I was six when my grandfather took me for a ride in his truck for the first time. It was a red Chevrolet C10 1975 edition pickup with slightly inconsistent shock absorbers and a loud engine. The vehicle was 23 years older than me, but it was still good-looking – freshly washed and waxed. After I’d jumped around excitedly for a few minutes, he lifted me inside the truck; I was too short to reach the door handle and climb up by myself. I didn’t mind that, though. I was engrossed in the childish delight of sitting in a pickup truck for the first time.

It was an August afternoon, sunny and bright. The truck felt almost new; over the years my grandfather had worked hard to maintain the Chevrolet in its best condition. On the old dirt roads there were always huge rocks that we couldn’t avoid and had to drive over. The truck, of course, took them all with ease.

What fascinated me more was how my grandfather drove. He had faith in his truck. He didn’t worry about rocks or flooded roads; he just kept going, and we were always safe. His eyes never left the road during the drive, while the afternoon sunlight highlighted his deep brown eyes and his pale hands on the steering wheel.

As we traveled through the countryside, I bounced on the passenger seat and loudly named the cows that I saw on the farms we passed. He didn’t tell me to be quiet; in fact, he seemed to be enjoying my noise. He was wearing a contented smile – an expression I rarely saw on him. Grandpa loved his family, but he was always tense and rarely opened up. Having lived through World War II and witnessed the deaths of friends and fellow soldiers, he couldn’t get over the war guilt. He would sit silently by the living room window and look at the mountains for hours.

We drove around the hills and farms, listening to old songs and the roaring of the engine, while a cool wind rushed in through the open windows. We cut through Grandpa’s 40 acres toward the sunset, inhaling the sweet aroma of fresh grass. We knew we could never reach the horizon, but we kept going, wishing that we would eventually touch the orange sun. Sitting in the truck with him, I felt calm and careless, driving through the boundary of time and age, horror and sadness, uncertainty and fear. I felt free. I finally understood why Grandpa loved the truck so much.

A few months later my parents and I left the small town where Grandpa lived. I insisted on taking a picture with Grandpa next to his red pickup, since I didn’t know when I would see him again. As I moved from place to place while my parents pursued their careers, I would show my friends the picture and try to tell them how my grandfather and I loved to drive in the truck, but they never understood. My friends were focused on Porsches and Lamborghinis; they weren’t interested in a Chevy truck that was decades older than them. Of course, they didn’t know the incredible feeling of driving it through the countryside.

It was eight years after we’d first moved that I flew back to see my grandfather. He had just been diagnosed with stomach cancer.

“Four months,” the doctor said.

My parents, refusing to accept the prognosis, moved Grandpa into one of the best hospitals in the district. In a week, it seemed as though my parents had turned into pharmaceutical experts; they’d become familiar with the names of multiple medicines and were constantly searching for better, more efficient treatments. They were afraid to lose him. So was I.

My grandfather, on the other hand, was calm. He followed the doctors’ directions, attended his therapies, and took the enormous amount of prescribed medicines. His dining options were limited, and he lost 20 pounds in two weeks. He didn’t speak much, but he asked for his hospital bed to be moved next to the window. After that he was silent, just looking at the mountains.

I stayed with Grandpa in the hospital, sat next to him in silence during the day and slept in a chair at night. Except for peeling fruit and changing the sheets, I could do little for him, but being with him made me feel better. This went on for two quiet months, until one night Grandpa finally spoke.

“Let’s take a drive in the Chevy, son,” he said, looking me in the eyes.

“Grandpa …” I started to protest. I was afraid that he wasn’t well enough to drive.

He cut me off. “Do you want to, or not?”

“Y-yes.”

“Let’s go then.”

I don’t remember it clearly, but somehow Grandpa managed to get out of bed and put on street clothes, and I found a wheelchair for him. My parents were out of town at another hospital in search of better treatments, and our nurse was busy, so no one stopped us. We walked out of the hospital and took a 20-minute taxi ride into the countryside. We opened the barn, and there was the red truck.

Grandpa chose to drive on the highway. It was already midnight, and only a few cars were on the road. I sat in silence while he drove, reaching out the window to let the wind rush between my fingers. He drove around the town again and again, passing every exit to the city center, keeping his eyes on the road while saying nothing.

Eventually he parked on the side of the highway and covered his face with his huge hands. I reached over and gave him a hug. Tears filled my eyes, but I didn’t let them drop.

“I am so tired,” he sobbed weakly into my shoulder.

“Everything will be fine,” I said. My voice shook. “Everything will end up where it is supposed to be.”

Grandpa was gone a few days later. He didn’t die from the stomach cancer, though. The doctor said he just kind of slipped away. He was content when he left.

My mother cried her eyes into mild myopia, while my father’s hair seemed to go gray overnight. I sat in the red Chevrolet for days, feeling numb.

A lawyer read Grandpa’s will after the funeral. At some point I heard my name and focused.

“I leave the Chevrolet C10 1975 edition pickup truck to my grandson,” the lawyer read, “since he is the only one who understands what the truck meant to me, and of course, to him. I hope he will drive this truck for me and live his life, a life full of happiness and hope, a life that has everything I didn’t, and approach the horizon that we both wished we could somehow reach.”

I sat on my seat, and for the first time I allowed tears to drop from my eyes.