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I hear another voice but this one is closer than the speaker lady. Whoever this one is still sounds distant. He sounds slightly familiar too.
Suddenly, it all comes back to me. I spoke to him before. He was asking questions I didn’t have the answer to, so I shut out most of his words. I figured he wouldn’t answer me when I asked questions so why did I have to answer him.
What questions was I asking him? I don’t recall what they were, but I know he wouldn’t answer them. My head feels weird. Something feels off. I don’t feel so good.
“Well ... is there anyone we can call?” I hear a male voice ask.
I don’t know how long I’ve been out. Hell, I don’t even know what day it is. All I know is I’m sleepy ... no groggy. My body feels like I’ve run some form of marathon or something. Everything hurts. I see that I’m ashy all over. Still, it doesn’t stop me from trying to get the hell out of this bed.
I have someone. She’s someone who needs me. I have a feeling I’m all she has left. It feels like the most depressing thing to say ... or think. Unfortunately, it’s the truth. It’s a hard one I’ve had to come to terms with ever since I discovered my grandmother’s secret.
She’s never been one to hold on to anything. Granma Elle was always one to say, “I can’t hold water. Telling me anything is like running liquid through a sieve.” She’d smile then add. “Me trying to keep things is like a bird lookin’ through a window. I’m just as transparent.”
My lips crook up at the edges thinking of her. It’s the oddest thing. Thinking of that force of nature not walking the earth, protecting me from everything. Even if it was myself.
“We are our own worst enemy, Moonbeam”, she’d tell me.
Granma Elle’s Cuban accent seemed like it was the thickest when she was expressing some truth about her feelings or spreading her wisdom to those she cared about the most.
A woman’s heavy sigh brings me back to the present. Before she speaks, I feel her pity. It’s not the first time someone sounded just like she does. I know this conversation is about me.
“No. No one.” She takes a deep breath before something buzzes. “She’s the last of the Emory line.”
With that, she goes silent. I hear muffled words before the click of retreating steps seems to fill the room. A man with a kind face and dark eyes comes into the room. His skin is a pale tan. There is very little hair on his face. What’s there looks like the result of too much time spent here and not enough time spent at home taking care of himself.
He tries for a smile as he enters but that doesn’t work. It doesn’t reach his eyes. Instead, he plasters on a face I can read like it’s a freshly written manuscript. The tears come unbidden as the woman’s words begin to make perfect sense.
“The last of the line”.
Those were her words. My heart ... the ache in it seeps into my soul. That precious little jewel ... my sunshine in everything, my ray of light is gone. I no longer have her smile to look forward to seeing. Her laughter is lost to me. Those perfect hugs that include my giggles from her soft curls tickling my nose, cheeks ... my ears. Her gentle kisses to my eyes or the Eskimo kisses or the three sniffs to my neck before she proclaimed, “You da best smelling mommy ever! You smell so good I da happiest gurl ever! Wanna see?”
She’d then perform some elaborate, happy dance that was sure to have us both smiling by the end of it.
All of it ... gone. Lost because of yet another slow burn. The slow burn of my grandmother’s brain cells. Ironic that being my choice of words even in my thoughts. I think of the last memory of the three of us and it’s too much. I can’t do it.
My body expels a sound. It’s a sound I never thought would come from me. It emits a tone I didn’t know I could produce. I’ve come so far from where I was. Yet, there it is. The depth of it is clear. At the root of this powerful bellow is something so real. It’s a tangible being in the room.
What has broken free this day, I will either deal with and conquer or it will forever be my burden. This thing that fills the room, the one I will wear like it is a suit of armor, is what will keep me from all that should ... this is sorrow.
I can’t shake it. I don’t know if I even want to move away from it.
How does one get over a loss as great as this? Honestly. No one truly knows, but it doesn’t stop them from trying to offer up their opinion on the subject.
So much lost that day and nowhere near enough gained. Some part of me knows this won’t be the last thing I will lose. As the cloud forms, I feel a sense of calm settle despite my obvious devastation.
Welcome oblivion comes next.
I don’t know how much later or earlier it is when I wake, but everything hurts. It hurts to even flutter my lashes. I listen but no sound. I open my mouth to speak, but nothing releases.
Did I lose my voice?
The question flits away as easily as it came as I work to make out my surroundings. The tell-tale beeps and tones of monitors lets me know I’m in the hospital. I can’t make out much of anything. I instinctively move to reach for the thing that feels like it’s choking me. Even that motion hurts.
How did I get here? What’s happening to me? What’s going on? Why can’t I move? Why does everything hurt, including my heart? What’s going on that I can’t move?
I’m locked into a bed, cuffed, and unable to move. Tears continuously stream down my face as I scream.
Savannah, GA April 11– Tuesday
