Page 60 of A Perfect Disaster

“I think I was wrong. I think she was, too. I think neither of us knew how to ask for help when we really needed it. I think we both got hurt, and instead of healing together, we decided to use those wounds as weapons against each other. Just like we’re doing now.”

“You’re both very proud women.”

“I don’t know who you’re talking about. I’m charming,” I joke weakly.

“You’re a ray of sunshine, yes. But even the sun burns if you get too close.”

I smile despite everything.

“I love her, Grandma,” I confess, without jokes or excuses. “A lot. I love that woman who drives me crazy, who hurts me when she hides behind her walls, who looks at me as if I were a constant threat to her order, and who, even so, makes me the happiest person in the world when she smiles at me. I don’t understand it, but I can’t help feeling it.”

On the other end, my grandmother sighs.

“Oh, my girl.”

“Don’t say it like it’s a nice thing. She’s a walking disaster.”

“Disasters don’t make you change your voice when you say her name.”

“I haven’t changed my voice.”

She bursts out laughing.

“Of course you have, and don’t try to fool your grandmother…” she insists affectionately.

I laugh, defeated by her irrefutable logic.

“Well, your powers should tell me what to do with all this now.”

“First, rest in your cabin. Second, don’t let a position at the company turn your heart into a trench. Compete as yourself, Maika, without silencing her. And, above all, without silencing yourself.”

“That sounds very poetic and very impractical for the corporate world.”

“Practicality has led you out onto this deck to cry with me at this hour. Perhaps the poetic has something important to contribute to this whole mess.”

I look up at the sky, now completely dark. Few stars are visible because of the glare from the ship’s lights, but a few shine brightly against the dark backdrop.

“What if Helen really does hate me?”

“I don’t think she hates you. Sometimes people speak out of fear and are then surprised by the cruelty of their own words.”

I think of Helen’s eyes. Of that moment before the meeting when she stepped in and asked that they let me rest. Of her face when she heard that I, too, acknowledged her work in front of Julianne. I know for certain that indifference doesn’t look at you with that intensity.

“I’m tired of fighting,” I admit.

“Then stop fighting for a moment. Make room for silence.”

“She doesn’t know how to stop fighting. She’s a security officer, Grandma; she’s on high alert all the time.”

“Maybe you’ll have to teach her how to let her guard down.”

The words leave me breathless for a few seconds. My grandmother has always known what to say when I feel as lost as I do now.

“I don’t know if I can,” I whisper.

“Of course you can. But you don’t have to figure it out tonight.”

The headwind picks up again. I hug myself, missing the feel of her arms around me.