Life Through a Lense

Chapter Thirteen

"Hi grandma," Ivy greeted.

The nursery home smelled like old butterscotch candy and wet wipes. Whenever I wondered why we didn't visit grandma more, the stench hit me and reminded me. Honestly it was awful we didn't come here more often. But to be fair, she hardly ever remembered who we were anyway. Plus, the two hour drive from LA to San Diego was hard to make with my work schedule and Ivy's school stuff. Since mom died we'd only managed to make it down here three times. The spirit of Christmas being about family and all guilted us into making the trip down here. We decided to come the day before Christmas Eve so we didn't have to spend the holiday in traffic.

"Katherine?"

My heart twinged when she said my mom's name. Despite the dyed hair and heavy make up, Ivy did look a lot like a teenage version of mom. Ivy was lucky to get the thick blonde hair (the kind that people spent hundreds of dollars to try to get, but Ivy didn't appreciate that), high cheekbones, defined eyebrows and straight teeth (lucky bitch didn't have to spend all of middle school and first half of high school in braces). I, on the other hand, looked more like my dad with the gross hair color that people so lovingly called 'dishwater blonde'.

"No grandma, it's Ivy," she said.

"Where's Katherine?"

I gritted my teeth. How was I supposed to tell her that her daughter was dead yet again? Deciding against it, I told her. "Katherine had to work."

"Oh," she said, sounding so disappointed, then looked around us. "Who are you?"

The haunting screams and cries from her when she found out for the first time that her daughter was dead was exactly the reason that children aren't supposed to go before their parents.

"Ivy and Danielle," I reminded her, wondering how many times I was going to have to do this today. "Your granddaughters."

"No, no," she denied. "Ivy and Danielle are much younger."

I sighed. "Grandma, we brought you a gift," I told her, laying out the Guylian chocolate we'd bought her. It was famously her favorite type of chocolate. In fact, she refused to eat any other type of chocolate.

Her eyes lighted up, the disappointment of her daughter not visiting forgotten for now. She unwrapped a chocolate and let it melt in her mouth. While Ivy sat with her, I headed toward the closet where the picture albums were kept. I pulled out the biggest one named 'KATHERINE CHILDHOOD' in big bold letters. There were other ones that was 'KATHERINE TEENAGER' and 'KATHERINE ADULT'. Ivy and I both had a binder, but they were much smaller. We had more at our apartment that mom had made.

"You know, you look just like my daughter," she told Ivy.