Author's Note: First of all, I originally gave this story idea to Nairobi-harper to do as a story request, but due to the circumstances she was under, she found it nearly impossible to write this story, and adhere to my request. Therefore, I decided I'd do this story in exchange for another request, which she released last night, the East coast version of 'No More Cookies,' called 'No More Candy.' Should you wish to check it out, it's available in the regular Rugrats section. I'd also like to apologize for not being around for the last couple of days. I not only didn't have a lot of time for Fan Fiction writing on Sunday, which was Father's Day, but I also felt the story I'm about to write here, didn't seem approapriate to be releasing on Father's Day, and then, yesterday, I didn't feel very well, I think I may have gotten a small case of food poisoning or something, so spent most of the day in bed. No matter, I'm feeling much better now, and so, have here, a story with the regular West coast Rugrats, which is dedicated to Nairobi-harper, the summary will explain everything.
Farewell Grandma Shirley
Summary: The story of the death of Chuckie's paternal grandmother. Wrote this in dedication of Nairobi-harper losing her grandmother recently.
Disclaimer: I do not own the original Rugrats characters, they're the property of their original creaters. I only own any OC's you don't recognize, like Zack and his Aunty Celeste.
Eight-year-old Chuckie Finster had been through a lot in his life, from losing his mother at a very young age, to gaining a new mom and sister in Paris when he was two-years-old, and having to overcome many fears, everything from getting potty trained, to the loud noise of the candy and soda machines in the elementary school cafeteria. But if that wasn't enough for this red head, one of the motherly figures, his grandma Shirley, who had been in his life since he was born, was on the verge of dying. It was no surprise, for the past couple of years, since Chuckie had entered the first grade, she had been suffering from Type Two Diabetes, and as of late, she was suffering from kidney failure, and had gone into the hospital around Christmas time. In fact, originally, she and his grandpa Marvin were suppose to come visit the family for the holidays, but had to cancel their plans because of the health state she was in at the time.
One Tuesday morning in the early spring, Chuckie was about to head out the door to wait for the bus, when the phone rang. Seeing he was closest to the phone, he answered it.
"Hello?" Chuckie said into the phone upon answering it.
"Well hey Chuckie it's grandpa. Is your dad there?" Grandpa Marvin replied.
"No, dad has gone to open the Java Lava, and I'm about to leave for school. Can I take a message?" Chuckie asked, grabbing a pen by the phone and pulling the pad of sticky notes near him so he could take down a message.
"Just tell your dad that your grandmother doesn't have much longer to live." Marvin said.
Chuckie's heart sank in his chest, as he stood there, unable to speak, his mouth gaped open. While he was only in the third grade, he wasn't unfamiliar with death, and he knew his grandmother's time might come, but he wasn't expecting it this soon.
"Chuckie? You still there?" Grandpa Marvin asked, after it had gone silent for a couple of minutes, on account of Chuckie's surprise reaction.
"Uh… Yeah… I'm… Right… Here…" Chuckie stammered, trying to hold back tears.
"Did you get the message? About grandma?" Marvin asked again.
"Yes grandpa, I'll make sure to give the message to my dad." Chuckie replied, as Kira and Kimi walked into the kitchen, carrying Chuckie's lunch.
"Well, I've gotta go to school. Bye grandpa." Chuckie said, hanging up the phone and looking up at his mother who stood before him.
"Chuckie, who was that?" Kira asked.
"It was grandpa Marvin. Grandma Shirley isn't doing too well and may be on the verge of… Of… Oh I can't say it." Chuckie stammered, nearly ready to break down again.
Kira put his lunch down and put a comforting arm on her son's shoulder.
"I understand that your grandmother is very special to you. Tell you what, I'll talk to dad, and after school, we'll see to going and paying your grandmother a visit. Of course, both of our cars are in the shop, after your dad getting that flat tire yesterday, and mine having to go in for an oil change, so we'll have to take a cab, but we'll see what we can do. Now, you and Kimi Chan need to be running along to school, the bus will be here shortly." Kira said, handing Chuckie his lunch box and walking with him to the door.
"Okay mom, thanks." Chuckie said, giving his mom a hug before grabbing his sister's hand and walking towards the bus stop.
The bulk of that day at school was uneventful for the redhead, as he found himself, in a fog, too worried about his grandmother to concentrate on anything. Come lunch time, he sat down at his usual table with Tommy and Zack, as Phil, Lil and Kimi usually sat elsewhere with some of the other kids in their third grade class. Chuckie opened up his lunch box, tore open the sandwich bag with his baloney sandwich, when he felt someone tapping on his right shoulder. He turned to see that Tommy had sat down with his hot lunch he had gotten from the cafeteria.
"Are you okay Chuckie? You seem a bit distracted today." Tommy asked, a look of worry on his face.
"No Tommy, it's my grandma. She's in the hospital." Chuckie said, leaning in to Tommy's ear to whisper something to him.
"I think she might be…" Chuckie whispered, but couldn't bring himself to say the last word.
"Don't worry Chuckie, she's in the hospital right? I'm sure she'll be fine." Tommy whispered back, hoping to cheer his friend up.
While ordinarily, he'd take his friend's word, he knew deep down she didn't have too much longer to live, but thinking about it, only made him more upset. It was all he could do most of that day to keep the tears from coming to his eyes, not wishing to cry in front of the other kids at school. He's been afraid to cry at school ever since he was in kindergarten, when he fell down on the playground, and cried because he hurt his knee. While the teacher came over and helped him in to the nurse's office, he couldn't help but notice several kids, the Mcnulty boys in particular, laughing at him and calling him a cry baby. Embarrassed by this, he swore to never break down in tears at school again, and now, here he was, three years later, on the verge of wanting to cry, but not wishing to face the embarrassment again, on top of losing one of the few maternal figures that's been there for him for as long as he could remember. He went back to eating his lunch, trying to put his grandmother out of his mind, not saying much to either Tommy or Zack, who were talking about the latest Reptar flick they had all gone to see the previous Saturday together at the movies. While Chuckie did enjoy the movie, he wasn't much in the mood to talk, so only put his own input in if he was spoken to.
"Wasn't it great how Reptar destroyed those evil honey bees Chuckie?" Zack asked.
"Oh, yeah, it was great." Chuckie replied in between sips of his apple juice he had brought from home.
Soon, the lunch recess bell rang and everybody went outside, where Chuckie sat on one of the benches up by the school and watched his friends play Hop Scotch. And just as it was all he could do to concentrate during the morning, he found the same trouble arose that afternoon. He was just greatful come the end of the day, that he was never called on to answer a question. Chances are he was so out of it, he would have gotten his answers wrong, something that hardly ever happened, unless he was really nervous over an upcoming test, or lost in thought over a major event, like it was today with his grandmother being on the verge of dying.
Before he knew it, the end of the day bell rang, and he got on to the bus, where he took a seat by the window, and looked out the window all the way home, not talking with anybody. No sooner had he arrived home, when a yellow taxi cab was sitting in his driveway. Curious, he went to see what was going on.
"Come on Chuckie and Kimi, let's go." Kira called from inside the cab.
"Okay mommy." Kimi called, approaching the back door of the cab and opening it.
"Where are we going?" Chuckie asked, upon climbing into the cab with his sister, and closing the door behind him.
"We're picking up your father from the Java Lava and heading up to the hospital where grandma Shirley is stationed. I received another call from grandpa Marvin today, and she doesn't have much time left. It will be a miracle if she's still alive when we get there. Neither one of our cars were ready to be picked up at the mechanic's, so your father and I agreed to take a cab up there so you two could see your grandmother and tell her goodbye." Kira explained, as the cab driver pulled out of their driveway and headed in the direction of the Java Lava.
Luckily, when they arrived, Chas was waiting out front, at which point, Kira moved to the back seat and let Chas ride in front, since he suffered from motion sickness if he rode in the back seat.
"Thanks for watching things while I'm gone Betty." Chas called from the cab, waving to Betty Deville, who was in the doorway.
"No problem Chazzy, good luck with everything." Betty called, as Chas closed his door, buckled his seatbelt, and soon, they were on their way.
It was a long drive, as Chas's parents lived an hour away, and grandma Shirley was stationed at the hospital in their home town, but the drive felt especially long to Chuckie this time. To pass the time, he decided to work on what little homework he did have that night, which was going over his spelling words for the week, and finishing up some math problems on a worksheet he had started in class, but didn't get time to finish, and his teacher told him to finish the problems at home. But just as he had trouble concentrating in school, not to mention, the bumpiness of the cab made it difficult to write, it was nearly impossible to do his math homework. So he handed the sheet of spelling words to his mom, and had her call out words to him.
"Chuckie, spell the word, quick." Kira read aloud.
"Uh… Q-U-I-C-K." Chuckie replied hesitantly, a bit unsure if he was getting it right or not.
"That's correct. Now, spell the word, queen." Kira read aloud.
"Uh… Um… Q-U-E-A-N?" Chuckie asked, once again, unsure.
"Nope, close, Q-U-E-E-N." Kira said.
They continued on through the rest of the spelling words, which were all words that started with a Q for that week, and while Chuckie got half of them correct, he was having difficulty with the other half. However, before they could review the words he was having trouble with, they had arrived at the hospital.
"We're here." The cab driver said.
"Thank you sir." Chas said, paying him the cab fare and everybody piled out of the cab on to the curb near the hospital entrance.
Chuckie gulped upon getting out of the cab. Being at hospitals made him nervous.
"What's wrong Chuckie?" Kimi asked, noticing her brother, looking nervous.
"It's just, I don't like hospitals, that's all Kimi." Chuckie replied, leaning in close to his parents for comfort and support.
"No worries Chuckie, we'll be with you, and I'm sure a hug from grandma Shirley will cheer you up, it always does." Kimi said, a huge smile on her face.
But Kimi was not only a similar spirited person to his best friend Tommy in times like this, always looking on the bright side, even at age seven-and-a-half, she didn't have quite the same concept of death that Chuckie had, seeing her real father was still alive, and as far as he knew, Kimi had never lost anybody important to her before. However, he didn't want to possibly start an argument with his sister, so he remained quiet, as the family walked into the hospital and went up to the receptionest's desk, to find out where Shirley's room was.
"We're here to pay Shirley Finster a visit." Kira said to the receptionist who was sitting behind the desk.
The receptionist typed some things on a computer, then turned her attention back to Kira.
"She's upstairs in room 305. Take the elevator to the third floor, it will be the fifth room on your right down the hall." The receptionist said, pointing in the direction of the elebators.
"Thank you mam." Kira said.
The Finster family got on the next elevator, and went up to Shirley's room. When they got there, they saw Marvin hunched over the hospital bed where his wife was laying, in uncontrollable tears. He was so upset, he didn't even hear the family come in.
"Mom, dad, we're here." Chas said, coming up behind his father, who turned around, startled by his son's presence.
"Son, this isn't easy for me to tell you, but, your mother is gone." Marvin whispered, burying his face into his son's shoulder.
Sure enough, Chuckie, Kimi and Kira all looked at the bed where Shirley was laying, and sure enough, she had died. At this point, poor Chuckie, who was a bit freaked out by seeing his dead grandmother before him, ran out of the hospital room, screaming and crying at the same time.
"Chuckie Chan, come back!" Kira cried, stumbling out of the hospital room, running down the hall to catch up with her eight-year-old son, who had run face first into a cart that had food on it to be delivered to other patients in the building.
Unfortunately, she wasn't quick enough, and poor Chuckie went face first into the cart, which ran down the hall until it hit a wall at the end, toppling over on top of him, splattering food everywhere.
"Chuckie! Are you all right?" Kira asked, when she approached her son, who was now lying on the ground, covered in soup and a car nearly on top of him.
A nurse came by at that moment and saw what happened.
"What's going on?" The nurse asked.
"Oh, thank goodness someone's here. My son, a bit freaked out over the death of his grandmother, ran out into the hall and had a bit of an accident." Kira replied.
"Well, let's get your son checked out then." The nurse said, getting the cart out of Chuckie's way, and checking to see he was still responsive.
He was, though he was quite soar. Once he was on his feet, they headed down to an examining room, where he was checked out. Nothing was broken, just a few scrapes and bruises, which the nurse practitioner treated. Once that was done, Kira and Chuckie went and caught up with Chas, Kimi and Marvin, who was seeing to making funeral arrangements for Shirley.
"What happened to Chuckie?" Chas asked upon seeing his son, covered in bandages.
Kira went on to explain to him what happened, as they headed outside to catch their cab back home. On the ride home, everybody had a good cry over the loss of Shirley, and the driver, who was a female this time, felt bad for the family's loss. Once they got home, Kira opened up cans of soup for supper, but nobody was in the mood to eat much of anything, in particular, Chuckie.
"It just isn't fare. First, mommy left, then my pet bug Melville, now grandma. Why did she have to die?" Chuckie cried at the dinner table.
"Mommy's right here Chuckie." Kimi said.
Chuckie glared at his sister.
"My other mommy." Chuckie snapped.
"Chuckie, be nice to your sister." Kira scolded.
"Sorry mom." Chuckie muttered, taking another bite of his soup.
"And just like your mommy, my mommy is now in Heaven watching down on us too, but I agree with you Chuckie, why did she have to go." Chas said, breaking down into tears.
"May I be excused?" Chuckie asked.
Kira nodded, as her mouth was full, so he got up from the table, and headed off to his room, where he sat for a while on his bed, and looked through old photos of him and his grandparents. The first photo he opened up to in the book was taken not long before Tommy's little brother was born. His grandparents had come to visit, and he saw a picture of Tommy making a pie with her. It had been a good six years since that ordeal happened, but he vaguely recalled some incident about thinking he and Tommy were brothers, and being upset by the fact that his grandparents were spending more time with Tommy than they were with him. He then turned to another picture where he, Tommy, and his grandparents were playing together in the yard the following day. Then, he flipped back a few pages to pictures taken of him when he was visiting his grandparents. There was one taken of him at age two, sitting on his grandma's lap, eating one of her delicious gingerbread cookies, and his grandpa giving him a blue pinwheel. He then recalled how much fun he had at that visit, and how he couldn't wait to show it to Tommy, who he found out had his first cut while he was away. He even recalled showing Tommy that cuts heal up, so he doesn't have to wear the bandage forever, after Tommy got his second cut upon rescuing him when they rolled down a hill at the park, into some thorn bushes.
He looked at more pictures, looking at all of the pictures taken of him wearing the sweaters his grandmother would knit for him every year. And then, he pulled out the last couple of years of Christmas cards his grandparents had sent him. Sadly, no card came last year because of the health state she was in, but as he looked at his grandmother's handwriting on the cards, he couldn't stop thinking about how he didn't even get to tell her goodbye, because she was already dead when they arrived at the hospital. By this point, the eight-year-old redhead lost it again, loudly bursting into tears, as he snuggled up with Wawa, and buried his face into his pillow, crying himself to sleep, never even getting undressed for bed, or remembering to take his evening allergy meds, something he hadn't forgotten ever, or at least, as far as he could remember.
The next day, while Kimi went to school, and Kira went to the Java Lava, Chas and Chuckie stayed home, not sure what to do. They spent their day, talking about grandma, and looking at old pictures, while crying, unable to contain themselves. That afternoon, Marvin called, letting Chas know when the funeral would be, and asking if he wanted an open or a closed casket at the wake.
"Uh… I don't know if I want it open or not." Chas replied into the phone, just as Chuckie walked into the kitchen to get himself a drink of water.
"I hope I never have to see grandma's dead body again, that was just, too freaky." Chuckie said to himself, filling up a glass of water from the kitchen fosset.
"Uh, closed casket." Chas replied into the phone, overhearing his son's comment.
The following day, which was a Thursday, Chuckie did go back to school, even though he would have preferred to stay home, he was going to have to miss half a day on Friday to go to the wake at the funeral home, followed by the funeral the next day, meaning they'd be staying at his grandparents place overnight, so his parents wanted him to go to school.
"How's your grandmother?" Zack asked, upon seeing Chuckie step on to the bus.
He took a seat next to him, once again, trying to hold back the tears. He leaned in to Zack's ear.
"She died, before we even made it to visit her in the hospital." Chuckie whispered to Zack.
"Oh wow, I'm very sorry." Zack replied.
"Thanks." Chuckie replied.
By the time they got to school, the rest of the gang knew of grandma Shirley's passing, and were all feeling pretty sad for Chuckie. The bulk of the day was uneventful, though Kira had sent in a note with Chuckie to give to his teacher about having to leave early on Friday, and asking if he could take his spelling test in the morning, since she usually gave them after lunch recess. She agreed to let Chuckie take the test the following Monday, seeing that she knew what he must be going through, giving him the weekend to study.
"You don't need to do that." Chuckie said to his teacher.
"I want to, you need to heal. I lost my dad last year, so know how it feels. You just hang in there, they'll get better in time." The teacher replied, as the kids were coming back from PE class, which Chuckie skipped, on account he was still feeling soar in a few places from his accident at the hospital from a couple of days ago.
The rest of the day and Friday morning were uneventful, as Chuckie more or less, went through the motions of going to school, preparing himself for the upcoming days ahead. At around lunch time, his parents both had their cars back, but Chas didn't feel much like driving, so Kira came to pick up Chuckie and Kimi, signing them out for the afternoon, and before they knew it, they were heading up to the funeral home an hour away from them. Poor Chuckie had difficulty sleeping the night before, so he caught himself a nap in the car on the way up there. After they arrived, they went into the funeral home parler, which was decorated in beautiful pink and white flowers, and the casket, closed with a photograph of Shirley sitting on top was near the alter. While Chuckie didn't really wish to see a picture of his grandmother, especially since this was one of the more recent pictures, when she started to get really sick, after her hair had turned dark gray, no longer the red color it possessed in some of the baby pictures Chuckie had looked at a couple of days ago, all he could think at that moment was…
"At least I don't have to look at her dead body again." Chuckie thought to himself, kneeling down at the alter to say a little prayer.
The rest of the afternoon was spent with lines of people who knew Shirley coming up through the line, and giving Chuckie and the rest of the family hugs, showing their respects and saying how sorry they were for their loss. Chuckie, wearing a black suit, which he changed into upon arriving at the funeral home, politely hugged them back and told them thank you, even though deep down, he'd much prefer to have been left alone.
If that wasn't enough, it was even harder to face his grandparents house, where they were staying that night. No aromas of baked goods came from the kitchen. No sound of his grandmother's sweet, soothing voice, humming a tune while she baked. And one of the hardest things, was when he went to bed that night. He always recalled how when he'd visit his grandparents, even at his current age, despite how many times he told his grandparents he was too old for bedtime stories, his grandma Shirley still insisted on reading stories to him, and her favorite story to read to him was the Goodnight Train book. She tried reading The Caboose that got Loose to him when he was two, but Chuckie was so frightened by that book, he started crying halfway through it, and she never read it to him again after that. She also read to him, a cute little board book called I Love you Through and Through, which always made Chuckie smile and laugh. That book still sat on the bookshelf in the room where he usually slept at his grandparents. He picked it up for old time sake, and as he quietly read the old childhood favorite to himself, he could hear his grandmother reading it to him in his head. By the time he reached the end of the book, tears were silently trickling down his cheeks, as he saw to brushing his teeth, putting on his pajamas, and getting into bed, as they had the funeral the next day.
The next day came bright and early, when Chuckie awoke, hoping to smell freshly cooked biskits coming out of the oven, then walked into the kitchen to find everybody eating cereal, remembering that there wouldn't be any delicious baked goods for breakfast, because the baker was gone. Not wishing to disappoint his grandfather or his parents, even though he didn't have much of an appetite, he poured himself a small bowl of cereal and sat down at the table.
"Did you sleep okay?" Kira asked.
Chuckie nodded.
"Well we'd better get a move on, they want us at the church at nine o'clock." Marvin said, standing up from the breakfast table and heading upstairs to get ready.
Everyone finished their breakfast and went to get ready. Chuckie put back on the black suit he wore the day before, if for no other reason, he didn't bring anything else to wear. Before they knew it, they were at the church, and the funeral shortly began afterwards. They performed several of Shirley's favorite hymns, and Marvin spoke about his late wife. Chuckie also learned that the church where her funeral was at, was also the same church where his grandparents got married, about two years before his dad was born. Then, they went to the cemitary, where she was laid down to rest.
"By grandma, I'll never forget you." Chuckie said to himself, looking up towards the sky, where he believes he saw his grandmother's face in the clouds, just like that time he saw his mother's face in the clouds while they were on their way to Paris, so many years back. After the funeral, they went to one of Marvin and Shirley's favorite restaurants for lunch, followed by a trip to the convenient store, where Chuckie picked up the latest Armadillo Dave comic with that week's allowance, and his dad picked up a copy of the newspaper, to have a copy of his mother's obitchuary. Soon after, they packed up the car and headed for home, where Chuckie read his new comic book on the way there.
Reading the comic cheered him up, and Kimi commented how it was the first time she had seen her brother smile in a few days. It was living proof that while it would take a great deal of time to fully come to terms with his grandmother's death, he was on the road to recovery, but before he could really begin the healing process, there was one final thing he went home and did. Late that Saturday afternoon, he got together a small box, and placed inside, the first sweater she ever knitted for him as a baby, which was not the brown and red one he was wearing at the park that fall before they went to Paris, when Tommy's daddy showed off his automatic apple picker, but one she had made for him right after his mom died. It was dark purple and had a red heart on the front. He put that in the box, along with several photos of her, one of which was one of him, Kimi, and his paternal grandparents, that was taken on the day he and Kimi were officially adopted by each other's parents, post returning from Paris. Along with those photos, he also put in there, the Christmas cards she sent him over the years, and on the very top of the stack, he cut out the obichuary from the newspaper, and laid it on top. Once everything was inside, he closed the box and placed it on a shelf in his closet.
"Bye grandma, you'll be forever in my memories." Chuckie said to himself, waving to the box, followed by closing his closet door.
He went downstairs to the living room where he found his sister watching the Dummi Bears on TV. He took a seat next to her on the couch. When a commercial came on, Kimi looked over to see her brother sitting next to her, smiling.
"You feeling better Chuckie?" Kimi asked.
"Yeah. Dad's right, grandma's up in Heaven, watching over me, just like mommy is." Chuckie said.
"I'm glad you're feeling better Chuckie." Kimi said, giving her brother a hug.
"Me too. I'll always miss her, but I'll never forget her. Besides the mommy I've got now, for a while, she was the closest thing to a mommy I had for a while." Chuckie said, returning the hug.
"But our mommy's still with us, and she loves us very much." Kimi said, just as Kira walked into the room.
"I sure do." Kira said, walking over to the couch and joining in the hug with her two kids.
And from that day forward, while there were moments where Chuckie missed his grandmother, in time, he got over the loss, looking back on the memories of his grandmother, with a smile on his face.
The End
Author's Note: I hope you all enjoyed that story. I made some brief references to several Rugrats episodes, including 'I Remember Melville,' from season 3, 'The Family Tree,' and 'The First Cut,' from season 5, 'Acorn Nuts and Diapied Butts,' Part 1 from season 6, as it was in that part where Chuckie mentioned something about the sweater he was wearing being made for him by his grandmother, and one of the photos he put into his box of momentoes, was a reference to the season 7 Rugrats episode, 'Finsterella.' Also, we never saw Chuckie's grandparents at all on All Grown Up, so I always figured they must have died prior to the events of that series, and I don't know, I just thought, having Chuckie be in third grade just, sounded appropriate to me for this story. Writing death stories isn't exactly my strong point, but I hope I did okay on this, and I do hope that Nairobi-harper and anybody else who reads it enjoyed it, and that I did a good job dedicating this story to Nairobi-harper's grandmother. Anyway, as always, be looking for more stories, coming soon, and hope everybody is having a good day or night, or whatever it might be at the time it happens to be when you're reading this. Thanks for reading and reviewing, and as always, more stories, coming soon!