight and monitoring her progress. I’m sorry, but we can’t release her until I feel she is well enough to be at home on her own. Caitlyn, I know you live with her, but she might need twenty-four-hour care at this point.” His grave expression casted a dark shadow over the entire room.
Ricky sensed what the doctor was saying — he had seen this kind of transition happen with all four of his grandparents. First, they started to show signs of age and illness, then the slow slide into eternity.
“Can she have a home nurse when you’re ready to release her?” he asked kindly, trying to brighten the mood.
“Based on what we’ve seen in the past from patients and the fact that Eula is a breast cancer survivor with possible metathesis in both the lungs and brain, I may be inclined to recommend out-of-home hospice care for her,” he said matter-of-factly — like he was reading ingredients in a recipe.
I gasped for air as tears pressed against my eyes, the corners of my vision growing dim. I stared at Dr. Pushkin’s face, the tiny withered features that constructed his countenance all seemed wizardly to me, like a dark magician who had cast a horrible spell on the one person I loved most on Earth. My heart felt like it was gripped in his claws, pierced by the talons protruding from them as he watched me bleed out on the lobby floor. I could barely breathe, and what felt like hot lava burned down my face. I wanted to be strong but had no strength.
Tammy put her hand on my knee, giving me a sad smile.
“Thank you, Dr. Pushkin,” Tammy said for me, keeping herself calm and polite in contrast to the mess I was beside her. “We appreciate any updates you might be able to give us, as soon as you know. If for some reason, we are at the hospice stage of Ms. Darning’s life, she will have it at home. We won’t be considering any out-of-home care, now or anytime in the future. I hope this is perfectly clear. Is there any way we can see her now?”
“She’s still resting, but I don’t see why you can’t visit with her for a few minutes.”
“Thank you,” I rasped.
“I’ll be in touch with you tomorrow, Caitlyn, to give you my update.” I dreaded anymore news, so I just nodded as Tammy and Ricky shuffled me down the hall toward Gran’s room.
As they guided me down the long corridor, I felt like I weighed a million pounds and my legs somehow had forgotten how to propel me forward. If Tammy or Ricky had let go, I probably would have fallen over. The hospital smelled like alcohol and death. While I had smelled that putrid smell before, it was taunting me now, beckoning me to swallow the bitter pill reality had dispensed. Soon, my Gran would have that same smell, I thought, as we lumbered down the hall to her room, the three of us marching in a thinly veiled parade of death.
When we walked into her hospital room, I saw someone with my Gran’s face, yet she had a frail birdlike body. It was a shock because she hadn’t looked like that just yesterday. The old woman lying on the precipice of death was not my fire-spirited Gran who caused upheaval wherever she went. The woman struggling to breathe with tubes and wires connecting her pale, emaciated body to one machine or another was not the woman who narrated our Friday night horror fests.
How had I not seen the woman lying in that bed dying?
How had I not known she was in this condition?
I guessed I saw only what I wanted to see. I saw Gran the way I had always remembered her. A warrior, a comedian, and the most loving woman on Earth.
The three of us stood there, not knowing what to do. It was like we were standing at her funeral, numbed by shock and rendered speechless.
“I’m going to get another chair,” Ricky said. “You ladies have a seat and wait until Gran wakes up.”
He made quite a racket bringing the chair back in, clanking and banging as he tried to negotiate it and his portly frame through the door. His labored breathing sounded like Darth Vader was redecorating the hospital, but god bless him, his chair battle woke Gran. The minute those beautiful eyes beheld us, her face became bold and spirited again. While she still looked fragile, at least her face was the one I recognized. Her smile was gracious and loving, and it immediately picked up my mood. I knelt by her side so that our faces were level.
“We havin’ a party?” she asked feebly.
“Well, you thought it might be fun to have a sleepover in the hospital, so now it’s a party,” I playfully scolded.
“Hell, no I didn’t,” she grumbled. “Why would I want to stay here? The food and the cable TV suck. I just watch the Latin channel, see if I can pick up some Spanish while they have me in lockdown. I’ve been kidnapped.”
“How you feeling?” Tammy asked.
“Like someone took a baseball bat to my lungs, kiddo,” she answered with a lovely smile.
I was trying not to cry. “Have you been feeling that way for a while?”
“Well, sweets, I’m old, so I just figured my insides and all my various innards were getting a little gunked up. But now that you’ve all come to rescue me from this hellhole, I promise to eat more prunes. I hope you brought the getaway car, Ricky. I wanna take that BMW roadster of yours to town and shake her legs, put her top down.” At least she still sounded feisty.
“I promise that I’ll fire up the roadster and tempt a speeding ticket for your enjoyment,” he said, squeezing her hand. “Today, you gotta brave the liquid diet and the Latino channels. I’ll help you with the Spanish if you want. I can teach you the Puerto Rican dialect, it’s much sexier.”
Gran winked. “Si, senior.”
I cradled her head as I ran my fingers through her thinning hair.
“Sweetie, bring me my cane. I’m ready to get out of here,” her eyes implored me, “you know I go to shit in a hospital. Hospitals freak me out. Saw too many people die in them. They aren’t places for healing, they’re places for torture.”
I thought she might’ve known what was happening. Maybe when you neared the end of your life, you always knew. I would have busted her out of here, but I needed to know what we were up against. I didn’t want to do something stupid that would end her life prematurely.
“Dr. Pushkin said you have to stay here tonight, that’s all.” I was being calm, as I could see that she was becoming agitated, the blips on her machines starting to spike.
“Forget Dr. Pushkin, I’m outta here,” she exclaimed as she sat up and started to get out of bed, sending off a host of screaming alarms. Shit!
“Come on, Gran, get back in bed. You’re being a crazy girl.” I looked at her and our eyes connected.
I was speaking to her soul.
“I’m the batshit, totally messed up variety of crazy right now, but I don’t care. This girl’s gotta motor,” she said, trying to tug herself free of the tubes.
I panicked. My eyes were begging for her to behave. “You just need to spend one night here, that’s all, and we’ll take you home in the morning.”
My heart shattered as she continued to struggle to escape.
“Sweetheart, it smells bad, and the people are morbid. I can’t be in this place anymore. Ricky, get your roadster!”
The alarms were still blaring as a doctor and nurse rushed into the room. The doctor approached Gran.
“Ms. Darning, you have to get back into the bed,” he said in a stern, condescending tone.
“I know my rights. I’m a free woman, I can get the frick outta here if I want.” She was being more obstinate than I’d ever seen her act before.
I realized that she had to be scared. I would be. Her whole world was crashing in around her. I understood why she would want to go home and escape it. I only had thought about how much losing her would hurt me. I never considered how it would feel for her to face her own death. I leaned in and whispered in her ear as the nurse reset her monitors, and the doctor rattled off the reasons why she was being kept at the hospital.
“If you really want to go home now, I’ll go apeshit on this place and get you out.” I smiled and reassured her.
“I would love that.” She seemed dazed and out of focus. “But I’m not feeling up to it just yet. Give me a min...”
She slunk down on the pillow and quietly lost consciousness. It had all happened so fast. I was confused and scared. Her behavior was way out of focus, even for her.
“Is she alright?” I asked.
“She’s very sick,” he said as the nurse continued to check and adjust the drips and cables that hung all about my grandma. “We’ll give her some medication to keep her asleep for the rest of the night. She needs to rest. You can come back in the morning.”
“Are you kicking us out?” Tammy asked, incensed.
“I’m asking you to leave so that Ms. Darning can get some rest. You’re welcome to come back tomorrow during visiting hours.”
Tammy was ready to have at him, but I touched her arm.
“Let’s just let Gran sleep and we’ll bring the roadster back tomorrow.” I gave Ricky a nod.
They understood the code. We would be busting Gran out tomorrow, come hell or high water.
The three of us headed back to my house. They didn’t want to leave me alone, and I was glad. I really couldn’t be alone. They made themselves at home, and I dumped my stuff on the kitchen table as I always did. There, a stack of bills sat on the dining room table. Gran usually left bills and announcements out for me to see when she found them too overwhelming or was unable to pay. They were old hospital bills for procedures she had done last year. She never paid them, and now the hospital was threatening collections.
Ironically, the total sum was almost two thousand dollars. My heart sank. At least my ridiculous tip from the overspendy movie billionaire would cover the unpaid amount. I was hoping to put the tip money away for Parsons. I let the disappointment wash over me. I didn’t want bill collectors beating down my door, so I was happy I had the money to pay, despite my disappointment.
I wasn’t sure what to do next, so I just sat on the couch and stared at the wall. Ricky whipped out his cell phone and ordered pizza. Tammy snooped through our cupboards and found some whiskey.
“Hey, Ricky, have them send over a six-pack of coke with the pizza,” Tammy yelled.
“Damn girl, you’re thirsty,” he whisper-shouted while he waited for the person on the other line.
“It’s not for me, dumbass. I found a whole bottle of Jack, so we’re gonna get our happy on tonight!” She laughed as she waved the mega-sized bottle of Jack Daniels in the air. “What’s Gran doing with a big ol’ bottle of whiskey, Cat?” Tammy’s face was a mix of condemnation and gratitude.
“It’s good for colds,” I answered in a monotone.
She snorted. “Oh, I bet it is. It’ll knock a little lady like Gran clean out.”
“Yeah…two large pepperoni pizzas,” Ricky confirmed.
“Have them add some jalapenos to one of them,” Tammy yelled to Ricky.
“Oooh, no,” Ricky refused, then sighed, “add a small pizza with pepperoni and jalapenos. Yeah, that’s all we need. Okay,” he said as he ended the call.
“I swear you are the least Latino Latin guy I’ve ever known,” Tammy teased. “I thought they put jalapenos in your baby bottles back there in Puerto Rico.”
Ricky shook his head. “No, jalapenos are way too spicy for me. They give me indigestion.” Ricky rubbed his stomach for emphasis.
We moved our party out onto the porch, but I still felt like a zombie. Even after the pizza came and we started drinking the whiskey and coke, I couldn’t shake the feeling of numbness. It helped when we began remembering our lives together, each telling fun stories about Gran. Tammy and I spent most of our lives together, and neither of us had left the neighborhood. While she didn’t live with her parents anymore, she had an apartment nearby. She was going to school to become an engineer and worked at a local engineering firm.
“You remember the day Gran came and got us out of school?” Tammy asked, having already had a few whiskey cokes.
“Oh my god, we thought we were so busted.” I smiled, remembering back to the day that Gran taught us a lesson we never forgot.
Tammy feigned hitting a baseball. “Still can’t believe that ball went through Gran’s bedroom window. And that poor frosted-pimple lamp.”
“I hated that lamp. It was so ugly, like a bulbous mutant from outer space. I swear it was gonna come alive one day and use its bumpy surface to eviscerate me.” It was terrifyingly ugly, but it was Gran’s favorite.
“We just stashed the broken pieces away, and you came over to my house for dinner.”
I remembered feeling like Tammy saved my life that day. “Right, we never told her what we did, then Principal Jaffrey calls us into his office and there she is looking all pissed off.”
Tammy laughed. “She looked like a little red fireball that was about to explode all over us!”
“We didn’t say a word to each other. She drove us to the train station, and I swore she was gonna just put us on a train going anywhere away from her.” I recalled the panicky feeling of thinking she was sending us away forever.
“And I was like ‘what’s wrong Ms. Eula, what are we doing? Does my Momma know you got me?’ I was pissing myself,” Tammy recalled.
I mimicked Gran’s expression. “She was like… ‘oh, she knows.’”
Tammy held her stomach. “I was shitting.”
“Then she got on the train with us and just looked out the window and didn’t say anything. I remember feeling so sick I almost threw up.” I took another big swig of whiskey and coke.
“Didn’t I throw up? I’m pretty sure I did. I went to the bathroom and just puked up my PB&J and chips.” Tammy was starting to slur her words a little.
“The ride was so long I thought we were going to hell,” I added for dramatic effect.
“Wait, was this the time Gran took you all to the theater?” Ricky chimed in, also getting a bit drunk.
“Yup,” Tammy answered, “we ended up at the 72nd Street subway station after, like, hours.”
“She bought us tickets to Cats, and we sat in almost the back row,” I remembered.
“Oh my god,” Tammy chimed in, “then…”
“’MEMORY!’” we said together.
“She’s like balling her little brains out when this raggedy cat comes out and sings this ‘Memory’ song, and we’re all sitting there just snotting ourselves, crying…” Tammy was tearing up.
“After the song, Gran emotionally sucker punched us,” I told Ricky. “She told us she found the lamp we broke and wasn’t angry, but the lamp was her memory. Harold, her husband, had bought the lamp for their shitty little dump of an apartment and it was all he could afford, but it made her feel like she was a queen in a castle.”
“It was from the 1940s, and you know her husband died of this horrible disease, and she felt like he was near her when she turned it on.” Tammy was drunk but trying to sound somber.
“We just couldn’t stop apologizing to her. She eventually told us that we mattered more than the lamp. Living people were more special than things. She had actually planned on cutting us from school long before we broke the lamp, but she decided to use the lamp as an opportunity to teach us about honesty,” I said quietly.
“I’m not shitting you, I haven’t lied since,” Tammy confessed.
“Neither have I.”
“I remember she got us ice cream on the way to our hotel. God, it was so much fun. Even though the play was a little boring, the whole experience was priceless. We got to sleep in a hotel and had this amazing breakfast at a cafe in New York. Hell, who does that?” Tammy’s voice cracked. “Who the hell does that? I don’t know, Cat. I don’t know if I’m gonna be able to say goodbye to her.”
I burst into tears. We hugged, our feelings huge and overwhelming. Although Ricky was crying, he was desperately trying to steer us in another direction.
“Well, I’ve got a story that’ll have you drying up those tears,” Ricky blurted out.
Even though Ricky had moved next door in the later years of our life, he still knew Gran very well since he visited almost every day.
“I remember when Gran set up target practice in the backyard because raccoons were coming around and eating up all of her vegetables. She told me she never planned on killing one, but she liked shooting the targets to scare them. Well, one night last summer, it was the first really hot spell of the year. I completely forgot about Grandma Oakley shootin’ the coons. She hadn’t done it in a while, so it was off my radar. It was like three in the morning, and I heard all this shooting and yelling. I thought there was a murderer outside my door, so I came out wielding my broom like that was going to stop a bullet. I had it over my head ready to swing. The minute I saw Gran, I remembered her damn raccoon scare tactics. When Gran saw me, she screamed bloody murder. I felt terrible for startling her. I apologized for scaring her and she yelled at me, ‘Put some damn clothes on,’ then it hit me. Oh my god. I was naked, completely buck-ass naked.” Ricky’s face had turned a brighter shade of red as he laughed. “She was like, ‘I don’t need to be seeing that!’”
I laughed at the memory. “She told me you were doing a hippy rain dance in your birthday suit.”
“Well, I thought I was going to confront a murderer. I had to defend my zone, what would you have done?” he questioned sarcastically.
“Put my damn pants on,” Tammy answered.
I bobbed my brows at him. “Apparently, you’re hung like a horse.”
“Why, thank you, Gran,” Ricky blew a kiss out to the sky.
As we continued to talk and drink whiskey and coke, then just whiskey until the wee hours, I realized that we were a family. When the inevitably horrible day that may be lurking before us came, and Gran was gone, I hoped I would still have them, or I wouldn’t have anyone left.
“When she’s gone, I’m gonna be an orphan,” I said sadly, completely drunk off my ass.
“Oh, shut up, drama queen, you’re already my mamma’s daughter. What do you think she’s gonna do, abandon you? Please,” Tammy said with a drunken slur, “you’re her little white baby. We’re always gonna be here for you.” She leaned over and put her arm around me.
“And Rafael and I aren’t going anywhere. Your gay brothers are always gonna be right here, should anything happen. And, girl, Rafael can bake some mean casserole. You’re gonna be eatin’ good, I promise,” Ricky said as he jiggled his stomach, also pretty inebriated.
“I love you guys,” I said, my face contorted into an ugly cry.
I was so hazy and sleepy that all I wanted to do was go to bed. Tammy offered to stay the night, but I told her I was fine. I was too drunk to be good company and drunk enough to fall asleep, which I did the moment they left. I actually fell asleep on the couch, I didn’t want to be in my room.
I was startled to see Gran walk through the door that night. She seemed younger than I remembered her looking and had an angelic aura around her. My heart pounded. I thought I was awake, but wasn’t sure. My unconscious brain was having a hard time deciding what I was doing. But Gran definitely knew why she was there with me in that moment. She looked more healthy and robust than I’d ever seen her and was wearing a cheery smile.
“What are you doing sleeping on the couch, pumpkin? That can’t be good for your back.”
“I’m too drunk to move, Gran,” I confessed.
“Ah, found my whiskey, did you? Hope you left me some. I like a little nightcap from time to time,” she said as she danced around a little.
“Sorry, Gran. We’re probably gonna have to restock.”
“No worries, bet I’ll come home with some sweet pain meds, that Vicodin is like a trip to outer space. I really like that stuff, hope I get a lot of it.” she rubbed her hands together excitedly.
“Gran!” I scolded.
“Whatever, I’m old, the highs are pharmaceutical at this stage. Hurry up and get off the couch. You have to get dressed before he gets here.” She started pushing and tugging at me to get up.
“Who? What?” I was groggy and still pretty drunk and sleepy.
“Prince Charming will be here any minute, silly. Get off the couch so we can get you ready. You don’t want to meet him looking like shit, do you?” She had a fierce look of determination in her eyes.
She got me seated upright on the couch, then put her arms behind her back and whipped out the most gorgeous gown I’d ever seen. It was bright red with flecks of gold and diamond shimmer. The back would plunge to my tailbone, and the front was gorgeously contoured.
“Where did you get this dress?”
“From behind my back.” The sarcasm was real. “Now quickly, put it on.”
As soon as I touched the luscious fabric, the dress was on my body.
“Okay, this is definitely a dream.” I looked at her with a playfully discerning eye.
She looked back at me like I was crazy. “Of course, it’s a dream. What woman doesn’t dream of having a good man in her life?”
“Me, Gran. I never really dreamed of having anyone,” I sadly shared.
Her glance was scolding. “I know. That’s why I’m here. Now let’s get a look at you.”
The dress looked spectacular on me. It had a plunging neckline and swept the floor gracefully when I walked. I twirled, and the gown flowed and danced about me.
“I look gorgeous,” I said in amazement.
“Oh, hell, you didn’t need a dress to tell you that. Now, come here and sit down,” Gran said as she motioned for me to sit at the small vanity table in the foyer.
I sat, and she started to do my hair. Without a curling iron or any hair accessories, she whipped my hair into a lavishly regal style using only her fingers.
“Seriously, Gran, what’s with the bibbidi-bobbidi-boo?”
“This is some fun shit! Who knew.” She seemed giddy as she twirled the long strands of hair into an elaborate design.
“Yeah, who knew you were a fairy all this time? What the hell is happening?”
She stopped, her expression angelic and peaceful.
“Well, it’s not hell, that’s for sure. Maybe it’s heaven or a slice of it, I guess,” she mused.
I panicked and my heart began to race with fear. “Are you dead?”
“Not yet, dear,” she cooed.
“Oh my god.” I knew I wasn’t going to be able to handle any of this.
“Now listen carefully. I want you to find love. It has to be true love, like the kind of love I had for your grandfather. No bullshit. No assholes. I loved that crazy old fucker until the day he died in my arms. Find that kind of love.”
“Gran—”
She shushed me. “When you do find it, every morning you wake up, look at him. Make sure, despite his flaws and the things that make him human, there’s still a glow in your heart for him. There should always be a spark of fire between you. If you ever wake up, and that spark is gone and the fire is dead, you will know you didn’t find the right man. If you wake up and still feel that burning ember within you, no matter what happens and no matter how bad things have gotten, you will know he’s a man worth saving and worth staying in love with.”
“I—”
She shushed me again. “I also want you to follow your dreams and never give up no matter how old you get before you get there. Don’t ever stop before you feel like your wishes, hopes, and dreams for yourself have been fulfilled.”
“How—”
She lifted a finger, her raised eyebrow shushing this time. “When I’m gone, and no longer with you, I promise you I will haunt you like a ghost. I’ll whoop at you every once in awhile, so you’ll remember that I love you. They’ll be times when you’ll feel me near, and they’ll be times when I’ll feel far away. Don’t be afraid of my death. I’m looking forward to my next adventure because I’ll finally get to be with my own beautiful daughter who I lost so long ago.”
Tears burned my eyes and she pressed a tissue in my hands.
“You’re so much like her, and I have been so lucky to raise you, but it’s time for me to be with her now. I look forward to sitting with her and catching up on everything that’s happened Earth-side. I look forward to telling her all about you and how amazing you are. My love is a never-ending circle, Caitlyn. You’ll have to understand that I love you and move on with your life. I want you to start living.”
No amount of tissues could stanch the flow by the time she was finished.
She kissed my forehead and disappeared. I looked around the room, nervously searching for her. As I searched, I realized I wasn’t in our home anymore. I walked into a candlelit room with breezy white curtains that billowed from floor-length windows. Standing before me, silhouetted in shadows cast by the candlelight at the other end of the massive ballroom, was a man. KP. He wore an exquisite tuxedo.
I laughed and said to myself, “Are you serious, Gran? This guy?”
He approached me, laughing as well. “Yeah, this guy.” He swept me off my feet and into his arms.
He slowly twirled us around, set me down, and bowed. I wanted to sneer at him and scoff, but it was a dream, so I might as well enjoy it as Gran suggested. I reached out my arms and let him lead me across the floor. We started dancing like Belle and the Beast did in the Disney movie, which must have been Gran’s doing because she loved that movie. I didn’t.
Our dance quickly became more seductive as he brought me in closer. Our bodies melted into one another’s, and we moved and gyrated with each other. We weren’t being lewd, but we weren’t being subtle either. Now, I was desperately hoping that Gran wasn’t watching. Everything we did was foreplay. The way our bodies oozed over and teasingly moved against the other’s was titillating my nerves, creating searing tension.
As soon as the music ended, KP leaned in for a kiss. It was warm and seductive. The pull to his embrace, deep and magnetic. He offered his hand once again and walked me out of the ballroom and into a bedroom down the hall. I tried not to snicker. But dream KP seemed very serious and extremely intent on getting me into that room, which was opulent and alluring. Once inside, he turned me around and kissed the back of my neck as he slowly unzipped my beautiful gown. As it dripped down my shoulders, he sprinkled kisses from the nape of my neck to my shoulder blades, sucking and nibbling as he went, making me squirm. He then slipped my dress down to my waist and used his fingers and the palms of his hands to trace the landscape of my back.
His fingers nimbly danced along the edges of my bra strap.
“May I?” he whispered in my ear, being a gentleman.
“Mmm,” was all that came out, as I was shockingly bad at this kind of seduction.
Even the dream me was a dork in the bedroom, but dream KP didn’t seem to care as he deftly removed my bra and tossed it to the floor. He then shifted me so that I was facing him as he looked at my body. I blushed and tried to push him away.
“Don’t,” he commanded, “you’re beautiful.”
I giggled nervously. “I just, this is so weird.”
“Is this weird?” he asked as he kissed my lips gently.
“No,” I sighed.
“Or this?” he said as he kissed my cheek softly.
I shivered. “Um, pretty G-rated.”
“Oh?” He leaned in and took one of my aching nipples into his mouth and tugged slightly with his teeth.
I moaned, no words necessary.
He then moved to the other nipple as he wriggled me out of the dress, hooking his fingers into my panties as he slid the whole garment off. Within seconds, I was completely bared to him, naked and vulnerable.
“I never do this,” I confessed.
“You aren’t doing it, I am,” he cooed as he kissed his way down to my stomach, sending lightning bolts of electricity through my whole body.
“Ahhhh,” I whimpered.
He continued down to my legs and inner thighs, spreading them carefully so that I was completely exposed to him. He then stood and carried me to the bed, laying me down gently upon it.
“Tell me this isn’t happening!” I rasped.
“It’s not happening,” he answered as he tossed off his tuxedo jacket and unbuttoned his shirt, “so enjoy it.”
He had a good point. I let myself relax a little. As soon as he was undressed, he lay beside me, kissing me again. I opened my mouth, and his tongue danced with mine. He tasted sweet and felt strong and commanding as he explored places where only his kisses had been. His soft palms grazed over my breasts, flooding me with heat and prickling sensations. His hand drifted slowly down to the place that was aching for his touch. I pushed myself up to meet his wandering fingers, but he remained slow and methodical.
“So eager.”
“It’s a dream, we can get to the good stuff without penalty,” I panted, arching into his hand.
“But this is the good stuff,” he said as his fingers traced patterns over my skin, igniting a fire within me.
“Ahhhh.” I was back to guttural sounds again.
He smiled. “Is this what you want?” he asked as his finger slowly slipped lower and touched the folds of my neglected lady parts.
I closed my eyes. “Better.”
“How about this?” he asked playfully as he parted my legs and slipped down between them.
A rough sizzle of electricity traveled across my skin as he tasted me. His hot tongue poured over my delicate folds, gently lapping between them as rockets of sensations flew about me recklessly. He started a gentle circular motion that had my insides in knots, making me want to explode. It both tickled and burned, making me ache all over for more. When his tongue thrust inside of me, wet and hard, I gasped and shattered.
“Oh my god!” I cried as his tongue continued to lap up my ecstasy.
He stopped for a moment as I cooled down a little.
“I like being called a god,” he teased.
“You can’t do that with your tongue,” I scolded playfully.
There was a devil under his expression. “Watch. Feel.” He accepted my challenge, bathing my pussy with his mouth.
When I couldn’t take it anymore, I grabbed his hair and begged. “Please!”
“Please?” He flashed me another sinister sneer. “Please what?”
I lifted my hips, reaching for him. “I need you inside of me.”
“I’ll be there in due time, my dear,” he said as he replaced his tongue with his agile fingers.
He played with the soft tufts of curls above my pussy, making me arch into his gentle assault. As his fingers swirled around me, his lips returned to my nipples that had been longing for him again. As his mouth caressed and tugged, his fingers dove downwards and teased my clit with their expert skill. His fingers teased and circled my sensitive nub, escalating my ecstasy as his mouth made music on my body. Without warning, he inserted a finger inside of me and sent bolts of lightning through my mind, body, and soul.
As his finger coursed in and out of me, I kissed his mouth, his strong shoulders, and his soft neck. My hot kisses sought out his chest and found his nipples. I lapped and tugged them with my teeth until he cursed, his fingers driving into me harder as his breath heaved in and out of his lungs.
“I think it’s time,” he panted as he slid off his dress pants and briefs, positioned himself above me, and spread my legs farther apart.
My body shivered with need, and I could feel the strength of his body and the thickness of his cock as he ran it up my wet slit. His dick was hard and commanding as it slammed into my pussy, making me cry out in surprise and ecstasy.
“Are you okay?”
I clung to him, lifting my hips, wanting more. “Please.”
“Good.” In one deep thrust, he was fully seated, deep within me.
I wailed as my body stretched and adapted to his size, and the exquisite feeling of his fullness. He kissed me, his weight pressing me into the mattress, our mouths expressing our desire for each other as he started a slow rhythm, moving in and out of my body with a torturous deliberateness that teased and taunted my already ravaged nerves. I clawed at his back, trying to get him to increase his pace, and he understood my desire as his moans punctuated his same heady need.
“You’re so beautiful,” he said as he picked up speed, lifting my legs until they were over his shoulders, changing the angle of penetration. As he dove into me deeper and harder, I shattered and came, quivering and writhing on him. I quaked with the power of my climax and my pussy clenched with delight, sending him to his release, which was hot and glorious. We both lay with one another, basking in the glow of our love.
He kissed the tip of my nose. “I think I love you.”
I snuggled closer. “You better.”
As I closed my eyes, a loud chiming sound startled me. I tried to shake off the irritating noise, but it was incessant. Slowly, my heavy eyelids cracked open and morning light filtered in. Morning? My brain tried to unscramble the sensations assaulting me. I felt the wetness of my climax coating my inner thighs and warm memories of my night with the mysterious billionaire flooded back to me. I then stopped cold as I bolted upright on the couch.
I looked around the room, flustered, bedraggled, and panting from what I realized only at that moment had only been a dream. I actually climaxed in my sleep. I chided myself for not making finding a boyfriend more of a priority. Because maybe if I had one, I wouldn’t be dreaming of having sex, I would actually be having it. I picked up my phone and silenced the alarm. I was hungover and desperately needed water, aspirin, greasy eggs, hashbrowns, and toast. Getting those things was more important than unraveling the tangle my brain was in.
Unable to fully commit to getting up off the couch, I laid there for a while and relived the dream. While it was embarrassing to have such a vivid fantasy about someone I hardly knew and mostly despised, I laughed at myself for how silly it all was. I’d dreamed of being a princess ravaged by a prince, but more horrible was the fact that the prince was him!