“But Emily asked me to hang out after school today!” I groan, instantly regretting how whiny it sounded, Mom always becomes in a worse mood when I whine. 

“Your grandparents miss you, and we haven’t visited in almost a month! We should take advantage of how close they live, more often anyway, and today, we are going to go.” She sighs as she grabs her keys and opens the garage door.

“I’ll be waiting in the car!” 

Of course she decides to step up and see Grandma and Grandpa the one day I actually have plans. Sometimes I wish they lived farther away so we would have a better excuse to not go other than “we were busy today,” and “it’s been a tough week.” A part of me feels bad for being so dismissive of my Mom, but she and I both know neither of them had said a word to her about “missing me.” My Grandma was diagnosed with Alzheimer's last year, and since then she has been cooped up in her bedroom all day, every day. I can barely remember she’s still around, so the odds of her remembering I do seem slim to none considering her disease. As for Grandpa, it is more complicated. I remember always being scared of him when I was younger, he seemed so intimidating and always wanted to teach me about life lessons. I gather that many people from his generation are like this, but it didn’t exactly help me enjoy his company. I contemplate whether I have made the right decision as I begrudgingly step down the stairs and open up the garage door. The drive to their house wasn’t anything special. They live a whopping fifteen minutes from ours so I suppose small talk would be pointless. Besides, I was just so busy answering text messages, as she was trying to control her temper from the other cars cutting her off, and tailgating her. I actually have no idea where she gets her temper from, Grandma always seemed like a generally happy person even before she started developing her Alzheimers, and as for Grandpa, he almost gave off the energy that he was above all the screaming and anger my mom has when something as little as a car speeding up happens. I suppose it could be developmental, afterall from the little I knew of my Dad he definitely did seem like quite the road rager before he left us. It’s almost comical to me imagining him screaming his little heart out at all the Chevys who crossed his path as he drove away from us. As I began to entertain this thought a little longer, we had arrived at our destination. They live on a grayish blue ranch in the middle of what I suppose would be the most grandparents-like suburban cul-de-sac in the world. There’s honestly nothing more to note than that. As we stroll up onto their straw-like welcome mat, and ring their doorbell which looked as old as they were, I smell flowers. The flowers that he always had in their front yard, it was honestly one of my favorite parts of coming over. They ranged from fuschia, to amber, to turquoise in all different species. Before I could take it all in, the door swings open in a swoosh, and Grandpa is standing there. 

“Hi dad, how are you doing today?” Mom says as she strides into the house like she always does when he doesn’t immediately invite us in. 

“I just won the best pool game of my life against your mother!” he exclaimed, smiling wide. Yep, that's Gramps. The two things that ever make him happy are pool, and Grandma. I suppose when you're that old there isn’t much else, but it still would be nice to be acknowledged once in a while. 

“Hi grandpa” I say, beating mom to her nudge that she gives me every time I don’t greet him. 

“Lizzie!” he practically shouts, taking me in for a bear hug. This is different. I always knew he loved me but Arthur didn’t seem the type to enjoy PDA. 

“Come, COME. I’ve got to show you how to play pool, you're getting older now and it is a fantastic game, you will love it!” He grabs my hand and pulls me down the hall into his pool room, faster than I’ve ever seen him move. I could barely even exchange a glance with Mom who is just as startled and confused as I am. When we get there he slides open the sliding doors as we stroll in. It still smells the same, oak wood, cue chalk, and dust, not from the pool table, but from the scattered random objects about the room, and the unkept carpet, and wood dressers. In short, the place is always a mess. 

“It’s time I show you how to play” he says, staggering over to the cues and picking the smallest of them all. He hands it to me, picks up his own, and sets up the balls in a triangle shape pointing right at me, daring me to make my move. 

“You lean down, feel the cue in your hands, aim, and softly hit it into the ball you want to move.” he says, finally calming down. I don’t know what else there was to do besides entertain his strange, out of the blue, impulse to teach me, after barely having an interest to talk to me after 13 years. So, without questioning it, I followed his steps and hit the ball watching it clang into the rest of them, none going into any of the pockets. 

“Why did you hit it so hard?” he questioned, seeming genuinely curious, but I knew not to fall for it. My teachers at school use the same tactic; question why the person did it their way, so they can figure out whatever they did wrong by themselves. 

“I'm not sure, maybe it’s just what is the most fun?” I say, unamused by his teaching methods. 

“Try being gentler, there is no need for harshness when it comes to pool.”

I sigh and try again, except this time another problem arises when I completely miss the ball. 

“My hand slipped,” I whisper, beating him to the punch. 

“Try getting lower,” he soothes, sensing my embarrassment. This whole problem- solution routine goes on for almost ten minutes when finally I hit one in. I look proudly into the pocket the ball had fallen into, and almost for a second forgot he was even there. 

“This was great progress” he says, sounding just as gratified as I felt. Before I could say anything else he stood up and led us out of the room. 

“Guess who just made her first successful shot in pool?” he exclaims proudly to my Grandma and Mother sitting at the kitchen table both with coffee in hand. I await their applause until I see their faces. 

“Is everything alright?” I ask glancing from them to Grandpa whose smile had faded away into a solemn expression as well. 

“Everything’s fine, honey” Mom says standing up. 

“And I’m so happy you guys have found a new thing to bond over after all these years, but I just remembered I have to get home and finish some work.” she says, as she places down her coffee, and picks up both of our jackets. Bewildered, I quickly give both of them a hug, making sure to hug Grandpa a little harder so he knew how much this meant to me, and walk out the door. The rest of the drive home was silent. Although I knew something was wrong, I didn’t 

want to pry since she obviously didn’t want to say just yet. As we arrive home after what felt like the longest car ride ever, she freezes, and turns to look at me, tears building up in her eyes. 

“Grandma’s Alzheimers has progressed, Izzie,” she whispers.

“And we aren’t sure if she will make it to the end of this month.” It all made sense now, the overly friendly disposition of Grandpa, the urge to teach me how to play, it must have been him hiding from the inevitable time, when he will be forced to face the truth. A slight tear catches my eye, and rolls down my cheek. I was never close with Grandma, but she always seemed like a loving person, and Grandpa always seemed happiest with her. As I turn in my car seat, wiping the tear away I say,

“What’s Grandpa going to do?”

“I’m not sure yet sweetie, but I want to make an effort to be with them more” she says her voice cracking with sadness at the end. I’m not sure what else to say, so I run out of the car through our garage, tears streaming down my face, and crash into my bed. 

The next few weeks were definitely stressful. The closer and closer we all got to the date the doctor had given us, the days became more and more somber. Grandpa and I had continued our pool lessons, and he had actually said I had made a lot of progress, and I felt it as well. Still, I couldn’t take my mind off of what would happen after Grandma died. Not only did I not know if Grandpa would still be interested in spending time with me, but I didn’t know what would happen at all once she was gone. Still, the day before she was supposed to go finally came, and he sat me down and began a talk with me at the end of our pool lesson. 

“Izzie, I want you to know that I will always be here for you, even if it doesn’t seem that way.” he says, as I make eye contact with him. I can see the hurt in his eyes even under the facade he puts on. 

“I’m really sorry about everything Grandpa, and I’m so glad you've set time aside to teach me about your passion” I say, praying he understands what I’m really thinking. That even after Grandma’s gone, and he won’t have her, that he still will want to spend time with me, because, as much as I hate to admit it, I like spending time with him. He unexpectedly pulls me in for a big hug and although it’s faint, I can feel a slight vibration, a whimper, a hidden cry inside of him almost as if he is too weak to go further. We then get up and I leave for the day. I lay awake that night and hope with all my might that Grandpa will be fine, and will get through it. 

As I wake up Saturday morning I feel a shift in the air, and immediately know that Grandma has passed. I had always had good intuition and this I know for sure. It isn’t a good feeling, like when you are dreading for something to happen and it almost feels unreal until it finally does. Like a pit in my stomach. Once Mom had come rushing into my room moments later, I had pushed those feelings away, dismissing them, so I could focus on comforting her. Before I could truly clear my mind, Mom comes up to me and hugs me. A tight, loving hug, that I hadn’t gotten from her in a while. Although I enjoyed it I was anxious for her to come out and say what I knew she had to. Pulling away she looked at me regrettably. 

“She passed in her sleep last night” she sighs, holding back tears for the sake of me. I give her another hug, as she gets herself together. 

“Should we go over to Grandpa’s?” I suggest, uneasily. As she nods her head her hand reaches out to mine and we stand from the bed. Once we get there, and are about to ring the doorbell, I swiftly stride over to the colorful array of flowers in the garden, and pluck one of each color. I walke back admiring the collection, and how each complemented each other perfectly. When I look up Mom looks just as proud of me as I do of the flowers. We finally ring the doorbell, and see Grandpa open the door looking disheveled. I had never seen him so solemn. 

“I can’t believe she's really gone,” he says, letting us into the house. I hand him the flowers, and Mom gives him a big hug. I know they will talk about the important stuff later, when I’m not there, like the funeral, and whatever else they need to, so the hug was definitely a comfort hug, not a whisper something in their ear hug, which was refreshing. I also give him a hug and hope with all my heart that he feels the sympathy I feel for him. Then it was just us three face to face looking at one another, knowing that no words need to be said, because we all know exactly how we all feel. This went on for a few minutes until Grandpa finally spoke up and said. 

“How about a game of pool?” with a saddened smile on his face. 

“Rack’em” I reply looking up from the ground, into his eyes, hopefully.