by Rhys Ford
“’Sides, it’ll be cooked. Food will be all ready to go when I get back in case Jake’s up.” He mulled over his options, torn between a slab of ribs or Korean chicken. “Chicken can sit in the fridge and still taste decent. Foghorn it is.”
His phone rang as he got to the end of a long line, a low dirge of a metal song about an iron man and if he was blind. Grinning stupidly, Dallas answered the call with a chuckle. “Hey there, Ozzy.”
“Hey, Dolly. How’s it going?” Austin rumbled back, and Dallas chortled when his mother shouted at his older brother to stop calling him by that stupid nickname. A dog barked in the background, followed by a howling chorus. Then Dallas heard the familiar squeak of the ranch’s back screen door opening and the scrabbling chitter of his mother’s pack of mutts heading outside. “Mom just doesn’t get it. You’ve been calling me Ozzy for what? Over twenty years? It’s like she doesn’t even know us.”
“She’s just pissed off Dad encouraged it.”
“She’s pissed off he taught you to call Victoria Tick.”
“That’ll teach her to give us names little kids can’t pronounce.” There was an odd snorfling sound coming across the phone, and Dallas struggled to identify it. “What the fuck is that? A horse?”
“Llama. Five of them, actually. Mom rescued them from an abattoir, although I don’t know anyone in their right mind who’d eat a llama.”
“People eat guinea pigs, Ozzy. Meat’s meat when you don’t have the luxury to be picky.” Dallas sighed, a twist of longing for his mother’s mediocre cooking kicking in. “This is going to sound stupid, but I miss Mom’s burnt hot dogs and lumpy mac and cheese. No one can put a char on a dog like Mom.”
“So go fire up the grill and toss some wieners into the coals. It’ll be just like home,” Austin suggested. “Pretty sure that’s what we’re having for lunch. What’re you doing?”
“Right now? Standing in line at a food truck for Korean chicken so I can take it back to this guy’s place and feed him.” Something crinkled in Dallas’s heart, and he wished he’d not gotten out of bed until Jake had. “So if I have to put you on hold, it’s because I’m at the window.”
“Good boy. Because only assholes keep talking on their phone when they get to the cashier.” Austin’s approval tickled Dallas into a grin. “And I can hear you laughing at me, dickwipe. You’re not too big for me to fly out there and beat your ass. Tell me about the guy. Someone you’re bringing home to Mom and Dad or just a bed to stash your boots under on the weekend?”
“It’s… complicated. He does metalwork and works across the street from the place I just bought. I’ve got some grates he’s restoring, but he does sculptures that’ll take your breath away.” Dallas took a step as the line shuffled forward. “But yeah, I’d… love to take him home. Mom would…. God, she’d fall in love as soon as he opened his mouth, and Dad would drag us all down to the river so we could drink beer and fail at catching fish.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“He’s been hurt.” Three words—three small little words that held more pain than Dallas could imagine. “His father… that man fucked him up so much, it’s not even funny. He’s… he’s a damned mess and a bit screwed up, but God, Ozzy, being with him makes me so fucking happy, and at the same time, I just want to put him into a box so no one can get to him. But with holes so I can shove cookies and hamburgers at him.”
“Kind of stalkery, but if it works for the two of you, who am I to judge? Does he feel the same way about you? Except for the box thing, because then neither one of you would get fed.” Dallas could almost see his older brother leaning against one of the ranch house’s porch posts, shadowed by the overhang and watching his mother’s dogs wrestle in the grass. Austin’s tone lightened, brightening as he teased, “Is he hot?”
“So fucking hot. Built like a swimmer, and he’s got these hazel eyes I want to fall into. And yeah, we get along. I’d say he’s thinking fondly of me, but you know, it’s going to be some work.” He made eye contact with a mother carrying a baby, and her disapproving flare made him grimace. Mouthing an apology, he put some distance between them, letting a pair of giggling teenaged girls cut in front of him. “Seriously, Ozzy, no words for what he does to me, but honestly, I just like talking to him, being with him. It’s just that he’s had a crap life and he deserves better.”
“Just be careful, okay?” Austin warned. “Sometimes people like being miserable. Make sure he’s not going to drag you down into something.”
“Don’t think he will, but I promise I’ll be careful. Mostly, he’s been holding himself in really tight, Oz. Like not letting anyone see who he is, like he’s folded in on himself. Watching him open up these past couple of weeks is… you know how it is when there’s a soft rain after being dry for a long time. It’s like that. He’s like that, and I’m just sitting here waiting to see what blooms.” Dallas sighed. “Fuck, I’ve got it bad.”
“Soooo bad,” his brother teased. “But if he does it for you, then helping him wade through the shit will be worth it. Look at Mom and Dad. Lot of crap they had to deal with, and they’re the best things in our lives. Although I could do with less art commune. Mom’s trying to talk Dad into turning one of the old barns into a retreat thing. Like knocking down some of the stall walls to make living quarters people can rent out. She’s gone nuts, Dolly. Asked me if I’d ever considered buying a loom. What the hell is up with that? Oh wait, you said he does art stuff. Yeah, bring him here. Get her off my back.”
“He’s kind of shy about it, but damn, you should see what he can do with metal. Mom’s going to latch onto him and never let him go. She’s always complained the three of us can’t even color inside of the lines. She’s going to shit when she sees the stuff he creates.”
“Time for a ring?”
“No, not time for a ring. Hell, not even time for me leaving a toothbrush.” He kicked at a loose piece of gravel with his sneaker. “He’s not ready for a relationship. Not yet. Maybe never but… fuck, Austin. He’s it for me. I can feel it. It’s just that… no one’s ever really loved him before. Not really. Not without… conditions, and I’m asking him to let me in, to trust me, and that’s asking a fuck of a lot.”
“Relationships are hard, Dolly. And then you add kids, because you know, you have to have kids.”
“Kids aren’t the reason for a relationship, Oz,” Dallas poked back at his brother. “You have relationships for the relationship, not anything else. That’s what’s got to work. Always. Kids can be like the whipped cream on top of a relationship. Not everyone likes whipped cream, and the ones who do love the taste, but they’ve got to work off the calories afterwards. Kids are work, delicious for the heart but a lot of fucking work.”
“Taking philosophy courses out there in granola land, baby brother?” Austin shot back. “Because you sound like you’re munching quinoa burgers and aligning your chakras right now.”
“Careful there, your Keep-Austin-Weird is showing, dick,” he teased back. “I don’t even know what a fucking chakra is.”
“Bullshit, you’ve probably got five pairs of yoga pants and order complicated half-caf macha-infused espresso drinks at your free-trade coffee shop slash seal sanctuary….”
“That rolled off your tongue way too smoothly to be off the cuff there, bro. That your standard order? ’Cause you know when I come home for a visit, I’ll want to know what to bring you in the morning.”
“Fuck you, Dolly.” There wasn’t any heat in Austin’s curse, and his low chuckle brought a smile to Dallas’s mouth. “So what are you going to do about… the maybe-relationship with this artist guy? Last thing I want to see is you getting hurt.”
“I’ll try not to.” The line moved quickly, and Dallas craned his neck to catch another look at the menu. “I’m almost at the window. You call for something in particular or just to see how I’m holding up?”
“Just checking in on you. Mom’s kind of worried about you. Want me to tell her about the guy
?”
“Are you fucking kidding? She’d be on the first plane out. Any whiff of anything serious and she’ll be at my front door.” Dallas groaned when the girls ahead of him got to the window and asked what the food was like. “And don’t think you’re going to be throwing me and Jake out to distract Mom if she gets on your ass. Keep your mouth shut about this, Ozzy. At least until I know where we’re going with this. Might be all he wants is a friend and—”
“And then I’ll fly up there to kick his ass for breaking your heart,” Austin promised. “Then I’ll tell Mom so she can fly there, kick his ass, then kiss your boo-boos.”
“Good to know you’ve got my back.”
“Seriously, Dal.” His brother’s voice deepened, a gruffer, meaner version than their placid father’s. “Take care of yourself. That’s number one. In all things. But if he’s worth the time and energy, take it. Do it. You and I both know life’s way too fucking short not to be happy. And if he makes you happy, you fucking hold on tight and teach him how to love you right. And now Mom’s yelling for some help. Love you, Dolly, and if you need anything, give me a call, okay?”
“Got it, Ozzy. Kiss the ’rents for me and kick the Tick.” Dallas grinned when his mother’s panicked cry for help with a loose pig screeched through the phone. “Have fun catching the hog.”
The girls were still debating the pros and cons of chicken versus beef ribs when Dallas’s phone buzzed again. Expecting it to be his mother, he answered with a laugh, “What? Austin couldn’t keep his mouth shut?”
“Dallas? Where are you?” Jake’s troubled voice plunged an icy knife into Dallas’s gut, and he stepped out of the line, worry twisting him around. “I need—”
“What’s wrong?” Dallas was across the sidewalk and to the crosswalk before Jake could utter another word. “I’m heading back. What’s the matter?”
“It’s my dad. I need to get over there.” Jake sucked in a hiss of air, then exhaled a slow, tortured half sob. “They don’t think he’s going to make it… and… I think I need you.”
WALKING THROUGH the sliding glass doors of the nursing home, Dallas realized he’d discovered the last place in the world he wanted to die in. Outside, the two-story building was depressing, a long narrow bit of gray-on-gray cinder block without even a hint of shrubbery to soften its hard lines. Inside was an equally flat muddle of space Dallas knew would drive him to madness if he had to live in its mushy-pea-and-shit-tinted drab walls for more than a few days.
The car ride over was tight with emotion, and more than once, he debated turning around and taking Jake back to the apartment or anywhere other than the nursing home where Jake’s father lay dying. They’d rounded a corner, Dallas taking the curve a bit too quickly, and Jake flushed green, clutching at the door until his knuckles bled white. When they’d arrived, Dallas sat quietly while Jake composed himself, reaching over to hold Jake’s cold, clammy hand when it looked like he was about to lose the bit of tea he’d choked down before they’d gotten into the car.
“It’ll be okay,” he’d promised, rubbing some warmth into Jake’s icy fingers. “I’m here. We’ll get through this.”
Standing on the lobby’s cracked tile floor, Dallas was having serious doubts they were even getting out alive.
The place smelled cleanish, an oversaturation of lemon cleanser and bleach, but there wasn’t enough chlorine in the world to mask the scent of incontinence and vomit. There was a round-faced woman sitting behind a curved nurses’ station placed directly in front of two hallways leading to the rear of the building. And from the sounds coming out of a pair of partially open doors to the right of the desk, residents were engaging in an exercise class being led by a celebrity workout DVD much too advanced for anyone without double joints and possibly a rubber spine.
From the far-left hallway, a cadaver-like male attendant shuffled next to a balding old woman with a walker, her too large pink housecoat dragging on the floor. The woman’s hair matched her loose-fitting Crocs, bright orange and patchy, but her grim, toothless smile and wink when she hobbled by the front desk made Dallas smile.
“You better get out of here while you have your good looks, dearie,” she rasped, coughing out a chuckle. “I was a Playboy Bunny before I got stuck in here.”
“You’re still gorgeous, Ruby,” the attendant mumbled. “Got all the boys in here chasing you.”
“That’s ’cause I’ve got all the good drugs.” Waving away the helper’s hand, she lifted the walker up a few inches, then put it down, leaning on it to support her next few steps. “Hurry the hell up, Henry. I need to get to the damned TV before Gladys or we’ll be watching some stupid gossip show with grinning idiots talking about some fat woman’s ass.”
“Down the right hall,” Jake murmured, waiting for the old woman to go by. “He’s… third door down and to the left.”
Dallas kept a hand on Jake’s back, hating the tremble running through the man’s body. A sour-faced lanky woman sitting behind a reception desk shot them a desultory glance, then went back to reading a gossip magazine, slowly flipping a page as they approached. Jake seemed to know where he was going, but she cleared her throat when it looked like Jake wasn’t going to stop.
“You need to check in and state what room you’re visiting, sir,” she droned, a flat scraping drawl catching on the edges of her words. “And then an attendant will be with—”
“No, I’ve never checked….” Jake turned, his eyes nearly wild with panic. “I don’t know his room number. I just go there. There’s never been a check-in.”
“Go find out what room he’s in and text me.” Dallas ignored the woman, pushing Jake toward the door. “I’ll fill out the form.”
“Sir, he can’t—” This time the woman stood up, reaching for a phone on the desk.
“They called him in. His father is fucking dying, and you’re hung up on some stupid rule you probably just made up?” Dallas leaned over the counter, slapping at the bare wood. “Where’s the damned check-in list? Jake, just go. I’ll deal with this.”
“Dallas, I’ll meet you—” A bloodcurdling shriek came from down the hall, cutting Jake off, and he bolted, sprinting toward one of the open doors.
The howls grew louder, and Dallas was torn between following Jake or handling the woman dialing the phone. An attendant in orange scrubs popped her head out of the double doors, her blonde ponytail pulling her temples back, and she smiled at Dallas, more seduction than welcoming.
“Just checking to see who that is. Haven’t seen you around here before. First day?” She flashed another smile, a piece of purple gum wedged between her teeth. When a chorus of slurs pelted the air, she made a face. “Oh, that asshole. God, hope his son gets here soon. Mean son of a bitch. Piece of advice? Suck up to Nurse Crabby back there and she’ll make sure he’s not on your roster.”
There was a commotion down the hall, and a scuffle broke out near the door as a broad-shouldered man shoved Jake out of a room. He turned, blindly reaching for the wall to lean on, and his fingers dug into the drywall, scraping off a line of paint, scattering gray flecks on the floor. The screaming continued, a horrific wailing filled with pain and rage. Then as suddenly as it started, it stopped, bathing the area in an eerie silence.
“Fuck her,” Dallas muttered, striding down the hall to get to Jake’s side.
It was close. Jake stumbled as Dallas grabbed at him, their arms tangled together as the nurse at the main station screamed into the phone, ordering someone to come down and take care of things. If anything, Jake was even colder now, deadly still and white in Dallas’s half embrace. He didn’t seem to be breathing. Then finally he gasped, his chest jerking out once, then twice, but the color never returned to his face, not even when Dallas wiped at the tears wetting Jake’s dark lashes.
“They’re killing him, Dallas.” He shook, fear darkening his eyes. “I think they’re killing him, and… I don’t know if I’m ready for him to die.”
Twelve
EVERY BROK
EN inhale Jake took hurt.
The machines hooked into his father’s limp body kept time with him drawing in breaths, then slowly pushing them back out again, his lungs too chilled to warm the air before releasing its hold. Every inch of Jake’s body was tight and cold, his spine frozen into a slumped curve from sitting vigil at his father’s side. He was submerged in the iced-over pond of his regrets and anger, his joints aching and his nerves knotted in tight.
Every rattle in his father’s throat caught on death’s grip, then continued along its way, fueling the limpid pulse keeping time with the beeping machinery. Every hour or so, an orderly or nurse would make a circuit of the room, a passing shadow keeping a jaundiced eye on the dying man and his silent son.
There’d been doctors and words, a constant river of information too frothy and violent for Jake to manage. He’d gone under within the first five minutes of listening, letting it all wash over him and filling his mouth with its brackish punch. In the end, Dallas saved him, throwing Jake a lifeline by stepping in and flinging questions back at the wall of brittle-faced people poking at him.
Every query Dallas made came back with the same reply: simply wait for death to come and make peace in the meantime.
There was no peace. Jake existed in a tumbling purgatory where he couldn’t find a purchase to grab, nothing to hold on to as the world spun around on him. And it would continue to toss him about, bruising his soul until Dallas returned from wherever he’d gone to stick a pin in Jake’s whorls, anchoring him in place.
Jake hadn’t realized how alone he was until his father lay at death’s door. He had no one to tell, no one to console so he didn’t have to look at his own conflicted grief. Instead he could only hunch over his father’s still body and count the breaths the old man took, silently praying each one would be his last.