Fell In Love In Stages // a matty healy fanfic

Nana

-Trinity's POV-

Once the summer cools, and the rains lighten in the north west, I spend most of the day lying in bed, immersed in the miserably uninteresting fictional world of Geoffrey Chaucer, while Matty sat at the desk, unravelling the secrets of differential equations or something. We'd spent days toiling away in my room preparing for finals. Me more than Matty, since he still had another year left and he's more concerned with music, anyway.
Although we tried to ration our smoke breaks amid cups of tea, we were dangerously low on our supply.
"Let's go smoke," he says
"Matty I can't. You know I have to study."
"Oh come on. It's a beautiful autumn day and we're wasting it inside!"
"I'm only about a quarter way through, I really can't" I plead.
"T," he says faux-condescending, "What's that saying? All work and no play makes jack a little fucked in the head or somethin'? Play is an integral part of the human experience."
"And besides," he says, "there's someone I want you to meet."
I was taken wholly by surprise. "Meet? Who?"
"It's a surprise," he smirks, already reaching for his parka.
I look down at the pyjamas I was wearing. "Wait, is this decent for where we're going?"
He studied me from head to toe and said, "Decent? You are utterly indecent- no one should look so tempting, it's not fair"
"Be serious" I rolled my eyes. "I can change-"
He sighed, shaking his head. "You are so absurd." He pressed his warm lips delicately to mine and the room spun. His scent made it impossible to think.

We drove in his car out of the main part of town, the road winding northward, the houses flashing past us growing further apart, getting bigger. It was a foggy autumn day and we'd been driving for about 20 minutes and all through-out, we'd been eagerly discussing our plans for the future- leaving out one key detail of course. Where I'm off to next year. He never brought it up and neither did I. I suppose neither one of us was ready to have the uncomfortable conversation, choosing to instead, live in the present.
I was trying to decide whether to ask where we were going or be patient, when he turned abruptly onto an unpaved road. It was unmarked, barely visible among the ferns. Up ahead, was a giant newly painted gate, bigger than any I've ever seen. The driveway twisted, serpent-like, around ancient trees. As we drove up the hill, there was some thinning of the woods, and we were suddenly in a small meadow. Or was it actually a lawn? The fog that had settled in town hadn't reached us here. The meadow was sunny and the sky was blue.
I don't know what I had expected, but it definitely wasn't this. The manor was timeless, graceful and probably a hundred years old. It was painted a soft, faded white, two stories tall and well proportioned.  I could hear the river close by, hidden in the obscurity of the forest.
"Wow."
"You like it?" He smiled.
"Where are we?"
He pulled me by the tails of my jacket and led us through the door.
The inside was even more surprising, grander than the exterior. It was very bright, very open, and very large. The walls were decked with fancy gold trimmed wallpaper, the floral printed furniture were regal, the hall we were standing in was the size of several rooms. The back, south-facing wall had long French windows, and beyond, the lawn stretched bare to the wide river.A massive curving staircase dominated the west side of the room. The walls, the high-beamed ceiling and the thick carpets were all varying shades of sage green, contrasted by the chocolate brown wooden floors. As I stood there in awe, Matty calls out to me from one of the corridors. I follow the sound of his voice and it appears to be coming from one of the rooms. The room I entered was large and spacious, with a heavy chest-of-drawers and wooden bed on one side, and on the other, I see him kneeling over a bed upon which an elderly woman laid, propped on a pillow.
"Trinity, this is the coolest person I know, my nana, Annie" he says with the widest grin.
She had the same pale face and beautiful features as he did. Something about her high cheekbones, short black hair and kind eyes reminded me of my own grandmother.
Her skin was soft and withered, bent into a thousand tiny creases that clung gently to the bone beneath.
Our mouth -hers a wizened pucker- spread into a smile at the same time. Apparently, she hadn't been expecting to see me either.
"Nana, this is Trinity" Matty breaks the short silence as I make the walk towards them.
"It's very nice to finally meet you" she smiles, her voice a soft whisper.
"Hi nana, glad to meet you too" I say sincerely.
"I love carrots" she smiles and Matty breaks out in a laugh. I glanced over at Matty trying to understand the joke but only then did I remember the pattern on my pants. I looked down mortified at my pyjamas, my cheeks turning red. Cartoon carrots doing day-to-day activities sprawled across my bottoms.
"Matty." I shot him a look. "
Why didn't you tell me we were coming here? I would've changed into something more appropriate"
"Oh T, that's plenty appropriate. My nana loves carrots" he chuckles

After a game of bluff over honey ginger tea- which Matty so politely offered to make- and biscuits, we sat around Nana's bed on the thick carpeted floors.
"Matty, my love," she wheezes, "How's mum and dad, darling?"
I see a flicker of sadness in his eyes which he quickly dismisses and reassures her that things at home are fine; that his mothers illness was at bay and his father was very supportive of her. I sneak glances at him as he talks to her about his band, his plans, his dreams. I saw through her eyes, a happy child in front of me, full of hope and wonder.
We're interrupted by a knock on the door and in comes the housekeeper followed by another young man.
"Thank you for coming, doctor." Matty says.
The doctor seemed young, yet carried the formal somber manners of a much older man.
"Trinity and I are going on a walk, nana. We'll be back very soon" says Matty, kissing her forehead gently.

Outside, the pebbles crunch beneath our feet. We walk in silence. An air of sadness hung above us. I wanted to ask about his nana, I wanted to console and comfort him. But I knew better. I saw a glimpse of myself in his eyes.
I recognised the illness immediately. The irregular beeping of the machines, the tubes sticking out of her, something about her fingers and wrists that looked so fragile. She reminded me so much of my mother in her last days. I wouldn't wish that kind of pain on my worst enemies, let alone the love of my life.

"Do you know what I'd like to do?" We stop beside a lake. He picks up a stone, smooth and curved, and walks to the waters edge. I have no idea what he's attempting, until he bends and flings his arm back and then forward. The stone skips once and sinks. He laughs, I laugh, and I suddenly remember my father doing the same, at a river back in Melbourne, when I was very young and he hadn't left us yet.
"You try," he shouts.
And I hesitate. My father hadn't stayed long enough to teach me.
But he is suddenly boisterous and happy, and I cannot let him down. He helps me pick a stone and shows me how to squat low.
"You're a terrible teacher" I say and he laughs.
Our stones sink one after another. Our greatest achievement is two skips, maybe three.
"This," he declares, "must be the oldest game in the world."
"Along with," I say, hide-and-seek.
For these moments, we are children. I feel I haven't been a child in a long time.
When we finish; after exhausting all the suitably shaped stones around us, we stand and watch the water, calm like glass.
"Nana is sick" he finally says, his voice at odds with the happy smiling face I'd seen just moments ago.
"I'm sorry" I murmur, a lump in my throat forming now.
"It's been three years since the sickness took over" he whispers.
I knew from personal experience that no amount of words could bring comfort. Only time. Not to take away the pain, but to soften its sharp edges, like the lake polishing these stones we stood upon.
So instead, I just held his hand and said nothing, and he placed his head on my shoulder and I wound my arms around him. We stood there for ages, listening to our heart beats sync.
"We should head back" he says and I kiss him for support before walking towards the house.