Frenemies ✔

Chapter 9

One week later...

"'Call me Ishmael. Some years ago, never mind how long precisely, having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world. It is a way I have of driving off the spleen and regulating the circulation—'"

"Is this is A Tale of Two Cities?" Grandma interrupted.

"Uh, no, Moby Dick," I replied, book up to my face.

"Can you read me A Tale of Two Cities?"

"But you said you wanted me to read you Moby Dick."

"Oh, I know, I know, but I changed my mind," Grandma said.

"Okay," I shrugged.

I got off the edge of her bed and returned the book to her little bookshelf of age-old classics. Some of the books were written by Charles Dickens, Jonathan Swift, Herman Melville, Edgar Allan Poe, and William Shakespeare. But one of her favorite authors was Charles Dickens. She loved reading his books a lot but liked it even more when I would spend the time reading them to her.

Not that I minded, of course. I enjoyed my modern authors as much as my old ones. I liked reading his books, too.

A week after the accident, I was still feeling distraught over it. I still had the nightmares about it. But every time I was feeling depressed about the accident, I found myself spending more time with grandma. I would read to her or play whatever game she wanted to play. I didn't care. It distracted me from my troubles. At least for a little while.

I sat on the edge of her bed again, opening the book to the first few pages after the table of contents.

"Okay, are you ready?" I asked her.

"Go ahead, dear," she smiled.

"All right. 'We had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way—in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some noisiest authorities insisted on its way being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only. There were a king with a large jaw and a queen with a plain face, on the throne of England; there were a king with a large jaw and a queen with a fair face, on the throne of France. In both countries it was clearer than crystal to the lords of the State preserves loaves and fishes, that things in general were settled for—'"

"Shh!" Grandma said.

We sat in utter silence for what maybe seemed about two minutes.

"What?" I said.

"I heard something," she replied.

"Heard something?"

"Shh!"

We sat in silence for another minute, listening.

"Like what? What did you hear?"

"I thought I heard the patio door open."

"But Cupcake would've barked if someone had come in," I said.

"True, but I thought heard the patio door open, Emma."

"Ava," I corrected. "Would you like me to continue, grandma?"

She hesitated for a minute. "Yes, please."

"—that things in general were settled for ever. It was the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and seventy-five. Spiritual revelations were conceded to England at that favoured period, as this. Mrs. Southcott had recently attained her five-and-twentieth blessed birthday, of whom a prophetic private in the Life Guards had heralded the sub—"