I nodded.
“And he told you not to tell me?”
Again, I nodded. Mom closed her eyes.
“Oh my God…”
“Mom, what’s happening?”
She turned toward me.
“You are not going anywhere tonight. You stay right beside me.”
When we got home, Mom called my aunt. From the hallway, I could only hear pieces of the conversation.
“…he said it to Lily…”
Silence.
“Yes. Tonight.”
Then, in a much quieter voice, she said:
“I knew this day was coming.”
After hearing those words, I couldn’t relax for the rest of the evening. At around eleven o’clock, the doorbell rang.
It was Grandpa. Mom opened the door but didn’t invite him inside.
“Dad, why are you here?”
“To get Lily.”
Mom’s face changed.
“No.”
Grandpa looked at her for a long moment.
“Sarah, you can’t protect her from everything forever.”
“She’s a child.”
“That’s exactly why I want her there tonight.”
I was standing near the stairs, listening to every word. Then Mom suddenly began to cry.
“But what if tomorrow…”
Grandpa interrupted her.
“Don’t talk about tomorrow.”
A cold feeling went through me.
What was going to happen tomorrow?
About half an hour later, Mom suddenly came upstairs to my room.
“Get dressed.”
“Where are we going?”
She remained silent for a moment.
“To Grandpa’s house.”
When we arrived, I was expecting almost anything.
But Grandpa didn’t take us to his bedroom.
Instead, he led us to the small enclosed porch at the back of the house.
Two mattresses had been placed on the floor.
One was large.
The other was small.
Near the window stood an old telescope.
I stared at him in confusion.
“What is this?” What happened next read in the comments‼️‼️👇👇
Grandpa smiled.
“This is what I meant when I asked you to sleep beside me.”
Mom turned away, as though she didn’t want me to see the tears in her eyes.
“But why did it have to be a secret?” I asked.
Grandpa sat down.
“Because your mother wouldn’t have allowed it.”
That was when Mom finally told me what they had been hiding for months.
Grandpa was going to the hospital the next morning.
He needed serious heart surgery.
That was also why Mom had constantly told me not to sit on his lap. A few months earlier, Grandpa had undergone surgery on his leg too, and the doctors had warned him not to put unnecessary pressure on himself.
