by Pamela Morsi
Today, Aunt Viv had left the overalls at home, but the man’s long-sleeved shirt and navy trousers she was wearing didn’t do any better at fostering a more formal image.
Both Claire and Jack rose from their seats, but the old woman preferred the chair next to the bed.
“How’s the dear old fellow today?” she asked Claire.
“I don’t like his color much,” she answered.
The two women gazed together for a moment into Bud’s face. Jack raised a befuddled eyebrow. He hadn’t noticed anything different about the guy. But then, he realized, he hadn’t actually looked at his grandfather in the face since he’d walked in. That’s what he was here for. Why hadn’t he done it? He pushed the question away. He’d had phone calls to make.
The old woman continued to pat Bud’s hand, but glanced up at the two of them.
“I came to see Bud, of course, but I wanted to have a minute or two to visit with you children,” she said. “That’s the best news about making up the schedule. I always know who I’m going to run into when I come up here.”
“Well, we’re glad you ran into us,” Claire said.
“Here, take my seat,” Jack said to his wife.
She waved him away. “No, I think I’ll go get a cup of coffee,” she said. “You stay here and talk with your aunt.”
Her retreat left Jack alone with the spirited senior. Not something with which he was particularly comfortable. What did a guy say to a really old lady?
Jack smiled in a way that he hoped looked pleasantly sincere.
“How are you feeling today, Aunt Viv?”
She laughed. “You know, Jackie, at my age I don’t ask myself how I’m feeling anymore,” she said. “If I wake up and I’m still breathing, I just figure that’s good enough. Bud here is my example. When I keel over, I want to be up doing something that people will remember, not laying around on a couch or worse yet, sitting on the damned toilet. That’s my worst fear—dying undignified, on the pot or some such. I’m more scared of that than of dying itself.”
There was no response that Jack could make to that.
“What’s that look?” Aunt Viv asked him.
“What look?”
“That look on your face,” she said. “It’s kind of like a cross between ‘the fort is surrounded’ and ‘I ate something that’s gone bad.’”
Jack felt himself blushing. “I…uh…”
She shook her head and held up a hand to forestall his explanations or apologies. “Don’t mind anything I say, Jackie,” his aunt told him. “Jesse is right about me—what comes into my head just goes out my mouth and I’m nearly helpless to stop it.”
“That’s a good quality,” Jack assured her, not sure if he were lying or not.
“Yes, I think that it is,” Viv agreed. “But there are a lot of people who don’t find it all that appealing.”
Jack smiled gingerly, trying to be noncommittal. Aunt Viv found that amusing enough to laugh aloud.
“So I hear you’re doing some repairs around the old house,” she said.
Jack shrugged. “I’m just keeping busy,” he said. “If you’d schedule me to be here at the hospital more, I would be.”
The old woman glanced down at the occupant of the hospital bed and patted his hand.
“You won’t get too much in touch with Bud in this place,” she said. “It’s too late for that. You’d be closer to him at that house, among his things, his memories, than would ever be possible here.”
“You don’t think he’s getting better?”
Viv raised an eyebrow at him and shook her head. “It was hard enough for him to scrabble up a reason to live before the stroke,” she said. “Even with all our family around, he’s been really lonely since Geri died.”
The words somehow felt like a reproof. Jack was surprised at that. No one in the family had ever suggested that he should have visited more often. He had a busy life, three kids and a business to run. He couldn’t have been running up here to Catawah to see the old man.
Even as the words ran through his head, he recognized them for what they were. A rationalization. He hadn’t visited, he hadn’t brought his children up here, because he hadn’t wanted to. These people might be related to him by kinship, but the Van Brugges were his family. That thought didn’t quite ring true, either. He was odd man out in that group, as well.
“I heard you went to Theba and the preacher’s church yesterday,” she said. “I bet that was an eye-opener.”
“It was Claire’s idea,” he said. “But it wasn’t so bad. Not that different from a lot of churches I’ve been in. I was surprised to find out that Bud attended.”
Viv smiled. “Yessir, since Geri died, he made his way up there pretty regular. But I don’t think it was for the preaching and singing.”
“Oh?”
“He and Geri used to really cut the rug in that old dance hall when Bud got back from the war. I think he just goes back there to remember.”
Jack smiled. “Is that when they were dating, after the war?”
Viv raised an eyebrow. “I guess that you could call it dating,” she said. “They’d been married before Bud went into service. But by the time he came home, they’d had it annulled.”
“Annulled? Really?” Jack had never heard that.
Aunt Viv nodded. “I think he just married Geri to change her name and give her some protection.”
“Protection? Protection from what?”
It was the old woman who then looked as if she had a bad taste in her mouth. “From the fine citizens of the community,” she answered. “If you haven’t figured it out yet, Jackie, it’s one of the nasty realities of human nature that everybody wants to look down on somebody. And in our town, it was our family that got looked down upon. And once everybody’s looking down on you, there are those who are just one opportunity away from doing you harm.”
Viv was momentarily lost in memory, memory that didn’t appear to be at all pleasant.
“The Shertz girls were in great need of protection and our mama and daddy, they were good people, but they were weak. They couldn’t do nothing to help us. We had to take care of ourselves,” she said. “Cleata left town. Opal married when she was just fifteen. I turned myself into a boy. Jesse was just too smart for them. And Sissy struggled to make herself invisible. Your grandma Geri loved Bud from the time she was a little girl. She always said that he’d saved her. But you know, I think when he came back from the war, it was her turn to do the same.”
“After the war, she saved him?” Jack asked, confused.
Viv’s brow wrinkled and she pursed her lips with self-disapproval. “I’ve said too much. My mouth just gets to going and I say things that maybe should never be said.”
“Why shouldn’t they be said?” Jack asked. “I’m family.”
He was surprised at his own declaration.
“I know that you are,” Aunt Viv said. “And I know that Bud and Geri just loved you to pieces. And maybe they wouldn’t want you to know everything. Maybe that’s why they never told you.”
“Or maybe they never told me because they didn’t have a chance,” Jack said. “I’ve haven’t been up here a dozen times in the last thirty years.”
Viv thought about that and slowly nodded.
“I don’t know so much,” she said. “But I do know that Bud was messed up after the war. He was strange. He wasn’t wounded, but something terrible had happened to him out there in the Pacific. Something that preyed upon his mind.”
Jack nodded.
“The doctor said that he’d suffered posttraumatic stress disorder,” he told her. “I guess that sort of thing is pretty common in combat. And from what my mother has said, I understand that Bud was a big war hero.”
“Gracious Lord!” Aunt Viv exclaimed and then in a whisper added, “Don’t let Bud hear you say that, he’d have a fit.”
The old man, breathing into the mask, said nothing.
Claire had been so grateful for Aunt Vi
v’s arrival. The interruption had given her a chance to put some distance between herself and the man she wanted to choke, aka her husband. Why in the devil had Jack even come to the hospital if he was going to spend his time talking business and playing phone tag with Dana?
In the vending area she decided to forego the thick black coffee and went straight for sugary soda and a dollar-size chocolate bar.
She sat down on a long, uncomfortable couch. She called to check on the kids. They seemed to be having the time of their lives. At Toni’s house, every day was a holiday. And every holiday meant presents.
Claire tried to be firm with her mother-in-law.
“It’s not good for you to overwhelm them with stuff,” she said.
Rather than being rebuffed, Toni laughed. “Oh, let me spoil them just a bit,” she said. “They miss their parents and getting a few shiny new things can be a welcome distraction.”
Though all three answered positively about what they were doing and how they were feeling, Toni was right about needing distractions. Peyton and Presley seemed especially keen on her coming home.
“What’s the deal with that old man? He should just get better and go home.” Her son declared.
“He’s trying, honey,” Claire told him. “But sometimes it’s not as easy as you think.”
“Well, if Pops was taking care of that guy, he’d be well by now.”
“Peyton, don’t speak of Bud as ‘that guy.’ He’s your dad’s grandfather. He means as much to Daddy as Pops does to you.”
The little boy only considered that for a minute.
“Naw, mom, I don’t think so,” he responded.
Claire didn’t try to argue the point.
Once she got off the phone, she actually missed the kids more than before she’d called. As the thought passed through her mind it occurred to her that she should lock it down in her memory banks. So much of the time the idea of being away from the kids for a few days sounded like heaven on earth. The reality of it wasn’t even close.
Claire tossed her candy wrapper in the trash and headed back down the hallway to Bud’s room. Jack and Aunt Viv were sitting in the small corridor waiting room. As Claire approached he answered the question that she had yet to ask.
“The nurse’s aide is washing Bud up. She said it would only be a couple of minutes.”
Claire nodded and seated herself on the one remaining chair in the alcove.
“Would you like something to drink, Aunt Viv?” Claire asked. “There are vending machines just down the way. I can get you a soda or some candy.”
She shook her head. “Oh no, sweet thing. I don’t eat nothing anymore except peppermints and black coffee. That’s been my way of life for years. My doctors say that’s not nutrition and it’s sure to kill me. I say, it better hurry up or I’m going to die of old age first.”
Viv chuckled, delighted at her own humor. Claire shot a glance at Jack. Neither of them knew whether to laugh or be appalled.
“So how are your little young’uns?” Viv asked. “I swear before I get to see them they’ll be in college.”
“Not quite yet,” Claire assured her. She gave a quick, positive report on her offspring, including the current excesses of their grandmother.
Viv chuckled. “That’s Toni, she’s something else, no doubt about that. Jackie, when your daddy brought that gal home he could have knocked us all over with a feather. She was so fancy and sophisticated. She’s like quality people and I swear I got tongue-tied every time I tried to talk to her.”
Claire found it hard to believe that anyone could intimidate Aunt Viv to the point of muteness.
“I’m sure she was as nervous around you as you were around her,” she said.
“Toni, nervous?” Aunt Viv laughed. “That gal has as much confidence as she had good looks. And who wouldn’t, with J.D. all calf-eyed and totally smitten.”
Claire smiled at the image and glanced at Jack. His expression was more serious.
“I don’t think it was the romantic love match that you imagine,” he said. “It was a quickie wedding. My parents hardly knew each other.”
Aunt Viv seemed puzzled at that statement.
“Things did happen fast between those two,” she said, “but it was no lighthearted fling with wedding bells. Those crazy kids were true hearts united. Soul mates they call it now.”
Jack appeared incredulous. He looked as if he was ready to dispute his aunt, and Claire thought it might be better to smooth out any difference of opinion on the subject.
“They were just newlyweds when they were together,” Claire pointed out. “And then Toni was a widow. The image you have of her is probably very different than the woman we know.”
Aunt Viv nodded, for once more wise than talkative. “I’m sure you’re right about that,” she said.
The subject changed and a couple of minutes later they were back in Bud’s room. He’d been turned onto his back again. He was freshly scrubbed and his hair parted neatly on one side and combed. To Claire he looked both very much like himself, yet completely different from the vibrant, active man she knew him to be.
As if she felt the same, Aunt Viv began telling stories. Not about the sadness in Bud’s life or the obstacles that he and Geri had faced. She told funny stories. Like the Saturday night dance contest where Geri and Bud were one of the last three couples on the floor. After a very successful twirl, the hem on Geri’s skirt got caught in Bud’s belt buckle. For a frantic few seconds Bud tried to get it unhooked. When he couldn’t he simply spooned her backside against him and danced her right out the front door.
She also related an incident when a local circus was camped in a field a half mile away. Geri looked out her window and saw an elephant in the flower bed. She grabbed her weapon of choice and ran out the back door to chase the creature away. Bud would say for years thereafter that she was the only person in the world willing to battle an elephant with a flyswatter.
Claire found herself laughing at story after story. April Fool’s jokes they played on each other. Family foibles. J.D. dragging his potty chair to the dining table when the preacher was over for supper. Geri slipping on the ice in the driveway, sliding under the car, and Bud coming to her rescue and then asking her, tongue in cheek, if she could lube the chassis while she was down there.
The entertainment made the time go faster. And when the nurse came in to take Bud’s vital signs and declared she thought he was looking better, Claire could hardly be surprised. Their own light spirits had somehow been conveyed to his own.
Driving back to Catawah, Jack commented on it.
“When Aunt Viv started telling those crazy stories,” he said, “I thought it was a bit inappropriate, like Aunt Viv herself. But you know, I feel better and apparently Bud was better. It’s amazing, really.”
Claire agreed.
“And I think I learned more about Bud and Geri today, as a couple, than I had ever figured out by visiting them.”
Jack nodded. “They seem a lot more likeable when you hear it from Viv’s point of view.”
“Likable?” Claire was surprised at his words. “You didn’t think they were likable.”
“That’s not it exactly,” he said. “I just didn’t think they really liked me very much.”
“Of course they liked you,” Claire said. “They loved you. Why would you think otherwise?”
Jack hesitated as if he were getting his thoughts in order. When he spoke it was almost defensive. There was a hurt in his voice that told Claire he’d been hanging on to these words for a long time.
“Well, they never came to San Antonio to visit us when I was growing up,” he began. “Every summer there was Little League, Scouts, summer camp. They never came to be a part of that. They never even saw me swim. I went to the state swim meet two years and my own grandparents never even watched me get wet. In that little house full of photo frames there are no pictures of me with my trophies. There’s not even my high school graduation photo. They have more
pictures of our kids, who they’ve never met, than they do of me.”
Claire was surprised at Jack’s admission.
“Because I sent them,” she pointed out. “Photos don’t just appear by magic. Toni had a lot of social obligations and two other boys to manage. Maybe she never got around to keeping her former in-laws in the loop. Did you ever mail them anything?”
Jack brow wrinkled. “No. I guess I thought that was somebody else’s responsibility.”
Claire raised an eyebrow. “You would never assume something like that at the company. You might delegate, but you’d never fail to follow up. Family is not so different.”
He shrugged. “But that doesn’t explain their attitude toward me as an adult.”
“What was wrong with their attitude?”
“I try to do something nice for them and they just throw it back in my face like it’s worthless.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Don’t you remember when I offered to put a pool out in the back for them,” he said. “It would have been a gorgeous locale and great exercise for them. And although cash was tight for us back then, I was willing to pay every penny of the expense myself.”
“Of course I remember that,” Claire said. “But Geri really did love her flower garden and she didn’t want to give it up.”
“That wasn’t it,” Jack said. “I watched Bud’s eyes when he said all that about Geri and her flowers. He was lying. He didn’t want my gift. He was disgusted by it and he threw it back in my face.”
Claire found that revelation shocking.
“They didn’t like me,” Jack insisted. “I don’t know if I reminded them of my father or if I wasn’t enough like my father, but they didn’t like me and didn’t want anything to do with me.”
“That’s just not true,” Claire said. “Toni told me that it nearly broke their hearts when she took you away from them.”
Jack glanced over at her, his jaw hanging open. “Took me away from them? What are you talking about?”
Claire remembered clearly that Toni said Jack never talked about it. Claire realized that was because Jack apparently didn’t know about it. She was hesitant to be the one to tell him. But it was too late to back away from it now.