The Widower's Tale

by Julia Glass

  The night after the mammograms, I called Sarah when I knew Rico would be in bed. She sounded tired and said she needed to get a good night’s sleep.

  “But how did it go?” I asked.

  “They put my tits in a waffle iron. That was fun.”

  “And? You’re fine?” I tried to ignore her crude language.

  “Well, my tits have recovered.”

  I waited. “Don’t they give you the results right then?” I said after a moment. I did not tell her that I had grilled Trudy about the protocol.

  “Apparently, not always. I have to go in for … more.”

  “More waffle iron?”

  Again, she held back.

  “Sarah?”

  “Oh,” she said impatiently, “I have to have a biopsy. They did an ultrasound, too. It’s all about malpractice, these endless tests. Ridiculous.”

  “You’re going to have it, though—the biopsy?”

  “Since you’d bug me about it till the end of time, Percy, I don’t think I have a choice—but do you have any idea what I have to pay to get it? There goes at least half of what I’m making on this window.”

  “I’ll pay for it, Sarah.”

  This particular silence was different from the ones that had come before.

  “Percy, I always pay my way. I’m no charity case. In fact, I’m sorry I told you Rico’s on scholarship. I’ve lived hand to mouth, and I’m past that stage. I don’t need a rich boyfriend to come to my rescue. Okay?”

  “I’m sorry, Sarah. I honestly didn’t—”

  “I know,” she said hastily. “Just drop it, the money stuff. Please.”

  “Fine. But I’m going with you this time. To the biopsy.” I waited for her to protest, but she sighed.

  “Well, Percy, you’re in luck. Somebody does have to go with me. They won’t let me leave ‘unaccompanied.’ The mom I know best at school is taking care of Rico’s pickup. So congratulations! You get to be my cancer clinic chaperone. You win the prize.” A quick laugh took the bitter edge off her speech. “Percy, I’m exhausted. Can you just say good night? I’m doing that now. Good night.”

  “Sweet dreams,” I said, as I used to say to my daughters.

  “Same to you,” she said.

  I was hurt, of course, that she hadn’t wanted me, above anyone else, to act as her chauffeur. What did this mean?

  Of the countless medical terms and procedures that I needed Trudy to explain or define to me over the ensuing months, I never bothered to ask about the nature of a frozen section, which conveyed to us the first bad news. To our surprise, the news was delivered swiftly, even matter-of-factly, half an hour after Sarah emerged from the biopsy, woozy from a tranquilizer, leaning protectively to her left, guarding the bandaged breast.

  She drifted in and out of a hazy sleep as I sat beside her in the waiting room (fraternal twin to the waiting room in Trudy’s suite; the couches olive rather than saffron, the paintings of trees rather than birds). We were summoned by a nurse in one of those Carmen Miranda smocks, who showed us to the surgeon’s office. Dr. Wang was an acutely slim Oriental woman who appeared to be a disconcerting decade younger than Trudy. Her hair was arranged in a glossy chignon, its elegance on full display because she was bent over a pad of paper, writing diligently, as we entered.

  When I introduced myself, her smile was formal. “Trudy’s dad. An honor and a pleasure.” She rose only partway from her chair to shake my hand. She told us to sit.

  “Sarah,” she said, “I’m afraid the tumor is malignant. We’ll do more tests, and they’ll take a couple of days, but that hard news, I can almost guarantee, won’t change. I’m sorry.”

  I reached for Sarah’s right hand, but it was clasped tightly in her left, in the folds of the big, loose shirt she’d been instructed to wear. She did not look away from the doctor. She did not make a sound.

  “But,” said Dr. Wang, “you are fortunate to have been diagnosed at a time when we’ve made enormous strides in treatment. The complicated part, but it’s the good part, too, is that we regard breast cancer as a wide range of distinct diseases, each with a treatment more tailored to that disease than we could offer just a few years ago. So there’s a lot to learn about the different factors involved here, but we’ll be able to address each one precisely. If you want, I can give you some literature to look at now. Some people like to learn everything they can as soon as they can.” She seemed to be asking Sarah if she was one of these people. Still, Sarah said nothing.

  “The first thing you need to do is go home and rest. Lily will give you a scrip for a painkiller on your way out, though it shouldn’t be too bad. The incision was fairly shallow, and I have good reason to believe the margins were clean. I’ll talk to you in a couple of days when we know more, and we’ll discuss how to proceed.”

  “Proceed?” Sarah spoke sharply, but her voice was hushed.

  “With whatever our next step may be. Probably surgery first, but again, let’s wait and see what the path report tells us.”

  “But I can’t.”

  “This is a lot to take in, I know.” Briefly, pointedly, Dr. Wang caught my eye. Then she said to Sarah, “Are you all right?”

  “No. Of course I’m not.”

  I laid a hand on Sarah’s arm. Dr. Wang smiled sadly. “It’s good to be truthful. You’re upset, as anyone would be.” Again, she looked at me before turning back to Sarah. “Do you have questions now, or do you want to save them till later?”

  “Later,” Sarah said. “Definitely later.”

  Dr. Wang rose. She was stunningly short as well as slim. She came around her desk and put a hand on Sarah’s shoulder. Sarah flinched.

  “So you’ll call her as soon as you know more,” I said.

  “Absolutely,” said Dr. Wang. “And both of you should feel free to call me or Lily. I do e-mail, too.” She handed me a card. Like my daughter’s name on her card, Dr. Wang’s was followed by a fleet of esoteric abbreviations.

  I thanked her. We went to the reception desk, received the promised prescription, and then I was guiding Sarah (or following her) back through the warren of corridors and arteries and bridges that would take us to the hospital’s subterranean garage.

  In the car, I fumbled about for the parking ticket. Sarah hadn’t spoken a single word since our audience with the diminutive Dr. Wang.

  I opened the glove compartment. “Of all the times to—”

  Sarah reached into a small well between the seats and pulled the ticket from a nest of receipts and paper napkins. She handed it to me without comment. She looked calm, dry-eyed. I wondered if she could literally be in shock.

  I asked if she was hungry. Did she want coffee or tea? A doughnut? A bagel? An early dinner? She stared out the windshield, toward the numbered concrete pillar bearing the sign KNOW YOUR LEVEL.

  I had no earthly notion of my level at that moment. There was no ground beneath my feet, no sky above my head.

  “Just take me home,” she said.

  By the time we hit Storrow Drive, the silence felt like an acidic hum. Yet what could I say? What wouldn’t sound like I told you so? What proclamations of devotion would console? I wished, most of all, that Sarah would cry. It occurred to me that I hadn’t seen this woman cry. Not once. Of course, I’d known her now for a scant three months.

  When I pulled up in front of her building, she said only “Thank you.”

  “Take your hand off that door,” I said. “Speak to me.”

  “Can we talk later, Percy? I’m dead tired.”

  “All right. I needn’t ask to know that you want to go up alone. But humor me a little. Let me take you to your next appointment. Just start there. Or let me take Rico, pick him up from school, and show him my centerfold collection. Teach him to smoke. Play poker. How about it?”

  I did earn a smile, but it was like a gratuity, impersonal and brief. “Percy, you’re amazing. I can’t make you mad, can I?”

  “You can, and you have. But not today.”

 
“There’s too much to think about before I can make any plans.”

  “Let me think about it with you. Let me cook for you while you think by yourself.” I sounded desperate. God, I sounded old. Let her go, you coot, I admonished my feeble self.

  “Percy, there’s a part of me that feels like you got me into this shit,” she said. “Not fair, I know. But I have to get past that. I need a break.”

  “From me.”

  “From your pushing me so hard. Looking at me from too close up.”

  “Which led to your getting cancer.”

  She opened the car door. “This is why we can’t talk now.”

  “I’ll call you tonight,” I said. “After Rico’s asleep.”

  “Not tonight. I have to crash.”

  “Tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow I’ll be in town. I have to make adjustments to the window, the way it fits. I’m not going to blow that connection.” She kissed me quickly before getting out. “I’ll call you as soon as I can.”

  I started to get out, to walk her to the door.

  “No,” she said. “Go home, Percy. You need rest, too.”

  Because I’m such a codger, I thought, and codgers need their naps!

  I had to wonder if her sudden collision with the notion of mortality made me appear even older; if it put me in the clubhouse of those most definitely closer to death than to birth.

  Winter, with its ever-looming darkness, draws out anxiety and suspicion, rather in the way that salt draws out water. It will do so regardless of extenuating circumstances, such as the refusal by one’s sweetheart to return calls for four solid days in the wake of a cancer diagnosis or the oddly ornery, jumpy behavior of one’s grandson when asked, in the most harmless fashion, what he’d like to do with his Christmas vacation.

  To distract myself from Sarah’s retreat (I would give her till the weekend before arming my catapult), I volunteered to take Robert out for dinner that Wednesday night. I took him to Gabriella’s Garden, a restaurant tucked into a clapboard house on one of the last unravaged lanes of Harvard Square.

  The bread was exceptionally good at Gabriella’s; alas, so was the butter I spread thickly on my second slice. “Now that you’re a bachelor again,” I said to Robert, “you’re free to gad about as you please once classes let out for the year.”

  “Well yeah,” he said, “except for studying. Exams are in January, Granddad.”

  “You can take a week off,” I said. “A few days, for heaven’s sake. Maybe you’d like to spend New Year’s in Chicago, with your pal Turo.”

  Robert did not look happy at this suggestion.

  “That’s where his mother lives, do I remember correctly?”

  “Used to, Granddad. Like, eons ago.”

  “Ah. That’s right. His home is in the Philippines, yes?”

  “His mother’s. He doesn’t really have a home. His home, right now, is our apartment.” Robert tore small strips from the napkin that belonged in his lap.

  “How about the two of you take off somewhere together? New York. Or you could go skiing in Vermont.”

  “Turo’s going to hang here, and so am I,” said Robert, sounding testy.

  Our house salads arrived. I liked this place because you could order “house” this and “house” that, perhaps with an inquiry as to what the chef considered the best dish that day, and put together a fine meal without ever consulting a menu.

  “ ‘Hanging’ sounds a bit dull—or fatal, depending on your definition. Can’t a grandfather offer to fund a modest vacation?”

  “Granddad, that’s generous, totally, and maybe in the spring? Like, I wouldn’t mind heading to New York then. Maybe stay with Uncle Todd.”

  This suggestion alarmed me at first, but I suppose it wasn’t out of line. Since when had Todd become the bad guy?

  “See your cousins—excellent idea,” I said. “But in the meantime, you could come out and stay at the house after Christmas. Come do your studying, your ‘hanging,’ on my utility bills.”

  “Could work,” said Robert, but absentmindedly. He gazed out the nearby window, at the dark, hibernating garden. He chewed his lettuce methodically.

  “Bring a bunch of your pals,” I said, attempting to regain his attention.

  Robert looked at me. “Are you okay, Granddad?”

  “I am perfectly ‘okay,’ young man.”

  “Everything okay with Sarah? Who’s totally cool, by the way.” He smiled sincerely for the first time since we’d met at the maître d’s station.

  “I’m glad you like her,” I said. “That is not unimportant to me.” Of course I wasn’t “okay.” Of course everything wasn’t “okay” with Sarah. And of course my grandson knew me well enough to see that I was off my game. As he seemed somehow off his.

  “So, Granddad, even though I’m not taking you up on that way-cool vacation offer—which is really awesome of you, and I might regret that I’m turning it down—I was wondering if maybe, something else …”

  The waitress took our salad plates and put down our entrees, then offered us pepper (as if we weren’t old enough to apply it on our own).

  “What are you wondering?” I asked once we’d been served and peppered.

  “Okay, like, I should probably ask Mom, but I so don’t want a lecture. I’m wondering if I could borrow some money for rent.”

  “Ah. You’ve been living it up on burgers and illicit beers?”

  “Actually, it’s not me. It’s just that Turo’s mom screwed up on his latest money transfer. Or the bank screwed up. We’re okay for December, because I covered him there, but just in case he’s not square by next month …”

  “What are grandfathers for?” I said, slicing into a fat, succulent ravioli. What a relief: a problem I could solve.

  “Thanks, Granddad. I promise to pay you back. With interest.”

  I waved my hand. “Don’t be absurd. We’ll tend to that now.” I took a check from my wallet and filled in a sum that struck me as a bit excessive—but I’d been hearing for years that rents in Cambridge had gone sky-high.

  During the remainder of our meal—including the gelati du jour, a heavenly pairing of mango and butter pecan—Robert told me about his next round of courses. I was pleased to hear that he would be taking a literature course. “Latin American magic realism” would not have been my first choice (and perhaps revealed a bit of undue influence from his roommate), but how I looked forward to catching a glimpse of my grandson with his nose in a book that was not filled with graphs, molecular diagrams, or chemical formulas. Over my decades at Widener, whenever I strolled through a reading room of brilliant children engaged in the mastery of science, I might wonder how many of them were destined to become engineers of weaponry or even widespread destruction via computer. When I saw them deep in a volume of Fielding or Cheever, I felt a naïve surge of comfort, as if this were proof that the world, whatever its troubles, was still protected by the human heart.

  On Thursday, the Grange arrived late, due to the relentlessly nasty weather. I was grumpy, because I could not risk running when the roads were nothing but slick, wet ice. The milk intended for my cereal had gone sour. And I had just hung up from my latest attempt to reach Sarah.

  I took the paper in, microwaved my last cup of coffee, and opened to the Opinions page. My eye traveled immediately to the Fence Sitter’s column.

  “Move Ye on Over, Goodwife Martha!” was the title of her offering that day.

  A resounding “Thank ye” goes out here to our very own crack historienne, Laurel Connaughton, for bringing off the first-ever Historic Matlock House Tour last weekend, competing bravely with a bout of weather to rouse old Noah from his nautically appointed coffin. Kudos, Laurel! Her efforts have netted an as-yet-to-be-disclosed sum (reportedly in the low but respectable five-figure range) designated as seed money for a school program to be titled “Who Says History Is a Thing of the Past?” Cumbersome, maybe, but we get the idea, Laurel, and like it we do—those of us who care about the h
eritage of our fine, well-aged town. Let a rowdy round of Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah!, complete with seven-musket salute, ring forth in thy name this coming Fourth. (Captain Jim Cusak of the Regulars, are ye reading this?) Now, let me take a moment on my humble colonial soapbox to single out as well our longtime citizen Percival Darling, one of the generous folks who opened their wainscoted parlors to history mavens, architectural voyeurs, and those who just wanted some inspiration on primo bathroom fixtures and wall coverings (that would be you, Jessalyn Paine!). But how I do digress! Percival Darling (may we call you Percy after lo these many decades?) is someone I neglected to felicitate earlier this year when he saved the proverbial day for Elves & Fairies by opening the doors to his old barn … once the haven of his talented ballerina of a wife, Penelope (may she rest in peace, especially knowing that the smallest dancers are romping in her graceful footsteps). Some of you newbies might not know that Percival’s daughter Trudy Barnes, the renowned oncologist at St. Matt’s, grew up in that magnificently quirky old house into which you set foot last Sunday. Percy, a heartfelt thanks for returning to the fold after so many years during which we hardly knew ye. Welcome back, comrade!

  And now, segue to the succotash chowder recipe I’ve been promising the chefs amongst my readers.…

  There are those who wouldn’t give a freight train’s hoot to see themselves trotted out in the Cheez Whiz prose of a local bigmouth like Mandy Pinkerton. (Felicitate my derriere.) And God knows, some poor souls probably relish such attention. Not (as you can guess) I.

  I threw down the paper and cursed, on the one hand, my generosity and, on the other, my gullibility. Together, they had landed me in a capacious cauldron of hot water (or lukewarm succotash chowder; imagine!). I knew precisely what lay in store for me after a star turn in the town gossip column. It meant an even greater loss of privacy and rounds of giggles for the next few weeks in every commercial establishment from Wally’s Grocery Stop to the wine store in Ledgely. This, at this moment, I did not need.