Young Writers Society

Part of June didn’t want her estranged grandmother to give her anything to eat. She hated to realize it, but there was a vindictive side to her, a side that wanted her grandmother to prove what she thought of her correct. She wanted to believe that her grandmother was an evil, cruel woman, and that morality was as black and white as the dreariness of living on the freezing streets of Frostville. A bitter fallacy she failed to understand.

And she was scared.

Thus without intending it, when she knocked on the door of her grandmother’s home, her heart was pounding and her muscles were shaking, and her emotions were confusing and conflicting. As if what she desired to want from confronting her grandmother was not actually what she wanted at all.

The door creaked open, and the aging woman winced at the sight of the orphans. They barely managed to see her graying, unkempt hair and beady eyes before she started to slam the door shut.

“Wait,” June said, holding it open. “Grandmother.”

“Mrs. Ruth,” the middle-aged woman corrected. “Your brother can call me grandmother, but you can’t. You call me Mrs. Ruth.”

June gulped. “Yes. Sorry, Mrs. Ruth.”

“That’s better. Now what the hell do you want?”

“We’re hungry,” August said, feeling his stomach grumble. “Neither of us have had anything good to eat in a long time. Can we just come inside, Grandma?”

Mrs. Ruth lamented. “You’re welcome to come inside and have as much to eat as you want,” she said. “But your sister has to wait outside like the animal that she is.”

“But that’s not fair,” August sneered. “You can’t let me in to eat and leave her out in the cold.”

Something about their argument made June happy, even if she didn’t want to feel so.

“Well that’s the way it has to be,” Mrs. Ruth said. “You’re lucky I even offer to let you eat my food anyway. The way the Wolfgang keeps raising taxes, I’m going to end up on the street with you two.”

June shook her head. “We don’t feel bad for you. We’re your grandchildren. We’re your grandchildren and you’re making us live in an alleyway.”

Mrs. Ruth cuffed her fists, mockingly rubbing them against her eyes. “Crybaby. You should’ve thought of the consequences when you murdered your father.”

June scoffed. “Are you really going to try to say that was a murder again? Pa's death was an accident, and you know that already.”

“You’re wrong, Grandma,” August said, frustrated over the foul attitude towards his sister. “It wasn’t her fault. Pa dying was an accident. Nobody could’ve done anything about it.”

“The Nevonian Language you possess is nothing but danger,” Mrs. Ruth said. “I warned your father a thousand times. He should’ve killed himself to wipe it off the face of the world but then he bore children. Now June, you know it. You have the knowledge, and the only way to get rid of it is for you to die.” 

Uneasiness crept into her voice with the final word in the sentence -– die.

“I know it too,” August said. His voice was shaky, as if his brain realized this was the wrong thing to admit, but couldn't stop his heart from spitting it out. He couldn't stand to see his sister hurt. Even if the words were more satisfying than damaging to her, he didn't know it. “Bet you didn't realize that, did you, Grandma? Pa taught the language to June and I both. So stop yelling at her.”

Mrs. Ruth gulped. It was certainly something she was not expecting to hear – this awful language, the root of the orphans’ persisting troubles – the same language that lead to the death of their father. The entirety of the time she assumed it only belonged to June, but to hear that it belonged to August as well was both astonishing and frustrating. But it also broke her heart.

“You're lying,“ she said. “Liar.“

“It's the truth,“ June hesitantly admitted, unsure if it was such a good idea herself. “He does know.“

The middle-aged woman froze. Closed her eyes before beaming them towards the young boy. “Then I retract my offer for you to come into my house,” she said, almost a cough, uneasiness in her voice. “You both should die. Die before anyone else learns about the language.”

Their grandmother slammed and locked her front door before the siblings could have a chance to rebut. She couldn't hear a rebuttal – her soul wouldn't allow it. She said what she believed, but at what harm to her own flesh and blood? Was the truth worth it? Was the safety of strangers worth the loss of her family? Her disappearance back inside her home left the orphans to contemplate alone whether or not she had the correct idea.

But before they could contemplate too deeply, a tall and suave man approached from the distance.