Chapter 2 – Constable Punching
When the person stood up and turned around, it shocked Aurora to see her grandfather. She looked from her grandfather to the person lying on the bed. The lifeless face of a stranger stared up at the ceiling.
“Grandfather, they told me you were dead? How? What happened?” she stammered.
Grandfather Mason pressed his fingers to his lips and moved past her to lock the door behind her. When he turned back around, Aurora grabbed him in a bear hug and clutched him so hard she hard that Aurora heard his back pop.
“I’m never gonna let you go, Grandfather,” she murmured in his ear as tears flowed freely down her face. “I’m sorry for arguing with you this morning. I’m sorry for giving you a hard time. I promise I’ll be good and treat you with the respect you deserve.”
Grandfather squeezed her briefly and wriggled free of her embrace. He put his fingers on his lips and motioned for her to follow him. Grandfather opened the window and slid through it. Aurora grabbed him to stop the old man from escaping.
“What are you doing?” Aurora demanded. “Are you losing your mind like Mila Wenham’s grandmother?”
Grandfather glanced back at her and shook his head. He pointed with his chin at the man lying on his bed.
“We need to leave before they send someone else to kill me,” he hissed, shaking his leg free from Aurora’s grasp so he could pull the rest of his body through the window.
Aurora wanted to argue with him. She wanted to ask questions. To understand what was going on. But Aurora remembered her relief at seeing him alive, and her promise to respect him. So she pulled herself through the window behind him.
The window was on ground level, but grandfather’s body was frail from having spent the last few days in the hospital.
He lost his balance and stumbled in the grass, falling to his hands and knees. Aurora leaped down beside him and helped him scramble to his feet. She wrapped his arm around her neck and slipped her arm around his waist to support him.
“I’m fine,” he grumbled. “Just lost my footing for a second. It’s been a few days since I’ve been out of bed. I feel fine now.”
But the young girl didn’t heed his words. She was just happy to hold him and hug him tight again. The short distance from the time the constable told her that her grandfather had died until she had seen him again at the hospital had seemed like an eternity. Now she was grateful to have a second chance at making things right with him.
“Hey! Aurora, wait up?” someone shouted.
She glanced over her shoulder to see the Constable scrambling through the window after them. Aurora smiled and waved with her free hand.
“It’s okay, Aaron! Grandfather’s not dead like you told me. He’s alive. Isn’t that wonderful?”
The constable trotted over as he said, “That’s great, but he’s been really sick and weak. We should get him back inside where the nurses can help him.”
He reached out to help grandfather on the other side of Aurora. She blushed and looked down. Grandfather slipped out of her grasp and backed away. The constable looked confused and took another step forward to grab grandfather.
But the old man sidestepped him deftly again and twisted his body as he threw a wicked right that caught Constable Aaron to the jaw.
“Grandfather,” Aurora shrieked in shock. “What did you do that for?”
Continue Reading Chapter 3 – Body Slammed >>>
