My grandmother

My grandmother leans against the car, a smoke teetering between her fingers, ankles crossed, skin peeking from her cigarette pants. The car, like her, has seen better days. A bit worn, but still moving.

Hooded eyes look at you with a jaded curiosity, but for the most part, she doesn’t care.

She comes from the school of hard knocks. Of childhood farm labor, of one pair of shoes a year. Hers was a time of handmade dresses for Sunday best. Drinks and guns and fists and corn from the field made up her days.

Now, she lives alone, unattached. She leans against her old, rusted car thinking of the days when this pose - cigarette in hand and coy eyes - would have turned heads and invited a whistle. Now, smoke lingers in her gaze, disappointment and contempt in her heart.

Her fingers flick the light, a motion done thousands of times before, feet not bothered to stomp it out. She slides into her car, door creaking before slamming shut, and drives away. She does not look in her rearview mirror. She has done this before, she is well practiced. She knows there’s no hope. Doesn’t know how to live a different life, doesn’t even know how to try. So she drives away.

You watch her leave, growing smaller and smaller, dust trailing behind. It’s an act of love. Looking back, you understand this now. So you whisper goodbye long after the dust has settled, turn, and walk toward a brighter future.