Page 10 of The Broken Heart Playlist
“Everything okay, Kate?” he asks now, pinning me with his serious gaze.
I swallow the sudden lump in my throat. The answer feels as complex as the question. Aaron is the one person I don’t want to lie to. After a hostile beginning, we gradually adjusted our viewof one another and now share a strange closeness, a source of great delight to my sister.
Before I can answer him, my small and feisty grandmother breezes into the kitchen, carrying the Google Home device. She deposits it onto the counter and plugs it in. Then her kind green eyes snag mine. “Kate! Lovely surprise having you and Lisset drop by. We’re having chicken curry, which I love, but it gives me the runs.”
“Hi, Grandma.” I stoop slightly to kiss her cheek.
She carries out a brisk surveillance of my face. “You look tired.”
I’m exhausted all the way down to my bones, but I say, “And you look gorgeous.”
Grandma pats her hair and preens a little, as I knew she would. She lives with my parents, moving in after my grandfather died a little over three years ago. For the most part, the arrangement suits everyone. There are occasional...blips, mostly to do with my grandmother’s bizarre love/hate relationship with Google. A relationship none of us dare analyze too deeply.
“I want to show you all something,” Grandma announces, rubbing her hands together.
Aaron makes some sort of weird, strangled noise.
My mother’s eyes narrow. “Please tell me, Mom, that whatever you’re showing us has nothing to do with Google.”
“What else would I be showing you, Joelle? I’m too old for any sort of striptease.”
Tess almost spits out the second tomato she popped into her mouth.
“Kate,” Grandma orders, “turn the lights off in the kitchen.”
Mom frowns. “I need to finish up dinner.”
Grandma waves a dismissive hand. “This won’t take long.”
With vast reluctance, Mom mutters, “Fine.”
“But I don’t like the dark, GG,” Lisset whines. GG is her nickname for her great grandmother.
It’s only 6 p.m. but feels like midnight. Darkness descends early in winter.
“Cuddle up with Auntie Tess then,” Grandma instructs.
Lisset hops onto my sister’s lap.
“Aaron helped me set it up,” explains Grandma, “but I made a few tweaks.”
Aaron is looking at the floor, avoiding eye contact with everyone.
I feel a pinch of nerves, a feeling this is not going to go well.
I flip the light switch and the kitchen goes dark. Lisset emits a little squeal and Tess wraps her arms around her.
“Okay, watch this.” My grandmother leaves a dramatic pause. “Hey, Google, turn on the lights.”
Silence. We all wait in anticipation.
Then a robotic voice intones, “Okay, playingTurn on the Lightsfrom Spotify.”
Music fills the kitchen, painfully loud because Grandma’s hearing is slowly deteriorating and she’s set the volume on Google to maximum.
I hear Tess smother a laugh and Grandma mutter something I hope Lisset’s little ears don’t pick up over the rising swell of the music.
“Why aren’t the lights coming on, GG?” Lisset yells in an effort to be heard over the music. “I really, REALLY don’t like the dark.”
