Lina stopped just a couple of steps into front hall and stared into the living room. Except for the slight layer of dust, it looked like her grandmother had just stepped out of the room to make some more tea. A book lay open on the coffee table next to a porcelain teacup and saucer. Aside from the dust layer, the giveaway that Gran had been gone for longer than five minutes, were the two spots of mold growing on the tea left in the cup.
Swallowing back her tears, Lina softly closed the front door behind her and dropped her suitcase at the foot of the stairs. The police had said they hadn’t touched anything in the house after removing her grandmother’s body, but Lina didn’t think that had meant leaving a cup of tea out to grow mold. She rubbed her hands down her face and turned back to look at the living room. Nobody had warned her that moving back home would feel like this… grief and sorrow weirdly mixed with hope.
“All right. Let’s just deal with this and then I can see what’s what with everything else,” she whispered to herself.
She walked back into the living room and gingerly picked up the teacup and saucer along with the small plate sitting next to it. From the crumbs on the plate, it looked like Gran had indulged in her favorite shortbread cookies while she was reading her book. Lina made her way to the bright, airy kitchen at the back of the house and set the cup, saucer, and plate in the sink. Movement out of the corner of her eye made her spin around and stare out the back window. A large crow sat on the back of a rocking chair watching Lina.
After a long moment, Lina slowly opened the back door. She stepped onto the porch, watching the crow. She reached back to close the door, her eyes never leaving the crow. It hopped along the back of the rocking chair towards Lina and cocked its head.
“Um. Hi. Are you Préachán?” she asked in a tentative voice. She remembered Gran thinking it was funny that she’d named her familiar crow “Crow” in Irish. “Oh, but it sounds so magic-y,” Gran had laughed.
The crow bobbed its head. Lina sighed.
“I wish you could talk. I really need to find out what happened to Gran. The police just say they found her on the kitchen floor and the ME says brain aneurysm leading to her collapsing on the floor and that she died immediately. But I’m not buying it. I mean, I know nobody knows they have an aneurysm until it bursts, but witches like Gran can tell when something’s off with their body. So, no. I’m not buying the aneurysm story, even if it does present that way to the ME.”
The crow bobbed its head again.
I can talk with you. I just wasn’t sure you knew that.
Lina jumped. “You can?! That’s great. So, do you know what really happened to Gran?”
I’m not certain, but I agree with you, it wasn’t like the police and medical people said.
Lina held out her arm and the crow hopped on. She surprised herself with her reply. “Okay. Let’s go inside and start figuring this out.” It looked like she was staying in town longer than she originally planned.
******
I forgot to send in a prompt last week and after perusing the spares, I actually decided to borrow the prompt submitted by Parrish Baker and caught by AC Young. Nobody had warned her that moving back home would feel like this. Make your way over to More Odds Than Ends and see what AC Young did with the prompt.