Until you call again. (Complete)

Stars.

"I never liked him anyways."

"You almost left grandpa to be with him."

"I was trying to be charming darling. You certainly wouldn't have appreciated it had I been rude."

Grandma says bullshiting me. She'd already came up with the names of mine and Luke's kids on the first day she'd met him and now she's claiming she didn't like him to start with.

"He was too muscular." I roll my eyes because she kept on touching his biceps as if they were gold. Luke had the greatest arms in the world.

"Speaking of grandpa..." I say clearly annoying her because,

"Ok you're right, he was an angel and you made a big mistake letting him go." She says revealing her true feelings. Obviously because she still doesn't want to talk about grandpa.

She's not wrong though, Luke was an angel. An angel that belongs to someone else, not me.

"I can't believe you kept all these." I say holding mom's fancy corset. I didn't even know they made them back in the day.

"I always hoped she would come back to take them." She says behind me. I can hear the hurt in her voice.

"I'm surprised she didn't. Mom was always so protective of her clothes. She treated them like they were her kids." I chuckle at that.

Some of her clothes had names and she'd spent too much time in her gigantic closet just redoing it over and over again.

"She wanted nothing to do with me."

I always try to ignore this conversation because it's too hurtful to bring up. I have too many opinions about it but I don't mention them because I don't want to seem disrespectful to her. I was always taught to respect my elders no matter what. But every time she brings up the fact that mom wanted nothing to do with her, I don't say anything. But also, every time it gets harder. Like today because I can't help but say to her,

"Well you did disown her."

Mom didn't choose to leave home, they made that decision for her when they asked her to choose. I've never used that tone on her before so her deafening silence is no shock to me.

She's too boojee to be strict so I don't expect her to throw a shoe at me or something. We instead both say nothing as we continue going through mom's old stuff, but the tension remains in the air.

"I always wanted the best for her." She says after a while like that's supposed to justify what she did. What does that even mean?

"And dad wasn't?" I try really hard to calm myself.

Maybe this conversation needs to happen.

"I never met your father Mia."

This makes me chuckle.

"But isn't that because you never wanted to?" I know mom tried on multiple occasions to introduce dad to her parents. She always thought if they'd met him then they'd have no choice but to like him because dad's lovable energy was contagious. But they wanted nothing to do with the both of them.

She keeps quiet and that only aggravates me more so,

"Tell me grandma. Didn't you tell mom to choose between you and dad? And when she chose dad, didn't you kick her out to be raised by the streets?"

I remember how hurt mom was about the fact that her parents wanted nothing to do with her. She even wanted them to be at the hospital when I was born but they'd refused.

"How perfect did dad need to be for you to accept him grandma? Was he supposed to have a lot of money? Is that what you care about?! Money over your own daughter?"

I can't stop and these tears can't either.

I always thought about how different life would've been if they'd stayed in mom's life. I would've grown up having grandparents I knew and loved. That way, when mom and dad died, I would've happily stayed with them. I wouldn't have insisted on staying with Aunty Maggie who had too many people needing her help to see that I was broken and needed her help too.

I would've had a normal upbringing and not have felt lonely like I did when I was growing up. I wouldn't have had so much hate in my heart for what they'd done to mom.

If grandma had simply accepted dad I would have not clung onto Tristan like I did for love and support. I would've had not one but two people there to provide me with the stability I so desperately needed as a teenager.

I didn't realize how deeply angry I was about this that my confession is shocking to me too. I know it's shocking to her ass well because,

"I'm a monster! Don't you think I know that?" Her sudden scream catches me off guard.

"I gave up my only daughter because she simply fell in love, don't you think that kills me too? Mia how do you think I sleep at night?"

I've never seen her so... not-put together before.

"And when she died..." I can now see the wrinkles that she'd done such a great job hiding.

She then falls down crying making me cry harder at the memory of my parents' tragic passing.

"I killed her. I killed my own daughter because I simply couldn't accept her for who she chose to be." Her voice is back to being soft but it breaks.

I've hated her for what she did to mom, but I've never ever blamed her for her death. Is that how she's been feeling?

"Grandma..."

"It's true Mia. If I had accepted your father, maybe the accident wouldn't have happened. Maybe it was some kind of a lesson the universe was teaching me."

The words barely come out the way her voice is breaking and I make my way to her to give her an embrace. I can feel her body shake as I hold onto her tightly.

We stay like that for a while, just crying into each other's shoulders.

No matter how bad mom and grandma's relationship was before she died, losing a daughter is a pain I can't even imagine in my worst nightmares.

What grandma did was beyond heartbreaking, but she's human. We all are. I know that she genuinely wanted the best for mom, even though she had an odd way of showing it.

We're all a victims of how we're raised aren't we? Grandma was raised to marry for stability not for love, and she thought she was doing the right thing by wanting to raise mom like that too.

I feel my heart forgiving her as we both start to calm down from our crying fest.

"After you left saying you hated us, grandpa wanted nothing to do with me. He said that I drove you away, just like I drove your mother away. He still stayed in the house, but we were living different lives. He hated me, until he eventually left."

I can't help but hug her tighter. Grandma loved grandpa, anyone who knew them would tell you that. She's always had a funny way of loving but love she did.

"I'm sorry grandma."

"No Mia, I deserve it. He was right. And now I'm all alone because all I do is push people away."

"You're not alone grandma. I'm here and I'm never going anywhere again." I assure her.

"I love you S'thandwa."

"I love you too Grandma."