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We turned onto Grandma’s street.
I knew we were on her brick street because the road got so bumpy it woke up Eddie.
I looked at the other houses on the street. I’d been here to visit plenty of times before, but knowing we were staying longer this time made me look around like I was seeing it for the first time.
The paint on most everyone’s shutters and front porches was the same shade of white. Or at least it used to be white. I could see it peeling on a lot of the houses. It looked like all it would take was one big wind to blow the chipped paint off and every house would be left stark naked.
Maybe that’s why the houses all looked sad.
And Grandma’s house looked the saddest of all.
As a matter of fact, I’d never realized it before, but her house was a big frowning face. I tipped my head to the side to see it better. The two upstairs windows sticking out of the flat roof were the wide-open eyes. The front door was a nose, and the shape of the peeling white rail of the wraparound porch, slanted on each side of the house, made a definite frown.
So there we were, plain as day, greeted by the entire house frowning at us. Guess nobody was happy about this move.
Except maybe Grandma.
She was out to greet us as soon as our car doors slammed.
When the car was moving, there was enough breeze to keep us from sweating. But now that we’d stopped, the heat took my breath away.
Eddie ran over to Grandma and gave her a big hug like always. Grandma can’t sign to him, so she just talks extra-loud, like he’ll hear that.
“Land’s sake! Look at you!” And she did. Up and down like she was taking inventory of Eddie’s arms and legs. “I think you’ve grown since Easter!” Of course Eddie did what he always does when people don’t sign to him—he nods his head to make them feel better.
Mama went next to hug Grandma. But first Grandma held her at arm’s length and announced, “It’s always wonderful to see you all. But there is absolutely no need for you to uproot your entire lives to come here to watch over me like a teapot ready to boil. I’m a grown woman and I’m fine.”
And she looked fine, too.
She was what Mama always describes as a perfect Southern lady... always dressed real nice. She only wears pants when she works in her garden. But any other time, she dresses like she’s ready for church, as if all of a sudden she might get a call for an emergency church service and will be able to say, “No need to worry. I’m ready to go.”
And right then, as I stared at her, thinking anybody who looked that nice couldn’t be in need of being babysat, she finally turned to say hi to me.
“Alice! Look at you.” She gave me a hug, squeezing me tighter than I wanted, and that’s when I noticed she didn’t smell as good as she usually did. She let out a high-pitched whistle before she shook her head and said, “You look more and more like your daddy every day!”
This was Grandma’s favorite thing to tell me. Mama always says Grandma loves me, but it seems to me Grandma loves reminding me I take after my daddy in every way. And the way she says it, I can tell it’s not a compliment.
By this time, Eddie had driven his plate in and out of Grandma’s house. When he came back outside waving his hand in front of his nose, his face was all pinched up in a sign even Grandma could read, though she couldn’t tell the next thing he signed was, “The house smells like the bathroom at the rest stop.”
And he was right.
Grandma’s house stunk and was a mess, too. There was a mountain of Life magazines in the corner, piled taller than Eddie. Two televisions were stacked one on top of the other in her living room. And what was that smell?
I saw Mama glancing around looking all worried, and I hoped beyond hope she was thinking we should head out and just leave.
But when she opened her mouth, instead of words telling us to get back in the car, her words were shaky like we were still on the bumpy road bopping up and down as she said: “Alice, you and Eddie need to stretch your legs and look around outside.”
I know better than to backtalk Mama, so I did what she said.
As the back door swung shut behind us, Eddie took off driving his plate around the backyard while I looked all around. On the right side of the yard was Grandma’s garden, which was off-limits. Once last year, I kicked a ball into the middle of some flowers and you’d have thought the ball hit Grandma straight in the gut. I tried to make the flowers stand up again, I even tried propping them up with sticks ’cause I knew she’d be mad, but the more I walked around trying to help, the more I only messed the garden up. “Sometimes I wonder what on earth you’re thinking!” she scolded me when she saw. “Just like your daddy,” she added before walking back to the house.
I couldn’t help noticing that the garden was drooping now, and looking less like the perfect blue-ribbon one she was known for.
On the left of Grandma’s yard was a big old oak tree I liked to climb. But now the lowest branch was too high for me to reach. And the tire swing that used to hang from it was lying there all worthless on the ground beside the tree, like it, too, wasn’t happy to be in this yard anymore.
Back in the far corner of the yard stood a rusty old shed where Grandma kept a lot of stuff for her garden. I wandered back there hoping to find something to stand on to hang the tire swing back up. Maybe if I fixed it, I’d have something to do in this town other than watch the flowers grow, or wilt in this case.
I entered the shed and found cobwebs hanging from every corner, draping down on rakes, and a wheelbarrow, and my mama’s old bike. I grabbed a broom and swung it around to clear out the cobwebs so I could walk in.
That’s when I noticed a box in the corner about the size of a shoe box and covered in faded gold paper that’d lost most of its shine. Still, one lone sparkle caught my eye enough to call me over. Squinting, I could make out my mama and daddy’s names circled in a heart scribbled on the very top of the box.
This was a curious thing, for sure.
Bending down to pick up the box, I bumped into some stuff leaning against the old bike. The clanging thud of a rake falling echoed in the creepy silence of the shed just enough to make my heart pretty near jump out of my chest.
But what I saw on the bike was even scarier.
The biggest and hairiest spider I’d ever seen was sitting on that old bike. It didn’t look too pleased that I’d bothered its quiet spot on my mama’s bike either—and it might as well have been challenging me to a fight over who was the rightful owner of the bike.
I must’ve been staring down that big spider longer than I thought ’cause the next thing I heard was a screechy voice yelling from somewhere in the backyard, “Hey! Anybody there? Anybody?”
I tiptoed out of the shed and looked in the direction of the voice. Before I could locate exactly where it was coming from, it started in again. “You there! Does this little man belong to you? Yes—you! Land’s sake—is the whole family deaf?”
And that was my first almost-conversation with Miss Millie.