by Rachel Cohn
“I’m so glad we,” Lily said.
“Yeah, I’m so glad we as well.”
“I think it’s time for a Salty Pimp, don’t you?” Lily suggested.
I nodded enthusiastically, and we headed over to Big Gay Ice Cream for a Salty Pimp (vanilla ice cream, dulce de leche, sea salt, chocolate dip) and an American Globs (vanilla ice cream, pretzels, sea salt, chocolate dip). Then we headed over to Mercer Street to get some coffee at Think, where we were helped by a stupendous pink-haired barista who didn’t flinch when I ordered an iced vanilla soy latte at the end of December. There was just enough time to stop off on Eighth Street to get Langston and Benny a Beyoncé-shaped lamp as a Christmas/housewarming gift.
(“Why a lamp?” I asked Lily.
“New Jersey doesn’t get as much light,” she replied, still a little bitter, but not so bitter that she opted for a Mariah Carey lamp instead.)
By the time we were done shopping, my eye was starting to ache, and Lily was due to walk some dogs. We split up—but only temporarily. I went off to my apartment and rested, and then at night Lily came over with pizza and some holiday movies to watch. She was shocked that I’d never seen Love Actually, and I was shocked that it wasn’t that bad, actually. And we may not have agreed upon whether The Nightmare Before Christmas was a Christmas movie or a Halloween movie, but we enjoyed it nonetheless.
At the end of the movie, we lay there for a few minutes, letting the TV screen fall silent and blue after the end credits.
“I like it like this,” I said. “When we can just be ourselves. Give or take an eye patch.”
Lily kissed my lips, kissed my eye patch, kissed the eyelid she could reach.
“I’ve got to go wrap some presents,” she said. Then she reached into her bag and pulled out the red Moleskine.
“Instructions for tomorrow,” she informed me.
I promised her I wouldn’t open it until morning.
The minute she left the apartment, I missed having her there. But as with all loves, I supposed, the consolation was in the fact that she’d be back.
Wednesday, December 24th
I didn’t mean to leave my boyfriend stranded at the Strand on the most frantic shopping day of the year. I hadn’t intended to strand him at each stop I’d planned for this day on this year’s Moleskine adventure tour.
The night of The Great Glitterskating Massacre, after all the commotion, I was late tending to the walking needs of my roster of dogs with owners away for the holidays. I hadn’t followed Dash to the emergency room because I knew he was in the safe (and bloodied—SO SORRY!) hands of many kind, wounded librarians. If those people could handle books so well, I knew they could handle Dash, despite my worry about not accompanying him to the hospital.
“Go,” Dash said when I insisted I could tend to my dogs later, after he was stitched up and made better. “I’ll be relieved not to worry about you worrying about your dogs who need to be relieved.”
I didn’t finish my dog-walking duties until late that night, and I was exhausted by the time I got home. I couldn’t fall asleep until I came up with a plan to right the situation. Feeling guilty—and cheated of my original grand plan to celebrate Dash—I stayed awake creating a makeup-fun-day plan for Christmas Eve. I organized the day and wrote the instructions in the red Moleskine notebook.
Instead of further drowning in apologies for causing Dash’s dear face to be maimed, I thought we could celebrate it. I was going to give him the best pirate day of his life. I was wrong.
Sorry.
10:00 a.m.
Yo ho ho
To Park Slope we go
We’ll meet at the Superhero store
We’ll scuttle a man-o’-war
Our first stop would be the Superhero Supply Co. store, with its secret back door leading to a room where the perils of after-school writing tutoring happened. As much as I loved my phone’s new lock-screen photo of Dash as Santa, I couldn’t wait to change it to Dash as full pirate, with legit-earned pirate patch over his eye, a tricorne hat, a swashbuckler’s white frilly shirt, and the sea captain’s galleon coat we could buy in the Superhero store. While we were there, we could inquire about putting in volunteer applications for literary goodness in the secret back room, which would be a much better celebration flourish than a glitter massacre. And good experience for my potential future librarian man.
The Moleskine directed Dash to meet me at the Superhero store at 11:30 a.m. on Christmas Eve day. Before I left for our adventure, I had to tend to Boris. My dog and I had spent the previous night at Mrs. Basil E.’s to visit with Grandpa, and I was about to take Boris for a quick morning walk around, and not in, Gramercy Park. He could do his business and I could think about all the presents I was going to unwrap tomorrow, and all the kisses I’d steal from my pirate boyfriend today.
I had Boris on the leash and was about to step outside Mrs. Basil E.’s townhouse for our loop around the park when I heard the refrains of a group of carolers performing outside the gated entrance to Gramercy Park. In faux hip-hop style, these middle-aged white guys were singing and beatboxing to the tune of “The Little Drummer Boy.” A huge crowd was gathered around them, applauding and grooving to the beat. I recognized the performers, and prayed that Grandpa, still eating his breakfast in the back of the house, could not hear them.
Grandpa didn’t hate the song. He hated the group.
They’d been a plague to the East Village and Lower East Side last year. They called themselves the Canarsie Crèche Crew, and they were a barbershop quartet of convicted Wall Street con men who’d met in prison and, once released, moved to South Brooklyn to resume their lives as bad guys. Now, instead of swindling investors, they performed for tourists while their non-singing member stole the tourists’ wallets, iPhones, shopping bags, and other valuables.
I didn’t close the front door to Mrs. Basil E.’s house fast enough. “NO!” I heard Grandpa shout from behind me in the hallway. He barreled outside with all the speed an octogenarian with a cane and a heart condition could muster. From the top of the stoop, he shook his cane in the direction of the singers and shouted, “Scum! You’re scum! Police! Police!”
Grandpa’s sudden appearance on the stoop was too hurried, causing the concerned Boris to bolt toward the street, his leash still attached to my hand, pulling me down the stairs with him. “Lily!” Grandpa cried out as I fell to the ground. I was totally fine, maybe I’d have a minor bruise or two, but Grandpa tried to reach down the steps to help me up.
He fell. Hard.
Mrs. Basil E. called 911. I called Dash.
11:30 a.m.
My call to Dash had gone straight to voice mail. He’d been stranded in Brooklyn on the F train (also known to locals as the “Fudge Me!” train, except not the word “fudge,” because of its perpetual lateness). When he finally got aboveground again and texted me, I told him to meet me at the Moleskine’s next destination so I could stay with Grandpa till he was discharged from the hospital.
I was too scared to deal with reality. I refused to see it.
After Grandpa was seen by the ER doctor, I sent an update to Dash. Grandpa just needs to get bandaged. He’ll be fine. I’ll meet you at the next stop! I’m SO SORRY!
Dash the Pirate texted back, Aaargh! Can Santa feel his face? I mean, Grandpa?
I laughed. The smile’s release to my tense jaw felt so good.
Some bruises on his cheeks and a bump on his head, I typed back. But he’s already asking for lunch, so that means he’s fine. And certainly he’s feeling his stomach!
Dash replied, Take your time. I’m having a delightful morning scaring all the precocious children shoppers of Park Slope with my eye.
You’re showing them your eye patch?
No, I’m taking it off for them. Pause. And now I’ve been asked to leave the store. See you soon!
3:00 p.m.
On a Clipper City boat we’ll scavenge
In the Pirate’s Booty bar we’ll ravage
&
nbsp; The Manhattan isle we’ll go around
While I scream I LOVE YOU aloud
Ahoy, matey!
I totally lost track of time. And my cell signal was spotty. Why is cell service so bad in the places you need it most, like hospitals, the subway, the movies?
So many doctors came in and came out.
My parents arrived.
Great-Uncles Sal and Carmine arrived.
Benny and Langston and Cousin Mark arrived.
It was almost like a party in Grandpa’s hospital room. My relatives were actually wrapping the presents in their shopping bags to pass the time. Or to not lose more time, since Christmas was tomorrow.
Grandpa had a room now. The doctors wanted to keep him under observation for a few hours.
No one said why.
I’d clipped our tickets to the page with the Moleskine directions for pirate destination number two.
I forgot to meet Dash there.
It’s okay! Dash texted me. There’s nothing better for a wounded cornea than being wind-whipped across the Hudson River.
Sorry.
Don’t be. I just got offered a job slinging drinks in the Pirate’s Booty bar.
Because you’re wearing a pirate’s patch?
No. Because I’m the only sober person down here.
6:00 p.m.
Shiver me timbers!
Back to the Strand we’ll go
Aglow aglow aglow
We’ll find books about hornswogglers, landlubbers, and scallywags
Locked back in the basement we’ll contemplate a sh…
I didn’t make it there, either.
I typed: Sorry! Again!
Don’t be sorry. Being stranded at the Strand during last-minute shopping chaos is actually the most relaxing place in the world to me. You really do love me!
You’re interrogating people trying to sell their books back, aren’t you?
No, I’m slumped in a chair in the We’re Here, We’re Queer section, about to take a nap. SO HAPPY. So don’t apologize. How’s Grandpa?
The cardiologist delivered the news while Grandpa slept. “I recommend he move to an assisted-living facility.”
A polite way of saying Grandpa’s most dreaded words: nursing home.
Mrs. Basil E. said, “Nonsense. He can live with me. I can provide the care he needs.”
Dr. Jerkface asked, “Does your home have stairs?”
Mrs. Basil E. said, “It’s a five-story townhouse. Of course it does.”
Dr. Jerkface said, “He’s at great risk if he falls again. Are you prepared to install chairlifts? Old Manhattan brownstones don’t accommodate those well.”
“I can convert the street-level rooms for him.”
“Are you prepared to provide live-in nursing care? His anti-coagulant medication needs to be rigorously monitored. He can bruise easily, as you see on his face, and is at risk for mini-strokes. Stairs are the biggest danger to his condition. To say nothing of five levels of them.”
Mom’s face was grim but resigned. “We knew this day was coming. Do we face it now or stall again, only to be left with the same choice a few months or a year from now, and risk that his condition will have deteriorated more in the meantime?”
In my heart, I knew it was the best option for Grandpa. I just knew how much he’d hate it, how hard he’d resist it, and my heart squeezed in pain for him. The doctor’s recommendation was meant to extend and improve Grandpa’s quality of life. To Grandpa, it would be a death sentence.
I expected Mrs. Basil E. to argue with my mother, but instead she sighed and said, “You’re right.”
Great-Uncle Carmine asked, “Should we cancel this year’s Christmas-night party?” A family tradition going on fifty years. Sacrilege! To cancel it was a sure sign of the end of the world.
“No,” said Mrs. Basil E. “The party is still on. Now, more than ever, we must celebrate.”
That’s when I lost it.
7:00 p.m.
They didn’t call it that, but I was basically put in a tantrum room. It was a discreet comfort area, with white padded walls and soft chairs and no hard objects, where patients’ grieving loved ones were taken so they could lose their shit. Yes, I said it. SHIT.
This situation was shit.
Christmas was shit.
Everything was shit.
Mrs. Basil E. accompanied me. She was always the only person besides Grandpa who could calm me down, even though she’d been the one to cause my meltdown to begin with, by suggesting we celebrate during this dark holiday.
I shrieked. I screamed. I begged. “Please don’t make him go to the old people’s home! You know he always says the only way he’s leaving his family is in a box.”
Mrs. Basil E. said nothing.
“Say something!” I demanded.
She said nothing.
“Please,” I said quietly. Sincerely.
“This hurts me as much as it will hurt him,” she finally said. “But the family has convened, and everyone is in agreement. The time has come.”
“Grandpa won’t be in agreement.”
“You don’t know Grandpa as well as you think. He can be irascible, but he also wants what’s best for his family. He doesn’t want to be a burden.”
“He’s not a burden! How could you say such a thing?”
“I agree. He’s not a burden. It’s a privilege to walk through this life with him as my big brother. But as his condition continues to deteriorate, he will feel like a burden. It already weighs heavily on his heart, which is why he’d wanted to move to my house to begin with. He’s known this day was coming, despite his resistance.”
I felt so stupid, and selfish, and irresponsible. Grandpa was doomed to a nursing home—his worst fear. Since his heart attack, I’d doted on him, cared for him, practically stopped my life to help him avoid this outcome. For what?
And I’d spent our last holiday season together before he was confined to a home goofing off with my wonderful boyfriend.
My wonderful boyfriend! Whom I’d led on a wild-goose chase all day!
I cried. And Basil E. let me, without pulling me to her for comfort.
“Let it out,” was all she said.
“Why aren’t you crying, too?” I asked her between sniffles.
“Because this is only going to get worse,” she said. “So we must buck up, put on a kind face, and get on with it.”
“Get on with what?”
“Life. In all its bittersweet glory.”
9:00 p.m.
A miracle finally happened.
Snow. It wasn’t a major storm but a light, soft, sweet dusting. As I strolled alone back to Mrs. Basil E.’s so I could walk my dog and feed Grandpa’s cat, then tend to my client dogs before returning to the hospital, the feel of the snow warmed my cold heart. I stuck my tongue out to taste it. Bittersweet, indeed. And a welcome sign of normalcy. But it was the night before the usually most exciting day of the year. Nothing was right. Nothing was normal.
Dash was sitting on Mrs. Basil E.’s stoop when I arrived. Dash! My phone battery had died an hour ago and I’d given up trying to communicate more apologies to him.
He was wearing a tricorne pirate’s hat. Snowflakes dotted his eye patch. Boris sat next to him. I’d never seen a more handsome sight.
“Aaargh,” Dash said, and pulled me to his chest. “Boris has been walked and Grunt has been fed,” he whispered in my ear. “And your client list taken care of for tonight.”
Sorry, I didn’t say.
“I love you so much,” I did say.
We didn’t say more. We just held on. He stroked my hair as I lay my head on his chest, now cloaked in a new galleon coat.
I could feel the ridges of a book pressing through his coat pocket, and I knew it was the Moleskine that had led him on the day’s hollow quests. Of all the people last Christmas who could have found the red notebook peeking through the other millions (and miles) of books in the Strand, Dash had been the one to find it for a
reason. I don’t know what will happen between him and me in the future, and I hope I’ll be okay with whatever does, but I know that no matter what, he was drawn to that notebook because he belongs with us.
He’s family.
Thursday, December 25th
Boomer was bummed.
Sofia’s family had insisted on spending Christmas in Spain, so he was solo again. Forlorn, he came over to my mother’s apartment so we could head to Mrs. Basil E.’s party together.
“Don’t worry,” I told him as I locked up and we sallied forth. “It’ll be over in a blink.”
“A blink is a very short amount of time,” Boomer replied. Then he demonstrated a blink. “See?”
I was about to tell him I was accustomed to the general duration of a blink, but then he continued.
“But I guess a blink is a good thing, right? Because if you didn’t do it, you’d be staring all the time. And your eyes would hurt. So maybe a blink is okay, if you’re saying it metaphysically.”
“I think you mean metaphorically,” I corrected.
“No,” Boomer said, perfectly serious. “I mean metaphysically. Everything is the way it is. You blink. Then you’re back, and everything is the way it was…except that parts of it have to be a little different. But that blink? Completely necessary.”
I thought about this the rest of the way—maybe Lily and I had just been through a blink. Maybe our eyes were back open. (Or at least one of my eyes was back open…but that was more a medical thing than a metaphorical or metaphysical one.)
I was lugging Lily’s Christmas present—I had ordered her the finest cookie sheets to be found on the Internet and had also used my father’s Christmas check (mailed to my mother’s house) to get her baking lessons at the French Culinary Institute, downtown.
I’d tied the cookie sheets with a bow instead of wrapping them, so I wasn’t that surprised when Boomer said, “I think it’s so cool that you got Lily those little sleds. They’ll be awesome when it snows. We’ll have to go to the park!”