79-year-old grandmother dug through trash can every morning, people thought she was looking for food, but the truth was much worse.
The old woman lived on the first floor, in an apartment with fogged-up windows and fallen ficus trees on the windowsill. No one really knew who she was. The neighbors knew one thing: every day, exactly at six in the morning, she went out to the trash bins with a large, faded bag. And she started digging. For a long time. As if she was looking for something important.
– She’s gone again…
– Maybe she’s looking for food? Or bottles?
– No, she’s just crazy.
– Or a witch. Her eyes are like an owl’s, the locals discussed.
A nine-year-old girl lived in the same house. She often saw her grandmother from the window and could not understand why she did this every day. One day, curiosity overcame fear. When her mother went to work, she went down to the yard and came closer.
– Grandma… have you lost something?
She seemed not to hear. Her hands continued to rummage through the trash – through the cores, through the scraps of paper, through the dirty rags. Then they stopped. The little girl expected to hear that she was just looking for food, but when she learned the truth, she froze in horror…
The girl expected rudeness, but her grandmother suddenly whispered:
— Have you seen a baby here?
The girl was dumbfounded.
– Whom?
– The boy… very small… was wrapped in a blanket. I lost him. He’s somewhere here.
With these words, she again bent over the trash and began to rummage through the old bags, no longer paying attention to the girl.
The girl ran home in horror. And in the evening she told her mother everything. She turned pale and only whispered:
– Don’t bother her anymore, do you hear me? Don’t come near her.
A week later, the elderly woman died – right next to the bins. A stroke. The ambulance arrived quickly, but late. The bag she never parted with was taken away by the janitors. And a couple of days later, people started whispering on the bench near the entrance:
— Did you hear what they found out about her?
— About whom?
— About this granny. When she was fifteen, she gave birth in secret. At home. Her father was twice her age, supposedly a neighbor. She hide everything. She gave birth – and immediately threw the child away. In the trash. Her mother then beat her up and kicked her out.
– God…
— Since then, her mind has gone crazy. She was either in a mental hospital or at home. And then she completely withdrew. And every day she went to the trash can. To look. For her child.
