A/N: Okay this story thing has 3 parts, this is the second and I'm still writing the third, hopefully I finish it. I have mentally beat myself up in order to...I was cursed with the inability to ever finish anything, yes mourn for me. Anyway, I'll be done now and shutting up.
Well before I shut up (This is the last thing I swear!) I wanna thank parseltongue girl and Saynt Jimmy for reviewing for the last part, I kinda didn't expect anyone to. So thank you!!!
NOW I'm done!!
(The disclaimer the same as last time, please don't make me write it again)
Part Two
Shawn's legs gave out after a mile; he tripped on a curb and fell, forcing his hands in front of him, awaiting the wet concrete. He let out a gasp as a deep, searing pain exploded in his left wrist. He picked himself up and cradled his arm in his opposite hand, only vaguely realizing he'd left the cookies at Grandma Lucy's house.
Grandma Lucy, he thought as a tear slid down his face, she won't remember me soon. He had always heard his parents talking about something being wrong with her, but they always stopped when he walked into the room, so he didn't read much into it. Looking back after that visit, Shawn decided he probably should have. It certainly explained why the family no longer visited her all together, but rather by themselves or a couple at a time. The misplaced knick-knacks and removal of all family pictures was also explained, Shawn noted miserably, and he concluded that his grandma was probably losing her mind. He didn't know there was a disease that stole memories and he briefly wondered if he could ask his father to catch the culprit. No that's stupid; he reprimanded himself, bad idea, why'd I even think of it?
Before another large tear could leak its way out of his eye, Shawn hoisted himself up with one arm, still clutching the other to his chest, and straitened out his body. The movement jostled his arm and he winced in pain, vaguely wondering if he broke it or sprained it, praying for the latter. Once he recovered, he slowly began walking in the direction of his home, dusting the wet gravel off his pants on the way. He sighed heavily and turned to the sky that still refused the let the rain fall, even though there were several cracks of thunder and flares of lightning. Dragging his feet along the asphalt, Shawn fought the urge to cry, closing his eyes and biting his tongue, attempting (and failing) to divert his mind away from Grandma Lucy.
He soon realized that he could see his home from where he was walking and felt as if stones had been forced into his stomach. He contemplated sneaking up the back porch and through the window on the right side of the house, but with the hurt wrist, Shawn didn't think he could make it. He gritted his teeth and walked up the pathway and snuck through the screen of the back door. He barely registered the presence of his mother, Noreen, in the kitchen, reading the paper, back to him. Shawn would've gotten up the stairs swiftly and quietly if he hadn't stumbled on the carpeting, falling forward on the same wrist as before and letting a cry of pain fill the open room.
His mother rushed to the stairs and, before Shawn realized it, was ushering him into the kitchen, suspending the hurt wrist before him at an appropriate angle. She sped about the kitchen, grabbing ice and a cloth, wrapping it up and pressing it on the sore spot.
"Shawn, what on Earth happened to you?" she said, voicing the concern written so clearly on her face, trying to catch the eye of her son. He, however, didn't seem as if he had heard her and she suspected he had been crying because of his red-rimmed, watery eyes. The sight of an overflowing pot on the stove broke her from her reverie as she scrambled to move it from the burner. While pouring the contents of the pot into a serving bowl, she glanced at the uncharacteristically silent Shawn, noting that he must've seen or heard something very serious to have gotten so down in the dumps. He was normally suspended in perpetual happiness things rarely broke through.
His eyes were glued to the wooden table and his shoulders were hunched over his now iced wrist. His mother walked over to him, knelt to his height, and pulled the arm from his chest and onto the table so that she could have a good look at it.
The pale skin of Shawn's arm was succumbing to an ugly yellow-purple bruise that spread onto not only his wrist, but his forearm as well. Shawn's mother lightly grazed her fingers over the abrasion and her son visibly flinched at the contact.
"Don't touch it," came quietly from his mouth as he retracted his arm and tucked it into his stomach. He then hunched his shoulders over it, as if attempting to protect the injury further. Noreen sighed noticeably and slowly lifted herself from her knees. She guessed he wasn't going to be telling her what was wrong; he was stubborn like his father. A flash of the argument the day before played before her eyes and she tried to ignore it; however she couldn't block the images of her son fleeing from the house as he tried to keep an apathetic façade on his young face. She felt a wave of emotion hit her and she turned and made the appearance of busying herself around the kitchen, stirring and putting finishing touches on the dinner that she realized was only going to be serving the two people already in the room, no Gus today.
It occurred to Noreen that she didn't even know where her child had been today, but given his current condition, she decided against an outright scolding. Instead she began to lightly prod him another way.
"So how was school today, sweetie?" she asked in her own chipper way, trying to avoid the irritating fussing that she knew she could break into at any moment. Shawn cocked his head upwards, looking her in the eye and asking quietly, "Why didn't you tell me?"
His mother's eye clouded with confusion for several moments before she recovered gracefully and turned to him fully, attempting to hide her worry; "What are you talking about, Shawn?" she asked, despite having a sneaking suspicion of where the conversation would be going and not wanting to go there.
Shawn dipped his head forward, pondering whether or not to continue with what was surely going to be an awkward conversation. He decided, however, that he needed to know; it was his grandmother, he had a right to know. He then pressed further, "What's wrong with Grandma Lucy? Please," he said the last part with such desperation that he tried to salvage some of his pride by continuing with an angry, "Don't lie to me."
Noreen immediately recognized the classic Shawn fear signs, anger mostly, so she chose to be straight with him. Preparing herself for the upcoming discussion, she marched deliberately forward and sat down on the chair opposite her son, smoothing the creases in her fancy work pants.
She let out a stuttered, "Well, Shawn…" unsure of where to begin, dreading what she was going to be forced to say. She remained silent for several minutes trying to form the words with her mouth, but unable to; somewhat surprised that Shawn was just as quiet and still. It was the first time in awhile she had seen him like this and it sort of scared her. "Umm, well Shawn," she again tried to start; angry with herself that she thought it would be easier than this. She had practiced to herself, but it was a lot different when there was a young boy looking at her, expecting the problem to be fixable and the answer to come easily.
Shawn noted the hesitation and how his mother kept biting the corner of her lip, a tendency she only did when nervous or fear; he immediately began fearing the worst, so Shawn habitually began kicking his legs around beneath the table, narrowly avoiding his mother's knees and the table legs.
Noreen felt the swishing of the tablecloth and inwardly cringed, knowing Shawn couldn't help it. She came to the decision to just come out and say it lest she get kicked painfully in the knee. "Umm…Nana Lucy, she well, I mean to say, she's…you know, sick," she began, wincing at the statement, and how much she had butchered it.
"Obviously, I know that Mom," came Shawn's curt reply. He ran the uninjured hand through his hair in exasperation, "I just want to know what's wrong, I know she's sick, and I know she can't remember things, what else is going to happen to her?" he whispered in a pained voice. He felt his throat close slightly and tears threatened to fall; he fought to hold them in, blinking them back forcefully.
His mother's eyes sparkled with tears as well and she shook her head, put her face in her hands dejectedly. She didn't move for several moments before lifting her head up once more, this time her once clean face, ran with her make-up. "Shawn," she croaked, voice thick with tears, "It's hard, you have to give me some time to get this out. This is my own mother we're talking about, I can't…I have trouble talking about it. She…umm…she has this disease, I don't know if you've heard of it, Alzheimer's?" she looked at him questioningly, while wiping her wet cheeks and nose with the back of her hand.
Shawn nodded pensively; he'd heard of it, he didn't really know what it was exactly. He locked eyes with his mother's and nervously asked, "What happens?" somehow already knowing what was going to come.
Noreen chuckled lightly, seemingly not noticing Shawn's question, continuing with, "I was angry with her, you know, angry she would forget to meet me or to call. I thought she was avoiding me, disappointed in me somehow," and noticing the look of puzzlement on her son's face, nodded continuing, "Stupid, I know, Mom never gets disappointed in anyone," She stopped, heaving a large breath, shaking her head side to side, "Anyway I went to see her at her house, and…well the doorman there said he hadn't seen her in a few days. You can't imagine how scared I was, but as it turns out, she…well, she…she was only a few blocks down at that soup kitchen she used to work with, only she wasn't working there, she was eating there." She paused and once again put her hands over her face as she let out a strangled cry, before wiping her face again and pushing her hair back behind her ears coarsely so that it once again fell into her face.
"Anyway, I...umm…went up to her…to-to ask her why she was there and, well…she looked at me like I had twenty heads and a misplaced jaw. And…when I tried to…g-grab her arm," Shawn's mother broke down again and he saw her shoulders quivering under an unseen pressure. He quickly pushed back his chair, so fast that it fell over from the force; he climbed over it and rushed to his mother's side, his hand reaching for hers. She grabbed it and then hastily released it when she heard a wheeze of pain; he had put the injured hand by her. He put it by his side and used the good hand to grab hers; giving it a squeeze to assure her he was there.
"Well, she…umm, screamed and kept asking me who I was. I guess I panicked and I started yelling at her, yelling that I was her daughter. I guess I was mad? No, not really…just scared that she couldn't remember me, I mean she's my mom…" Noreen drifted off, her eyes glazing over. Shawn gave her hand another squeeze and she looked up at him, before continuing, "So I called your father, and he said to call a hospital…I did and…well, she didn't go quietly I'll tell you that much. She was so different, like another person completely. She's my mother, I've known her my whole life, yet I've never seen that side of her."
She looked as if she were about to cry again and Shawn reacted by rushing to the kitchen counter, grabbing a handful of tissues and thrusting them at his mother. "Thank you Shawn," she muttered quietly, blowing her nose into a tissue and wiping her tears with another before carrying on with the story. "So we got to the hospital and the doctors took a look at her, they thought she had, had a breakdown or something like that…I told them that couldn't be, it had to be something else. They actually listened which surprised me, usually they think they're always right; anyway they at first sad it wasn't Alzheimer's because the onset was too sudden, but then they said it was. I was so confused," she told Shawn, whilst wiping off her make-up, "And your father was no help at all, he kept insisting we put her into a nursing home;" she finished bitterly.
Shawn had stiffened at the mention of his father, he hated when his parents would talk about each other with him. Honestly, half the time he really did NOT want to know what they thought of each other, he'd rather have them argue. Noreen hadn't noticed Shawn's rather obvious dislike of her statement and continued berating Henry by listing all of his faults.
"Stop," Shawn shouted angrily, "I don't care, what's going to happen to Grandma?" His mother was taken aback and took several minutes to regain her composure before sternly stating, "Don't shout at me Shawn." Shawn opened his mouth to argue in response, but then shut it, far more worried about Grandma Lucy than being unnecessarily scolded when he didn't deserve it.
He simply glared at his mother and repeated his question in a calmer, albeit with a begrudging tone. "Well," his mother answered slowly, "We already moved her into a nursing home…it's hard to say what's going to happen the next couple of months…she's not going to be the person we knew Shawn," she finished, tears once again threatening to fall but this time detained behind her lids as she closed her eyes over them.
A few minutes later she opened them again and released the crumpled tissues that she had been holding. They fell into a small pile on the table and Shawn stared at them for several minutes before picking them up and throwing them out. His mother gave a nod of 'thanks' in his direction, reaching out her hand grabbing his arm gently, guiding him over to the seat beside her.
Still holding onto his uninjured arm, she pulled him into her, placing her chin on his soft hair. Shawn inhaled softly, taking in the smell of her peach perfume; the scent tickled his nose, warming him and life didn't seem as dreary as a few seconds prior.
"I'm sorry we didn't tell you before," she said quietly, sniffling a bit, "But I guess…well I just thought that if you didn't notice it, then it…well, wouldn't be true." She paused and added proudly, "You were always so good at figuring out things."
Shawn gave a shy smile at this, a smile that would normally have been beaming if it wasn't for the dark atmosphere in the room. She let out a sigh and began to stroke his hair gently, "I guess dinner's going to be cold now," she said lamely, knowing full well neither of them were hungry anymore, if they had ever been.