Topic: Moving On

Kieran Granger

Date: 2013-08-27 03:34 EST
The city wasn't normally so gray, so bleak. On any day other than this the sun cast a friendly light on the people below. Cars honked and trucks roared down the interstate, music could be heard on every corner. Birds flew through the air, their songs a cacophonous backdrop to the rest of the noise. On any day other than this, the city was alive. But this day was different, the city was quiet outside the wrought iron fences and gates of the cemetery. A sea of black wrapped around a single, rectangular hole in the ground. The mourners came in all shapes and sizes, each wearing a mask of grief for the small family that remained.

The deceased was a man named Cillian Granger, former lawyer and United States Senator. Amidst the mourners were young men dressed in black, their hats white and their rifles resting against their broad shoulders. They stared straight ahead while a man in dark robes stood, speaking of impact, of honor, dignity and God. Inch by inch the casket was lowered as an elderly woman sobbed into her kerchief between the two men who sat on either side of her. One was thin with lanky arms and legs, the runt of the family. His hair was dark and shaggy, his brown eyes focused on his hands. The other was older, a man who wore his suit well and hid his grief as best he could in front of so many people. One arm was wrapped around his weeping mother's shoulders and the other rested on his knee, a balled fist the only emotion he dared let slip past his perfectly controlled expression. That man was a lawyer, just like his father.

When the casket was swallowed by the earth the first shots were fired. Some of the mourners jumped in surprise, though they had been expecting the shots all along. By the time they were finished the hole in the ground was a scar of earth, waiting for the next fall of rain to mash it all together. The crowd slowly thinned. One by one the mourners vanished into their cars and disappeared. The family remained afterwards, waiting for when the recently widowed Angela Granger was ready to leave.

Kieran Granger

Date: 2013-08-27 03:35 EST
"Kieran."

Her voice made him jump in surprise. Kieran Granger had been sitting in his father's old study, looking over the many law books that lined the dark wooden shelves. He had been lost in thought, reminiscing about the recently departed Cillian Granger and didn't hear his mother enter.

"Mom," he sighed, rubbing at his chest through his shirt. He rolled back in the plush chair and stood, walking around the desk to wrap her in a hug. "I thought you were asleep."

"I can't," she admitted. "I'm so tired, Kieran, but my mind is racing. I don't know what I'm going to do."

"You'll be alright, Mom. We just have to look forward now."

"How can you say that' How can you be so calm already, Kieran?"

"Because Dad would want me to be, I know. He'd say: Now, Kieran, you need to take good care of Connor and your mother," Kieran replied, doing his best imitation of his dad. His mother offered him an exhausted smile and smoothed out the wrinkles of his shirt.

"Of course he would," she paused, smiling up at him a moment longer.

"You should try and get some sleep, Mom."

"I will," she leaned up to kiss his cheek and then turned away, stepping through the door of the study.

"Kieran?"

"Yeah, Mom?"

"Are you alright?"

He shoved his hands into his pockets and stared across the room at her. "Yeah, Mom. I'm alright."

Angela Granger, the mother and the widow nodded at her son and turned away. She soon disappeared from sight but Kieran stood there, listening for the sound of her door shutting. When he heard it echo down the cavernous hall he turned back to the desk and fell into it again, breathing out another sigh. For a few more minutes he simply sat there, then started to open drawers and cabinets, rummaging for something.

"What are you looking for?"

This time it was Connor, his younger brother, who startled him.

"Huh' Oh, I know Dad kept some scotch in here somewhere and I could use a drink."

Connor crossed the room and stepped around the desk, opening a cabinet beneath one of the many shelves that lined the walls of the study. He produced a bottle and a pair of glasses that clinked together, flashing Kieran a smirk as he set them both on the desk.

"How's Mom holding up?"

"Hard to tell," Kieran admitted, taking a glass after Connor filled it. "She's doing her best. Trying to stay strong."

"Remember what Dad said, right?"

"What do you mean?"

"About if anything happened to him?"

Kieran rolled his eyes. "He thought he was going to get shot or something. He was in a wreck, Connor. We aren't taking her to that place just because he was a little paranoid before he died."

"Don't talk about him like that. His funeral was less than twenty-four hours ago, at least pretend to respect him."

"Respect isn't the issue. That place is nuts, mom needs to stay here, at home where she can mourn and then move on. All sending her there will do is remind her of him."

"And living in their house won't?"

"I'm done having this conversation, Connor. It's not happening," Kieran stood and stepped around his brother, making his way out of the study. "Good night, Connor."

"Night," his brother scowled after him. As Kieran moved down the hall he could hear him muttering as he put the bottle of scotch away and flicked the lights off in the study.

Kieran Granger

Date: 2013-08-27 11:10 EST
"What does Kieran have to say about this?" Angela and Connor Granger were standing near the island in the center of the kitchen, speaking over morning coffee of what they might do next now that the reality of Cillian's death had settled over them.

"You know what he thinks, Mom," Connor grumbled into his coffee. "He thinks it's a bad idea. That Dad was insane to even suggest it."

"Well, Kieran understood your father in ways no one else did. Perhaps he's right about this."

"Dad wanted you to go, Mom!" Connor set his coffee down, placing both hands on the island. He leaned across it toward his mother. "Dad thought, before he died, that someone was out to get him. He thinks that person is probably after you, too. And me, and Kieran. He said we aren't safe here."

"Your father had quite the imagination too, Connor," she replied calmly before taking another sip of coffee. "Sometimes he confused fantasy and reality, especially after he retired."

"What are you two droning on about?" Kieran asked as he stepped into the kitchen, running a hand through his hair, still damp from the shower.

"Oh, your fathers delusions."

"Connor, we talked about this last night. It's not a good idea," Kieran eyed his brother as he grabbed the coffee pot and opened a cabinet overhead to fetch a mug. He turned as the dark drink splashed into the vessel gripped in his hand and studied his brother thoughtfully.

"Do you really think he was just crazy, Kieran' Our dad" The lawyer" The skeptic" He thought someone was after him and now he's?"

"That's enough," their mother said rather sharply. She set her mug down and pulled herself up in as dignified a manner as she could muster. "You two will not bicker and fight like schoolboys, not today. Your father's gone and there's still so much we have to do before we can take a breath again. I can't have you two fighting along the way."

"Sorry, Mom," Kieran replied, raising his mug of coffee to her.

"Yeah, sorry,? Connor echoed the sentiment as he turned and exited the kitchen.

Kieran Granger

Date: 2013-08-29 14:05 EST
"I don't think it's a good idea."

Cillian's study had turned into the unofficial meeting place of the Granger family in New York. Each night the three that remained gathered there to discuss the day, to make plans for the ones that would follow and to argue about where to go next. Kieran sat at his father's desk as he often found himself doing throughout the day, Connor perched on its edge and their mother resting in the wingback chair by the fire.

"Why not?" she asked, turning to look at her eldest son.

"Don't you remember what it's like there" It's a crazy town, dangerous and unpredictable. If Dad really thought someone would be after us, he wouldn't want us to go to the most dangerous place possible. We'd be safer here."

"No one over there is after us, Kieran," Connor was quick to point out. "They probably don't even know what?s happened yet."

"No one's after us here, either!" he slammed his hand on the desk and pushed his chair back, rising to his feet. "I'm tired of having this conversation with you, Connor. Dad lost touch with reality. He wasn't being hunted, he wasn't assassinated. He was in an accident, a terrible accident, and he died. Stop mistaking his paranoia for anything but that."

Both Angela and Connor were silent for Kieran's brief rant. The clock's ticking was unbearably loud in the moments that followed. The eldest of the three Grangers sat in her chair, staring at the flames as they danced in the hearth, quietly crackling. She rose with a soft exhale and turned to face her two sons, offering them both a sad, sad smile.

"I'm going," she announced. "Your father has family there, they need to know what happened. And it's what he wanted. We should honor that."

"Good," said Connor as he nodded and slipped from his perch at the edge of the desk. "I'll go too, Mom."

In unison they turned to look at Kieran who stood there with his hands on his hips, staring at them both incredulously.

"Fine," he said at last, his voice full of exasperation. "Fine, we'll go. But we aren't staying long. We'll see the family, tell them what happened and then we're coming back home."

"Of course, dear.?