Page 14 of Certified to Handle You
“Yo’ spirit cracked.”
I gasped dramatically. “Mama, you hear him?”
My mama looked into the camera. “I heard y’all, and y’all both need to shut up.”
Grandma Glo started to say somethin’, but the words came out wrong.
“I need you to get the… get the… the…” She paused and blinked a few times like she was tryna grab the rest of the sentence out the air. “The numbers, the paper, the… the…”
My smile faded…
At first, I thought maybe she had just lost her train of thought ’cause Grandma Glo did that sometimes when too many people was talkin’ at the same time. But then her face changed in a way I ain’t like. Her mouth moved again, but the words ain’t come out clean.
“Mama?” my mama said, her voice changin’ fast. “You okay?”
Grandma Glo blinked again, her eyes unfocused. “I… I was… I was…”
I sat up fully, grabbin’ the phone. “Grandma?”
Richie stopped by the doorway. “Auntie?”
My mama moved around the chair and came into the screen better, the oil bottle still in her hand. “Mama, look at me. What’s wrong?”
Grandma Glo’s hand lifted a lil’, then dropped back into her lap. Her mouth pulled weird on one side for just a second, but it was enough to make my whole body go cold. She tried to speak again, but nothin’ came out except a small, broken sound.
“Grandma,” I said louder, my voice crackin’ before I could control it. “Grandma, say somethin’.”
Then she went quiet. Her body leaned to the side like all the strength had slipped out of her, and my mama caught her before she could fall completely out the chair.
“Mama!” my mama screamed, droppin’ the phone for a second.
The screen blurred and moved wild, and all I could hear was my mama panickin’, Richie cussin’, and furniture scrapin’ across the floor.
“Mama!” I yelled into the phone, even though I knew nobody was listenin’ to me now. “Mama, what’s happenin’? Pick the phone up!”
My mama’s face came back into view for half a second, and I had never seen her look that scared in my life.
“‘Nelle, I gotta call the ambulance,” she said, breathin’ hard. “I gotta go.”
“No, wait! Mama, what happened? Is she breathin’? Mama!”
My mama hung up in my face…
I sat frozen for one second with the phone still in my hand, starin’ at my reflection on the black screen like my mind wastryna catch up to what my eyes had just seen. Then everything hit me at the same time, and I jumped off the bed so fast I almost tripped over my own slides.
“No, no, no,” I kept sayin’ rushin’ toward the door. “Not Grandma. Not my Grandma Glo.”
I ran down the hallway, my heart beatin’ so hard I could feel it in my back. The house felt too big, and the distance from my room to the backyard felt longer than it ever had before. I could hear Toni outside laughin’ with My’Love, that sweet baby laugh floatin’ through the glass doors, and it made my stomach twist ’cause I was about to walk out there and snatch every bit of peace out the moment.
When I got to the back doors, Toni was in the pool with ’Lo’Lo, holdin’ her under the arms while she kicked her legs and splashed water everywhere. Toni had her hair tied up, big sunglasses on her face, and a smile so soft it almost made me break before I even said somethin’. My’Love squealed when Toni bounced her through the water, and for half a second, I hated that I had to be the one to bring fear into this.
“Toni,” I called, pushin’ the door open.
She looked over at me, still smilin’ at first. “What?”
I walked closer, and the second she saw my face, her smile dropped.
“What’s wrong?”
