Photo by MAX DEARINGER

The sliding door to my mom’s dusty old grey minivan slides shut. 

I climb into the third row seat, smack my baseball cleats off and buckle my seatbelt that has been cooking in the sun for hours.

“I love you all,” my grandma almost sings as all six of us Gross children file into the car. 

The words that I cherish. The words I wish I heard more. The words that make me feel secure and safe and at home. 

When I hear these words, I don’t think they will be the last words I hear my grandma say to me before becoming someone I don’t recognize.

***

Winter break, 2016, the snow coming down hard and the festivities coming to an end as I approach the beginning of the new semester. 

But for me, this semester will begin in the “Lone Star State.”

Not in my home in Chesapeake Beach, Maryland, 20 minutes off the bay.

But in Texas. 

I don’t want to move. What about all my friends and family here? What is even in Texas? Are all the roads made up of dirt and tumbleweeds?

***

Feb. 2, 2017.

We’ve moved in completely – to the big new house with big new rooms in a big new neighborhood. My first few days at Nancy Neal Elementary go as expected. 

I’m the new kid. No friends. Nobody to eat my turkey provolone sandwich my dad made for me that morning with. Nobody to talk to about the simple addition problems we’re learning in math class.

I just want to go home.

But I can’t – I have to stay positive because moving here is a great opportunity that my dad earned for our family of six. New job, new experiences, new memories waiting to be made. 

But I don’t see what’s headed my way – one of the toughest- and big, big, biggest – moments of my life two months after moving into that big, big house and that new neighborhood.

***

I’m sleeping in my sleeping bag on my mattress set up on the soon-to-be-finished carpet because we haven’t reassembled me and my brother’s bunk bed yet. 

Squirming around in my sleep, I’m abruptly and uncomfortably woken – my mom bursts into my room. “Eli, Quentin, come downstairs please we need to talk,” she said. Then she swiftly turns around and heads down the hall.

Two minutes later, all four of us – brothers and my 5-year-old sister – sit fidgeting at the feet of my parents’ unmade bed.

We’re scared

Thirty minutes go by. 

Now, an hour.

My sister’s asleep, her head laying on my leg. And my three brothers are cuddled up against her – asleep, too.

And I’m thinking, can I just go back to sleep?

Finally, my mom walks in the room with an “I’m so tired” shuffle… and begins our “chat.”

“Kids, your grandmother was in an accident…”

These words don’t quite make sense to me. Did she get in a car crash? Did she do something illegal? What the heck is going on?

“On the walk back from grabbing the mail out of her mailbox, she slipped on a thick sheet of ice and landed on her head.”

***

Three and a half months later – May 19, 2017, to be exact. My grandma moved into an elderly home in Texas about 20 minutes from our house. She’s losing hair, so she only wears wigs. She barely speaks, barely goes out and barely calls us the way she used to. 

She’s not exactly the grandma who told me she loved me before we moved to Texas.

I turn 8 years old the next day – in just a matter of hours – at 10:02 A.M.

My whole party’s planned out. Thor theme. A big hammer as the cake. Avengers decorations to fill up the house. 

And all my new friends I’ve made? Of course, they’re invited.

I’m smiling, thinking – Nothing is going to ruin my birthday this year. 

I climb into the top bunk. My entire room’s set up by now — bunk bed, cool lights, real carpet.

I fall asleep in minutes, filled with joy for my upcoming birthday. 

BOOM!

The joy vanishes.

BOOM! The loud crack of thunder – right outside my big new house – rushes me awake.

The BOOMS. Just. Keep. Coming. 

Each time louder and closer and scarier. 

BOOMING until my little sister barges in, and hurries my brother and me downstairs.

It’s safer there.

Our entire family crams into a hall closet – one of the few rooms without windows, a closet just big enough to fit the suitcases we brought when we moved. 

This is so uncomfortable. It’s almost my birthday. I just want to go to bed.

Ring.

Ring.

Mom picks up her rose-gold iPhone 8 – her phone which seems like a treasure to me.

My selfish thoughts wear off when I see my own mother begin crying. The strongest woman in my life. My role model. Her hands shaking and her words stammering as she speaks with the woman on the phone. 

And my selfishness really ends when I hear mom say, “Where is she now?”

“Do I need to go there?”

These questions flow out of my mom’s mouth.

But I still have no idea what’s going on.

***

Ten minutes later.

My next door neighbor- who somehow is now in my mom and dad’s room – is asking me, “Are you OK?” 

I sit there on my parent’s bed – my arms around my sister and my brothers – and look at my neighbor.

“I’m not OK. My mom is crying. What’s going on? Wait… where did my mom go?”

“Your mom asked if I could come over and keep an eye on y’all for a while.” Y’all? Why did she just say that? 

The Texan accent’s new to me and my siblings – all scared and crying just as much as I am. 

“Honey, your mom and dad left. They’re heading over to the hospital.” 

I hear these words, and they hit me like Thor’s hammer.

“Why are they going to the hospital? Why can’t I go?” 

My neighbor stares at me maybe two-seconds, puts her hands on my shoulders.

Then she says…

“Your grandmother passed away.”