Grandma
Your grandmother has always been a peculiar woman. Her garden is full of strange herbs and spices, she knits strange things and her decorations are just downright creepy.
You swear sometimes you can feel their ceramic eyes watching you. It turns out though… she’s a demon
I put down the scroll, my heart tight in my chest. A demon of all things. Had Grandpa known? He couldn’t have, could he? Not when that meant—
I hid the scroll back in the wooden box I’d taken it from, and slid it under her bed. Straightening, my mind full of the implications, I went to the living room where she knit in her rocking chair, swinging hypnotically back and forth.
‘How did you meet Grandpa?’ I asked.
‘I’ve told you,’ she smiled. ‘I was at the cafe in the plaza — the widow of a war hero ran it back then, rest her soul — and he came and sat next to me. “You’re not from around here”, he’d said.’
‘Did Grandpa ask where you were from before he married you?’
She kept her eyes on her knitting needles and rocked, back and forth. ‘He didn’t care.’
‘Grandpa was a priest,’ I reminded her. ‘I think he would’ve cared to know—’
‘To know what?’ She raised her eyes then and met mine, and I shivered at the yawning abyss in her dark irises. Chills ran down my spine. She knew I knew.
‘To know where you’re from.’
She smiled and went back to her knitting. Something long, with too many sleeves. ‘Grandpa knew I was a fugitive. I’d caused some trouble back home and had to flee. That was enough for him. What you don’t know is that he was also a fugitive.’
‘Grandpa was a demon?’ I spluttered. It couldn’t be; Grandpa was a man of the cloth, for crying out loud!
‘No, silly,’ she laughed. ‘Grandpa was an angel.’
***
16 March 2018
