it is – “thing.”
Not buying it. All over her face.
But Samantha smiles, tugs her bag off my shoulder, puts her hand in its place. “Two more things, actually – but they’re crucial. Don’t wear that stupid Axe stuff clueless guys think is sexy. It reeks of desperation.”
I fake scribble on an imaginary pad. “Noted.”
“And don’t let her break your heart, okay?”
“Sammy-Sam, I think that’s already a given.”
“I get to ride on the feet!” George squeals.
“Bro. You can’t ride on the wheelchair feet. I’d lose my job,” Brad says, maneuvering Dad out of the hospital room, skillful and grounded in his transporter role. We’re a parade to help move Dad to the rehab part of Maplewood. Joel’s got the duffel full of the clothes we brought so Dad would feel semi-normal. Mom’s arms are bundled full of his books. Andy’s carrying a stack of artwork the little guys made, carefully detached from the Scotch tape on the wall. Duff has the Xbox and the videogames. Harry, the old deck of cards, the pick-up sticks, the dominoes, the old-fashioned games we rediscovered to make time pass.
I have all the paperwork, most of which my parents don’t know about.
It would be Brad they sent to do the transfer, of all the ’porters in all of Maplewood Memorial. He’s ignoring me. I’m ignoring him. This is fun. At least he’s been decent to the kids, even though George keeps giving him sidelong glances, no doubt worried the tears will start again.
I check my watch – plenty of time to do what I need to do, get home, and get ready to go out with Tim, as long as this all goes quickly.
Two and a half hours later – twice as long as it was supposed to take – Dad’s in his room, everything (more or less) sorted out.
Mom leaves with the kids, Joel heads to cop class, I linger. Sticking the pictures up on the wall, stacking the games in piles, making the bare room a little like home. Dad shut his eyes the instant they all left, “just for a moment.” But he immediately dropped off to sleep.
I sit down on the side of the bed. Really, I want to lie down too, put my head on his shoulder. I was up late last night studying, and George had a wake-up-screaming nightmare, something about a supervolcano under Yellowstone Park. After I convinced him it was absolutely nothing to worry about and he finally fell asleep in my lap and I carried him back to bed, I googled it.
There is one.
Looking at my father’s face, worry lines smoothed out, faint smile, his big hands brown against the white hospital sheet, air siphons out of my lungs for an instant. Black spots collect at the corners of my vision.
Deep breath.
Deep breath.
The spots scatter and fade.
On to the next thing, because what else can I do?
I brought a change of clothes for tonight along with me, just in case.
I mean, I’m not dressing up. Not for Tim, for God’s sake. But, I’ve been wearing this black V-neck and skirt all day long, and Harry squeezed his juice box too hard and –
Anyway.
I shower in the bathroom off Dad’s new room, crowded in by the walker, the quad cane, and the commode chair. Tiny hospital-issue soap and body wash and shampoo, because I forgot to bring my own. Hospital towels are rough and tiny, it takes two to dry off, and still my dark blue sundress clings in a few wet patches. No blow dryer, so my hair will dry curly. So be it. When I look in the mirror, I recognize myself again.
There’s a sharp sound from the other room, like air through teeth.
Sweat stands out on his forehead and his face is chalky white.
“Dad?”
“Al,” Dad says gently, “come back a little later, okay?”
“Not happening. What do you need?”
My hand is poised over the call button. He sets his on top of it. “They’ll only dope me up. Not what I want.”
Dad shifts in the bed with a crackle of plastic hospital mattress pad. He sucks his breath in hard, again blows it out. My own breath snags.
“Scale of one to ten,” I say, groping to find the professional in me.
“I’m not your patient, tiger,” Dad says. “Luckily for both of us.”
Without warning, my eyes fill. I don’t cry. I never cry.
Which Dad knows. His hand shoots out, squeezes my shoulder. “You know I didn’t mean it like that. You know that.” Now he’s batting at the box of tissues at the side of his bed, which is slightly out of reach, and something about that, my dad, who can do anything, who can fix everything –
“You look gorgeous, Alice,” Dad says. “Hot date?”
“Just a thing,” I say, my face going hot.
He studies me, saying nothing, waiting for information to come to him. Mom and Dad have that one down to an art.
“How’s Tim these days?”
These two questions are not connected. He’s making conversation. Distracting me from calling the nurse and another debate about pain medication. “How Mom and Dad Met” is a family fairy tale – Mom’s told us the story so often, we can all fill in words when she pauses. But there’s a part she leaves out when we’re younger . . . that charming, perceptive Jack Garrett had a dark side back then. He was, as he tells it, “mad at the whole live world” because his mother had died the year before, and his little sister and brother, my aunt Caroline and my uncle Jason, had stayed behind in Virginia with their grandparents, while his father had taken my father, alone, since he was sixteen and old enough to bring in a paycheck, up to Connecticut. Dad had a drinking problem, which got worse until his twenties, when he realized he could go that route, or have a life with Mom, and turned his around.
I have never seen my father drink alcohol. He doesn’t even have soda, although he’ll be the first to tell you that entire coffee plantations are supported by his caffeine habit.
It could go that way for Tim. Or it could go the other way.
“Oh . . . you know. The usual.”
Dad laughs. “That kid has no ‘usual.’”
Out in the hallway again, I rub the back of my neck, close my eyes, flip back my hair. I’m looking forward to Tim – Tim! – like a steaming hot bath after a long, cold day.
Still, I pull Dad’s chart from the plastic holder outside the door, page through it. Standard entry, expected procedure, the usual blah, blah, blah.
But then . . .
Holy.
Holy Mother of God.
