“You should eat something. At least have coffee,” I said.
My father eyed the freshly brewed pot. “One mug, then. Thank you. To go.”
I prided myself that my life was not my mother’s life. But here I was, in my mother’s kitchen, pouring my father’s coffee into a travel mug.
I handed it to him. “How is Mom?”
My father hesitated, as if words were coins and each one cost him. Maybe they did. Maybe my mother’s long illness had beggared him. “She has an infection of the bone—osteomyelitis—which has weakened her back. Quite curable. But she’s having an operation on Friday to strengthen the affected discs and alleviate the pressure on her spine.”
“I know. Meg told me.” No need to mention she’d spilled the beans before I left New York. “How long will she be in the hospital?”
“At least overnight. Then she goes back into rehab for two or three more weeks.”
“So long?”
“She needs to continue on IV antibiotics for six weeks. She could go to a clinic as an outpatient, but it takes several hours to administer all her medication, and travel is difficult for her now. It’s easier to do it there.”
“But how is she?”
“The doctors say the procedure will make a great difference.”
I waited expectantly. But apparently that was all he had to say. All my mother wanted him to say?
My father patted my hand. “‘Do not let your heart be troubled.’ Your mother doesn’t want a lot of fuss. We must have faith.”
I appreciated his reassurance. But I wasn’t one of his ex-parishioners or vets. I was his daughter. I wanted more. Also, I was supposed to be supporting him. I plunged ahead. “And how are you?”
“As you see.” He sipped. Grimaced slightly. “Shall we go?”
* * *
When I was younger, my father spoke from the pulpit with the voice of God. Or how I imagined God sounded, anyway—sort of kindly and remote and just above my level of comprehension. The new pastor sounded like a camp counselor. I half expected him to hand out participation trophies to the congregation simply for showing up to church that morning.
The service over, the people flowed from the pews and out of the church, dividing between their new pastor in the vestibule and my father on the steps outside. Aunt Phee sailed through the crowd, bearing down on us like a luxury liner in a red jacket and pearls, Miss Wanda in her wake.
Crap. I’d forgotten to tell my father she’d dropped by the house last night.
“Um. Dad . . .”
“Ashton.” Aunt Phee stopped directly in front of him. “I’ve made a reservation at the club for dinner. Five o’clock. If that’s convenient.” Her tone made it clear she expected him, convenient or not.
My lanky father stooped to kiss her cheek. “Thank you, Phee.”
“You may pick me up at the house. You might come early so we can have a proper visit.”
“We’ll see,” my father said. “I have open hours at the veterans’ center this afternoon.”
“But it’s Sunday,” I said.
“The Lord’s work is never done,” Wanda Crocker said piously.
“Even the Lord rested on Sunday,” I muttered.
“You may join us,” Aunt Phee said to me. A command? Or a question? Her gaze swept from my sweater to my boots. “You’ll want to change first.”
Bite me, I thought. “Thanks, Aunt Phee, but I thought I’d go to the rehab center today. I want to spend some time with Mom.”
“Your mother is in no shape to entertain visitors,” Aunt Phee said.
“Jo isn’t a visitor,” my father said. “She’s Abby’s daughter.”
I threw him a grateful look.
“Suit yourself.” Aunt Phee’s mouth puckered. “You always have.”
Now that I’d dodged her dinner invitation, guilt crept in. “Maybe another time,” I offered.
She sniffed.
“Thanks for the rescue,” I said to Dad when she was out of earshot.
He did not return my smile. “Phee has been very generous to us. To you,” he said. “You might try to have more sympathy for her.”
“I do try,” I protested. “She’s always criticizing me.”
“Because she doesn’t want to see you repeating her mistakes.”
“You mean, staying in Bunyan all my life?” I asked flippantly.
“That’s unworthy of you both. You and Phee have a lot in common. You both care deeply about family. You have strong minds. Strong wills.” My father leveled a mild look at me. “And you both sometimes speak without considering the full impact of your words on the people you care about.”
My face flushed. I’d always joked that Aunt Phee had no heart. But maybe she hid her heart because she felt things deeply. Because she refused to appear vulnerable. Had my rejection of her dinner invitation, my rudeness over the years, actually hurt her?
But she kept inviting me. She kept showing up.
Another lesson there. Or being home, going to church, was messing with my head.
* * *
My mother’s eyes were closed, her face shrunken and naked. Her faded hair straggled flat across her forehead, squashed of vitality. Only her chest moved, up and down, her breathing slow and sonorous.
“Why is she breathing like that?” I asked the aide who had accompanied me to her room.
Keisha, her badge said. She stood by my mother’s bedside, taking her pulse. My mother’s wrist looked thin and light in her hand, like the bones of a bird.
When Granny died, all us girls went to the visitation. I remember our mother protesting that a funeral parlor was no place for little children, but in her grief over her mother’s death, she was overruled. Anyway, there was nobody to watch us. Everybody in town was there to see my grandmother laid out and pay their respects to the family.
Meg moved with twelve-year-old dignity through clusters of our neighbors, taking care to keep Amy away from the open casket at the front of the room. Not that our little sister could see over the sides of the coffin. Beth was hiding under the white-skirted table that held the guest book. But I marched right up and looked in, curious and unafraid. I loved my grandmother, who never cared if I got dirty and always smelled comfortingly like her kitchen. Besides, I’d never seen a dead person before.
She looked . . . wrong. Not like Granny at all. I recognized her Sunday dress, her gold earrings. But her face was a funny color, like an old peach crayon, and a rotten sweet smell hung over her like dying flowers.
I’d wanted to throw up.
I wasn’t going to throw up now. But my stomach churned with the same sense of wrongness. The shock. Where was my mother?
“It’s the drugs,” the aide said. “That fentanyl patch is helping with the pain, but it does make her drowsy.” Keisha leaned over my mother’s pillow. “Abby, you have a visitor, hon. Your daughter’s here to see you.”
“Oh, don’t wake her,” I protested.
“It’s all right,” Keisha said. “It’s time for her lunch tray.”
“Not hungry,” my mother mumbled. And then, “Meg?”
I swallowed hard. “It’s Jo, Momma.”
“I have to listen to your heart now, Abby,” Keisha said. “Then you and your daughter can have a nice visit.”
My mother nodded obediently, like a child. I stood back as Keisha moved the stethoscope over my mother’s thin chest.
“Still beating,” my mother joked when the aide was done.
Keisha smiled. “Yes, your heart is good and strong. Do you think you can sit up now?”
My mother pressed her lips together. Nodded. A grimace flickered across her face as the aide raised the head of her hospital bed. I winced in sympathy.
“Thank you.” My mother shifted, trying to get comfortable. “I think . . . A pill?”
&n
bsp; “It’s not time yet, hon. After lunch, when I come in with the IV, okay?” Keisha looked at me. “You see if you can get her to eat something.”
It felt rude—wrong—talking over my mother’s head, as if she wasn’t there. “I brought biscuits,” I said.
“Whatever tempts her appetite. Fruit would be good,” Keisha added. “Those pain meds stop her up something awful.”
I sat beside my mother’s bed. Took her hand. An empty IV port ran into her arm, the skin around it purple with bruising.
“Jo.” Her fingers squeezed my hand with none of my mother’s strength. “Love you, honey.”
“Love you, too, Momma.”
She used to pester me with questions. How was your day . . . your date . . . your doctor’s appointment? Are you finished with your homework . . . your college applications . . . your taxes yet? In high school and later, coming home from college, I’d tended to brush her concerns away, saving my stories for a more appreciative audience. Saving them for my father.
I’d originally planned to fly home on Christmas Eve. Changing my ticket so close to the holidays had pretty much emptied my checking account. But she never asked me what I was doing at her bedside. Maybe she didn’t have the breath or the energy. Maybe she’d lost track of time. Or maybe, in some bone-deep, heartfelt, drug-induced place, she simply accepted I was where I belonged. I didn’t need a messy breakup to justify my presence at her side. She was sick. I was her daughter. Where else should I be?
My phone buzzed. A text from Eric. Where the hell are you?
Right. I was scheduled to work today. Well, screw him. Aaron was covering my shifts for the next two weeks. He didn’t need me.
I was suddenly, fiercely glad I’d come home.
After lunch, another aide—not Keisha—came to take my mother to physical therapy. She couldn’t get out of bed.
“Abby, you have to try,” the aide said with barely veiled impatience.
She’d been trying, without success, for almost twenty minutes.
My mother closed her eyes. The small gesture—of defeat, of resignation—terrified me. My mother never gave up.
“Listen, she didn’t choose to feel like this,” I snapped. “She’s in pain.”
“I understand. But we have patients waiting who are willing to do the work.”
“My mother has worked her whole damn life. She’ll get out of bed after her surgery.”
“Jo, it’s all right,” my mother said. “Don’t fuss.”
But after the aide left, she cried, silent tears of frustration leaking from her closed eyes. It was a relief when she slept.
* * *
It rained all week, a thin, cold rain that darkened the shortened hours and drove the goats to seek shelter under the lean-to. The days until my mother’s surgery stretched gray and empty. I visited her every day, driving an hour each way past frozen fields and huddled houses, my windshield wipers beating against the gloom.
When I got home, I fed the goats and my father, but he was rarely around.
“The holidays are a difficult time,” he explained. “Particularly for people who are dealing with sickness or loneliness or separation.”
Tell me about it, I thought.
I’d always relished my own space. But the house felt haunted by the ghosts of Christmases Past. I missed my sisters: the smell of Meg’s nail polish, the plunk of Beth’s guitar, even Amy’s messes scattered everywhere. Meg loved me. But she had John and the twins to care for. I couldn’t expect her to babysit me all the time.
There were worse things in life than being alone, I reminded myself. Anyway, it’s not like I didn’t have stuff to do. Laundry. Cleaning. I could haul out more Christmas decorations. Let Trey know I was back in town.
Or . . . I grabbed my hoodie and went out to the barn.
Shoveling straw was like cooking on the line—hard, dirty, sweaty work. After twenty minutes, I paused to pull off my hoodie. It felt good to use my muscles, to occupy my hands, to find my rhythm. To feel appreciated, even if it was only by the goats.
But as I lay in bed, listening to the creaks and pings of the old house at night, a message lit my phone screen. Eric.
Are you all right?
My throat cinched tight. Chefs were egotistical, temperamental jerks. But Eric . . . Despite his unforgiving standards in the kitchen, he had a basic decency, an innate kindness I admired. He looked out for his employees.
Or ex-employees. Ray must have told him by now I wasn’t coming back to work.
Fine. I chewed my lip, staring at the single, stingy word on the screen. Added, You?
He texted back instantly. I want to see you. Let me in.
He must be at my building, waiting at my door, expecting me to buzz him up. My heartbeat quickened. Was he looking for an apology? A retraction? A booty call?
No. You were right, I typed, hoping he’d contradict me. Me working for you was a mistake.
I didn’t say mistake, he corrected. A problem.
Big problem. He thought I was using him. Which . . . Okay, I had. He’d served up his big heart on a plate, and I’d taken his passion to feed my own. But I put myself out there, too, in my words, on my blog. When I wrote about him, I revealed a piece of my heart. And he didn’t see. Or maybe he didn’t care. He’d belittled my blog. And that made me feel small.
I couldn’t forgive that.
I poked at my phone. Well, I solved it for you, didn’t I? I quit.
No reply.
Worry niggled inside me. To my neighbors, Eric might not look like an award-winning chef on a booty call. What if they saw him as a large black man hanging around the building entrance? Ringing Doorbells While Black. What if they called the cops?
Three dots appeared. Eric, typing. I drew my breath in relief. We need to talk, he said.
I scowled at my phone, resenting the echo of my own advice to Meg. Talk? Maybe when I was cooler. Maybe when I was calmer. Maybe when I’d figured out what to say.
I think we said enough already, I answered. Anyway, I’m not . . . My fingers hesitated. Not home, I thought. New York wasn’t home anymore. Not there, I added.
Where are you?
The question yawned like a chasm, threatening to swallow me up. I teetered on the edge of answering. I’d left Bunyan because I didn’t want to be an accessory in Trey’s life. A possession. A decoration. I thought I’d found a place in Eric’s world. But I didn’t shine there. It was all reflected light. I was a satellite, the moon to his sun. I could lose myself in him, in his life, so easily. More easily, because I loved him.
My fingers hovered. Eric, I . . .
Oh God. Oh God, I didn’t want this, this terrible yearning. He couldn’t simply show up at my apartment and expect me to give up. To give in. The temptation to do both sucked at me like a tide. I was terrified that I could lose myself in him, that I would become less right when my family depended on me to be more. I couldn’t deal with this now. I needed to focus on Mom.
But at least I could save Eric from an altercation with the police.
I mashed DELETE. Typed, Go away.
Turning my phone facedown beside my bed, I buried my head in my pillow.
But when I finally fell asleep, it wasn’t my mother’s face I saw.
* * *
The buzz of my phone jarred me out of sleep. Eric, I thought dreamily. I reached out in the thin gray light of morning, my fingers fumbling across the nightstand. “’Lo?” I croaked.
“Jo?”
Beth. She had always turned to me for confidence. For reassurance. I spoke up for her at the dinner table, stuck up for her at school. But before this week, I’d never realized how much I counted on her quiet presence at home. Even after she went away to college, she was always in the background of my visits to Bunyan, like the teddy bear on her bed, a comforting talisman of our childhood.
“Hey, sweetie.” I struggled to sit, pulling up the covers against the attic chill. “How are you?”
“I talked to Meg. She said Momma’s having surgery on Friday.”
“Um.” I fought to wake up. “Friday. Right.”
“I want to be there.” Beth’s voice was thin and determined.
Yes.
No.
“Hang on, I have to pee, okay?” I threw back the quilt, using the pause to collect myself.
Our father was right. I needed to learn to think before I spoke. The right word—or the wrong one—would bring Beth flying home. But this once, I couldn’t be selfish. Couldn’t think about what I wanted. Now that Beth had finally left the nest, I couldn’t be the one to clip her wings.
I splashed water in the sink. “Beth. Sweetie. You know I’d love to see you. But it’s not necessary, really. Mom’s going straight from the hospital right back into rehab. She has all kinds of people taking care of her. There’s no reason for you to come home.”
“What if something happens?”
My stomach hollowed. “Nothing’s going to happen,” I said firmly. “Mom’s going to be fine.”
“I still want to be there for her operation.”
I looked around for a towel. “But what about your show?”
“I’ll quit.”
“You can’t quit.” I dried my hands on my shirt.
“You did.”
I opened my mouth. Shut it. “That’s different,” I said. “I’m doing what Daddy told me to do.” Every time he went to war. “Take care of Momma and your sisters for me . . .”
“Sorry,” Beth said humbly. “I didn’t mean . . .”
I cleared my throat. “No. No, it’s okay.”
Crap. I’d always presented my best self to Beth, fearless and reassuring. To protect her, I told myself. Or to protect my pride. Like a hedgehog, showing off its spines. But that wasn’t what she needed from me now. If I wanted her to stay in Branson, I had to tell the truth.
Meg and Jo Page 27