Chapter Text
Present Time
LENA POV
FLASHBACK
"Lena, it is so nice to hear from you. I know you have a busy life honey ." I hear my grandmother say on the other end. I had just gotten off work and was making some pasta for myself while I had to Rockefeller Center tree lighting on. "Are you watching the tree lighting?"
"I'm never too busy for you Gran . Ever. And yes, I'm watching it." I smile, knowing it was her favorite, even if she had no desire to ever visit New York City.
"I still don't know how you do it, honey. Live in that big crazy city of yours. I hope you can come down soon. I'd love for us to spend Christmas together. Even just for one day." She says as my heart all but breaks and I grab my wine glass and pour some.
"Gran, I promise I'm going to make it down. I'm so sorry I haven't yet. I really am. But I promise and we are going to have an amazing Christmas together. I promise. It's good to get out of this crazy city sometimes. But tell me what books are you reading now? What can I send you? Did you turn the iPad on I sent you?"
"I did. But, you know I like my regular books. Eileen said she'd take me to get my new prescription for my glasses. So then I'll be able to do more reading. But until then, I try to find something on TV and do a little gardening." She says and I smile at the photos on my fridge of her. "I miss those days, honey, when you were little. They sometimes come back to me."
"I know. I miss them too."
"Well, I will let you go. Please call me, okay? I love your voice. I do, and be careful in that big city. Don't let that job take over. There's more to life than that."
"I promise I won't. I love you too Gran . So much."
Hanging up the phone, I had no idea that I'd never get to spend another Christmas with my grandmother and it all but broke my heart.
FLASHBACK ENDS
As I board my Amtrak train to Galveston, Tennessee, I was relieved to get out of New York City for the holidays. My main goal was to rest my brain, and well take a break from everything that had been going on in my life the last few months. Honestly, it was enough to make my damn ass head explode.
I was almost grateful that my job all but let me go. Budget cuts, of course, and being that I worked as a graphic designer in the fashion industry, I was constantly being let go. It was a lethal job and rather grueling with long hours. Honestly, I didn't even really like it all that much, considering I worked 12 hours straight staring at a computer screen and letting it suck my damn brain out. Along with my integrity.
But it paid my rent, along with my bills, and allowed me to keep my apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. So, in some sense, it had its advantages. Sadly, it didn't leave me with much of a social life, but being that I was now in my 40s, I enjoyed the quiet nights at home on my sofa. To some extent.
As the train pulls out of Penn Station, the trip to Galveston was about two days, which may seem long, but I breathe a sigh of relief, knowing I won't be around.
I had almost missed my train, which would have been a real pain in the ass, and had to run across the station with my heavy ass luggage and heels that I foolishly wore. But the subway had been crowded, everything was running slow and the tourists in the city were making the crowds even bigger. If that was at all possible.
The city could be a magical time during the holidays, but to me, especially this year, it was anything but that.
The year had been a long one. Very long, and with the passing of my grandmother a few months ago, life almost seemed to stand still.
I didn't really know what to do with it or how my life made much sense anymore. I was trying to find meaning, but without a family of my own and friends who just didn't seem to get it, I was more alone than ever.
It wasn't that I didn't have a family, but I was not very close to my father and had not been since he moved us up to New York City when I was eight. I don't think I ever really forgave him for that and for the strained relationship he had with my grandparents, which, of course, put me right in the middle.
Sighing, I pull my tray down and gather the few photos I had in my bag of my grandparents. There weren't many, but I had a few that my grandmother gave me, and they were ones that I cherished.
I smile at the one of the three of us together on their farm in Tennessee. It was during Christmas time when Grandpa John would chop down our tree on December 1st, and my grandmother and I would make cookies and cakes.
It was my absolute favorite, even more than Christmas Day itself. We would decorate the old farm home from top to bottom and adorn all the doorways and tables with fresh garland, ivy, and holly. The smell alone. I wish I could bottle up and take it everywhere with me because there was just something so magical about it.
I smile, thinking back on her wood floors that she covered with the nicest rugs and had freshly cleaned for Christmas.
Her wooden table that my great grandfather, Harry Adams, carved and gave to my grandparents as a wedding present, was adorned with her nutcracker statues and a crystal candy bowl filled with peppermints that my grandfather and I would eat.
Christmas cards always hung around the doorway of her living room from the many friends my grandparents had from the time they were young themselves. It was almost magical every year as the knitted stockings we had hung around the old fireplace with the carved wooden mantel felt the most festive of all.
Many nights when Grandpa John was done with his farm work, he would chop extra wood for the fireplace while my grandmother, Mary Adams, played Nat King Cole while baking her famous cornbread.
She could be a stern woman, but she had a soft spot for me and often let me have sweets and drink hot coco almost daily during December. But I still had to eat my vegetables.
Right now, I try not to let my tears fall as I think back on my childhood growing up with them. But it is very hard not to cry, very because it feels my time with them was so short-lived. And to some extent, it had been.
My life with them was a simple life, one that I loved so much, and my 40-year-old self has tried very hard to think back on how much I loved that time in my life. How much I loved their farm, and how much joy it brought me. I probably took it for granted then, but I had no idea. No idea that once my father and I moved to New York City when I was 8 that my life would never be the same. And it wasn't.
"Ticket." I suddenly hear the conductor say as I snap out of my mind and hand him my ticket. He smiles and punches it as I nod and place it back in my bag.
This was not really on my plan for Christmas, but after the reading of my grandmother's will a few months ago, I found out both her and Papa John Adams left me their candy store, and they wished for me to spread both their ashes over their Galveston farm. A farm they had also left in my name, and a farm that my grandmother had been born on in 1931, 93 years ago.
The thought of it made my stomach hurt, but I'd do anything for them. No matter what.
In a sense, I guess this was bittersweet, especially since I had not been back to Galveston since my Papa passed ten years ago. Yes, that was something that also haunted me, but I was trying so hard to make peace with many things that transpired the last few years. But it was not easy at all.
Putting the old photos away, I never understood what could have caused my father to stop speaking to his parents. Even when Papa John died, he didn't go to the funeral. And it only made my anger for him grow, and that had not changed. At all.
When I was a teenager, he all but refused to let me visit them in Tennessee. Even when I turned 18 and went to FIT and was a grown ass adult, he refused. So I worked odd jobs and paid my way through college and most certainly visited my grandparents, who would send me money when they could. I always refused, but they didn't listen and wanted to make sure I had a little extra.
Even when my Papa John wasn't able to walk much anymore, he and my grandmother were still the most supportive people I had ever known. They couldn't come to my graduation because of his ailing health, but I knew they cared, and I continued to speak to them daily.
Honestly, I didn't know how I was going to feel going back to Galveston, and I could feel my stomach turning over the memories that I knew would come flooding back, plus the guilt I felt over not visiting my grandmother after Papa John passed.
I had tried to shake it; I had tried to reason with myself for why I had not gone to see her saying it was almost enough to talk to her on the phone. But none of it seemed to make a difference. None of it, and I was very angry at myself. More than I could fathom.
So I was hoping this trip and fulfilling their wishes would somehow give me peace. Because I damn sure didn't feel like I deserved the candy store, they left me along with their farmhouse. Not at all. And I'd almost give anything to go back in time to tell them how much I loved them and thank them for everything they did for me.
But that wasn't possible and as I close my journal that had the little photos of my grandparents when they were both about 1 or 2 years old, I shut my eyes and drift off to sleep, having no idea how my life was about to change.