I’ve been in Las Cruces for four days. David told me this morning that he ran out of the food last night, and tonight he’ll stop by JR’s for dinner.
“Dad,” I say, resettle myself on the edge of the bed because my back is beginning to ache from no support.
He looks at me.
“Have a little more water.”
“No.” He shuts his eyes again.
I stare at the three Frank Lloyd Wright awards on the wall. My father has won many awards for building designs, but these are the most prestigious, proof that he has an ironclad will for doing everything flawlessly.
“Dad, the nurse says you need to drink more water. You’re dehydrated. Just take a few sips, then I’ll leave you alone.” It feels so strange telling my father what to do.
“’Water, water, everywhere, nor any drop to drink.’” His voice is raspy, as if he’s thirsty, yet he enunciates each word perfectly.
I laugh. He used to quote this poem when I was a kid and we were traveling. Lena and I, from the back seat of the car, would beg him to stop at a Quick-Stop so we could get Cokes. When he refused, Lena would tell him we were dying of thirst. He’d look at us through rearview mirror, recite that line.
He opens his eyes. “Melinda, I don’t want any more water. I’ve had enough.”
“Are you sure?”
He nods once.
“If you’re hungry I’ll fix you something to eat.”
“No. I’m fine.”
“Do you want to talk?”
“I’m too tired.”
He closes his eyes again and I study his face. His skin is smooth and he doesn’t look seventy-two. After he retired, I called him every two weeks, worried that since he’d been such a workaholic, he might not adapt to retirement. But he got along just fine and was busy as ever with traveling, his volunteer work, his friends, Jan. On the phone we’d discuss politics, his trips or teaching, nothing personal, but it was nice to talk to him.
“Okay,” I say.
He looks at me. “Okay?”
“I can’t make you drink more water. I do remember that poem, though. Lena would claim she was so thirsty she was dying, and you wouldn’t stop the car because we were on a tight schedule.”
“Yeah, I was always in a hurry.”
“Oh, we survived. Do you remember the rest of the poem?”
“I do.”
“Remember, sometimes Mom interrupted, finished a line for you.”
He sits up a little, pushes back against the pillow but doesn’t say anything.
“Mom gave me the book of poetry you and she used to read from, when you were both in college.”
He turns his head a little. “Oh, really?”
“It was years ago, when I was going to school. She said I might be able to use it.” I place the water glass on the nightstand and watch the straw circle to the other side. “There are margin notes by some of the poems.”
“She and I used to go to the park, read poetry out loud.”
“‘Water, water, everywhere, nor any drop to drink.’ I always liked that even though you wouldn’t stop for Cokes.”
He shakes his head. “Back then there never seemed to be enough time. Now there’s too much.”
Another memory surfaces—Lena and I in the back seat, my parents in the front, my mother sitting close to him, and he has his arm around her.
“I forget. Who’s the poem by?”
Dad closes his eyes, licks his lips. They look dry and chapped. I need to get him some Chap Stick at the store tomorrow.
“Coleridge. It’s the ‘Rime of the Ancient Mariner.’”
“I used to love when you’d recite it.”
“‘God save thee, ancient Mariner!’” He smiles at me and I smile back.
“Did Mom memorize some of it, too?”
“I don’t know. I had to memorize it to win a contest in school. First prize was ten dollars. Back then ten dollars was like a million. We didn’t have much money. It took me three months.”
“You memorized the entire poem?”
He nods and I imagine my father as boy, trying to put each line to memory. I’m not surprised though. He’s always been determined.
“Yeah, I was the only one in the school who could recite it perfectly.”
“What did you buy with the money?”
“I gave it to my mother for food.” He closes his eyes again. “I’m so tired.”
I pat his shoulder, get up and walk through the living room into the kitchen. Three mugs half full of cold tea sit next to the sink. Dried-out tea bags, like winter leaves on our front porch in Texas, dot the counter, stain the white Formica. Jan loves tea and makes cup after cup, leaving a trail of tea bags behind her like Hansel and Gretel.
I look through the pass-through above the sink. She is sitting on the couch, the phone pressed between her right shoulder and ear. I hear her laugh, say, Oh, Donny, and I know she’s talking to her only child. Before Dad, Jan was married to a colonel in the air force and they had Donny. He’s thirty-three, a problem man-child who’s been in jail three times for drunk driving.
“Things are the same. Oh, Stanley’s daughter, Melinda, is here.”
Jan looks back to me, holds up her mug and smiles deeply. I have learned this means she would like another cup of tea. I turn to the stove, grab the kettle, fill it with water, place it on the burner, snap the control to high and hear the familiar hiss—fire licking metal.
“We’re bonding, Donny. She’s nice. You’d really like her.”
Jan’s words remind me I have not seen my ex-stepbrother in a long time. I try to think of the last time but only know it was when he was a child.
“It’s a lot of work for me, but I have to do it for Stanley. Work, work, work, there’s nothing else,” she says in her breathy persona as she flips her hand back and forth.
Jan has her back to me now, and I wonder if she knows I can hear her.
Work, work, work, my foot! Since I’ve been here, she sleeps till ten, sits on the couch and goes to lunch with Verna and Bob Skilly. I have encouraged her to do these things because I know it must be difficult for her to see my father depressed and in bed most of the time. And I appreciate that she
