Goodnight, Sweet Dreams

My grandmother died when I was twelve. I was too young to remember the way she took her coffee, but old enough to remember the faint scent of smoke and soap that clung to her cardigans. I do remember the last time I saw her. There was a schedule to our visits. I would stay with her on the weekend, cuddled up on the leather sofa, watching old westerns and black and white films till I fell asleep. 

She was a frail woman. An older woman. So, she would leave me there to sleep instead of carrying me upstairs. Every morning, I would wake to her clashing around the kitchen, making breakfast. Static fizzling from the large block of a television that sat in the corner, tapes scattered around it.

The final time started just as normal as all the other times I had slept over. Dad dropped me off, speaking with Gran for a moment, before waving to me as he left to take Mum out for the night. She ordered us fish and chips, then let me sit near the TV to look through the stacks of films she had collected. None of them were really for my age group, but I remember enjoying the ones in colour more, the ones with singing. After an hour or two, she came over and patted my head as a signal to go put on my pyjamas, before going off to plate up our tea. When I came back to the living room, I remember her already watching something which was unusual since the deal was when I slept over, I got to pick what we were watching. But as I watched her, I remember not even feeling slightly miffed at the lack of choice. She looked so invested. The food half-plated up on the coffee table, her knitting forgotten at her side with one of the needles hanging off the sofa, but she didn’t notice. Didn’t care. Just kept looking forward.

It was static. Just a wall of sizzling static that would glitch into a quick image but leave before I could begin to grasp what it was. I sat down next to her and held one of her shaky, frail hands, asking her what film she had picked and if it had started yet. I remember she looked at me, turning her head slowly till I saw her face in full. Eyes red-rimmed and blank, nose drippy with snot that trickled down to her lips. She looked confused. Said I was the one who put the film on. The reply I gave is lost on me now, but I remember that we sat there together for a while, maybe a few hours, and just watched the static. She would laugh or hum in appreciation while I tried to not look concerned by just how focused she was. 

Sleep never came for me when I tried. I pretended to when the static got too much, too boring. Some time that night, I gave up on trying to sleep. Instead, I wriggled myself out of my grandmothers hold, careful not to wake her. I got up and checked the tape. I thought it would be one of those blank ones you have to put your own footage on, but it had an image on it and writing. The picture was blurred and scratched beyond recognition, the writing clearly in a language I didn’t know, but what I did know knew certain was that I was not the one to put the tape in. I had a clear rotation of five films I would pick over and over again, Gran too old to realise she had seen it before. It didn’t make sense to me, but sitting on the carpet picking at a random tape wasn’t going to do anything, so I put it back in the TV, moving to go upstairs to the spare bedroom. I remember stopping for a moment, deciding whether or not to carry her upstairs to her bed own bed. 

So instead, I crawled onto the sofa, careful not to wake her while I moved her frail arm back around my shoulders. I remember closing my eyes, too focused on the static screen to notice the slowing rise and fall of her chest.

I woke up to Dad carrying me, already halfway towards the car. It was dark. There were colourful flashing lights and a loud siren that echoed in my head as we drove away from its range. The car was too fast, and in my tired state, I fumbled around the question of why he picked me up early, but he gently shushed me, rubbing my back in encouragement to fall back to sleep.

I slept for three days. A doctor came to the house to check on me and gave my Mum a letter for the school. I was exhausted. I’d never felt so tired, and by the next weekend, when I finally felt myself, I had excitedly asked to go to Gran’s. Instead, they sat me down at the kitchen table and solemnly told me the news. Grandma had passed away. They didn’t tell me when, but I knew. It had been the night Dad took me home early. I was devastated. Inconsolable. For the rest of the year, I would spend my weekends hiding away in my room, crying whenever my parents tried to take me out, before they eventually took me to a counsellor.

As the years went by, it got a lot easier to cope. Growing older helped. So why talk about this now?

God, I’m in my seventies, and I’m still thinking about a night from decades ago. I honestly thought nothing would ever come from what happened. Life carried on. The bungalow was refurbished into a two-story starter home. VHS tapes became DVDs. 

Fifteen years ago, my parents passed away peacefully in their sleep, in each other’s arms. I never got married, never had children, not even a dog. Instead, I moved into a small bungalow on the edge of an even smaller village. I even got myself one of the older tape players to watch those childhood films that give me a sense of nostalgia that nothing else does. I suppose you could say that I’m lonely. That I’ve become one of those paranoid little old ladies the children in the neighbourhood stay clear of on Halloween; but I don’t mind, not really. 

I don’t have an attic, don’t think my hip would handle the climb up to one, so instead I have a little cupboard opposite my kitchen. It’s filled with absolute tat if I’m honest. Baby clothes and old toys from my childhood, school work, and my Gran’s jewellery. My Mother’s wedding dress, a box of VHS tapes. I thought nothing of the box. Saw the cheesy rom-coms that belonged to Mum on top and decided not to bother searching the rest. But again, I am lonely. That comes with boredom that my typical hobbies can’t fix, so tonight I opened the box again. 

Tipped the dusty contents onto my living room carpet and scanned for anything good. There wasn’t much to start. Films taped over with Dad’s car show, blurry videos from school plays, a couple of random TV show episodes. But it only took me a moment to recognise a familiar tape sat at the bottom. It was that tape. Gran’s tape. 

When she passed, all her belongings were either given away or sold; the jewellery was already Mum’s when she passed. Neither of my parents believed me when I mentioned the tape, but I remember them both steering clear of buying any more. I want to leave it alone. I should leave it alone. But it’s here, somehow, sitting on my coffee table opposite the stack of tapes with colourful images and scribbled writing.

I’m going to put the tape in. 

I could be wrong, it might be another one of my parents’ TV show episodes they forgot to detail. It could be nothing. I put the other tapes away, cleared up the dust from the carpet and stared at the tape the entire time. I made a cup of tea and watched the tape like it would disappear, maybe I want it to. I’ve got a blanket wrapped around me. It’s a cold night so I rushed to put the tape in before I could overthink it anymore, tucking myself into the sofa in anticipation. 

It’s just static. My stomach dropped slightly at the realisation that no introduction music or image was going to show. But it’s only been a few minutes, hasn’t it? 

I think I’ll watch for a bit longer, maybe the static will change to something. It is quite a peaceful view, I feel like I could watch it for hours.

Kelise Brooke Cassidy is a Newcastle-based Horror and Supernatural fiction writer who loves the disturbingly odd and freakishly bizarre. If you want to keep up to date with her writing, give her a follow on Substack @kbcassidy and Instagram K.B.Cassidy