Chapter 13

Grace groaned as she stirred awake from the strangest dream she had ever had. She pulled the blanket over her face to block out the offending sunlight that was, in Grace’s opinion, shining a little too cheerily for her moods. Cuddling closer to her favorite pillow, she let herself delay the inevitable waking to the harsh realities of her world. Suddenly, she heard footsteps coming towards her. Flinging the blanket away from her face, she spoke before she even opened her eyes, “Yes mum, I’m up.”

As if on auto-pilot, she brushed up and commenced her breakfast.

“Remember to bring the oranges. They’re your father’s favorite,” her mother said plainly, “and don’t be rude, he is still your father.”

Grace reigned in a particularly nasty comment with a huge stuffing of sandwich into her mouth, not trusting another other form of silencing. Her mother should not be subjected to the profanities she reserved for that man. She merely nodded in acknowledgement, and chewed her sandwich a little more viciously.

“Shouldn’t George be awake by now?” Grace asked. If she had to face that slime ball, she didn’t want to face it alone.

“George is not going with us today. Let the poor thing sleep, he came home quite late last night.”

Poor thing? Grace scoffed mentally. He was having his unfair share of fun with his friends in some club while I was killing myself with the tuition kid last night. Poor thing indeed. But Grace knew enough to keep her comments to herself. Her brother will always be the perfect boy in the eyes of her parents, because naturally, anything he did wrong was accredited to her. She would feel sick of such injustice if not for the fact that she was growing numb to everything.

“I am going out with some friends after eleven,” Grace informed her mothering a tone that didn’t allow negotiations.

“But I told you we will be there till lunch. You can’t just go there for 5 minutes and leave!”

“Be thankful I’m even going,” grace said with a sense of finality.

The journey to the hospital was pure dread to Grace. She felt that the taxi driver was driving unnecessarily too fast for her liking. At this rate, she would have to spend more than 5 minutes in the same room with that man.

All too soon, they arrived at the hospital. Grace followed as her mother led her through the chlorinated corridors of the hospital, feeling slightly nauseous as they past numerous wards. It reminded her of the time she followed her mother through similar corridors, only to reach the ward in which her grandfather had passed away. A loud click of the door handle alerted her to the dreadful knowledge that they had reached the ward. She peered in, and to her utter relief, found that the man was lying prone, his eyes closed in a deep sleep.

Grace placed the bag of oranges on the small table and fished out the apple she brought for herself. She settled herself in the chair near the window and contented herself with the juicy fruit. She could faintly hear her mother enquiring after her father’s condition from a passing nurse, but didn’t pay any attention to the details. All she felt was a sense of annoyance when the nurse assured her mother that the slight concussion her father had was nothing to be worried about.

Taking another bite off her apple, she checked her watch. There was still four minutes to go, and she hoped the heavens would be kinder to her and keep that man asleep. He was marginally more tolerable when unconscious. She fixed her attention outside the window and saw a wheelchair-bound old man staring blankly at a bed of yellow flowers. That vacant expression on his face made him look sicklier from this distance. Hospitals don’t do anyone any good, Grace decided. Her own grandfather had died in a hospital, right under the noses of the nurses and doctors that swarmed the place. She didn’t like doctors too, she decided bitterly. Grace got up from her chair, stalked to the table and grabbed her bad roughly before turning to the door.

“I’m off,” Grace said simply, “I hate hospitals.”

“But you only just came!”

“He isn’t awake anyway. Don’t wait up for me tonight, I’m going to be home late.” And with that, Grace stormed off, leaving her mother shaking her head sadly.

The moment she stepped out the door, she heard someone call her name from the other end of the corridor. She turned and saw a guy running towards her. It was Daniel.

“Hey Grace! I didn’t expect to see you here. What are you doing here for?” Daniel smiled genuinely at Grace.

“Visiting someone who hasn’t died yet,” Grace replied in a dull voice and started walking away from the ward she just exited.

Daniel must have picked up on the negative vibe coming from Grace, because he refrained from asking who she was visiting.

“I’m here to see my grandma. She slipped and fell, and injured her back the other day,” Daniel said in a falsely calm tone, and when Grace did not say anything in response, he continued, “You know, I saw this really cute cat roaming around the cafeteria. Maybe you want to go see it with me?”

Grace didn’t even look at him and said in that same dull voice, “No thanks. I’m meeting a friend.” Then she walked a little faster as they neared the hospital exit, and without a goodbye, she left; leaving Daniel to stand and watch as she disappeared around the corner.

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