“No.”
The woman began crying.
“You were so young.”
Grandma couldn’t speak.
She reached toward Grandma.
“It’s you.”
Grandma shook her head.
“I thought…”
She couldn’t finish.
Thomas moved aside.
His mother reached out her good hand.
Grandma knelt beside the wheelchair.
“I thought you died.”
The woman held her fingers.
“I nearly did.”
She explained that part of the ceiling had collapsed across the passage.
But the fallen display shielded her from the worst of it.
Firefighters reached her through a service entrance.
Her leg was badly injured.
She spent months in the hospital.
But she survived.
Grandma was sobbing now.
“I promised I’d come back.”
The woman shook her head.
“I remember.”
“I tried.”
“I know.”
“They wouldn’t let me.”
The mother squeezed her hand.
“Sweetheart, I was terrified you would come back.”
Grandma looked up.
The woman continued softly.
“I heard that ceiling cracking. I knew what was coming.”
