Greyscale [✓]

Chapter 21

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

There was silence and then Hannah laughed; a sound that was so throaty and false that it almost scared them. "You're actually going to tell me about him? After wanting to know for eighteen years?"

Her laughter became hysterical until tears dripped down her cheeks. She didn't know why she was feeling so emotional these days but it was frustrating her. She barely ever cried and here she was, wailing like a baby.

Aunt Sara's expression melted, pity shining from her coal eyes. "I'm so sorry, darling. I thought it would be best for you not to know because truthfully there isn't much to say."

"But you do deserve to know," her Uncle Jay added, nodding along with his wife as he pulled his chair closer to the teenagers.

Once Hannah had controlled herself and wiped her eyes, she motioned at them to continue. "So... how much of an asshole was he?"

Cameron's parents looked at each others with identical unsure expressions. "Well... he wasn't."

The food long forgotten, Cameron swore loudly. "What the fuck?!"

His father shushed him and continued. "Okay, so, they met in university. I think they were in the same business class or something. He was really smart but also worked really hard for what he wanted to achieve because unlike us, he didn't grow up with money. He was studying computer engineering or something like that and-"

Hannah gasped, a memory of her mother shouting at her as a child to stay away from her computer. "Is that why she hated me being on the computer? I always thought it was because she didn't like me near her stuff."

Sara nodded. "Yeah, although you look like Jasmine, you most definitely take after Chris in every other aspect. You're a mini version of him from what I remember."

"Chris." Hannah whispered the name to herself, feeling the way it fit on her tongue. It was such a regular, standard name.

"Chris Davis," her uncle confirmed.

Cameron scrunched his nose, running his fingers through his pin straight hair. "That's so... white. He's English? That's weird, I've never thought of you as half something else before. I always think of you as being just as Indian as me."

Hannah felt like her mind was reeling. They had barely told her anything and it was already too much. Now she had a name and a race to go on. "I don't really think of myself as Indian though," she murmered, more to herself than to Cam. "I don't feel connected to it. I don't feel white either though, I feel like neither."

"You're both, honey," her aunt said with a sad smile as she squeezed her nieces hand reassuringly.

"Go on."

"Chris was a good guy, kinda nerdy but sweet talking and pretty funny. He was a charmer, that was for sure. And he charmed Jasmine right off her feet," Sara continued, smiling to herself as she remembered her days in university with them. Sara and Jasmine had been in one of the same classes and from there, their friendship had grown. And ever since she met Jasmines brother, Jay, she had become one of the family.

"You know what your grandfather is like, don't you," Uncle Jay continued, his foot absent-mindedly tapping away at the wooden floor as he recited all he could remember. "He was much worse when we were kids. After mum died, our dad grew tougher, stricter, more controlling. I was lucky that I always had managed to please him and I didn't back down when he wasn't happy with Sara because her parents weren't as educated as mine. I fought for her but Jasmine was never brave enough to fight."

Hannah's mouth had dropped open and she actually looked outraged. "Do you mean that my dad wasn't some random deadbeat guy and that the only reason I don't know him was cuz grandad was horrible to him?!"