Beneath The Blackwood Sky | ✓

Chapter Nineteen: The Grandfather's Tale

"YOU ARE ANTHONY'S GRANDFATHER, AREN'T YOU?" Rose blurted out and immediately covered her mouth, regretting what she said. Theo stared at George with wide eyes.

He thought about what Will had said earlier, and it did make a lot of sense. George's black hair and grey eyes seemed really familiar when he had first seen him.

He was George Wilson.

Of course, George Wilson, who was Anthony Wilson's grandfather was a really big scientist. George Wilson only had one child, who in turn had only one child. Anthony Wilson was George Wilson's only grandchild.

Theo knew everyone in Blackwood. That was how he knew about George's family just after knowing his last name. But he also did have a mental face block of faces and names, which was just a fancy way of saying he was bad in relating names with faces. He knew that was the case with Jade and Kai, but Will, Shay and Rose never had trouble remembering faces and names.

George was staring at the ground with shining eyes filled with tears. He had a pained expression on his face, his hands in fists. "I'm so sorry, I really am," Rose said, her face a mask of true guilt. "I'm sorry," she repeated again, and this time George looked up and took a deep breath.

"It's alright. You don't have to apologize for that. You just stated a fact and there's nothing wrong with stating facts. You just realized that I was a grandparent of someone you knew, and you voiced your thoughts. There's nothing wrong in that." George said, mustering a small smile.

Rose smiled back but she still looked guilty. She opened her mouth, but George cut her off, "You are going to apologize for reminding my grandson, but that's a good thing. I want to remember him, remember everything about him. Every little thing. How food always made him happy, how half of my library is filled with his books. I'm not going to pretend like he never existed, instead, I choose to keep him alive by thinking of him every day, which is my way of keeping him alive. There's no need to apologize, dear." George told her kindly and Rose nodded gratefully.

Theo remembered the day Anthony died. He remembered how Anthony had told them that people dying weren't coincidences, they weren't suicides but murders. He remembered how he ran away, and fifteen minutes later they found him, lying on the ground with blood pooling around his head.

There was silence. Theo knew his friends were thinking about the same day too, and George broke the silence, sighing.

"Anthony told me about you guys, you know?" He told them gravely, "After his girlfriend, Vanessa died, he was very sad and upset, refused to eat anything, unable to figure out why she killed herself when she had a perfectly good life. Right now, I too am asking the same question over and over again, why he had killed himself, I know that he didn't kill himself just because his girlfriend died. I know my grandson well enough to know that instead of killing himself after his girlfriend died, he would've come to terms with the heartbreaking sadness, accept her death and maybe after years, move on, because she would've wanted him to."

Theo stared at George, knowing that Anthony didn't kill himself, but someone murdered him because of the knowledge he possessed. But Theo didn't know how to tell a heartbroken grandfather that his seventeen-year-old grandson had been murdered and his murderers had cleverly disguised it as a suicide.

George continued, his voice uneven. "Anthony told me that you guys had kindly offered him to sit at your table during lunch, to keep away his loneliness. He told me that all of you were closely knit together, and gladly accepted and welcomed Anthony's presence at your gang. He told me that he was very grateful to you guys, your jokes and your presence had helped him. He told me that everyone in your gang had a rough past in some or the other way, and the way you had battled with your rough past had inspired him and helped him come to terms with Vanessa's death. He hadn't moved on or accepted it completely, but it was a start." George's eyes were glossy as they fell on their faces, silently thanking them.