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Chapter Twenty-One

I'm very ashamed to say that as I drove home, I cried like a baby for a few minutes, just to let all my frustration and aggravation out. Driving while crying definitely was a risky and hazardous thing to do, because my eyes started getting so blurry I could hardly see the double lines on the highway after a while.

When I get home and pull off into the driveway, I'm both pleased and concerned to find my Grandmother sitting outside on the porch on the swing outside the front door. Her body is slanted slightly in a weird position, so I'm assuming she fell asleep while waiting up for me, bless her. I feel a bit guilty, because I'm even considering waking her gently so that she'll let me rant and rave on how things with Eric went tonight. When I climb up the steps cautiously and quietly, I realize she's out like a broken and battered flashlight. She's dead to the world, and sleeping so silently like a log.

Literally.

Instantly, I dismiss being rude in waking her just so that I have somebody to talk to. I sit next to her on the swing, feeling not so much in the mood for talking, but for sleeping, like she is.

Sitting so closely to her, it's then I realize something is wrong.

I can't hear her breathing. At all. No snores, no less, and Gran isn't a big snorer. She just gives off little faint huffing noises, from time to time. But she isn't this time. Absolutely nothing comes from her.

Quickly, I wipe my face of all tears and gently push my shoulder against hers. I don't exactly want to startle her awake, and give her a fright. "Gran?" I whisper gently, feeling the nerves choke me as she doesn't respond. Gran isn't usually such a heavy sleeper. "Gran, wake up! You fell asleep on the porch, you silly beautiful woman. Plus, your neck is going to be sore now! You're sleeping in a funny angle!" I hate the quavering in my voice, but I just had a bad feeling.

A very, very bad feeling.

"Gran? Wake up!"

I make myself move into action, by bringing a hand carefully up to her shoulder. I give her a gentle shake, and her head falls forward limply over her chest.

It was then I realize. It hits me so fast, I almost fall onto the porch in a heap with overwhelming panic.

My beautiful Grandmother wasn't sleeping. The reason I can't hear her giving off funny little snores or restless breathing sounds is because she is... dead.

This really was the worst night for me. I suddenly feel so terrible with myself. There I was, minutes ago, sobbing like a hormonal woman in the car over some silly vampire who had treated me with such aloofness this evening and giving me the cold shoulder, and yet, there was something far more important at home to be concerned and upset about.

I want to scream at the top of my lungs to wake myself up. It feels like a horrible dream in a sense. It feels completely unreal, and for a few moments, I refuse to accept that my Grandmother has passed. I want to somehow reverse time and go back to this morning, where Gran was so vibrant and her usual early bird self in the morning, fussing over making me a hot coffee.

I take a deep breath, and compose myself.

I knew what I had to do, it just took me a while to get over the numbing shock. How can you possibly prepare yourself for the death of a loved one? I guess you can't. I guess it's just one of those cruel things about the world. When death comes for a loved one, you sure as hell can bet it comes without warning and without sense, and threatens to rock your world and all sensibility entirely.

With a strange sense of mild detachment, I run inside to the phone. I dial 911.

An ambulance and Police Officer, Andy Bellefleur, was there within five minutes.

The death of Gran only fully sunk in, once I was trying to reach Jason. He was unreachable, and I had to have called his cell number over five times, only to have nobody pick up. Why is it that a person is unreachable in a time when you truly need them the most? It's the most frustrating and hopeless experience imaginable, because Jason deserved to know our dear Granny had passed away. She was his Grandmother, too. She had always been like our foster-mother, so what in Lord's name was he doing that was so much more important than answering the phone?

I feel a bit silly as I stand outside by all my lonesome on the lawn, out of the police's way. When a team from the ambulance work on putting my Grandmother into a body bag, it's the surrealist image imaginable. It's like I've only just stepped into the set of a murder mystery, and all these people are just actors on stage.

It's also an eye-opener to realize how alone I was on this. I'm standing by myself, crying hysterically, while people fuss around, doing odd things to the house, like searching for any clues or any weapons or any slightest indication of what happened to my Grandmother.

In times like this, it certainly makes you realize who is trustworthy and actually cares about you, and who doesn't. And the fact I was standing around aimlessly, with a wet face and no doubt snot dribbling out of my nose, it became apparent to me that no one cares. The world can be real lonely and hurtful sometimes, but sometimes you've just got to suck it up and take it all in with a grain of salt.

I don't even understand what is going on, when I hear a bustle of noise coming from the back of the ambulance van as they load my Grandmother up inside, several moments later. It's like I'm not really present in the world. I hear murmured shouting, and somebody sounds as if they want to punch the living daylights out of somebody.

"Is that her? Fucking answer me!"

"Sir, I... I don't know what you're talking about. Do you mean the old lady in the body-bag? If so, yeah. It's her." There's a weird noise, the sound of someone choking and spluttering for air, and a few other people jog to the behind of the van hurriedly.

"Release your hold on his neck now!"

"Where is she, then? Where? Answer me!"

"You mean the girl, who's the Granddaughter? She's standing over there by the grass, man! I can't breathe, dude!"

I hear a lot of coughing and retching for air, and then, much to my shock and equal relief, Eric appears from the back of the van, looking very murderous.

He's the very last person I'm expecting to see right now. But on some unconscious level, I think it sinks into me that maybe he does care after all. How funny that Eric Northman is the very first person to come along. It certainly revealed a lot to me, though currently, I feel far too detached to fully understand and appreciate it. I just watch him, as he comes over to me. He's clearly in shock over the whole thing, too, because he doesn't say anything. Maybe he can't? He just puts a hand on my elbow, giving me a bit of a squeeze with his fingers into my skin that I hardly feel. I'm sure its meant to be comforting, but as for now, I feel completely numb and immune to anything. Everything is just going straight past my brain. There's no sense.

"Are you all right?" he asks, after a while. He sounds stunned out of his wits. His voice is completely hollow and exhausted.

"Oh, this is the best night of my life. I get home and discover my favourite woman in the world has passed away. I'm just wonderful." Hate to sound whiny, but it's the truth. And able to see the irony of the evening, I cover my hands over my face, and double over in a fit of laughter. Soon, I'm laughing so hard, and crying- maybe even both- that my legs give out beneath me, and I sink into the grass on my knees. Soon as I hit the lawn, I realize the grass is wet, and I feel all damp and dirty, but oh well.

Eric stands around uncomfortable while I laugh and sob, and laugh and sob, shuffling his shoes on the grass and glaring at his feet, with not really knowing what to do. I suppose after a while he got tired of listening to me having a crazy attack, because he sinks down on his knees to the grass with me and makes a few attempts to put me right. He can't glamour, of course, and he sure already knows that, but I get the feeling he is trying to. He grabs my face between his hands and stares at me for a very long and hard moment, with anxious and fear-stricken eyes into mine. I certainly wish he could glamour me, and put me to a right frame of mind so I wasn't so hysterical right now. It would have helped lots, and though I couldn't exactly help the way I was acting, it was embarrassing for him having to see me like this.

"You returned here soon as you ran off from Fangtasia?"

I make a face at his choice of words, and all I can seem to manage is a curt nod. I can't even begin to find my voice.

"How did you find her?"

I lift my chin, and jerk it over to the chair on the porch, where a few medics were fussing around.

"Over there on the chair?" I nod again. "How did she look? Was there blood?"

I try to trek through my hysterical and foggy brain to think that over. Was there blood? No, not any I could see. She looked very peaceful sitting there, hence why I so foolishly assumed she was just sleeping.

"Perky?" Eric puts his hands on my shoulders and gives me a little, urgent shake. "Was there blood? Did it seem as if she was murdered?"

"No," I answer numbly. "She looked... serene as anything. As if she had almost... passed away while she was dreaming of something beautiful." And then I'm off, sobbing again. I think this time they were mostly happy tears at the expression on her face. He touches my hair with his hand, and after a startled moment of digesting that, I sag into his body in both relief and turmoil. He stiffens, and then a bit awkwardly, he puts his arms around my shoulders, pulling me into his shirt. I give out a weird sigh of gratitude at being hugged and comforted by him. He definitely gives super good hugs. "Why are you here?"

"What? You want me to leave?"

"No," I gasp quickly. "Definitely not. Please, don't."

I look past his shoulder blankly at one of the men who steps out behind the van. For some reason, he has his hands wrapped around his throat.

"What's wrong with that man over there? Did you do something to him?"

"I got him into a fucking choke-hold," Eric admits, breathing into my hair, a little embarrassed. "I thought, for a moment there... that it was you in that fucking body-bag. I lost my shit, but I'm glad it wasn't you. I'm... relieved to know that now."

He tightens the hug, pushing his chin into the back of my hair, and we spend an immeasurable amount of time hanging around on the grass, clinging to one another. I hear him give out a long and ragged sigh after a while, blowing my hair around. I'm guessing he could use a good hug himself.

"I thought it was you... and after you left..." I feel him shudder against me. He was full of surprises right now. "... I couldn't stand it if it had been you. I couldn't tolerate that." He makes a weird strangled noise, and whispers into my hair, with quiet desperation, "I love you so fucking much." It's like an outburst, something uncontrollable that curls off his tongue.

I lift my head slowly from his shoulder to meet his eyes. "Huh?" I whisper numbly.

"What?" He can't even stand looking me in my face. "I never said anything, I think you're imagining things," he says quickly, defensively, and I feel him shrug casually underneath my arms. And he probably didn't. I'm probably imagining it, since I'm being so crazy right now. Grief does that to a person, I'm presuming. "I've made a decision. I'm going to buy a house, whether you like it or not," he says firmly and decisively after a moment, I think, just for something to say.

I'm too tired and emotionally dead to think of anything to say to that, so I just let it slide. He's a big boy, after all. He can do whatever he wants. And seeing him here, solely for me, offering me comfort in my time of need when nobody else was around, it made me realize I feel a lot about him. He's the only person that came through for me tonight, and I didn't even have to so much as call him. He just came out of his own accord, and it's truly wonderful of him. Suddenly, the world doesn't seem so bleak and lonely for me, after all.