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Jan walks into the room, hugging a large, fuzzy, brown teddy bear. She stops in the middle of the room, glances from face to face, and her expression crumbles. She puts the teddy bear on the bed at my father’s feet and sits in the chair closest to him.
“Stanley, are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
David gets up, walks into the hallway, and I follow him to give my father and Jan some time alone. My husband leans against the wall, folds his arms.
“We probably should go home tomorrow.” His tone is flat, dry.
“What?”
He stares at the floor and then looks at me. “I’ve got work waiting for me at the office. Besides, there’s not a lot we can do here.”
My heart begins to pound and my mouth feels dry. I know he has things to do at work, and this isn’t his responsibility, but it’s so nice to have my husband here while I try to help my father.
“I’d like you to stay. I know it’s not a lot of fun, but I want to be here for a few more days to make sure Dad’s okay.”
David shakes his head. “You should come home, too. Your father will be okay with Jan here.” He nods back toward the hospital room. “The doctor said he’s going to release him tomorrow.”
“Maybe I can make Dad look at his condition more positively. He seems a little depressed. I mean, I would be, too, but maybe I could help him see that his attitude is going to affect his recovery time.” I stop, look down the hall and then back to David, hoping he’s smiling, but he isn’t.
“I wish Dad would have asked the doctor some questions.” I gesture to the room.
“Maybe he doesn’t want to know the answers.” David stands straighter, uncrosses his arms. “It’s got to be tough for him.”
At least this is something we both agree on.
David and I are at our neighbor Elizabeth’s house. She and her husband Brad invited us over for dinner. We came home from Las Cruces three days ago, the day my father was released from the hospital. I never managed to cheer up my father, and I’ve been worried about him since we left.
Yesterday Elizabeth called and I gladly accepted her invitation to dinner. I want to be with friends, laugh and not worry for a few hours. Elizabeth invited another couple, Jim and Deanne Smith. The six of us have spent many evenings together, like this one, enjoying drinks, eating dinner, talking about the neighborhood. Sometimes Deanne and I talk about our children. Elizabeth and Brad don’t have children, yet she seems happy to hear about my Jenny and Deanne’s two.
Right now, our husbands are standing at Brad’s bar, a throwback from his bachelor days. They are laughing about something. David is behind the bar, and I’m happy he is having a good time.
Deanne, Elizabeth and I are sitting on stools at the kitchen counter. Stuffed manicotti bakes in the oven and everyone is drinking Sapphire gin and tonics. If someone were to look through the kitchen window right now, they would see a perfect evening.
Elizabeth touches my hand and I turn toward her.
“I’m glad you and David came over.” She takes a sip of her drink and I watch the lime slice bob between the ice cubes.
“Yeah, it’s good we can all get together,” Deanne says.
I don’t feel as close to Deanne. At times, she’s distant, almost cold, the opposite of Elizabeth. I felt an instant connection with Elizabeth when we met eight years ago at one of David’s work-related dinners. Elizabeth is a hospice nurse and Brad has worked with David for years.
“I’m glad we’re here, too. After the last few days, I need some laughs.” I glance over at David again. He’s listening intently to Jim. He looks nice in his long-sleeved white shirt and khakis. I catch his eye, lift my glass and he does the same.
“How’s your father?” Deanne asks. She studies her left hand and picks at the cuticle of her ring finger.
Elizabeth takes my hand and squeezes it for a moment. “Yeah, how’s he doing?”
“Dad’s doing great,” I say, although this isn’t true.
Deanne looks up. “What did the doctors say?”
“That Dad needs to keep a positive attitude. The cancer came from his prostate. You know, he’s never been sick a day in his life. But he’ll be okay. He’s so strong.” I force myself to smile. I feel like I’m about to cry, but I don’t want to do that here.
How can I explain that the doctor never really gave us any real information except that we need to stay positive? And since David and I came home, my father won’t come to the phone when I call?
“That’s understandable,” Elizabeth says in her calm voice. “You know, if you wanted, you could bring him here, and I could help you take care of him.”
I study her. She’s so kind, thoughtful, but I can’t imagine my father coming here or me taking care of him. We don’t have a relationship like that. He’s so independent and we’ve never really spent a lot of time together. Besides, in a few months he’ll be better.
“I don’t think he’d come here. Plus he has to take six radiation treatments.”
“When he gets worse, it’ll be difficult to bring him here,” Elizabeth says.
When he gets worse! For a moment, the words make my chest hurt and my throat burn. I swallow, breathe in. I’ve heard a lot of stories about people beating cancer, and if anyone can do it, my dad will.
“I think he’s going to get better,” I say.
“Prostate cancer can be unpredictable when it’s in the bone. I’ve dealt with a lot of patients like your father,” Elizabeth says.
“And I’ve heard of lots of people surviving. My father’s a strong man.”
“Yes, some do.”
“Dad’s that kind of person. In a year they’ll probably write about him in the Journal of the American Medical Association.” My father used to run for miles, train for marathons and still work long hours.
The guys laugh, the three of us look over at them, and I’m grateful for the diversion.
“Listen to them,” Deanne says. “They’re sure having a good time. What do you suppose they’re talking about?”
“Let’s see, either sports or work, or both. Certainly not us,” Elizabeth says.
There won’t be any need for my father to come here. In a few months, he’ll be taking a trip with Jan, laughing, feeling relieved that he beat cancer.
“I’m sure my father’s going to get better.” The words fall from my lips before I can stop them.
The two women turn to me and Elizabeth’s eyes narrow a little.
“He’s always been so strong, a runner…anything he put his mind to he did.” I gesture toward where I think Las Cruces might be from Elizabeth’s kitchen.
Deanne nods. “I’m sure he will.”
“Everyone is different,” Elizabeth says.
“My goal is to cheer him up. I call him every day.” I leave out the fact that Jan has told me he won’t talk to anyone.
Over at the bar, David is looking at me. Did he hear what I just said? He lifts his gin and tonic. I raise my glass again then take a long sip. An ice cube touches my tongue, feels so cold.
I place the chilly glass back on the napkin, right in the middle and press the lifted corner with my fingertip.
“I don’t understand men. They just don’t want to be sick or inconvenienced,” Deanne says. “When I told Jim about your father, he asked me if we could talk about something else. They certainly don’t want to think about illness. When I was in labor with Ellie, he couldn’t stand it.”
I imagine my father lying in his bed. I push the image out of my mind. Elizabeth’s kitchen clock says six-thirty. I wonder what Jan and Dad are doing right now? Maybe they’re watching TV, sitting on the couch, laughing.
“…and then, when I came home from the hospital, Jim didn’t even want to hear about my sore nipples.”
Elizabeth laughs. I laugh, too, pretend I was listening.
“Well, I wouldn’t want to hear about them, either.” Elizabeth gets off the bar stool, goes to the oven and opens the door.
I sniff. The gin has kicked in and I feel more relaxed, the alcohol buffing some of my edginess. The manicotti smells delicious, rich, comforting, and for the first time in days I’m actually hungry.
I am standing in the breakfast nook of our brick home, looking out at the front yard. The morning is flooded with pink sunrise and the bare tree branches make an interesting pattern against the opal-like sky. The purple pansies David planted weeks ago ring the ground around the tree trunk. The bright flowers are doing fine, even though it’s been cold. Beneath the pansies, deep in the earth, are the rough daffodil bulbs I planted months ago.
This morning, right before David left, he announced he’d be home late. I stood in the garage, next to the door to the house and smiled, told him not to worry, I have plenty to do. Then I explained that I was going to clean house, straighten some drawers, rearrange the hall closet and then maybe go to the library and help out. He waved like he always does and climbed into his Avalon.
I sit at the breakfast table, take a sip of my coffee. I love our home in the mornings. Watching the sunrise from our breakfast nook always gives me an awesome feeling. At times, when I’m really busy, I forget about nature’s beauty until I sit here and watch the world turn pink and gold.
My favorite coffee mug is warming my hands. Jenny gave it to me for Easter eleven years ago, when she was nine. She was such a cute and serious little girl. That year, she made David drive her to the drugstore, and she came back with this oversize white mug filled with blue jellybeans. On the outside of the mug is a picture of a cartoon rabbit catching jellybeans in an upside-down umbrella. The rabbit is drawn in thin circles and there’s a tiny raised blue jellybean for his nose. That beautiful afternoon, she and I sat at this table in our old house and ate all the candy.
After, we laughed, and I could see that her mouth had turned blue. I told her about it, and we both got up and looked in the mirror. Mine was blue, too. Now she’s a serious college student at the University of Texas, majoring in pharmacy. I miss the bubbling of a child in the house, going to PTA meetings, listening to gossip about her friends.
I turn a little and the neat stack of papers I brought home from the hospital—information about cancer and treatments—catches my eye. I should read all of it, learn about my father’s disease, but there is something deep inside me that doesn’t want to know any more than I already do.
More sunshine breaks through—yellow-white—eating up the opal-like sky. I get up, take my mug into the kitchen, stand at the sink and pour out my coffee. I need to keep busy, vacuum, dust, scrub bathrooms. The last year I taught junior high I began feeling restless. I told David and he suggested I quit because financially we were doing fine. But I didn’t want to break my teaching contract, so I trudged through each day, telling myself the school year would end soon.
I quit June first, the same day the kids climbed on the buses for the last time. The moment I walked out of the principal’s office, I felt better. I’m not sure I want to go back to teaching, but I don’t know what else I could do. And for the past seven months I’ve enjoyed staying home, cleaning out closets, keeping the house in perfect order.
David says it’s fine, that I’ve worked for years and I should take a break or retire early, but in a lot of ways I miss working—the friendships, the creativity of teaching.
The phone rings and the sound startles me a little. It’s probably David, letting me know what time he’ll be home for dinner. I pick it up and hear Jan’s whisper.
“I can’t understand you,” I say. “What’s the matter?” I’m in the breakfast nook again, looking out the window, my heart pounding.
She says more breathy words I can’t decipher.
“Is Dad okay? Jan, you have to speak up.”
“The garage door is broken and the water heater went out last night,” she says in her normal voice—the cartoon cat one.
I take a breath, relax a little. Dad’s household problems can be fixed. “Did you call a repairman?”
“Stanley is so depressed. He won’t eat, won’t get out of bed. I don’t know what to do.”
“Why won’t he eat?” I’ve never known my father not to eat, not take care of himself.
“I don’t know. And he said he’s not going to do any more radiation treatments.”
My heart races more. He’s had half the treatments, Jan driving him to the radiation clinic a few miles from his condo.
“Let me talk to him.” But I know he won’t come to the phone. I’ve called twice a day since we came home and have only spoken with Jan.
“He’s so depressed, he doesn’t want to talk to anyone.”
“What can I do?” I begin to feel a little sick to my stomach.
“Come here. He seemed okay when you were here.”
I was hoping my father and Jan would get into a routine, Dad going to his radiation treatments, Jan taking care of him. At night when the house is quiet, I imagine Dad getting better, and later, talking about how awful this time was. Yet, deep down, I knew when I left Las Cruces, it wasn’t going to play out that way.
“He wants me there?”
“Yes, he wasn’t so depressed when you were here.”
“Okay, I’ll talk to David and call you back,” I say then hang up. Although my father is ill, I’m happy he wants my company, that I can help him in some way.
I look out to the yard and wish things were the way they were the day I planted the daffodils. My life was so calm, so perfect that early October afternoon.
CHAPTER THREE
D avid and I are standing in the garage by his workbench. After I hung up with Jan, I called him and explained that I need to go back to New Mexico. He didn’t say much except we’d talk when he got home.
I cleaned house all morning to keep busy then packed and repacked my suitcase. I kept changing my mind on what I should take, folding different jeans, T-shirts and sweaters then hanging them back up. After I finally got packed, I spent three hours in the kitchen, making dinner—Paprika Chicken, David’s favorite and chicken stew. When I heard the garage door open, I rushed through the house to meet him.
The garage door is still open and a crisp winter wind blows brown leaves under our cars.
“Why do you have to go back there so soon?” he asks.
“I told you, Dad’s condo has some problems, and Jan said he’s depressed. Maybe I can cheer him up.” I stop, realize I’m breathless. “She said he feels better when I am there.”
David rubs his left eye with the back of his hand. He looks tired, and I feel awful for not even letting him come into the house before I started telling him about this.
“I’d be depressed, too, if I had an ex-wife taking care of me. Hasn’t that woman ever heard of a repairman? If she can’t handle the house, how is she going to help your father?”
“I had a feeling Jan taking care of Dad wasn’t going to be that easy. She says he won’t eat, doesn’t want any more radiation treatments. Maybe they need some moral support.” I shrug. “What else can I do?”
“She couldn’t leave you alone for a few more days? We just got back. I don’t think it’s a good idea to run there every time she calls. What did Stan say?”
“He won’t come to the phone.” I hug myself. “You’d do the same for your mother.” This isn’t true. David would send money, call—but he wouldn’t worry like I have. Most men are different that way, and maybe they’re better off.
“No, my sister would do it. And what about your sister?”
I laugh, shake my head at his question. David knows how my sister Lena is. She won’t fly, won’t take car trips. She’s a barrel of anxieties, lives on disability and borrows money from Dad. She still tries to get money from me, and I used to lend it to her until I realized she was never going to pay us back.
“You know how my sister is.”
“Yeah.”
