Wouldn't It Be Good

My grandfather is dying. My Papaw. I'm sitting at my computer in some sort of depressed trance, repeatedly listening to the self-pitying "Wouldn't It Be Good?" by Nik Kershaw and mindlessly looking at giant area rugs on ebay without seeing them at all.

When I was a little girl, he would rub my back with his rough hands, calloused and dry from years of gardening and not sitting still. Before we got into the pool he would say, "Just don't you get wet!" and laugh. Every time.

My heart is breaking wide open into this cheap, stupid candy wine I can't finish because I feel too sad to even pick up the glass.


I wish I was 11. Up in that house on the hill that Christmas when baby Meghan wore Santa pyjamas and matching hat and I carried her around on my hip like she was my daughter instead of my sister and my Mamaw was still alive and my Papaw wasn't dying in a hospital 1100 miles away.