Mickey crosses a street and knocks on a door; from inside, there's the voice of an old woman asking who it is. The door opens, and Mickey's blind gran, Rita-Anne, stands sassily. But not so sassily that it becomes offensive. She's a bad-ass grandmother just like yours. "Who is it?" she asks. "I know you're there. Shame on you, tricking an old lady. I've got nothing worth stealing." She shakes a stick at Mickey, staring. Heartbroken. "And don't think I'm gonna disappear! You're not gonna take me." He stares some more. "Hi," he says quietly, and she stands very, very still. "Is that you?" she asks quietly. "It's me," he tells her. "I came home." Gran touches his face: "Rickey?" Heh. He corrects her, and she corrects him right the fuck back: "I know my own grandson's name, it's Rickey. Now, come here." They embrace, and his joy is physically palpable. He gets about five words into the "Fine, I'm Rickey" speech before she starts beating hell out of him: "You stupid boy! Where've you been? It's been days and days! I keep hearing all these stories, people disappearing off the streets. There's nothing of it on the download," she points at her earpiece, "but there're all these rumors, and..." Her voice goes quiet: "I thought they'd gone and disappeared you!" He notices a torn bit of carpet on the stairs behind her, and his voice suddenly breaks: "That carpet on the stairs, I told you to get it fixed, you're gonna..." He closes his eyes and swallows. Dead grandmas are not awesome. Especially those who die horribly. I wish we'd known this about Mickey sooner. "You're gonna fall and break your neck," he tells her. People falling down the stairs and breaking their necks is not awesome! I love Mickey right now so bad. "Well, you get it fixed for me," says Rita-Anne, and Mickey breathes: "Shoulda done way back. I guess I'm just kinda useless." She gets another fierce look -- "Now, I never said that" -- and he melts. "I am, though," he tells her. "And I'm sorry, Gran. I'm so sorry." (He blames himself for the elimination of home. He has no home to return to, and it's his fault. And he has hyperfocused on a girl named Rose, because he has no other anchor. Maybe "Mickey the Idiot" is just a metaphor for somebody else entirely, depending on who says it.) Gran tells Mickey to stop with the self-abuse talk and sit down with a cuppa: "You got time?" He smiles: "For you, I've got all the time in the world." She laughs at him: "You say that, but it's all talk." For her part, Gran blames "those new friends" of Mickey's, whom she doesn't trust: "Don't pretend you don't know. You've been seeing them, Mrs. Chan told me. Driving about all helter-skelter in that van." (There's the skid of tires, coming for Mickey.) What van? "You know full well! Don't play games with me..." And just then, the van draws up quick behind Mickey, and Gran tries to usher him inside, but Jake jumps out and grabs Mickey by the collar. The woman driving shakes her head and drives away, leaving Rita-Anne surprised by beauty and calling Mickey's name.