Falling Out

I closed the door to Billie’s car and looked at the house in front of me. It wasn’t small but it wasn’t big. It was the perfect size, in my opinion. It was painted this deep gray color with the shutters and door painted vibrant red. It had a little white fence around the entire property and a garden of vibrant flowers that surrounded the front porch.

“You nervous?” Billie asked me. I shook my head. I really wasn’t nervous which shocked me the most. I was really exciting to be meeting Ollie, Billie’s mom, my grandmother.

It didn’t take a lot of convincing to meet her. Last night on the way to the house after Mike’s dinner it was silent. Adrienne and Tre managed to find me in the spare bedroom and convinced me to come out and come eat.

Knock, knock, knock...

“Amber, sweetie, come out. The food is ready.” It was Adrienne.

“Donovan, I got to go. I’ll talk to you tomorrow, okay?”

“Alright. Good luck.” We hung up. I got to my feet and put my phone in my pocket.

“Amber, come on.” Now it was Tre. Good grief, how embarrassing. I walked over to the dresser that had a mirror headboard. I wiped my face off and took a couple of deep breaths to get calm. In mid knock, I opened the door. Adrienne looked worried.

“I’m sorry. I just needed to talk to Donovan.” Beside Adrienne was Billie. He had a rock hard face on and didn’t seem to budge when I came out. He gave me one more look before walking away.

“It’s okay, sweetie.” She wrapped her arm around my waist. My heart began to race when her hands landed directly on my cuts. I gently grabbed her hand and took it off. She didn’t seem to be offended or feel the grooves. Thank goodness.

After the most awkward dinner to date, well for me anyway, we were on our way home. It was silent. The boys were passed out and Adrienne was playing on her phone. I just stared out of the window and Billie just stared at the road. When we pulled up he finally spoke.

“Amber, I need to talk to you.” I didn’t move. Adrienne got out and woke the boys, bringing them inside. We were alone in the car. And it was silent. Again.

“Amber, I’m so-”

“I want to meet your mother.” He was taken aback by that.

“What?” I turned to look at him. He had turned in his seat to face me.

“I want to meet your mother, my grandmother. Tomorrow, if that’s fine with her.” Billie didn’t say anything for a few moments.

“Okay. I’ll call her in the morning.” I got out of the car and went to my room. I took a couple of pills and just stared at the ceiling.

And so here we are. Donovan didn’t seem to care that I would be missing his movie hang out especially when I told him that I would be meeting my grandmother for the first time.

“There’ll be more movie nights to come. And don’t you think I forgot about Aladdin.” He had told me last period. I was so excited that I was meeting my grandmother that I didn’t take as many pills that I did the previous day.

We walked up the front steps that creaked under our feet. It was just Billie and I. The boys had soccer practice and Adrienne thought it would be good bonding time. She’ll be upset when she learns that we didn’t talk on the drive here.

Billie was about to ring the door bell when the door opened. My heart stopped when I saw the lady that answered it. It was my grandmother. She was short with even shorter hair. She had the same green eyes that I shared with my father.

Ollie smiled so big she was showing teeth. She walked over to me and gave me a hug. I didn’t flinch or even stiffen when she wrapped her arms around. I wrapped my arms around the tiny woman just as much.

She pulled away and had tears in her eyes. Happy tears.

“You look just like your mother.” She told me. Her compliment didn’t make me sad like when Tre had told me that. It made me feel nice.

“Thank you.” She grabbed my hand and we walked inside. She brought me to the kitchen and sat me down.

“I made cookies for you. I didn’t know what kind you would like so I baked several different kinds.” She sat a plate of cookies in front of me. I smiled and grabbed a chocolate chip cookie. I took a bit out of it and smiled.

“These are good. Did you use nutmeg?” Ollie smiled across from me.

“Yes, I did. How could you tell?”

“These taste like the kind my mom used to make. Spot on, actually.” Ollie smiled.

“That’s because she got the recipe from me. We would cook a lot together. She was like one of my own. She was over here so much.” Ollie looked at Billie.

“It was funny because your father would get so jealous because every time she came over here she would spend more time with me than him.” Billie playfully rolled his eyes.

“Even when she would stay the night she would stay up longer with Mom and talk to her more than she would me,” Billie added. I grabbed another cookie. Ollie laughed.

“Yes. Yes, she would. Your mother was a gentle soul. She was a blessing to be around and I am so sorry that you lost her at such a young age.” I gave her a small smile, trying to hold back the tears. It was hard to listen to other people talk about my mother, people who knew her before I knew her.

“I know this is an odd question but what do I call you?” I asked after a few minutes of silence. She laughed.

“Honey, you can call me whatever you want.”

“What does Joey and Jakob call you?”

“They call me grandma. But if you don’t feel comfortable yet to call me that, Ollie is perfectly fine.” I shook my head.

“No, I like grandma.” Ollie smiled big.

“I managed to scrounge up some photos of your mother and father when they were together. Do you care to see them?” I nodded. She got up and walked out. I felt Billie staring at me. I looked at him and he indeed was staring at me.

“I think that’s the first time I’ve seen you genuinely smile.” I didn’t say anything. Instead, I grabbed another cookie. Grandma walked in with a box. We sat there for a few hours going through them. She even had some baby pictures of Billie in there which made me laugh. As she showed me more and more pictures of my mom, I couldn’t help but tear up. She was so beautiful and so full of life. When we got to some of the photos with just her and Billie, he started to tear up. I could see that he genuinely missed her, too. By the time we were done looking at the pictures, the cookies were gone.

Grandma wound up convincing us to stay for dinner where she cooked us pork chops and macaroni and cheese. We stayed about an hour after that before heading to the house. I couldn’t help but smile on the way back to the house. It was honestly the closest thing to happiness I have felt in a long, long time.

Too bad it didn’t carry on to the next day.