Chapter 2 - The Glue on the Rug
Grandma Evelyn didn’t knock like a polite visitor. She rapped her knuckles against the front door in three sharp, rhythmic cracks that sounded like a judge’s gavel.
It was barely nine on Saturday morning when the front door swung open. From the top of the staircase, I could hear her deep, gravelly voice ringing through the entryway. Grandma Evelyn was sixty-four, wore turquoise jewelry that clinked when she walked, and drove an old silver Buick that smelled like spearmint gum and cedar chips. Since Mom had died, she was the only person who looked at me like she could read the fine print in my brain.
"David," Grandma said, stepping into the foyer. I leaned over the banister, watching Dad greet her in his rumpled grey sweatpants, holding a mug of instant coffee. "You look like you haven't slept since last Tuesday."
"Overtime at the depot, Evelyn," Dad replied with a weary sigh. "Peak shipping season started early. Lauren's making pancakes if you want some."
"I ate an hour ago," Grandma said crisply, setting her oversized leather handbag on the credenza. "I’m here to take Hannah to get her poster boards and art supplies for that science unit. Where is she?"
"Upstairs," Dad said, gesturing vaguely. "Still getting ready, probably."
My heart hammered against my ribs. I scrambled back to my bedroom, frantically checking the right sneaker. The clear glue had dried, but it hadn’t set smooth. It looked like a thick, glossy scab sealing the rubber toe to the blue canvas. Worse, a tiny droplet of dried industrial glue had bonded to a fiber on Mom's braided rug. When I had lifted the shoe, a small tuft of blue wool had pulled away with it.
"Hannah bear?" Grandma’s voice came from the hallway, followed by the firm click-clack of her low heels against the hardwood floor.
"I'm here, Grandma!" I called out, jamming my foot into the shoe and frantically yanking the laces tight. The stiffened glue bit into the top of my big toe, hard and sharp.
Grandma pushed the door open. Her sharp grey eyes took in the room in a single sweep: the neatly made bed, my school uniform laid out for Monday, and then me, kneeling awkwardly beside the blue rug.
"Well, look at you, shooting up like a sunflower," she said, stepping forward with her arms open. She pulled me into a hug that smelled like lavender hand cream and cool morning air. When she pulled back, her hands rested on my shoulders, her gaze narrowing slightly as she took in the dark smudges under my eyes. "Are you eating enough of those vegetables your dad claims he cooks?"
"I'm fine, Grandma," I said, forcing a cheerful grin. "Ready for the craft store."
She glanced down, and my stomach plummeted into my socks.
"What's that smell?" she asked, her nose wrinkling. "Smells like chemical fumes in here."
"Nothing. Just... model glue from an old project."
Grandma didn’t buy it. Her eyes dropped to the floor, catching the yellow-and-black tube of heavy-duty adhesive sitting on my nightstand, and then to the heavy dictionary resting next to a strip of gray duct tape. Finally, her gaze settled on my feet.
"Stand up, Hannah."
"Grandma, we should go before the craft store gets crowded—"
"Stand up and let me look at you."
I swallowed hard and stood. I tried to keep my right foot angled back, hidden behind the bell of my jeans, but Grandma was already on one knee. With the speed of an eagle catching a field mouse, she caught my ankle and lifted my foot.
The shoe looked terrible in the morning sunlight. The sole was jagged, crusty with hardened amber glue, and bulging awkwardly at the sides where I had clamped it down too hard. The white rubber bumper around the toe was cracked down the middle.
Grandma's face didn't get loud. It did something much scarier: it went completely still and pale, the way the sky looks right before a tornado touches down.
"Hannah," she said, her voice dangerously quiet. "How long have you been walking on a glued shoe?"
"It's fine, really," I rushed out, my voice squeaking. "I fixed it last night! It holds up great, Grandma, honest. Dad works hard and things are tight with the mortgage and bills—"
"Did David tell you that?"
"No! Well, Lauren said—"
"Lauren said." Grandma let go of my ankle and stood up smoothly. Her turquoise rings clicked together as she folded her arms across her chest. "Take the shoe off."
"Grandma, please, don't make a thing out of it. We had an argument last night at dinner and Dad was really stressed—"
"Take. The shoe. Off."
I obeyed. I unknotted the worn lace and peeled the stiff shoe off my foot. Without the structure of the shoe, my sock showed: the heel was worn so thin that my pale skin was visible through the gray threads.
Grandma took the shoe in her hand, bent the rubber sole, and watched as the dried adhesive instantly crackled and separated along the seam with a sickening *rip*. Inside the shoe, the manufacturer's inner sole was worn entirely through to the black grid of the base.
Then, Grandma’s eyes caught the nightstand. She reached past me and picked up the small square of paper tucked under the brass lamp.
"Don't read that," I pleaded, reaching for it. "Please, Grandma."
She unfolded Ms. Finch’s note. Her eyes flickered over the short, polite message: *Please provide appropriate athletic footwear for physical education. Contact the school if assistance is needed.*
Grandma didn’t shout. She folded the paper neatly, slipped it into her pocket alongside her car keys, and dropped my broken sneaker onto the floor.
"Put on your slip-ons," Grandma commanded. "The ones from the summer."
"They're too small, Grandma. They pinch my heels."
"Put them on just to get to my car. We're leaving."
"Grandma, please don't yell at Dad. He was up until midnight on the computer..."
Grandma turned to me, her expression softening just enough to make my chin tremble. She cupped my cheek with her thumb, smoothing away a tear I hadn’t realized was falling. "Your mother spent four years of her life teaching your father how to pay attention, Hannah. I will not watch him forget how to see his own daughter."
She walked out of my room and down the stairs. I scrambled into my tight summer canvas shoes, heart hammering in my ears, and rushed after her.
When I reached the kitchen, the scene was frozen.
Grandma had set my broken, glue-crusted sneaker right on the center of the kitchen island, directly beside a warm stack of blueberry pancakes.
Lauren was holding a spatula, her smile frozen in confusion. Dad was leaning against the counter, coffee mug halfway to his lips, staring at the beat-up shoe like a foreign object that had dropped out of the sky.
"Evelyn?" Dad cleared his throat. "What’s that doing on the counter where we eat?"
"That's a very good question, David," Grandma said, her voice crisp, calm, and utterly terrifying. "I was wondering the exact same thing. What is this garbage doing on my granddaughter’s foot?"
Lauren’s eyes flicked from the shoe to me, standing frozen at the doorway. A slight flush crept up Lauren’s neck. "Evelyn, we have a budget. Hannah knows we are replacing her shoes next month when the seasonal sales begin. There’s no need to make a scene before breakfast."
Grandma didn’t look at Lauren. She kept her eyes locked squarely on Dad. "Next month? The physical education teacher sent this home yesterday." She slapped Ms. Finch’s note down next to the pancake syrup. "They won't let her run in gym class because she’s a safety hazard. She has glue on her bedroom rug, David. Her socks are worn through to the skin."
Dad looked at the note. He picked it up, his brow furrowing as he read the words. His jaw tightened. "Han, you didn't tell me Ms. Finch wrote a letter."
"She tried to talk to you last night at dinner!" Grandma snapped, her composure cracking into sharp thunder. "She asked you for thirty-five dollars, David! Thirty-five measly dollars for basic athletic shoes! And what did you tell her? That she was counting pennies while your new wife bought Chloe a pair of designer sneakers that cost one-hundred-and-eighty dollars?"
Chloe, who had just walked into the dining room wearing her pajamas, stopped dead in her tracks, clutching her stuffed rabbit.
Lauren stepped forward, her polite façade slipping. "Evelyn, with all due respect, you don't run this household. Chloe received a gift from her grandparents—my parents—for her academic progress. How David and I allocate our shared household expenses is none of your business."
Grandma let out a short, biting laugh. "Your parents? That's fascinating, Lauren, considering David’s debit card receipt was sitting on the hallway table when I walked in, showing an eighty-dollar charge at the suburban athletic outlet yesterday afternoon."
Dad’s head snapped toward Lauren. "Lauren? I thought you said you used the birthday gift card your mother mailed?"
Lauren’s face went rigid. "It was... a partial payment. The gift card was only for a hundred. I covered the rest from the incidental fund."
"The incidental fund," Grandma repeated, stepping right up to Lauren until she was barely six inches away. "You spent eighty dollars of my former son-in-law's warehouse wages to dress your child in luxury while Hannah is upstairs taping her soles together with gorilla glue. You should be ashamed of yourself."
"Mom, stop," Dad groaned, rubbing his temples, his face flushing crimson. "Stop. We'll handle it. I didn't know the shoe was that bad. I thought Hannah was just being picky about the style—"
"You didn't look," Grandma said, her voice dropping into a devastating whisper that cut deeper than any shout. "That is your sin, David. You stopped looking at her because looking at her reminds you of what you lost, and it’s easier to look at your phone. Sarah would be heartbroken."
At the mention of Mom's name, Dad flinched as if he had been slapped across the face.
Grandma turned on her heel, took my hand in hers, and marched me toward the front door. "We’re going to the shoe store. We’re going to the craft store. And then Hannah is having lunch with me. Don't call us until you've cleared the trash off your kitchen counter."
The front door clicked shut behind us, cutting off the heavy, suffocating silence of the house. As we walked down the driveway toward Grandma’s Buick, I couldn't stop the tears from rolling down my cheeks.
"I didn't mean to start a fight, Grandma," I sniffled, clutching my jacket around myself.
May you like
Grandma unlocked the passenger door and looked down at me, her eyes fierce and warm all at once. "You didn't start a fight, Hannah bear. You survived an injustice. There’s a big difference."
***
