By the end of the night, the fields were enveloped with the familiar smell of spent fireworks. I remember standing back from the crowd, watching the joy on the faces of the children and my imposing, childlike father. Al clapped with delight at the explosions, as the colorful sparks shot across the sky. Almost thirty years later, I can still see his silhouette as he leaned against a tree, smoke swirling around his legs, and watched as the small manmade universes shudder to their explosive deaths, painting the sky with their ephemeral beauty.
The Fourth of July celebrations now over, Vanessa and I resumed our campaign to get my father to the doctor’s office. He agreed and made an appointment for the morning of July 6, and reported back that the doctor, although concerned with his usual high sugar levels, otherwise gave him a good report. Although relieved at the news, I could not shake the apprehension that had settled in the pit of my stomach. The next day, still consumed with worry, I stopped by the store on my way home from work and found that my father was spending the day in Pittsburgh with Vanessa. Knowing he was in good hands with my sister, I returned to my apartment. I fell into a troubled sleep, awaking with a start around eight pm. In a sleepy daze, I grabbed my keys and headed to the store. My unease grew when I found the store closed. Parking my car on the Avenue, I went to the family apartment and found my father watching television. “Dad, what’s going on? The store’s closed. Where’s Mom?”
“It was a slow night so we closed up early. Your mother went to the mall with a friend. I had a long day in Pittsburgh with Vanessa and needed to catch some sleep.”
“Are you feeling all right?”
“Yeah, stop worrying. I’m just a little tired.”
“Okay. Tell Mom I stopped by. I’m going to head home. I’ll call you in the morning.”
Instead of turning to my left and leaving the apartment, I turned to the right and entered my mother’s room. I sat for a few minutes in the dark, trying to shake the anxious feeling that was consuming me. Chastising myself for allowing my silly fears to dictate my movements, I got up with the intention to leave but instead turned on the television and began flipping through the stations. A half hour later, I went into the kitchen and made a cup of tea. Since leaving home the year before, this was the most time I had spent in the family apartment and although the ghosts of the past hung heavily around me, I could not bring myself to leave.
Walking back past my father’s door, I heard him calling to my mother. “Is that you, Bonnie?”
“No, Dad, it’s me.” I popped my head in his room, leaning against the doorframe and dipping my teabag.
“You came back?”
“No, I haven’t left. I’m watching television in Mom’s room.” My reluctance to leave was bewildering.
“You don’t have cable? You really need to demand a raise.” He was always a great teaser.
“I have cable. I just think I should stick around.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know,” I answered honestly. “I have no idea why I’m here. I’ll leave when Mom gets home,” I decided aloud.
“Since you’re sticking around, how about you make yourself useful and get me a glass of water.” He handed me his empty glass.
“Sure. Anything else?”
“Aspirin. I must have pulled a muscle. My arm is aching.”
I returned with the aspirin and water. He asked me to sit and stay awhile. The request was not unusual as we had often spent many late evenings watching classic movies together. After about fifteen minutes, my father sat up, and began to rub his left arm.
“What’s wrong, Dad?”
“The pain in my arm is getting worse. Will you rub it for me?”
“Sure, Dad.” I responded, as I unbuttoned his nightshirt and began to rub his left shoulder and arm.
“Something’s wrong. It’s getting worse. I need to stand up.” I moved to help him up. He paced the floor for a few minutes and then returned to the bed. I assisted him in putting his nightshirt back on.
“Is it better?”
“Yeah, the pain is lessening. I’m fine,” he said, but I knew he was not. The slur was back.
“Dad, you’re slurring your words again. I’m going to call the ambulance. Stay on the bed. Don’t get up until I come back.” I ran for the phone in my mother’s bedroom. Dialing the ambulance service, I explained the situation and asked them to come immediately. I then called my sister and told her to come at once.
“What’s wrong?”
“Something’s wrong with Daddy. Come now. I have to get back to him.” I hurried back to my father’s room. “Dad, the ambulance is on its way. Is the pain getting worse?”
“Yeah, it’s getting bad again. I need to walk.”
“No, I don’t think you should get up.” I moved quickly toward the bed and tried to keep him from rising.
“This is bad. I need to get up.” He fought to rise to his feet.
“Please, Dad. Don’t get up,” I implored. I released my hold on him when he relaxed back into the bed. Realizing the door to the apartment was locked, I told him to stay put and ran to unlock the door. Leaving it wide open, I rushed back to my father’s room, relieved to find him still lying down. “The ambulance should be here shortly.”
“No, it’s too late,” he exclaimed, jumping from his bed with tears running down his face. He paced back and forth. “I still have things I need to do. I’m not ready yet. I need just a little more time.” He addressed an invisible entity above him.
Trying to calm him, I attempted to maneuver him toward the bed. “Dad, you have to get on the bed so the paramedics can treat you. They’re almost here. I can hear the sirens. Just hold on,” I pleaded, struggling to hold up his flagging body while steering him toward the bed.
As I inched him closer to the bed, he suddenly stood up straight, removing his weight from my shoulders, and howled in unimaginable pain. It was then that I noticed the blood pouring from his nose. Grabbing a shirt from the chair, I held it up to his nose just as he collapsed at the foot of the bed, pulling me onto the floor with him. Half pinned under his shoulders, I pulled his head onto my chest and tried to comfort him. His lips were moving, so I leaned over. “Om’ee,” he whispered, saying the word “mother” in Arabic, “I’m here…You came for me, Om’ee.” He spoke his last words to his deceased mother as he slipped into a coma.
His head cradled in my arms, I rocked back and forth in grief. I heard the paramedics clambering up the stairway. Calling out, they asked where we were. I opened my mouth and found I had no voice. I was still struggling to stanch the flow of life pouring from my father’s nose when the paramedics found us a few seconds later. Quickly assessing the situation, they moved him into a prone position and pulled me from the floor. I found myself pushed into the hallway as paramedics swarmed into the room. In a daze, I leaned against the wall trying to take in the events of the last few minutes. A paramedic brought me back into the moment by asking me for medical details. I robotically related the events and gave him a brief update on my father’s complicated medical history. He then suggested I change my shirt. I looked at him bewildered, not understanding his suggestion. “You’re covered in blood,” he said, pointing to my shirt. “You need to change into something.”
“I don’t live here.” Robotically, I stared down at my bloodstained shirt.
“How about we find you something?” He maneuvered me into my mother’s room. Opening a drawer, he pulled out one of my mother’s shirts and handed it to me. I could not move. “Listen, you have been through a traumatic event. Walking around with a blood-soaked shirt is not going to make things easier. You need to change. Okay?”
I nodded in agreement and he pulled the door shut as he exited the room. Changing quickly, I walked back toward my father’s bedroom just as my sister appeared in the hallway. Seeing my face, she knew immediately the seriousness of the situation.
“What happened? I spent the day with him and he was fine. In fact, he told me he felt better than he had in
years,” she explained, stunned at the turn of events.
“I know, he told me he was fine just an hour ago.”
A paramedic came to update us on my father’s condition. “It looks like he’s had a cerebral hemorrhage. We’ve done everything we can for him and need to get him to the hospital but we don’t have enough muscle to lift him. Can you get us some help?” His tone was solemn.
“Yes, I’ll get help.” I dashed from the apartment and into the bar next-door. I returned minutes later with four men who had quickly volunteered their assistance. The paramedics directed Vanessa and me outside while they arranged the manpower to lift my father from the floor and carry him down the apartment steps. Just as my sister and I emerged from the apartment walkway, my mother arrived looking pale and anxious. Wild eyed, she tried to get to her husband but Vanessa and I restrained her. “Mom, you’ll just get in the way. They’re bringing him down the steps now. You can see him when they bring him out,” I explained softly as my father appeared from the walkway and was loaded into the ambulance.
Vanessa and I coaxed our mother into the car and followed the ambulance to Monsour Hospital. Seated in the emergency waiting room, I explained the events of the evening and tried to steel my mother for the worst. “Mom, you have to prepare yourself. Dad was talking to Sitto just before he lost consciousness. She came for him.”
The finality in my words surprised her, but she refused to accept the possibility of his death. “No, he’ll be fine. He has come out of worse. Just wait and see. The doctors will tell us he’s fine.”
By morning, the doctors informed us of the severity of my father’s condition. He had suffered a massive cerebral hemorrhage and there was little chance he would recover. I left the hospital shortly after receiving the devastating but expected diagnosis, leaving my mother in my sister’s care. Stopping by my apartment, I quickly showered and changed, and then headed back to the family apartment. My father’s room was in complete disarray. I lovingly straightened up. I looked through his closet, selecting a black suit, white shirt, and red tie, which I promptly dropped off at the dry cleaners. I knew, even though others were in denial, that Al had already crossed the line between this world and the next. His mother had come to assist him in his journey, and for that, I was grateful. I would make sure he had a smart outfit for his final stage appearance. I then picked up lunch and returned to the hospital, joining my mother and sister at my father’s bedside vigil.
Throughout the day, we sat with Al and waited for an update on his condition. After performing a battery of tests, the doctors informed us that my father’s brain showed no sign of activity. The only thing keeping him in this world was the life support system. They advised us to remove the life support, and let his body and God decide his fate. My mother and my father’s family were in deep denial. Only my sister and I seemed to understand that our father had embarked on life’s final great adventure.
Over the next day, we managed to make our mother understand that Al was not going to recover. We encouraged her to make the decision that he wanted. His final wishes were well known, as he had repeatedly told the women closest to him that life support was never to be an option. Bonnie accepted the burden and agreed to adhere to her husband’s wishes, affording him a natural and dignified death. Grief-stricken, she signed the papers, but requested time to notify family and friends who wanted the opportunity to say goodbye. The finality of the moment was gut wrenching for the Abraham women. For so long, we had loved and fought with the loveable yet exasperating giant awaiting the final leg of his journey. The decision made, my mother turned to my sister in anguish and whispered, “Who am I going to fight with now?”
Vanessa and I understood the enormity of the moment. For all her bravado and emotional aloofness, we understood the depth of her loss. The connection between our tragically flawed parents was as deep and enduring as it was dysfunctional. My sister comforted our mother while I made calls to his closest friends and family. Joetta and Penelope were the first to arrive. After bidding him adieu, they sat and comforted Bonnie.
By the morning of July 10, a stream of friends and family had come and gone, leaving us alone for the final act. As the life support system was removed, I kissed my father on his forehead, wished him peaceful journey, and left my sister and mother to witness his final breath. I had been blessed with the task of attending my father’s final conscious moments and knew his body would shortly follow his spirit. My father, Big Al Abraham, died just a few minutes later, leaving a grief stricken widow and two deeply wounded daughters to mourn the man who had been the center of our universe.
Goodbye
The dramedy that was my father’s funeral mirrored his madcap life. An assortment of gamblers, politicians, bookmakers, hit men, police officers, customers, friends, enemies, spectators, and mysterious strangers came to pay their last respects to a man who had blazed his way through life in a frenzied dance of addiction, excess, and adventure.
Vanessa and I protectively flanked our emotionally exhausted mother as she greeted mourners. Kindhearted gamblers and bookmakers passed through the line, offering their condolences and presenting my mother with envelopes of cash that they hoped would help her climb out of the financial disaster my father had left behind.
Al’s shadow life was represented in the myriad of strangers who passed through the line that led to his coffin. Some gave fabricated explanations about their relations with my father while others stared silently at the women he had left behind. Even though we were surrounded with family and friends, the atmosphere was rife with tension, a tension that was unexpectedly released with the appearance of the Grim Reaper and his mirror.
Although the Grim Reaper’s calculated actions were grounded in cruelty, the absurdity of the moment flooded over me. Years of police raids, high-octane escapades, and eluding pedophiles, stalkers, and psychopathic criminals had prepared me for the moment the mirror made its outlandish appearance. Instead of being consumed by fear or offence, I found myself struggling to contain a fit of laughter that bubbled up from my wounded soul. As the Grim Reaper retrieved the mirror from under my father’s nose, I scanned the room, taking in the stunned faces of those closest to the coffin. I settled on a hoodlum I had known most of my life. I watched as the shock of the Grim Reaper’s actions played across his face in a mixture of dismay and disbelief. Then, I gave up the fight to hold back the laughter. While others stood frozen in shock, I lost myself in the hilarity of the moment.
Laughter—my dearest friend, my most effective tool for survival, and my saving grace—bubbled forth. I looked to Vanessa and saw she too was struggling to contain her wicked sense of humor. One glance at my mother and my laughter intensified. Heavy with grief just a moment before, I watched as she transformed from a weeping widow into the wild-eyed terminator of my youth. Aware that I had made the ultimate breech of etiquette, I welcomed my mother’s fury. Grabbing me by the arm, she dragged me into the adjoining room and turned her full fury on her hysterical daughter. “What kind of daughter laughs at her father’s funeral?” She grew even more livid when I answered her with more laughter.
I saw the slap coming but did nothing to protect myself, willingly accepting the full force of the blow. My face now red with the force of my mother’s hand, I continued to laugh at the absurdity of the moment, only coming up for air as Vanessa entered the room.
“Mom, that’s enough!” Vanessa ordered. “Go back inside. I’ll take care of Heather.” Her stoic face masked her emotions. My mother left the room with a huff and I stood silently gazing at my sister. “Well, that was a hell of a spectacle,” she said with resignation as she took a seat in the nearest chair. “Another asshole in a long line of many.” She spoke sarcastically, but I heard the subtle humorous inflection and once more fought the urge to let laughter consume the moment.
Rubbing my cheek, I flopped down beside her and struggled to keep a serious tone. “I think she knocked a tooth loose.”
“You’re lucky it was open
handed. She has a hell of a right hook.” Vanessa replied as she melted into laughter. We howled in excess, tears pouring down our face as laughter consumed us in blissful release. Hearing our cackling from the viewing room, our cousin Lovely entered the room and found us sprawled out on the chairs in tears and laughter. Intent on quieting us, she instead found herself caught in our contagious laughter and joined us in our merry grief. It took ten minutes before we had composed ourselves enough to rejoin our mother in the receiving line. Temporarily in control of our emotions, we squared our shoulders and steeled ourselves for the unknown.
The Grim Reaper may have succeeded in unsettling spectators, but his bizarre performance had also afforded the grieving Abraham women with a badly needed release of emotions. I saw his actions as the perfect tribute to my father’s madcap life. With tensions temporarily broken, I became deeply aware of my father’s presence and imagined his belly shaking with mirth at the Grim Reaper’s audacity.
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