Improbable Solution

by Judith B. Glad

  Both contemplate departure.

  Impediment? Obstacle? Deterrent?

  What?

  FIFTEEN

  Sally found Pop half in, half out of his bed, mouthing incomprehensible syllables and struggling to get out of the cage formed by the bedrails. Somehow, he had managed to scoot the wheeled hospital bed across the room, wedging it tight against the mahogany table where a photo of her mother had been.

  Had been, for the photo lay on the floor in slivers of glass, soaked by water from the nosegay of lilacs she had just that morning set beside it.

  It had been Pop's favorite image of his beloved wife, and now he didn't even know it was damaged beyond repair. Or care.

  Gus was right behind her, and he helped get Pop back into the bed. Immediately, using his still strong left hand, Pop pulled himself back to the rail and reared against it. All the time the formless cry came from his mouth, broken only by gasping breaths.

  "Lower the rails," Gus said, while holding him in the bed.

  Sally complied, hoping Gus knew what he was doing.

  Lifting the struggling old man, Gus carried him across the room and set him in the heavy oak rocking chair Sally had moved in for Juana to use. Pop became relatively quiet as soon as Gus released him. She tucked a blanket around him with shaking hands.

  "Oh, Gus, what if he'd fallen?"

  "I know," he said, pulling her close. "It's a good thing you had the monitor."

  Sally felt his strength again, wished she could lean on him for a while instead of standing on her own two feet.

  Pop rocked rapidly in the chair, seemingly oblivious to the world around him, his vacant eyes unfocused, his mouth slack. But he was calm, and seemed as content as he ever was.

  "Do you want me to stay?" Gus's arms were loose about her. She looked up at him, hearing something in his voice she had heard once or twice before. Reluctance? Distaste? It was almost as if being around Pop made him uncomfortable.

  Odd, because he was so good with Pop.

  She shook her head, stepped back until she was entirely free of his embrace.

  "No, I don't think so. I doubt if I could get him back into bed tonight, anyway."

  Always before when he'd had one of these hyperactive spells at night they lasted well into the following morning. There was no reason to believe this would be any different.

  "I can always call Lyle if there's a problem."

  After Lyle had given her a very large piece of his mind the morning of Pop's stroke, she had no reservations about calling on him at any time of the day or night. If she wanted to remain his friend, she would allow him the privilege of helping whenever he could. Besides, it was, as he'd reminded her in no uncertain terms, also his job.

  Sally had no doubt it was relief she saw on Gus's face as he kissed her goodnight.

  "I'll call you tomorrow," he said as he pulled the front door closed behind him.

  Standing in the door of Pop's room, she stared down the hall, as if seeing Gus still there. His ready departure had hurt, and she knew why.

  It was one thing saying that all she wanted from him was great sex, but it was another thing entirely when that was all she got.

  Pop suffered a series of mini-strokes during the next several weeks. No single episode was life-threatening, but taken together, they slowly, inexorably, carried him closer to his final moment.

  Juana was a godsend. Sally couldn't have made it through the rest of May and the early part of June without her. Matter-of-fact, cheerful without being insensitive, she took care of Sally as much as she did of Pop. Sally hadn't realized how much she'd missed being hugged.

  After she'd had time to come to grips with having exactly what she'd asked for, she was equally grateful to Gus for his deliberate non-involvement. When she was with him she could forget, for a little while, that her father really was dying.

  The heat wave in mid-June had the mercury hovering around a hundred. If it weren't for the nights, when it sometimes grew cool enough to require a light sweater, she might have moved back downstairs. Her room had never seemed this hot when she was a child.

  After the first night of the heat wave, Gus bought a window air conditioner for his apartment. All the warm air that entered the drugstore with each opening of the door gradually worked its way upstairs throughout the day until, by evening, his apartment was an oven. The air conditioner made it passably livable rather than a barbecue.

  They were together nightly, except for Sundays and Mondays, Juana's days off. Sally went to him as to a spring. For refreshment...and to forget. Their sweat-slickened bodies writhed and tumbled on the warm sheets as they sought, and often found, new heights of passion, new crests of fulfillment.

  She sometimes felt as if she were two people. One, the dutiful daughter, was exhausted, resentful, impatient and scared. The other was carefree—for an hour or so each evening—and hedonistic. Sally didn't like either one very much, but she didn't know what to do about changing, nor did she have the energy to care.

  She tried to be discreet when she went to Gus's apartment at first, but her efforts were about as successful as her earlier intention of not getting involved with him. One night she arrived at eight instead of nine, and waved to Walt Kemp as he was locking up. Another time she met Georgina and Jack Maye, out for their evening walk.

  Georgina said, "I told you he was a hunk," and winked.

  "He's a good man," Jack added. "Been givin' Buster Jones some time every afternoon, showin' him how to tinker with engines."

  Sally couldn't remember Jack ever saying so many words all at once. He must really be impressed with Gus. She waved to them as she turned into the stairwell, knowing neither Jack nor Georgina would ever gossip about her.

  The very next morning, Ernie Green varied his conversation.

  "How's your pa?" he said.

  "About the same," she answered, as she always did, "and how are you?"

  "Tickled pink you've finally got yourself a good man," he said, and his mouth widened in an approving grin. "It's about time."

  Sally was so astonished she gave him a tentative smile and hurried on down Main Street. She didn't stop at the café, just waved at Georgina through the window as she wondered if there was anyone in town who didn't know about her and Gus.

  Well, perhaps she wouldn't be expected to wear a big red A on her sweatshirt after all. So far, no one had said anything disapproving.

  She slipped into the Post Office, opening the door only wide enough to get through.

  "Whew!" she said to Wilma, who was sorting on the other side of the counter. "I thought it'd be cooler if I came early."

  "It's supposed to get up to a hundred and ten today," the postmistress said. "I reckon I'll close down for a siesta about one. Nobody'll be comin' in till it cools off."

  Sally pulled the bundle of mail out of her box and sifted through it. Down toward the bottom was a bright pamphlet, the announcement of the Portland Opera's upcoming season. She set the rest of her mail on the counter and leafed through it.

  "They're doing Parsifal," she said, more to herself than to Wilma, "and Aida. The Barber of Seville. Oh, God! They're doing Fidelio." A hard knot grew in her throat and threatened to overwhelm her. "I wanted to design those costumes," she whispered, remembering the folio of drawings she'd been working on for years, ever since she first heard Fidelio.

  "What are you talkin' about, girl?" Wilma demanded. "Speak up. You know my hearing's not what it used to be."

  "Nothing, Wilma," she said, tucking the brochure in the middle of her stack of magazines and envelopes. "Just impossible dreams."

  "There's no impossible dreams, Sally Carruthers. Just people too lazy to work for what they want most of all." She leaned on the counter, an ancient woman who'd been Sally's grandfather's playmate. "I can't believe any granddaughter of Archie's would lack the gumption and grit to go after what she wants, can you?"

  Sally shook her head. How could she go after anything, as long as she didn't know from one d
ay to the next what Pop's condition would be?

  "I'll see you tomorrow, Wilma," she said. In about one minute she was going to weep, and she didn't want Wilma to see.

  * * * *

  "What happens around here on the Fourth?" Gus asked her one night about a week before the Independence Day holiday. They were lying naked on his bed, letting the breeze from the fan cool the sweat of their recent passion. The air conditioner kept the living room end cool, the bedroom end merely endurable, so Sally had bought a little clip-on fan the last time she'd taken Pop in to Ontario to see the doctor.

  "Nothing much." She was tracing patterns in the red pelt on his chest. It fascinated her. She'd never thought about body hair on a redhead—it made her fanciful impression of his being forged out of brass and copper seem less fantastic. "People generally go somewhere else. There are rodeos in Jordan Valley and Vale, fireworks in Ontario."

  "And what about you? What are your plans?" His eyes were closed and his body totally relaxed.

  Sally wondered if he really cared what she was planning, or if he was simply talking to keep himself awake.

  "I haven't made any plans. Even if I wanted to go somewhere, I'd be afraid to be out of touch."

  She had this awful feeling that if she went farther from home than the Post Office, something terrible would happen. Pop was so much worse. He hadn't even objected to the bedrails for more than a week. All he did was lie in the bed and waste away.

  No! She wouldn't think about Pop. Not while she was with Gus, the only time she felt as if she still had a life.

  Desperately, she kissed him, crushing her mouth against his. "I've got a little while longer," she murmured. "Don't waste it talking."

  Gus responded to her kiss automatically, even while he wanted to push her away. The desperation in her words, in her voice, was too much.

  It wasn't physical need that was driving her tonight, but emotional. And he had nothing emotional to give her.

  After a moment, he realized he had nothing physical, either.

  She realized it at almost the same time. "You're tired, aren't you?"

  It was a convenient excuse. "Long day." He shrugged one shoulder. "And the heat."

  She rolled away from him. "Maybe I'd better go."

  "Yeah. It's late." A pang of regret arrowed through him as he heard the hurt in her voice. It was followed quickly by resentment. Damn her! He'd told her what he could give, yet she kept wanting more.

  She scooped her clothing from the floor and went into the bathroom. Gus lay on the rumpled bed and wondered if he'd finally driven her away. Always before she'd dressed in the bedroom, humoring his once-stated desire to watch her. It turned him on, he'd said, and it did. Her body was slimmer, firmer now than when they'd first met, her motions were graceful and sensuous.

  He sighed, aware of a subliminal ache. He didn't love her, but his life was richer for knowing her. He often went for days at a time between black moods, rarely thought about leaving Whiterock.

  Perhaps that was the problem. She had brought happiness back into his life, and he wasn't supposed to be happy.

  As waves of remembered pain broke through him, Gus clenched his fists, his teeth, his whole body. He tried to visualize his wife, his child. Marilyn's image was hazy in his mind, but he could still see her dark hair, her petulant mouth, her yearning eyes. He could still feel the weight of her emotional neediness—a need he'd been unable to satisfy.

  But where was Emily?

  Oh, God! How could he have let this happen? It was not quite three years ago, and already her face was growing dim in his memory. He could no longer feel the delicate wiriness of her little body as he swung her onto his shoulders. He could no longer hear her happy "Quack-quack-quack!" at his command to duck as he carried her through her bedroom door. And he could no longer smell the sweet baby shampoo-strawberry soap scent of her as he hugged and kissed her after checking for monsters under the bed.

  Why had he left all the photos of her behind, along with everything else he'd once thought important?

  He rolled over and buried his face in his pillow, feeling the burn of tears behind his eyes, the aching lump in the back of his throat. He heard Sally open the bathroom door, hesitate, and then head for the apartment door. Her soft "Goodbye, Gus," only exacerbated his agony.

  Sally let herself out without going to Gus as she longed to do. She didn't have to be slapped in the face with a dead fish to know when she wasn't wanted.

  It was still hot, the sidewalk reflecting back its stored heat. She hurried across Main Street, knowing the gravel that began half a block up Third Avenue would be cooler than the pavement and concrete of Whiterock's narrow downtown.

  The old-fashioned yellow streetlights, swinging in the middle of the intersections, cast sharp shadows. She watched hers catch up with her at the corner, lengthen before her as she turned onto Jasper, passing first Wilma's single-story bungalow, then the Jones house, untenanted since Mildred died.

  She lingered by Mrs. Alpin's fence, smelling the hot, heavy scent of sun-warmed roses. Their watchdog, of course, was not about, but she whispered, anyway, "Your roses are lovely, Grip."

  And at that moment, she could no longer contain the tears she had been denying since Gus's withdrawal.

  Leaning against the fence, she laced her fingers into its chain links, needing the support. Sobs wracked her, no matter how she tried to contain them. She didn't know what she wept for, except that she had so much sorrow, so much regret and so much loneliness within her that this might be the only way it could come out.

  "Pop," she gasped. "Please. Please, let go. I can't stand seeing you like this any longer."

  Today he had caught her hand as she washed his chest, holding it tightly for a few seconds as if he'd known what he was doing. But most of the time he was like a vegetable in the bed—inert, oblivious, apart.

  There, she'd said it out loud. Finally.

  "Yes, Pop, I want you to die," she said, this time in a firm voice. "I'm so sick of seeing your body suffer, when I know that my father's not there anymore."

  Her suspicion that he was hidden somewhere inside the failing husk of his body, unable to escape, had been defeated by reality. The father she'd loved and admired was long gone. It was time she accepted that.

  Time to let Pop go.

  The thought of living the rest of her life without his wise advice and uncritical love was almost more than she could bear, and the sobs renewed.

  "Oh, Pop, I love you so, and I miss you so much," she told him, hoping that, wherever he was, he could hear.

  Eventually, the ungovernable weeping passed, and she was able to continue toward her house, feeling drained and empty. Perhaps she could finally find peace, now that she had finally admitted to herself that wishing for Pop's death was infinitely more compassionate than praying for his continued imprisonment in a failing body.

  Sally slipped inside to tell Juana she was home, and went back out to sit on the front steps. The moon wasn't up yet, but the streetlight at the corner of Fifth and Jasper kept the night from being totally dark. She perched her elbows on her knees, cradled her chin within them.

  Weeping for Pop hadn't resolved her confusion about Gus Loring. She wasn't sure anything would, but she owed it to herself to examine her feelings about him.

  Of course, there was the possibility, after his complete withdrawal tonight, that her feelings about him wouldn't matter anymore, except to be conquered and exiled. He'd gone back into that private place inside himself where all that showed was anger. Why?

  She thought back over all the times he had withdrawn. At first he had done it whenever he seemed tempted to smile, to be comfortable, to be amused. After he took the job at Cowles Implement, he'd relaxed a little, although he still hadn't been exactly friendly.

  No, that was wrong, He'd been friendly enough, but only in response to friendliness. Seldom had he initiated any kind of exchange beyond the necessary small talk of daily life. She'd listened to Roy Gilbert tryi
ng to talk him into helping with the May Fest and had gathered from his responses he was reluctant to get involved in the town's social life.

  It seemed like every time he let himself get close to someone, he went into automatic retreat. Like tonight. All she'd done was show him how much she needed him, and he'd withdrawn.

  She hoped he would be as mercurial this time as he had before. While ordinarily she wouldn't give the time of day to someone as on-again-off-again as Gus, right now she needed him. Tomorrow night she would be at his door as if nothing had happened.

  At least when she was in his arms, in his bed, she didn't feel so terribly alone. She didn't have to be strong.

  INTERVAL

  What is Emily?

  SIXTEEN

  Bernie stuck his head out of the office as Gus was returning from lunch. "Got a minute?"

  "Sure." Gus entered the dimly lit office that looked as if nothing had been thrown away since the day Bernie's grandfather opened for business. He set a pile of parts catalogs onto the floor and sat in the rickety chair. "What's up?"

  "Why are you wasting your time working for me?"

  Gus shrugged. "I like it here. It's uncomplicated."

  "That's no answer." Bernie's tone said he wasn't anybody's fool.

  "It's the only one I have." He rose, done with a conversation that wasn't going anywhere.

  Bernie said, "Hold on. I've got a deal for you." He opened the file cabinet behind his desk. "It's in here somewhere," he muttered while flipping through file folders.

  Gus waited.

  Finally Bernie pulled out a stapled-together sheaf of papers, dog-eared and coffee-stained. He looked at the top sheet.

  "Good grief! Has it really been that long?" He held the papers out. "Take a look. It's a little out of date, but things haven't changed much."

  Gus looked. Cowles Implement Company, Financial Statement. The date was more than three years ago. Curiosity got the better of him. He flipped to the balance sheet, skimmed down the right hand column. Where he halfway expected to see red, there was a nice, healthy black number.