Yesterday, I found a picture of my grandfather, black and white, published in a newspaper article, and carefully preserved for some 20 years. It must have been taken decades earlier, perhaps in the 1930s. A handsome man, wearing a suit, his wavy hair carefully in place.

The picture had come to me entirely by chance. Nothing by chance, you say. Well, it was my father, strangely, who had stuck it into the folder in which my dear mother, long before her death, had collected my report cards and other miscellany, including a courtroom script I'd written when I was 11. Why would my mother have placed the article about her father with my things? Elaine, seven years my senior, should have been the first to know about our grandfather's successes in public life and his acceptance of the national award for his contribution to the country.

I've just left the photo shop downtown where they've transformed the old picture into a portrait I can place on my knick-knack shelves, next to my mother's. Not my grandmother's, of course. Divorced in life, they ought not to be reunited in death. And now I'm on my way to visit Elaine. Her office is in a new structure recently erected in King's Park West.

I park, marvelling again at the technology that allows a huge building to sit atop a basement car park. In a shopping bag I have a gift for my sister, a framed copy of the picture, and wedged between my arm and torso is a portfolio containing some of my work, and the newspaper clipping. Cheerfully I wave to the receptionist - it's the usual one - and walk across the polished wooden floor to the elevator. I press the button for the eighth floor, and smile at the man who enters to share the space with me. He returns the smile and I glide out when the door whooshes open.

Despite myself, I enjoy the cool elegance of the room I enter. She's not there, but I make myself comfortable in one of the dark leather chairs at her desk. I reach into the shopping bag for the portrait; it flips from my hand but I catch it and place it carefully on her immaculate desk. As soon as she enters she'll see it. She'll ask, who's that good-looking guy? She'll pick it up, hold it close and admire the black and white as a special effect. And I'll laugh and pull out the article.

Elaine walks in and greets me. Her smile is beaming and her voice is warm and motherly. Then her face freezes. She says in a low voice, 'Anju, please get that thing off my desk. What are you doing with that picture?'

Immediately I pick it up, and hold it against me so that she can still see him.

'This is a picture of Mummy's father. I found this newspaper ... why are you so angry?'

Elaine sinks into the chair next to me. Her hand slowly comes to touch the ivory-coloured frame.

'Porcelain,' she says.

'Look at this,' I say, and produce the article, which she accepts, then swiftly thrusts back at me.

'I've seen that. Don't know why Mummy kept it.'

I am growing annoyed. 'I don't understand. I get the feeling that things have been kept from me. What do you know that I don't know?'

The force of my voice surprises us both. 'Don't make a big deal out of it. Mummy used to talk to me about him. Especially when he passed away. Fourteen years ago. You were still in high school.'

'What about him makes you so mad?'

Elaine hesitates, stands, paces the room a bit, then shuts the door and turns to me again. 'I don't know if hate is ever purely hate, but there's enough to make anybody hate this man.'

'I don't know what you mean. Just tell me. That so hard?'

My sister looks at me wearily. 'There are no earth-shattering secrets to tell, Anju. But the stories add up. You know the scar Mummy had on her forehead? This man here' - she jabs at the picture - 'threw a pot-spoon at Nanny and it got Mom instead. That man betrayed Nanny endless times.' Her voice begins to rise. 'You know how many bastard aunts and uncles you have? That's something we'll never know. And when he picked up with Shakuntala, all he did was say to Nanny 'I divorce you' three times, and she had to get out of that house with Mummy and find some way to live. San Juan they went, but more Laventille than San Juan. And that is what our mother had to live with. Is damn amazing you and I are where we are today.

'So you look at this lovely article, and see what a splendid mayor he was, and how benevolent to the poor in San Fernando - 'from his own pockets,' it says, right? And think how Mummy had to ketch arse all those years ...'

Elaine swoops down, snatches the paper from my lap, and shreds it. She gathers up the fallen pieces, and smashes them into a ball that she flings into the wastepaper basket at the side of her desk. The portrait is next. I do not stop her as she flicks aside the pull at the back of the frame and removes the picture. Bit by bit, my grandfather's image is ripped. The pieces flutter down to cover the discarded paper. Elaine hands me the empty frame. 'Use this for somebody more deserving, Anju.'

There's a peculiar hum at my ears; I feel it reverberate upwards in my head. My hands are tremulous, and when I stand my legs feel bloated and awkward. Elaine has dug out tissue and a compact from her handbag, and she's fixing her face. I tell her I must go and will call her, and I drop the frame into the waste basket and leave.

I walk out to the elevator, find myself in the dimly lit basement, and then in the car. I start the engine. Next to me is my own framed picture of the man. I look at the face. How could my grandfather be such a beast? Tears come, but then they subside. I sip the water that's kept in the small cooler on the ground, front passenger side. I am tired. Bone-weary. I sit back and close my eyes. The darkness is soothing, protecting. It washes over me in successive waves.

Close to me, right up against my left ear, there's a voice, a whisper against my skin.

Anju.

The air bears a sudden chill, as if the air-conditioning's been on too long. There's someone in the car with me, but I am not afraid.

Mom.

It's over, Anju. And everything's okay.

In my mind forms an image of my knick-knack shelves. There's Nanny, and Mom. There's Elaine and me. And our grandfather too.

END

- Carolyn Harnanan