Nonfiction, AJ Tierney
My grandma played Solitaire every day with her worn deck of playing cards. She bought them at Gaddy Drug, the only pharmacy in town. She mesmerized me with her smooth shuffling then making a rainbow as she called it, the flitter of the cards against each other looking like an optical illusion of blue and white flashes. She was teaching me how to play Solitaire, but her method of teaching meant I wasn’t allowed to touch her cards—only watch. I sat quietly as she dealt the cards one by one in neat and tidy rows, her greenish veins mounded up like river streams coursing under her paper-thin pale skin. Fingernails polished the lightest shade of coral. Then she’d start her dismantling.
These cards were no ordinary cards. When she wasn’t using them to play Solitaire, she used them to tell people things. She would turn over one card and lay it in the middle of the kitchen counter. She studied the card, then told the person what she saw. As long as I was quiet, she let me stay and watch her while she gave her readings. I saw a Four of Spades or a Queen of Hearts. Grandma saw the answers to everyone’s burning questions.
After she had her first heart attack, Grandma came to live with us and started giving readings with her cards. A couple of days a week after school, I’d bound into the kitchen, excited to see who Grandma was entertaining. My perch was at the end of the kitchen counter on a cracked vinyl barstool. She tipped her head, looked over the rim of her glasses, and I knew she meant business.
Trish was a regular visitor and my favorite. She came often for my grandma’s magical cards. She paid for her sessions in trade. Trish got all her questions answered, and my grandma got her favorite coral Avon lipstick and nail polish. Trish was a mom, but not like any mom I had ever seen. She had blonde hair ratted to the heavens, long, red, pointy fingernails, tan skin that smelled faintly of coconuts, long dangly earrings, and shiny red high heels. She was friends with my mom, but my mom didn’t approve of Trish’s clothes, job, or men. They had been friends since high school and Mom said, “It’s just a phase! Someday she will come to her senses.”
One day Trish told my grandma she was tired of dancing and wanted to find a man who would take care of her. Grandma flipped over an ace of clubs, studied it for a moment, and assured Trish her man was on the way. My mom interrupted the reading and told Trish she could find a man if she didn’t look and act like trash. “Who’s giving the reading here?” My grandma cut her eyes over at my mom, and she knew she was in trouble. My mom didn’t have my grandma’s gift for the cards or people and loved to ruin the mood when everyone was having fun. “Well, I’m just telling you the God’s honest truth, Trish! But go ahead and listen to some cards.”
Trish wanted to know what this man looked like. Grandma told her not to worry what he looked like. He was an honorable man and would take care of Trish and her daughter. Trish appeared to have a lot of things and a happy life, but Grandma knew better. She grabbed three cans of Coke from our avocado-green refrigerator, cracked them open, and popped in curly straws. Grandma tapped out one of her Kool 100s and offered it to Trish. She fired up her lighter and Trish leaned in, cigarette dangling from her cherry-red lips. Grandma looked at me, “Don’t ever start.”
“I won’t, Grandma. I promise.”
“She’s my good girl, Trish.” She turned back to her stack of cards. “Honey, now ask me what you really want to know?”
Trish flicked the ash from her cigarette into the ashtray. “Is my dad ever going to forgive me?”
Grandma shuffled the cards and turned one over, king of clubs. “He misses you, he’s ready, but you have to go to him. He’s a proud man, you know this.” Trish started to cry.
Grandma pulled a wadded-up napkin from her housecoat and handed it to Trish. She dabbed below her eyes trying to stop the watery black rivulets running down her face.
I ran my finger along the edge of the amber-colored ashtray imagining there was some ancient life form hidden below the layer of ash trying to feel less like an intruder into this private moment.
Grandma turned over the next card. Three of hearts. She sat a moment tracing her finger over the hearts. “Be wary of women posing as your friends.”
Trish let out a little chuckle. “Everyone knows your mama doesn’t really like me.” She fluffed her feathered blonde hair. “I can’t imagine why not.” She gave me a little wink.
I laughed a little too loud. “My mom says you have a lot of male friends and wear too much makeup. And that red Caddy makes you look like you’re a lady of the night.”
“No need repeating your mama’s business, young lady.” My grandma tilted her head but continued shuffling her cards, never looking over at me.
“Yes, ma’am.” I hung my head because I didn’t want them to see my red face. There was nothing worse than disappointing my grandma. I slid my chin down on the counter and kept my eyes focused on my pop can while tracing the curls of my straw to avoid making eye contact with either of them.
My mom decided when Grandma moved in she should have a room on the first floor of our house. The only room big enough for all of Grandma’s things was the room that housed my mother’s thirty-year-old doll collection. She started collecting after receiving her first Madame Alexander “Elise” doll when she was five. Over three decades, she’d amassed every doll imaginable, the collection nearing three hundred dolls; all of which were off-limits to children. Her latest acquisition, an astronaut Cabbage Patch Kids, joined the others entombed behind panes of glass. I thought it was creepy to have all of these dolls watching us but a small price to pay to watch late-night TV and eat sweet treats with my grandma.
As the eldest daughter, my mom decided I should stay with Grandma during the night in case she needed anything. Our late-night ritual was to watch the last bit of the 10 o’clock news, the weather—my favorite was watching Don Woods draw “Gusty” each night. Followed by a double dose of the fun shows Cheers then Night Court. I’d sit in front of her recliner, and she would brush and braid my hair. She bought me my own fancy Pantene shampoo with the little stash of money in her cigarette pouch.
She promised we would get a house of our own someday for just the two of us. We’d talk about our little house. It would be the color of pale buttercups with a white wraparound porch. We’d sit on the porch and watch people walk by. Maybe wave them over for freshly squeezed lemonade adding the sugar until Grandma said, “That’s enough.” Not too sweet and ice cold. I wanted a big white rocking chair to remind me of when she rocked me to sleep when I was younger. She smelled of Jean Naté and baby powder. She was soft and I could nuzzle in close to her and hear her heart beating.
One night during Night Court she woke up clutching her chest. “Baby, get my purse.”
I turned to see her leaned back in her chair, rubbing her chest. “What is it, Grandma?”
“I need my heart pills.” She continued to rub her chest.
“I know which one it is.” I jumped up and headed toward her purse on the nightstand. I rummaged through crumpled tissues, cigarette cases, and butterscotch candies searching for the tiny brown glass bottle.
“That’s my girl.” She scooted herself to the edge of her recliner.
“I found it!” I stood in front of her recliner, her left hand outstretched. I tapped one chalky white pill into her shaking hand.
“I’m gonna need two.”
I gently tapped one more pill into her shaking hand.
“Thank you, honey. I’ll be all right now.” She leaned back into her chair.
I sat back down on the floor and rested my head against her knee while stroking the top of her house slipper. This hadn’t been the first time Grandma needed her heart pills and usually one pill would make her ok. Night Court ended. When I turned to her, she had a blank look in her eyes.
“Grandma, you alright?”
“No, baby. I think we need to get to the hospital.” She didn’t move.
“What’s wrong?” I pulled myself to my knees and placed my hands on her legs.
“My pills aren’t working, that’s all.” She put her hands on mine, her right eye big and wide.
“I’m going to get Mom.” I started to get up. She gently pulled my hand.
“I need some clean drawers first.” Her voice was low and raspy.
“Grandma, let me get Mom first.”
“I can’t go to the hospital without clean drawers.”
I quickly pulled out a pair of lavender underwear from the top drawer of her bureau and laid them on the bed. “Grandma, hold on to my neck, and I’ll pull you up.”
“Wait, I need my maroon nightgown too.”
“Grandma! It’s June. You’ll die in that velvet gown!”
“I am not going to the hospital looking like something the cat dragged in.”
I couldn’t argue with her, so I went to her closet and got the maroon velvet nightgown. She couldn’t stand on her own, and I wasn’t strong enough to lift her, so we compromised and got her gown on first.
“Now you can go get your mama. I need her to drive me.”
I took the stairs two at a time to my mom’s bedroom. I shook her and shook her.
“Mom. MOM! Grandma’s sick. She needs to go to the hospital. She’s dressed and waiting for you.”
“Dressed? What in the world are you talking about?” She leaned up on her arm.
“She wanted to wear her nice velvet nightgown.” I pulled on her arm to get her out of bed.
“I can’t believe you didn’t come get me right away. That’s why I have you down there.” She swung her legs over the side of the bed and pushed me aside.
I grabbed her hand. “Mom, I only did what Grandma wanted me to do.”
“Well, Grandma doesn’t know what she needs. That’s why she lives with us.” She grabbed her robe from the end of the bed and stormed down the stairs, her footsteps thundering with each step. I followed closely behind and waited at the bottom of the stairs. The next thing I heard was the screech of my mother’s voice.
“Adri-Anne! Get your ass in here!”
I crossed my arms and forced myself to take the first step toward my grandma’s room. I peeked my head in.
“This is how you take care of your grandmother? Playing dress up?” She pointed to my grandma’s face.
“Don’t yell at that child. I needed a little rouge and lipstick to help my color.” She held onto my mother’s arm as they shuffled across the parlor.
“I will talk to my child any way I want in my home, Mother.”
“Oh, you talk to people any way you want all the time.”
They continued to bicker as they pushed past me.
“Get upstairs and watch the twins and don’t wake your brother up. He needs his sleep.” They pushed past me.
Grandma gave me a little smile as she passed by.
Grandma couldn’t come home for a few days. The doctor gave strict orders: no stress (wasn’t going to happen in this house), no cigarettes (after fifty years, not likely), and no sweets (she kept the Hostess store in business). I knew Grandma wouldn’t follow the rules and was scared about what that might mean. But I was glad when she walked through the front door. She leaned on my mom and dragged her leg a little, but she was still Grandma.
One Friday after she returned from the hospital, she hollered for me from the kitchen. Same scene as always: her at the end of the kitchen counter on her barstool, cigarette in hand, cup of creamy beige Folger’s, and deck of cards in front of her. She would usually be playing by now. I hopped up on my barstool and waited for her to start shuffling. She tapped the deck lightly with her index finger, coral nail polish chipped. I looked up and began to ask what she wanted me to do. Her left eyelid pulled down a bit, lipstick dragged down on her lower lip. She gently nudged the deck of cards toward me.
“Cut’em in half, baby.” She took a long drag of her cigarette and let out a puff of smoke.
“But I’m not supposed to touch your cards.”
“Things change sometimes. Think of these cards as a little gift.”
My hands fumbled trying to pick up each pile, and I dropped them all on my first shuffle. She had made shuffling look so easy. I swept them together and gave them a good pat. I turned over the first card—six of spades. When I went to pull the next card, she said, “Wait. Just look at it for a bit.”
I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to look at though. This was Solitaire. But I looked at it for a long while and got this weird feeling that I didn’t like. “I just want to play Solitaire like we always do. Is that ok, Grandma?” Before I turned the next card over, I glanced over at my grandma, her eyes squarely on my hands.
“Pull the next card, baby.”
AJ Tierney holds an MFA in Fiction Writing from Sarah Lawrence College. Her creative works have appeared in The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature, Foliate Oak, and Narrative Magazine among others. When not writing or reading, she loves hanging out with her rescue pup Henry Francis.
Comentarios