This summer, when I walked into my grandparents' house with my little brother Frank, I tried not to look at Grandpa's chair anyway. It still looked the same. His blue 1 was there, as if Grandpa was going to pull it over his legs. My cousin Jack was playing in the yard as if2 had happened. "Let's go to catch fish!" Jack 3 the fish net from the corner, Grandpa's net.
Last summer, I was holding the net when Grandpa asked me 4 I could help him teach Frank how to play chess. I said no because I wanted to catch fish. Grandpa had been the one who'd taught us how to catch fish, but then the 5 made him stay behind.
I 6 saying no to Grandpa, and now I wouldn't have chance to play chess with him.
When we reached the stream, we began to catch fish. Suddenly, Jack shouted, "Frank is shaking." We hadn't brought anything to keep 7 so I had to send him home.
Grandma was worried to see a wet Frank and 8 put Grandpa's blue blanket around him. As I went to the stream again to meet Jack, I looked back at Frank with that old blanket. Something seemed to 9 me at that moment. Everything was just like before, but Grandpa was gone.
I walked to Frank. "Did Grandpa teach you to play chess last summer?" I asked. "No, Grandpa was too sick then." he said, "I miss him."
"Me, too." When I said it, I knew Grandpa was never gone. What 10 us was still there. It could be the fish net. It could be the chess. It could be the blue blanket.
