Alexandra DelBello
Hand in Hand
I pulled up her long windy driveway and parked in front of the wooden garage doors. Her house suddenly looked too beautiful that day. The dogs attacked the front door as usual, as if they forgot what had happened last night. Grandma still dressed in her black sweater and black sweatpants with her clogs on. She usually wore a little bit of makeup on her eyes, but not today. They were red and swollen, and she was tearing far more than usual.
I came in and she still offered me something to eat or drink, even after being a widow for twelve hours. She took me into my grandfather’s old closet, a mysterious and unfamiliar place for me. It was exceptionally organized and smelled of an even stronger scent of their house, which I love. I watched her hands graze over his basket of bowties. I hadn’t noticed her hands before this moment. Her fingers were long and bony, and her veins ran like a river over rocks. Her hands are skinny, but strong. Not like the rest of her body, which feels like you could break her if you hugged her too tightly.
Her hands gathered Grandpa’s bowties into a zip-lock bag and slowly sealed it shut. Then they carefully collected all of his glasses together to throw away. They delicately tied the strings of the garbage bag to put in the garage. And occasionally her hands would unwrap the wrinkled tissue from her pocket to dab her tearing eyes.
The phone rang about every fifteen minutes. Her hands would reach into her pants pocket, where she kept the phone the entire day, and put it to her ear. Her fingers so gently embraced the phone, it looked like it could fall out of her hand any second, any time she’d whimper in sadness. And when she’d hang up, she pressed the “end” button precisely with her index finger, and let the phone slip back into her pants pocket. “I can’t take the phone calls anymore,” she told me. I looked at her, with her two hands covering her face, and said “Grandma, you don’t have to answer the phone, you know.” She took her hands away from her face, and she looked at me with a half-smile. Walking around the counter towards me she sort of chuckled, “You’re right. I don’t.” Then she took my hands in hers and squeezed them. Her warm hands held mine out of love and thanks, and I had never felt closer to her until that moment.
