paper rings (l.h.)

1

It felt as if I had spent nearly the entire night outside staring at the star-spotted sky, making out shapes in the constellations and watching as large, gray clouds moved with the breeze that shook the trees. My Grandma didn't know I snuck out after she had been put to bed, sneaking through the house to find my way back to where I spent most of my day: on that same porch, my bum on the railing with my back pressed against the post. There wasn't this many stars in the sky back where I was from, but there weren't many trees around, either. I thought I would hate transitioning from city life to rural, but it's quite the opposite.

I rubbed my eyes as my bare feet walk across the hardwood floors, perhaps older than my Grandmother herself. The house seemed hollow without the life that ran about it growing up. My Grandpa died before I was old enough to know who he was, and my Grandma spent the majority of her retired life alone — besides the usual church gatherings that took place in her living room, or the fact that my Aunts and Uncles were still around to help care for her. But they moved on, and soon she became too fragile to be able to drive on her own. She was alone now, nearly 95, and my Uncle was too busy with his new nursing career to be able to keep an eye on her as much as he used to.

That's where I came in. I was broke and newly single, still madly in love with an ex-boyfriend who dumped me for my best friend months ago. I was over it now, much more over it than I would have been had I stayed back home. My parents weren't exactly going to miss me crashing on their couch since I couldn't seem to save up enough to move on my own. My Grandma offered to shelter me if I moved in and helped her out. I hesitantly obliged, and suddenly I was 22 with a part-time job at the local bookstore, as well as a full-time caregiver for my Grandma. I didn't mind it, either, my Grandma was happy to finally have some help and I was happy to be away from my parents.

It was nearly seven AM, the old rooster in the coup behind our house croaking so loud that I nearly had a panic attack my first few days here. I was used to it now, used to the mornings alone that I spent in silence, cooking for two. I gathered eggs from the hens, cracked them into the skillet as I tried to cover a yawn with my hand.

I didn't mind helping out around the house, my Grandma stayed to herself most of the time so she felt more like a roommate than anything. Our paths only crossed when it was time for a meal, or if she needed help trying to lift a box or two. I cooked, swept, vacuumed, and mopped once a week. Gathered the eggs, the vegetables from her garden. She paid the neighborhood kids to mow her lawn for her. I always made them lemonade to cool off with afterwards.

The bacon sizzled in the pan as I watched the sun rise from over the horizon, the orange sky turning pink, then blue. The clouds from the evening before were long gone. It was perhaps the third week without rain, the grass was turning brown. I was afraid the leaves would dry out on their own and fly away before it even turned September.

It wasn't half as lonely as I thought it'd be, either, now that my only companion is locked away in her room most hours of the day.  I got comfortable with silence, with only myself as company. I learned to enjoy reading, bike rides to work and the farmer's market. I made friends with the critters that crawled in my path, ones I had never seen in the city before. I liked the lack of police sirens and the way that the trees shaded the yard on even the hottest days, and how they rustled in the breeze. I believe I would not have loved the earth as much as I do now had I not been so connected to it here. I wasn't sad or upset about what had happened back home. I was glad it happened, it brought me peace.

"Good morning, Grandma," I say as I knock on her bedroom door, listening to it creak open as my knuckle taps against it. She cracks the door when she is awake, closes it while she is sleeping. Almost immediately I watch as her sleepy smile greets me from where she sits at her desk. "Are you hungry?"