The rain was coming down sideways when I pulled into Grandma’s driveway at six-thirty that Tuesday morning.
She was already standing on the front porch.
Seventy-nine years old, in a navy blue raincoat buttoned all the way up to her chin, holding an umbrella in one hand and an old brown handbag in the other. Tucked under her arm was a paper envelope. A big yellow one, the kind people used to mail important documents in before everything went online.
I jumped out of the car to help her down the steps. She waved me off.
“I’ve been walking down these steps since 1968, Daniel,” she said. “I think I can manage.”
That’s my grandmother. Evelyn Walker. She still lives alone in the little brick house my grandfather built with his own hands the year they got married. She still bakes her own bread every Saturday morning. She still calls me every single Sunday at four o’clock to remind me to check the oil in my car, even though I’m twenty-seven years old and have checked my own oil for ten years.
When she asks for a favor, I usually don’t ask questions.
She’d called me the night before at almost eleven o’clock. That alone was strange. Grandma goes to bed at nine-thirty. She has for as long as I can remember.
“Daniel, I need you to drive me somewhere in the morning.”
“Sure, Grandma. Where?”
“St. Andrew’s Medical Center. Over in Millbrook.”
I sat up in bed. My wife Sarah stirred beside me.
“The hospital? Grandma, are you okay? Are you sick?”
“I’m fine, sweetheart.”
“Then why do you need to go to the hospital?”
There was a long pause on the line. I could hear her breathing. I could hear the old clock on her kitchen wall ticking.
“I need to see someone,” she said finally. “Before eight o’clock. Can you pick me up at six-thirty?”
“Who do you need to see?”
“Six-thirty, Daniel. Please.”
And she hung up.
I lay awake for a long time after that. Sarah asked me what was wrong, and I told her I didn’t know. She put her hand on her belly, the way she’d started doing ever since she hit five months, and said, “Maybe she’s visiting an old friend.”
“At seven in the morning? Twenty-eight miles away?”
“Maybe it’s a very good friend.”
Now Grandma climbed into the passenger seat, shook the rain off her umbrella, and set the yellow envelope carefully on her lap. She folded both hands on top of it. Like she was protecting it.
“Buckle up,” I said.
“I know how a seatbelt works, Daniel.”
I pulled out of the driveway. The windshield wipers thumped back and forth. The streetlights were still on. The whole world was gray and wet and half asleep.
I glanced over at the envelope.
There was no address on it. No name. Just a coffee ring stain in one corner, and the edges worn soft, like it had been opened and closed a thousand times.
“What’s in the envelope, Grandma?”
She didn’t answer.
She just looked out the window at the rain.
Ethan Blake is a skilled Creative Content Specialist with a talent for crafting engaging and thought-provoking narratives. With a strong background in storytelling and digital content creation, Ethan brings a unique perspective to his role at TheArchivists, where he curates and produces captivating content for a global audience.
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