Grandmother 1941-2021

Grandmother is paralyzed from the waist down; it happened 5 years ago (that's half a decade) and I think it was because she slipped and fell in her bathroom.
I don't remember what she was like in the baby fistful of years between the fall and when I was younger. When we lived together, I used to run into her arms and she would hide me in her arms whenever mother was angry at me, she would tell her not to be angry, and later she would tell me she can't keep hiding me forever. I remember her long silver hair braided into a thin plait that she threw over her shoulder. I don't think she needed a walking stick. I remember how the water from the neighbor's pipe outside her room dripped constantly; the smell of the fresh strawberries and coconut oil; dusty flowery linen on the bed; scalding hot sunlight on my back as I hugged her, giggling at her from between my legs. We would all celebrate birthdays on the lawn, even in the summer.
My faith has never been enough to impress a preacher; it has never even been enough to impress my mother I love, and I believe, but maybe I'm doing an injustice to god; I'm not a poster boy for this religion. My faith is strung taut in the distance between me and the awkward gaze of my grandmother, who sits in the chair next to the door every day since half a decade ago.
Grandmother developed a habit of staring, but I'm not entirely sure if she can see me; sometimes she grasps my hand when I greet her and gazes at me like she's blind. She looks away, forgets she's holding my hand, and I stand awkwardly in the doorway, slipping it out when nobody's watching. I dart around the room and squeeze myself between people (there are always people) because I don't want to catch her eye - they bring with them the looming threat of condemnation, a loud but stuttered reproval of how I bring home girls and kiss them in my room. Grandfather offers me age-old chocolates and dates I accept one only to pocket and forget it, and settle at the edge of the room to listen to everyone talk. She does not participate. Father and his sisters gather in the room before dinner and play chess, the food is never good.
During a silence, she asks if I remember her, as if she is the one that needs this reassurance; sometimes she asks if I love her and I have no idea what to say. Because I don't know how to say “of course" in her language, because I don't know if I do - a red-cheeked laugh, an earnest, loud and pathetic “yeah" with as much indignance as I can muster in a smile is forced to suffice. She looks at me as if in disbelief, doesn't smile, and her gaze falls on her lap again.
I think we care more about her happiness than about her being able to walk to the bathroom on her own again. I also think we know that both are lost causes. I'm too much of a coward to talk to her, to hold a conversation in an unnecessarily loud voice, so she can hear me, repeat the same sentence thrice, so she can understand - because I tell myself it's too late. In some ways, I think I'm as paralyzed as her. Watch me give myself shit for the passive cruelty I could have reigned in when I stand over a grave. I hug her extra hard before I leave (we visit every Saturday), just in case it's the last time I get to; that is the closest I can give someone to genuine affection. The water from the neighbor's pipe still drips, even as I shut the door behind me.