“Everyone talks about Grandma like she’s got a big secret,” Mikhail said from the backseat. “I just wish someone would tell me what it is.”
He asked this every Sunday afternoon. Or had for the past six months, at least. And no one budged.
His mom’s hand hovered over the center controls before drifting back to the steering wheel. He could sense an avoidance coming.
“What an odd thing to say about your grandmother. Look, we’re almost there!”
He hated the implication, as if by pointing out the truth, he somehow didn’t love his grandma. He did. He really did.
And she even looked like a grandma should. Curly white hair, always bustling about and offering fresh-baked cookies.
But there was something odd about her. First off, who really even did that? It was too storybook perfect. Second, peanut butter cookies don’t normally cure greenstick fractures.
He’d just learned about them in school – six months ago, when his question barrage began. His cousin Avril’s arm had been unmistakable. And totally gross, nothing like his science textbook. But the concern was over him, somehow, adults saying he was making up stories when they thought he couldn’t hear.
Not having answers was just frustrating.
Minutes later, his mom was fussing in the kitchen with his aunts, and that way lay perfumed cheek kisses that smeared lipstick and made him want to gag. The backyard was best to avoid it, but that’s where the babies were. He wandered into the living room with the other kids his age instead.
Avril didn’t even look up from her phone. Olive looked bored, eyes closed and vigorously rocking the ancient, fuzzy recliner so fast its springs squeaked. And Nick sat on the floor, idly flipping through an ancient coffee table book.
“An actual book?” That wasn’t much like his cousin, an avid gamer.
An exaggerated scowl. “Mom took my phone away.”
“When’s that thing even from? The fifties or something?”
“1973,” Avril answered, still studying her phone but showing signs of life. “It’s been here forever. I checked years ago.”
“Pictures are all fuzzy,” Nick grumbled. “I know technology sucked back then, but still.”
“It’s like being an archeologist,” Mikhail suggested. “Like Indians Jones.”
“Whatever…What is this, an oak tree?” Nick gestured to the open page.
Mikhail looked, and his jaw dropped.
The book was glowing. Golden light leaked from between its pages, and sparkles that reminded him of tiny fireflies glittered in the air.
“I – uh – I don’t know,” he managed around a dry tongue and numb lips. He stumbled to the couch and traced the familiar embroidery, seeking solace.
None of his cousins even noticed.
But from the doorway across the room, a pair of piercing blue eyes watched him from underneath a mop of curly white hair.
***
Thanks for the prompt trade, Leigh Kimmel! Find more at More Odds Than Ends.
