Dream Smashers
me to the invisible force behind
me. “Or …or something valuable. Do you know where Grandma keeps
that stuff, sweetheart? It’s very important that we find it. Come
on, come on, come help Mommy.” Her speech reminds me of an older
model race car: quick but jerky. She turns back to the cabinet and
resumes her frantic search.
    “Mom.”
    She continues her destruction.
    “Mom.”
    Nothing.
    “Jacinda!”
    She twitches half-way around.
    “Grams doesn’t have anything like that. So,
you should probably leave before she gets home.” Broken plates on
the floor, glass everywhere. “You don’t want her to see the mess
you’ve made here, do you?”
    She leans across the table, inches from my
face. An open flame to newspaper, she bursts into a tirade. “You
don’t tell me what to do, little prissy missy. You fucking whore,
you’re the one that needs to leave. Just leave, you stupid little
bitch!”
    Rotting mouth and cigarette breath along with
fear almost cause me to step back—almost. She’s in my space,
invading my air, stirring emotions I never knew I had.
    “No. I’m not leaving because this is my
house. And you’re not welcome here.” I control my voice,
barely.
    “This is my fucking house you stupid fucker!
Two-faced brat. You better watch yourself, you might fall off that
high horse you’re on.” She turns back to the cabinet, pushes some
plates onto the ground, and then faces me again.
    “You think you’re better than me? Fuck off.”
Spit flies from her mouth. “Go! Go now! I grew up here too, ya
stupid fuck. You’re selfish, you know that? Who do you think you
are?” She takes a breath. “Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck you! Get the
fuck out!”
    I don’t budge.
    Her eyes don’t belong to her, or to any human
being for that matter—twitching, black, filled with the darkest
hate imaginable.
    No, I’m not like her. Not like her at all. I
will never be like her.
    I step around the table, with air under my
feet, to stand toe-to-toe, eye-to-eye with the devil-woman before
me. “Grams doesn’t have anything because of you. Grams, who worked
her entire life, and Gramps, who worked two jobs seven fucking days
a week until he died, have absolutely nothing. Because of you. You
sucked them dry. So, it’s time you leave now. There’s nothing left
for you here.”
    She doesn’t move.
    The front door latches shut. Footsteps make
their way through the living room.
    I break the stare down. Grams appears in the
doorway of the kitchen. Shoulders rounded. Face full of sorrow. As
if she’s carrying a heavy barbell on her shoulders and can no
longer hold on to it. But if she doesn’t, it will fall. And its
fall is the worst thing imaginable.
    Silence.
    She crunches through the broken glass to the
pantry, opens it, and pulls out a broom.
    Jacinda’s face scribbles up; a small vein
swells on her forehead. Tears flow. She chokes and hacks on phlegm
from deep in her lungs. Only air escapes her mouth, no voice. “Fuck
you.”
    She wipes the pain from her eyes onto the
back of her arm and jitters out of the kitchen.
    Before leaving through the front door, she
looks back. “It’s all your fault.” She points a crooked finger
encrusted with dirt at me. “Fuck you!” The door slams shut behind
her.

CHAPTER FIVE
     
    Grams never cried in front of me when Gramps
died. But late at night I often heard her weeping in the dark of
their bedroom. I feel closer to her knowing she isn’t as tough as I
always thought. Her crust is made of stone, but her filling is a
soft woman with a broken heart.
    “You should be getting ready for your date,
honey. Don’t you worry ‘bout me now,” she says.
    I laugh. “You’re crazy to think that I’m
leaving you alone tonight.” I put the broom back in the closet,
then sit at the clean table.
    Grams sets a small plate of Oreos and two
glasses of milk in front of me before sitting. “I won’t be alone.
It’s bunko night.”
    Oh yeah, bunko. Woo hoo.
    “Where’s it at
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