Grandma's Friend

I had just gotten off of my plane and grandma was standing there at the airport with a sign with my name on it. I haven’t ever seen people do that—only in movies. What was she thinking? Did she think I wouldn’t recognize her?

             “Grandma, why the sign?” 

             “I just bought a new whiteboard for the farm before I came here; decided to see if it worked.” That sounded like her. 

             “Did it work?” I asked laughing. 

             “It appears so.” 

             We walked to her old loud truck, which would take an hour and a half drive, three hours. We hopped in and she started the loud engine and she asked, “Want to listen to music?” 

             “What?” I yelled back. I could barely hear her. 

             “Music?” 

             “Sure!” 

             She hit a few buttons on the console and then looked at me, “Sorry, honey no music. You may need to roll the windows down cuz the AC don’t work in here.” 

             “Ok! I don’t know how though!” 

             “You see that lever?” 

             “Yeah?” 

             “Just crank it.” We don’t have cars in the city. We usually ride the train. Plus this truck was ancient.

             As I cranked the window down, I felt something touch the back of my neck. A tail or something. Now, I remember when I was younger that my uncle would always talk about mice being in the farm trucks.

             My anxiety got to me, “Ahhh!” I screamed out, “Grandma there is a mouse or something on the back of my chair. I’m too scared to turn around and look!” 

             My grandma looked behind me, “Missy, get down! What did I tell you about your seat belt!” Missy? When we got in the car it was just grandma and me, no Missy. 

             I decided to gain the courage to turn around and look at this mysterious Missy. I screamed, Missy wasn’t a person she was a “Possum! Grandma, there is a possum!” 

             “Don’t freak out Soph, she’s a good possum. Right, Missy?” Then, this disgusting rodent jumped onto my grandma’s lap. “Oh, Missy! If I have to pull this car over to buckle you in, I’m going to be mad!” 

             The rodent went back to the back and sat in a seat. I don’t know if it buckled itself in or not. My heart was racing too hard to look behind me. 

             “Grandma, why do you have a possum?” 

             “Well, she’s my neighbor.” My Grandma doesn’t have neighbors. She lives on a farm and the next close person is about a mile down the road. 

             “What do you mean?” 

             “Welp, one day I was sitting on the porch watching the kids. Then, Missy came up. I went inside got some food and fed Missy. I’ve been doing that for a while. Then we became good friends and now we are best friends.” 

             I was in shock and probably in need of medical attention. I sat for the rest of the ride not able to look behind me at the hideous beast, who my Grandma says is her best friend.

             When we got home, Grandma offered the possum to come inside and watch TV. These are her exact words when she asked; “Hey Missy, heading home so early? Our favorite show is on in about an hour.” Favorite show? 

             The possum literally turned from walking underneath the porch and she walked up the porch stairs and into Grandma’s house. 

             “Grandma, do you know how many diseases and bugs possums carry?” 

             “Can’t be any more than your Grandpa!” 

             “No grandma I’m serious. If It bites you, you will probably get rabies.” 

             “I can’t get rabies, I’m immune. I got the shot back in ’72.” 

             “I’m no doctor, but I don’t think that is how it works.”

             The wild animal came to me and started to nibble on my shirt. It’s going to bite me and give me rabies. “Missy!” grandma yelled at the wild animal, “We don’t nibble!” She hit the animal across the nose and it growled a mean evil snarl. I honestly thought it was going to attack me. My feet were stone. I stood there not able to move. 

             “Welp, Missy,” Grandma started. “Nice seeing ya today. I think you should go home for the night. Soph isn’t used to your exoticness.”  

             It looked like the animal shrugged and followed grandma to the door. I still couldn’t move. Grandma gave me a glass of water and said, “The guys should be in soon so I better start cooking wanna help?” Grandma started acting a little blue.    

             “What are we having?” 

             “Tomorrow we are having spaghetti, your favorite. I was gonna let me have all day to make a meal like that. We are just gonna have leftovers tonight. Usually, Missy helps me cook but obviously, she can’t control herself tonight, and you ain't used to her.” 

             I just about died. This possum, that who knows how many diseases, made the food I’m going to be eating in about twenty minutes. 

             When my cousins got there, they were all like how are you, Sophie? Nothing important but fast forward a little bit. 

        “Hey, did you know Grandma has a pet possum?” I asked my cousin Cyrus. 

             “Yeah, Missy? They are like best friends. She takes her everywhere, bingo, church, restaurants. I was surprised Missy wasn’t here.” 

             “Well, I told grandma it would give her rabies and the thing was acting like a wild animal.” 

             “Sophie, seriously! I guess you didn’t know, but grandpa took that thing—when grandma started feeding it—to the vet to get all of its diseases away! Don’t tell the old lady that though, she doesn’t need to know that.” 

             “The vet seriously fixed an animal like that?”

             “If you pay enough money, they will do anything. That sounds a little wrong, but you know what I mean.” 

             “That’s sounds corrupt.” 

             “Oh, Soph you gotta not use big city words.” 

             “Do you think grandma looks depressed?” 

             “Umm, I’m sorry?” 

             “Do you think she looks sad?” 

             “Of course, she does, her best friend is outside.” 

             “Should I apologize?” 

             “Now that is a word that I know. Well, I don’t know what you said but you should probably clarify that you don’t dislike the beast no matter how weird it is.” 

             “But I do dislike the beast.” 

             “I don’t give advice, I’m just Cyrus but sometimes you gotta make exceptions to your likes and dislikes for your family cuz they never leave ya no matter how much ya deserve it. And, if ya a tight-ass all your life, ya get wrinkles and age fast.”  

             “Thank you, Cyrus. That actually sounded really poetic.”

             “Oh, I ain’t no poet.” 

             “You never know what the future holds, Cyrus.” 

             “True, but I’m almost 100% positive I’m not gonna be a poet.” 

             “Whatever,” I said getting up, “I’m going to go talk to grandma.” 

             “Cool.” 

             I walked over to grandma and asked her if she would come outside, “You know there are animals with rabies out there, right?” 

             I rolled my eyes, and she followed me out there, “Grandma, I need to apologize for not accepting Missy as your friend. I’m sorry.” 

             “It’s ok, darling. You’re from the big town and don’t have an open country mind.”