My mother often told me, “Don’t sit on Grandpa’s lap.” I never understood why. One day, I didn’t listen to her and sat down anyway. Grandpa smiled, leaned close to my ear, and whispered, “Can you come sleep beside me tonight?”

“Very.”

“But you didn’t look scared.”

He smiled.

“That’s because I had you looking at me.”

I hugged him.

Carefully.

Very carefully.

Mom laughed through her tears.

“That’s why I told you not to sit on him.”

I looked at her.

“You could have just told me!”

She shook her head.

“You were nine.”

“So?”

“So you would have asked me seventy-three questions.”

I thought about it.

“That is true.”

Grandpa laughed.

“She’s definitely your daughter.”

---

The surgery lasted more than five hours.

I remember sitting in the hospital waiting room beside Mom.

She kept looking at the clock.

Every few minutes, she’d stand.

Then sit.

Then stand again.

I held the little telescope cap Grandpa had given me.

It was scratched and old.

I refused to let go of it.

Finally, the doctor came through the doors.

Mom stood so quickly her chair almost fell backward.

The doctor smiled.

“Everything went well.”

Mom covered her face.

I burst into tears.

Not sad tears.

The kind that come when you’ve been holding your breath for hours and suddenly remember how to breathe.

Grandpa survived.

He came home weeks later.

He complained about the hospital food.

He complained about the television.