Unnoticed

In life, many things go unnoticed. We brush off things like the age of a far-away relative as unimportant, or our friend’s favorite color slips our mind. We become unaware of the seemingly unimportant aspects of life. That was what happened with my grandfather.
I used to go to my grandfather’s house every weekend. My mom would drop me off at the metal gates of his apartment, and I would happily skip up the stairs to greet my grandparents. The apartment was like a safe haven for me--I was away from the nasty teachers at school, and Grandmother always had something delicious cooking in the kitchen. Whenever I was stuck on my homework, my grandfather was always there to help. He could solve difficult addition problems in his head within seconds, create a sentence in English, and read any Chinese passage I brought. I thought he was immortal. Whenever I felt troubled, he would comfort me and make me laugh with his never-ending supply of jokes. Before I went to sleep, he would tell fantastic stories about his past. I was five at that time.
As time went on, I noticed that my grandfather started taking more time in mental math, spacing out when we talked, and pausing to use the restroom when reading those passages. His jokes became less enthusiastic, and coughing fits interrupted his stories. Each night, the stories became shorter and more mixed up. Each week, his restroom breaks increased, his fits more frequent. Each visit, his symptoms became worse than that of the previous week.
“Grandpa,” I interrupted him in the middle of a story one night. He was coughing more than usual, and I was worried that he might have gotten a hairball stuck in his throat, since his coughing was strangely similar to that of a cat’s. “Are you okay?”
“Yes,” he said. “It’s only a cough, it should pass over soon.”
“Are you sure? It’s been getting worse for the past few weeks, and you look pale.”
“Yes. I’m not so old to die of a simple cold,” he repeated. With that, I wished him good night, and went to sleep without any worry. After all, I had never known my grandfather to be wrong before.
…
He was hospitalized soon after that night. The news hit my mother the hardest--she stayed in the hospital with my grandfather for three days straight, taking care of him. Whenever she came home, her eyes would be puffy, her hair smelling like vaccines, and she looked distant, as if in a world of her own. My sister and I have tried to comfort her with hugs, but she started sobbing when we did, so we stopped giving her hugs. Why is she so distraught? It was only a simple cold.
…
It was raining the day I went to visit my grandfather. We brought his favorite shrimp flavored chips, flowers, a picture of us, and other gifts that barely fit inside our car. As I walked up the stairs of the hospital, I thought about how happy Grandfather would be to see us. We stopped at a door that had “ER” written on it. I wonder what that means. When we entered the room, a strong scent of rotting flesh mixed with purell hit me. My grandfather was lying on his bed with his eyes closed, his chest rising and falling at a steady pace. There was a nurse checking his temperature through a monitor that beeps every second from across the room. Grandmother was sitting motionless on the stool beside him. I guess she must have fallen asleep. I planned to run up to my grandparents to announce our arrival, but Mom held me back, saying that they needed their rest. I looked at my grandfather again, at how peaceful he seems, how content he looks. What I didn’t see were the machines he was hooked up to, how frail he seemed under the covers of his bed, the paleness of his skin, the bruises on his arms, and the sickly yellow that was starting to spread across his face. He had an IV connected to his arm. My parents quietly put his gifts next to his bed and exited the room. I followed them out.
…
Grandfather seemed to always be sleeping, since he was never awake when we visited him. His gifts were left untouched, and Mom never lets me disturb his rest to say hello. He must be getting better after all this rest. At least, that’s what Mom always says. My mom clearly thought otherwise--she started pacing around the hospital muttering to herself, researching about Grandfather’s sickness online, and tears rolled down her face whenever she saw him. I don’t understand why she is so worried. I never paid any attention to my grandfather’s shallow breathing, the pained expression I mistook for content, and the yellow that was spreading all over his face.
…
There were white roses at the entrance of the church. I had never seen white roses before, so I asked Mom why the roses weren’t red. Mom said that white represents purity while red means blood. She didn’t say anything else. As we silently walked down the aisle to the front, I noticed people I had never seen before shuffling in with their heads bowed, as if in respect for something. They look like grim reapers with their black attire. There was a pastor at the front stand. We stood for two hours listening to the droning of his voice, and all I could think about was the aching in my knees. Every now and then, there would be a wail of a baby in his mother’s arms, and children sniffling. I looked at Mom, there were silent tears falling down her face. The only sound echoing in the church was the soft voice of the pastor. The urge to cry disappeared when my grandfather was rolled in through a glass box. He was dressed in his usual gray sweater and black pants, but he looked… different.
“How long has he been in there?” I whispered to my mom.
“Three days,” her reply was short.
“It must have been cramped,” Mom shushed me before I could say anything else. I stood by my mom for the rest of the funeral. I felt like I should be mourning for a loss, but I don’t remember losing anything. I was six at that time.
…
I went to my grandparents’ house a week later. I thought about how happy Grandfather would be to see me, about how he would go back to being his usual self. However, when I approached those familiar metal gates, it was my grandmother who greeted me.
“Where’s Grandfather?” I asked.
“In a better place,” she didn’t explain further, and I didn’t say anything else. Is Grandfather on a trip? I walked up the same stairs, and as usual, there was something cooking in the kitchen. I never got to say goodbye. Nothing had changed since my grandfather had gotten sick, but somehow the apartment looked gloomier, emptier. The familiar stool Grandfather sat on felt foreign. There was an absence of the laughter we shared from his jokes, the excitement of his stories. My grandmother moved to a senior home soon after, and it was the last time I went to that apartment.