“God, I love this woman,” I declared before turning around to go find her.
Down the hall, Edith Westbrook was in the tiny living room, flipping through channels while she grumbled about something incoherent.
“Hey, grandma.”
“Harlow!” She rushed to her feet to wrap me in her arms. Swaying from side to side, she fussed over me excitedly until she let me go.
“Sit down, sit down.”
As I did what I was told, I mentally side-eyed the plastic wrapped couch in the process. I tugged at the hem of my dress, making sure no part of my thighs would be on the plastic and sat down. I knew I’d be sweating in a matter of minutes regardless, but at least I wouldn’t be slipping and sliding around on her furniture.
It was only ten a.m. and already ninety degrees outside. I didn’t know how she was posted up in this house with no A/C like it was the dead of winter.
My grandmother sat down beside me and picked up the remote to keep flipping through channels. After a while, she landed on reruns of a game show, turned the volume as low as it could without being on mute and laid expectant eyes on me. She was damn near vibrating with anticipation.
With a hand on my knee, her voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper.
“You got my cigarettes, sweet pea?”
I didn’t carehow old I got, nothing compared to being grandma’s baby.
I was a mama’s girl through and through and had always been the most spoiled in my friend group. But something about having one on one time with the matriarch of my family just did it for me.
All I did was blink and it was four o’clock. The whole day passed, and it felt like I’d just gotten there.
We watched tv for a bit, I helped her fold some sheets and we ended the afternoon outside on her porch, watching people stroll by because it was somehow cooler outside than in her house.
We had tomato sandwiches for lunch, pineapple sorbet for dessert and now she was in her rocking chair hand rollingcigarettes because Mr. Tiny had conveniently dropped off some loose tobacco.
“I thought you said you weren’t thinking about that man.”
My grandmother had the nerve to look sheepish. “I’m not. But what’s the point in a man saying he fancies you if you don’t make him prove it?”
Hiding my smile, I shook my head. “I can’t with you. You better not let my mama see you with that.”
“That lady ain’t the boss of me,” she sassed, but stopped what she was doing to squint at me. “She not getting back in town til tomorrow, right?”
I cackled at the abrupt change in her tone and caught the sly smile on her face. “What you getting up to all summer?”
“I haven’t decided yet.” That was a half-truth. Last night, when I couldn’t sleep, I’d made a list of plenty of things I wanted to do this summer, but there were limits to the debauchery I’d share with my grandmother. I couldn’t even explain to myself why things near the end of the list required more than one partner. So instead of divulging the depraved things I’d written in my journal last night, I crossed my legs and enjoyed the ocean breeze while we swayed on her porch. “Just playing it by ear.”
She harrumphed and pulled a lighter out of the pocket of her housedress. “Ain’t nothing wrong with that.”
Harlow’s Fuck-It List
Make out until I come
More dry humping
