Hilde on the Record by Hilde Lysiak

Author:Hilde Lysiak
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Chicago Review Press
Published: 2022-01-21T08:03:07+00:00

20

The Saddest Tuesday

It was Tuesday, but my dad and Izzy had gone to Grammie and Grandpa’s earlier in the day to take down the Christmas tree. At some point, my uncle Andy called my dad to say Grammie had been in a car accident in the parking lot of the hospital. My dad left Izzy at the house and rushed to the hospital, only a mile away. As I rode in the car with my little sisters to Grammie and Grandpa’s house, I tried to comfort myself by thinking that an accident in a parking lot couldn’t be that bad.

But in the initial moments afterward, there was much confusion and the information we were getting turned out to be inaccurate. When we got to my grandparents’ house, my dad’s car was in the driveway. I let out a big sigh of relief. If Grammie was in really bad shape, my dad would have been at the hospital. As soon as we parked, I noticed my Mimi’s car was there too. I thought that was strange. Usually, my Mimi and Pop-Pop only came to Grammie and Grandpa’s house for big occasions like birthdays or holidays. I watched as my mom ran to my Mimi’s car. In what seemed like only seconds, Mom sprinted as fast as she could into the house. My Mimi came to us, still in the backseat of my mom’s car. She looked like she had been crying. The sinking feeling in my stomach returned.

“Where’s Grammie? Is she OK?” I asked, my voice sounding more frantic than I wanted it to.

“Let’s get your sisters out,” was all she said in response.

As Mimi set about unbuckling Juliet from her car seat, I reached over and set Georgie free from her booster. I felt sick and confused and worried—so, so worried. Even though it felt like hours passed, my mom came back out in what was just a few minutes. She gave Mimi a hug, thanked her, and began leading us inside.

My dad was standing inside the entry to my grandparents’ house. Something didn’t look right about him, but I couldn’t place what it was.

“Come with me, Hilds,” he said as he started walking up the stairs to the room we used to sleep in when we would visit from Brooklyn. My mom stayed downstairs with my little sisters. I didn’t know where Izzy was.

My dad began speaking, but I couldn’t make sense of the words he was saying. My mind had latched on to one sentence and kept replaying the words over and over in a broken loop: Grammie died.

What really happened (the short version): Grammie died of a broken heart.

What really happened (the longer story): My Grammie took my Grandpa to have his PET scan. Because Grandpa was so weak, she didn’t want him to have to walk to the parking lot afterward, so she went to pull the car around for him. The doctors told us that almost immediately after she started the car, her heart stopped.

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