She was expecting customers that night. While I did the dishes she muttered to herself, now and then raising her voice as though she was having a conversation with someone. I was passing by her chair on my way to put Chub down, when she shot out her gnarled, yellow-nailed hand and grabbed my wrist.
“You know you’re the future, Hailey,” she said, lips twisted in a grin that revealed the gaps where she’d lost teeth. Gram wouldn’t see a dentist, so her teeth were gray in places and several were missing. “You’re the one who’s gonna carry on the legacy.”
I tugged my wrist back, but Gram held on tight. She’d said things like that before; it was nothing new. Years ago I’d asked what she meant, and Gram had got all coy and winked and said I’d know soon enough. It gave me the creeps, the way she stared at me with her milky eyes bright, almost hungry-looking.
“You got titties now, girl, don’t you,” Gram said.
Instinctively I covered my chest with my hand. It was barely even true. I was still skinny through the hips and it was clear I’d never be curvy the way Jill Kirsch and Stephanie Lee were, the way that caught the boys’ attention as they walked down the school halls.
But it was horrifying to think that Gram had noticed, that she had been looking at me… that way.
“And your monthlies,” she continued, wheezing and coughing into her sleeve.
I hadn’t made an effort to keep it a secret. When I got my period a few years earlier, I knew what to do from eavesdropping on other girls at school, and I stored my box of tampons in the bathroom medicine cabinet. But hearing her say the words made my stomach roil, and I jerked my hand so hard that her fingers bounced off the arm of her chair as I backed away.