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Another movie about gangsters plays on TV.
The main character flashes a .38 snub-nosed
revolver and blows a hole in some poor man’s
head.
The old man, who is sitting in his wheelchair in
front of the screen, looks at me and says, “That
was my gun.”
This morning, I caught the old man eating
cheddar cheese crackers for breakfast. He ate
them with a spoon, in a bowl filled with water.
All the milk in his refrigerator had spoiled.
"That’s the gun I used to have, but someone
came into my house and took it. They’re keeping
it from me, and won’t tell me where they got it
kept.”
On Christmas he tried to introduce me to his
daughter and her husband, who I’ve known for
twenty years. He had forgotten my name back
then; I don’t think he remembers it even now.
"They’re worried I’ll shoot someone."
He turns and looks at me with big, watery eyes.
He can’t control his tear ducts, and sometimes he
cries without sadness. He used to be too strong
to cry. I look at him, but his eyes don’t meet
mine. He’s completely blind in his left eye and
can’t differentiate red from green in his right.
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"I've had that gun for thirty years, for safety
purposes, of course. Ain't never had to shoot nobody
though.”
When the old man used to live alone, he watched
commercials all day and wouldn’t answer the door
for anyone but his children. He went around in his
wheelchair and left piles of broken dishes in front
of the sink for his daughter to gather up and throw
away every Sunday.
"Because people know," he says, nodding. "They
know when you’ve got a loaded gun on the table
next to your chair."
By chair, he meant his favorite chair, which we
left out on the curb to be taken by the garbage men
when we moved him out last week. He doesn’t even
know what happened to it.
"They know," he repeats, pointing at the mobster on
TV who just beat a man senseless for laying hands
on his woman, "and they respect you.”
As he says this, a stench overwhelms me. I believe
my grandfather has just shat himself, again.
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