Chapter Twenty-One #4
And I regret it so much. Every hour that’s passed has formed a brick of guilt inside of me, building an ever-growing wall between us.
The worse I feel, the harder it is to reach out.
What if he’s sick? What if he doesn’t respond?
What if those hurtful things I yelled at him are the last words I ever get to say to him?
My first real friend. The only family I have left.
“CQ CQ CQ, Gramps, this is Maisie-girl, come in.” The words are rusty, and now I’m the one clearing my voice over and over. It doesn’t seem to help. An invisible hand grips me by the throat. “CQ CQ CQ, Gramps, please. Come in!”
Static flares, and then his voice carries over the miles between us, tinny and joyous. “Maisie-girl! Oh, Maisie, honey, I’m so glad to hear your voice!”
“Gramps!” I laugh a little as two tears squeeze out of my eyes. “I’m so glad to hear yours, too.”
“I’ve been radioing just about nonstop, honey, but I didn’t hear from you! I was so worried you were still mad, or worse, lying in a ditch somewhere, or eating that fella’s face off, or just something terrible, you don’t even know where an old man’s mind goes to when he’s worried.”
I laugh again, incredibly touched to be greeted with his love and concern instead of the anger I expected. “I’m so sorry, Gramps, for disappearing on you again.”
“You don’t have anything to apologize for, sweetheart. Now, how are you doing?”
“We’ve definitely had some adventures since we last talked, but our faces are still intact.”
“Adventures?” Gramps hoots into the mic. “Tell me all about ’em, sweetheart.”
And, so, I do. I tell him about seeing the ocean for the first time.
I describe the way the sand felt in my toes, grainy and transformative, like if I stood there long enough it’d polish me into a pearl, too.
And he asks how cold was the water, and what color was the froth.
Every detail I give, he wants two more, and our conversation feels like a magician’s trick flag, unfurling square after square, always more to give, until it’s like I’m there all over again, surrounded by the memory once more, sharing it with him.
I’ve never had so much to say in all my life, and I hadn’t even known I needed to say it.
But Gramps knew. And sharing every little observation I’ve had with him makes them all the more precious. He receives each one like a gift, and that, in turn, is a gift to me.
He listens.
“Oh, Maisie. I knew you were brave, honey, but you’ve gone and blown my mind. Standing at the top of the Empire State Building, looking out on all of Zombie New York? Now that’s a life-changing moment!”
I blush furiously. “Yes. It was, um. Pretty amazing.”
Instinctively, Gramps seems to know about that, too. Not the details, of course, but the feelings underpinning these adventures with Everett. How his presence illuminates every single one.
“Do you love him, sweetheart?” The words crackle and pop, fizzing from the radio straight through my insides.
“It’s crazy, but…yes. So much, Gramps. And before you say anything back, he loves me, too. And whatever our future looks like, it’s going to be together.”
The airwaves are silent, but only for a beat.
“That makes me happier than you’ll ever know, Maisie-girl.
” He swallows roughly into the mic. “I never meant to keep you from living. I just wanted to protect you from dying. In all my old-man fearing, I didn’t even realize that they’d become one and the same thing.
I’m so sorry, Maisie-girl. I’d never keep the ocean from you. You deserve every drop of it.”
The tears fall freely down my face. “I love you, Gramps. I don’t want to choose between you and living my life, though. It feels like it’s only just begun.”
“I love you, too, Maisie-girl, so damn much. I don’t know what an old man like me ever did to deserve a second chance at having a family, but I’m thankful for meeting you every day of my life.
Even if our family only exists over this frequency, you’ve given me what I never managed to make for myself, and I want the whole world for you. I just wish it wasn’t full of zombies.”
I laugh into the mic. “Me, too, Gramps. Me, too.” I breathe in and out, letting the air expand my chest in a way it hasn’t managed to since our fight. “Would it be all right if I brought Everett and Chicken to come see you soon?”
“You eat meat now?”
“No, that’s the cat’s name.”
“Well, that’s a choice. But yes, honey. You could bring a damn zombie if it meant I got to see you, and I’d like very much to meet your fella. I promise I won’t even have my guns out. Well. Not all my guns. Maybe just one or two, to make a point.”
I smirk. “Sounds subtle.”
“I’m a man of few words,” Gramps says, a smile curling the edges of his gruff voice. “But many guns.”
I laugh again, letting him hear it. “Maybe we’ll come by in a day or two, after my car gets serviced and we rest a bit. Everett’s catching up with his family here, too, and well…we haven’t decided what’s next.”
“I’ll be here, Maisie-girl. No matter what, I’ll be here for you.”
“You better be,” I say, my throat tightening.
“Ten-four, my sweetheart.”
I run my hand over the shiny green metal of the radio, the first bird that never flew away.
“Ten-four, Gramps.”