Tropical Storm by Stefanie Graham Page B

seemed like hours, Cairo raised his head and wiped the tears from his eyes with the back of his hand.
    “What’s wrong, son?” The old man persisted. “Tell me what possessed you to leave your wife alone on your wedding night. Whatever it is, I’m sure it can’t be that bad.”
    Again, Cairo didn’t speak; instead his jaw hardened into steel. He lifted his left hand and slowly removed the gold wedding band from his finger. He placed the ring onto his grandfather’s lap and with a voice that belied his twenty years, he said, “Hold that for me, granddad. I don’t need it after all.” Cairo got to his feet. “Remember when my parents died and you took me to Jamaica so I could see where you were from. On the trip, you told me that my parents made you my guardian because they knew you loved me as much as they did. You told me then that despite the differences in our races we were more than family and if I ever asked you for anything you would see that it got done. Well I am asking now. I’m leaving New York. I’m going to Jamaica as soon as I can get a flight. I want you to come with me. You’re too old to be working in that factory. We’ll go to your little house in the country and make ourselves a new life.”
    “What about that sweet girl of yours?” His grandfather asked his eyes penetrating.
    “Her parents took her back. She’s no longer mine.” Cairo turned away from the look in his grandfather’s eyes.
    “But . . . ”
    He turned back. “I don’t want to talk about her. Not now, not ever. She’s a liar and she can’t be trusted. Let’s just leave it at that.”
    His grandfather caught his hand. “You can’t run away from love, Cairo. You can’t run away from life. Whatever your problems, they won’t end when you leave the country. They’ll follow you wherever you go. Now tell me about Storm. Tell me what happened that makes you want to run away to Jamaica?”
    Cairo stood looking down into the face of the only person on earth that he now loved. “Papa Joseph, I’m leaving with or without you but I really want you to come. Storm is dead to me. I don’t ever want to hear her name mentioned in my presence again.”
    Papa Joseph didn’t ask any more questions. Instead, he studied Cairo carefully, his gaze sneaking into the hidden corners of his heart before he stood and slowly made his way to his room.
    “Where are you going, granddad?” Fear and the threat of tears roughened his voice. He’d lost Storm; he couldn’t lose Papa Joseph too.
    His grandfather looked back. “I’m going to pack.”
    Cairo ran behind the old man and hugged him, lifting him clear off his feet. “I love you, granddad. You’ll never know how much this means to me. I’ll build you a grand house on the hills. You’ll be proud of me. You just wait and see.”
    The dream shifted and changed. Tears wet the corners of Cairo’s eyes as he slept.
     
    “One, two, three, yeah, that’s it Papa Joseph. Keep on breathing. You can do it. I know you can.” Cairo coached as he sat silently holding his grandfather’s hand in the hospital room. The other hand rested lightly on the old man’s now sunken chest. He’d been there for twenty-four hours already, tirelessly counting each and every beat of the old man’s heart.
    Somewhere in the back of his mind he felt that if he kept track of his grandfather’s erratic heartbeat that he could defy the things that were conspiring against him to steal the life of the only person on earth that he loved. But if God was ready for his grandfather, he had to wait in line, because Cairo wasn’t letting him go. So throughout the long night, he kept vigil at his grandfather’s bed and when Papa Joseph’s heart beat, his heart beat as well. He didn’t move, but sat in the chair and watched over the man who’d been more than a parent to him. He had taught him everything he knew, he had saved his life more than once and now Cairo was determined to return the favor. The man in