to forgive!”
“… ”
“It’s my heart,” Grandmother Weird said. “My goddamn elephant heart.”
Grandmother Weird’s heart, while much smaller than an elephant’s, was unnaturally large. The average human heart weighs between 250 and 350 grams and is about the size of a fist. The weight of Annie Weird’s heart pushed 600 grams and it was the size of two fists together. She was convinced that its exaggerated dimensions were the source of all the drama that had ever befallen her. And she was well aware that Angie was her only grandchild who’d inherited this condition. Angie’s heart was even slightly bigger than her own.
“I held you in my arms,” Grandmother Weird continued. “I looked down and it came from me and tumbled into you. I gave to you the power to forgive anyone, anytime.”
Angie looked down at Grandmother Weird. She saw how loosely her rings fit on her fingers, the tremor in her right hand and the droop in her eyelids. “That’s so … it’s … it’s r … really b … eautiful,” Angie said. She’d started to cry.
“Maybe I should have given you the power not to be such a crybaby sap,” Grandmother Weird said.
Angie had a deserved reputation as the family’s crybaby. Yet her grandmother’s comment stung. “Couldn’t it have been invisibility?” Angie asked, her tears ceasing, instantly. “Flight maybe? Something a little more useful?”
“You came out bright red. Not very attractive, I’m afraid. Like a boiled lobster!”
“Super-speed?”
“All of you got one, you know. All five of you got one.”
“You gave Kent the power to be an asshole?”
“Yes. In a way I did. Kent is slightly stronger than anyone he fights. Physical fights, I mean. He came out so small and I knew he’d need to defend himself, somehow. That he’s emotionally stunted is not my fault.”
“He’s not stunted. He’s just angry all the time.”
“Lucy is never lost. Abba never loses hope. Richard keeps himself safe. I never thought they’d all become curses. They were supposed to be blessings. I didn’t know that they’d end up ruining your lives.”
“Our lives are ruined?”
“And it’s not just you kids. It’s the family. The family name! I will not go to the grave responsible for taking down the good name of the Weirds.”
“Oh yes. Well, then, that makes more sense.”
“That’s why you’re here, Angie. You must go and find them. Round all of them up and bring them here. All five of you must be in this room at 7:39 p.m. on April 20 precisely. At the moment of my death I will lift the curses.”
“Can’t you just lift mine now? If it’s a curse, the sooner the better, no?”
“Again with the sass! Angie, I have no control over these things. I didn’t consciously bestow these abilities. I can’t consciously remove them. I just know that at the moment of my death, when my heart is confronted with a now or never situation, it will see the damage these curses have inflicted and take them away.”
“I see,” Angie said. She looked down at her belly. She put both of her hands on the arms of her chair and stood. A blue plastic pitcher sat beside the phone on the bedside table. She filled a Styrofoam cup with water and took a drink.
“Did you hear me?” Grandmother Weird asked.
“Even the water smells like pine.”
“Look at me.”
“Hmmm?”
“You think I’ve lost my mind.”
“No. Not at all. It’s just big. Big news. I just need some time to absorb it, that’s all.”
“I see. Perhaps a demonstration then?”
“Not necessary.”
“There’s a marker in there,” Grandmother Weird said, pointing to the drawer in the bedside table. “Could you get it for me?”
Angie opened the drawer. She searched through it. Beneath several celebrity gossip magazines Angie found a black felt-tipped Magic Marker. She handed it over to her. Grandmother Weird took the cap off with her teeth and spit it out, sending it sailing through the air.
The instant the cap hit the floor, every light in the room dimmed by half. The television sets lost reception. Angie felt her grandmother’s cold, bony fingers encircle her wrist. She tried to pull away but the old woman’s grip was incredibly strong and she could not break it.
“Watch the little old ladies,” Grandmother said.
Angie looked up. The elderly woman closest to the window fell backwards, as if she’d been deboned. The machine beside that bed made a high-pitched whine. Grandmother Weird pressed the Magic Marker against the skin of Angie’s forearm and began to write. The lights dimmed further. The white-haired woman in the next bed collapsed. A second machine began making the high-pitched whine. A nurse ran into the room. Angie tried again to pry her grandmother’s fingers away. She still couldn’t. Grandmother Weird wrote a series of numbers on Angie’s skin. The lady in the bed closest fell backwards. A third machine whined. More nurses ran into the room.
“Stop it!” Angie yelled. “Stop this right now!”
Her grandmother did not look up. She wrote the last number of a ten-digit sequence. Then she let go of Angie’s wrist. The lights returned to full-strength. The televisions regained reception. The machines stopped making their high-pitched whines. The elderly women sat upright in their beds and looked around the room, dazed and frightened.
“Never doubt your elders, child.”
“Shark!” Angie yelled. She began to back out of Room 4-206. “You will never hold my baby. You will never see me again.”
“Yes I will,” Grandmother Weird said. She smiled broadly. She began to laugh. She laughed in the Tone.
Angie backed out into the hallway. Holding her belly she ran as fast as she could. She did not look back. By the time she’d reached the elevators, Angie had already forgiven her grandmother.
NINETY MINUTES AFTER FLEEING her grandmother’s hospital room Angie was scrubbing her forearm at a sink in the women’s washroom on the departures level of the Vancouver International Airport. She’d rebooked her flight from the back of the taxi she’d taken from the hospital. The only other woman in the bathroom stood at the hand dryer. Her pantsuit was unwrinkled. The diamonds in her ears shone. She pretended not to stare at Angie. Then the dryer shut off and she gave Angie a gentle look as she walked confidently away on her strappy high heels.
Angie looked in the mirror. The front of her white blouse was soaked. Her belly button bulged through the cotton.
