By the Book

by Julia Sonneborn

  “Now that you’re both here,” the doctor said, “we need to discuss whether you wish to put in a feeding tube.”

  “A feeding tube?” Lauren asked, blanching.

  “Isn’t that really invasive?” I asked.

  “It’s a medical intervention, yes. Your father’s on a ventilator and can’t chew or swallow. A feeding tube is the best way for him to receive nourishment, especially since we have no idea when or if he’ll regain consciousness.”

  “Is the tube permanent?” I asked.

  “In your father’s case, it may be, since we don’t know if he will ever regain the ability to eat.”

  “And what are the risks?”

  “Some patients can aspirate or develop infections.”

  Lauren roughly cleared her throat. “What’s the alternative?” she asked.

  “We focus on making your father as comfortable as possible. Give him fluids, but that’s all.”

  “You mean hospice?” she said, her voice wobbling.

  “Yes. We move the patient to hospice care in such cases.”

  Lauren shook her head. “There has to be more we could do. He’s still so young—he’s not even eighty!”

  “Dad wouldn’t want a feeding tube,” I said, putting my hand on Lauren’s arm. “You know him. He hates being forced to do anything he doesn’t want to do.”

  “He doesn’t know any better, though,” Lauren said.

  I shook my head. “He’d never want to be this way.”

  “He could still wake up—right?” Lauren asked, turning to the doctor.

  “He could, but we’d have no idea when. It could be tomorrow, or it could be twenty years from now. And he’ll likely have a substantially reduced quality of life.”

  “ ‘Substantially reduced’—what does that mean?”

  “He may be paralyzed. He may have impaired cognition, memory loss, difficulty speaking.”

  My mouth felt heavy and dry. “If we forgo the feeding tube, how long until he . . . until he dies?” I asked. Even as I said the words, I couldn’t believe they were coming out of my mouth.

  “It could take a few days or he could linger for a few weeks.”

  A few days or a few weeks. Lauren and I sat there in stunned silence, contemplating my father’s death sentence. He’d always been so vigorous, carrying us around easily when we were kids, one under each arm. I remembered how he’d climb the roof after heavy rains to check for leaks, or how he’d mow the lawn under the hot sun, or how he’d moved us single-handedly from place to place, using only a hand dolly and his brute strength to move everything from our refrigerator to our sofa. When he talked, it always sounded like he was barking out commands, and Lauren and I learned to warn people that even when it sounded like he was yelling, he wasn’t really yelling. Now, though, it was hard to believe that the silent, fragile figure under the white hospital sheet was really my father. When had he gotten so old? Until then, the thought of his death had always seemed strangely abstract, but this—this was final.

  “How long do we have to decide?” Lauren finally asked, looking tearfully at the doctor.

  “You have some time. It’s a difficult decision, I know. We want to be here, not just for your father but also for you and your family.”

  “Lauren?” I asked tentatively. She was sitting with her hands clenched in her lap, her forehead furrowed.

  “Do you need a few minutes?” the doctor said. “I can step out.”

  “It’s OK,” Lauren said, her voice distant and strained. “Anne’s right. Dad wouldn’t want this. He’d want to go on his own terms.”

  “Are you sure?” I asked her. “We don’t have to make the decision right now.”

  “I’m sure,” Lauren said. As I reached out to touch her, she crumpled into herself. I held her tightly, rocking her back and forth, my shirt turning damp with her tears.

  For the next ten days, Lauren and I took turns sitting beside my father’s bed, reading to him or playing music while he slept, leaving only to grab a shower and a change of clothes. I dabbed Vaseline on his dry lips and massaged his hands with lotion, little gestures of affection he never would have tolerated had he been conscious. Lauren brought her kids over for a final visit, the three boys standing solemnly over their grandfather’s body, Tate trying to tickle my father’s calloused feet and wondering why there was no response. “Stop it, buddy,” Brett said, but his voice was halfhearted. He gathered his youngest son to his side and hugged him tightly. After they left, Lauren placed a picture of the boys by my father’s bedside, along with Archer’s Student of the Month certificate and a small vase of daisies. We spent the night at the hospice facility, sleeping on roll-away cots that had been placed beside my father’s bed, waking every couple of hours when a nurse came in to take his vital signs and check to see that he wasn’t in pain.

  Lauren never lost hope that my father might revive, waving me over excitedly whenever he grunted unexpectedly or spontaneously moved a limb. “What does it mean?” she kept asking. “Is it a sign?” When he made no further noise or movement, she’d inevitably looked disappointed and would sit with her hands folded across her chest, as if giving him the silent treatment for his recalcitrance. True to form, my father clung to life until the very end, even as his breath grew increasingly labored and drawn out. In those final hours, the waiting was both endless and terribly brief. When he finally slipped away early on a Sunday morning, Lauren and I were both seated beside him, each holding one of his hands. It reminded me of the Emily Dickinson poem—he seemed about to mention something, then forgot; consented, and was dead. We sat there stunned. Was he really gone?

  A nurse came in to confirm, and only then did Lauren and I burst into tears.

  chapter seventeen

  IN THE DAYS AFTER his death, Lauren and I argued over whether to hold a service for my father. Other than his lady admirers at the retirement home, he had few friends and no living relatives beyond us. I argued that the most dignified option was to have no memorial at all. In the end, though, Lauren prevailed, and I went along, seeing how the process of planning seemed to help her cope with her grief. We decided on a small funeral service in Fairfax, inviting only close friends and family members. A few of Lauren’s friends from Los Angeles made it down—Marni, Celeste, and an old business school friend I remembered meeting long ago. Larry was there, too, as were one or two members of my department. Rick was scheduled to be in Toronto for a book festival but offered to cancel his engagement to stay with me.

  “Don’t bother,” I told him. “You never met my father anyway.”

  “But I want to be there with you.”

  “I know. I appreciate it. But really—it’s not worth it. Honestly, I didn’t want to have a service at all.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “I’d probably be no good anyway,” Rick admitted. “Funerals aren’t my thing—I’ve seen too many people die.” He looked at me earnestly. “At least your father had a long life. He had the opportunity to grow old.”

  I smiled at him weakly. Part of me was secretly disappointed Rick hadn’t insisted on staying. It bothered me a little that he traveled so much and that he was usually out of town when I needed him. Then again, I’d told him to go to his book festival, and part of me felt like I wanted to grieve alone.

  During the service, I stood up to give a short eulogy about my father. Lauren hadn’t wanted to do it, afraid she might break down. “You’re a teacher—you’re used to talking in front of people,” she told me. I looked out at the sparse gathering of people, all of them looking at me with solemn expectation. I had no lecture notes for the situation, no lesson plan or learning outcome, nothing but a jumble of memories. Most of the people in the audience had never met my father, so I tried to describe him for them. I talked about how our mother had died when we were young and how he’d raised us himself, never remarrying and working, working, working all the time. I described how he used to feed us hot dogs nuked in
the microwave and Hormel chili straight from the can. I talked about how hard it must have been for him to raise two moody teenagers, and how he gave us a lot of responsibility at an early age.

  “He wasn’t talkative or particularly affectionate, and he had high expectations of us,” I said. “But we knew he loved us, even though he didn’t show it in the way other parents did.” Even though my pet peeve was when people recited poems at weddings and funerals (how many times did I have to listen to the same damn Shakespeare sonnet?), I’d decided to end my own eulogy with a Robert Hayden poem I often taught in my classes. As I recited the lines, I could see Archer and Hayes getting fidgety, and Tate trying to wedge himself under the pew. Lauren was wiping her eyes and sniffling, while Brett tried to restrain them. Glancing to the back of the room, I saw a couple slip in late and take a seat. It was Adam and Bex.

  Distracted, I blundered my way to the final, anguished lines of the poem—“What did I know, what did I know / of love’s austere and lonely offices?”—and then sat down in silence, staring at my lap and waiting miserably for the service to be over. Lauren reached over and took my hand in hers. “That was nice,” she said. Her hand was clammy, but I held it tightly in my own.

  The service ended with a perfunctory blessing, and we were ushered into a waiting room where well-wishers lined up to offer their condolences. Standing in a makeshift receiving line, I shook hands briefly with Lauren’s friends and then watched them flock to Lauren, enveloping her with hugs and cries of support. Steve had shown up with his wife, and I was suddenly grateful he believed in departmental esprit de corps after all.

  “My profound condolences,” Steve said, giving me an awkward pat on the back. “We’re all so sorry for your loss.” His wife, a doughy blonde whom I’d only met once before, impulsively gave me a hug. Larry, who was standing behind her, caught my eye and raised an eyebrow.

  “Annie!” Larry said, giving me a tight hug when it was finally his turn. “Are you doing OK? What can I do? I’ll do anything—I swear, I’ll even grade your papers for you.”

  “Wow, you must really feel bad for me,” I said, trying to smile. “Check with me in a few days—I may take you up on your offer.” I peeked behind him in line. There were only two people left to greet, both of them friends of Lauren. “Hey—have you see Adam and Bex? I thought I saw them come in.”

  “President Martinez? I didn’t even realize he was here,” Larry said, looking around.

  “Adam’s here?” Lauren asked. She’d detached herself from her group of friends and now appeared beside me.

  “Did you invite him?” she asked, pulling me aside.

  “No!” I said. “I thought maybe you had. He was with Bex.”

  “Me? No way,” Lauren snorted. “Remember how mean Dad was to him when he visited us in Florida that one time?” She gave a hollow laugh. “Maybe he came to make sure Dad was really dead.”

  I excused myself, telling Lauren I needed to use the bathroom. There was no one there, and I did a quick check of myself in the mirror. I looked sallow under the fluorescent lights, my eyes puffy and bloodshot, so I splashed some water on my face, straightened my dress, and left quickly. After doing a quick circuit of the building, I stepped out a side door and into an empty courtyard, a small and shaded oasis with overgrown ferns and a stone bench. As I stood there, breathing in the damp smell of moss and dead leaves, a couple entered the courtyard from the opposite side, the woman picking her way across the uneven brick path in high heels, the man steadying her with his arm. Even before they materialized from the darkness, I knew it was Bex and Adam.

  “Anne!” Bex said, seeing me and coming over to give me a gentle hug. In her heels, she was so much taller than me that she had to bend her knees and her waist to reach me. “We were just about to come inside. I hope we’re not imposing— I heard about the service and wanted to come.”

  “Not at all,” I said. “I’m glad you’re here. Lauren will be really happy to see you.”

  “Is she inside still?” Bex asked, and I nodded, pointing to the side entrance.

  “Are you coming?” she asked Adam, who wasn’t making a move to follow her.

  “I’ll be there in a minute,” Adam said. “Go on without me.” Bex looked faintly surprised but then smiled amenably and disappeared inside.

  As the door closed behind her, I turned to Adam.

  “I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch,” I started to babble. “I didn’t have your number, and things have been crazy. I’d been meaning to thank you for all of your help—driving me to the hospital and everything. You didn’t have to do that—it was so thoughtful of you, and I didn’t want you to think I didn’t appreciate it or that I’d forgotten. I just—I just wanted to say thank you, thank you for being there, and I’m sorry. For not being in touch.”

  My throat was burning and I stopped, wondering if anything I’d said made sense. Adam was waiting, giving me the time and space to finish. When I finally petered out, he didn’t respond right away. Instead, he took my hand, guided me to the stone bench, and had me sit down beside him. I was wheezing a little, and he pulled a pack of tissue from his pocket and handed it to me, waiting as I dabbed my eyes and blew my nose.

  “Thanks,” I said from behind the wadded-up tissue.

  “Take your time,” he said, his hand on my back. Under its steadying pressure, I could feel my breathing become less jagged, evening out. After a few minutes, Adam finally spoke.

  “I’ve been thinking about you a lot these last couple weeks,” he murmured. “Wondering how you’re holding up.”

  “It’s been rough,” I said, trying to clear my throat. My nose was now completely stuffed, and my voice sounded muffled and gluey. “Everything just happened so quickly. I think Lauren and I are still in shock.”

  “I’m sure you are,” he said, shaking his head. “It was so sudden. But you’ve been incredibly strong.”

  “I’m not strong,” I snorted. “I’m a mess.”

  “You’re selling yourself short. You’re stronger than you realize.”

  Adam shifted so he was looking at me. I felt myself melt slightly under his gaze.

  “What you said in the car—about it being your fault—you know that’s not true, right? You did nothing wrong.”

  “I’m not so sure of that,” I said, looking down. “I keep wishing I could go back in time and change things . . . that maybe everything would have turned out differently if I’d just paid attention more, listened, understood the signs. Do you know what I mean?”

  “I do,” Adam said. He looked troubled.

  “I don’t know why I do this,” I said, laughing bitterly. “I can’t help myself. I must be a masochist.”

  Adam might have nodded in agreement, but I couldn’t be sure. I reached for another tissue, blew my nose, added it to the snowball of used tissues on the bench beside me.

  “You can’t blame yourself,” I heard him say. “I know that’s easy for me to say, but it’s true. You did the best you could.”

  “Maybe,” I said, but my heart wasn’t in it. What did Adam know about failure and guilt, anyway? I thought. He was the perfect son.

  “I just feel like I was always a disappointment to him,” I mumbled. “That I could have been a better daughter.”

  “Don’t say that. I heard the last part of your speech, and it’s clear your father really loved you.”

  “I’m not sure he knew how to show it. He was a pretty tough guy. But I don’t need to tell you that.” I laughed self-consciously.

  “Anne,” Adam said, and I looked up reluctantly.

  “He was very protective of you,” Adam said, speaking slowly and deliberately. “Fiercely so. I didn’t understand it then. I thought he was hard to impress. Demanding. Stubborn. I was intimidated by him. But hearing your eulogy, learning of the sacrifices he made and realizing how much he cared for you . . . it made me see him in a new way. It made me realize I’d read him wrong.”

  He hesitated, grasping for the right
words. “Your father loved you deeply. You have to know that. It’s a real testament to him that he raised such an accomplished, independent daughter.”

  I felt my eyes starting to burn. Don’t cry, I said to myself.

  “I should go back inside,” I said thickly, turning away so Adam couldn’t see my tears. I stumbled to my feet and moved toward the chapel, dizzy with emotion and exhaustion. I felt Adam’s arms around me, holding me steady as my body swayed with grief. I hadn’t cried during the service, but now I felt something break inside. My father was gone, and I felt like I was spinning in a void. I was no longer Jerry Corey’s daughter. I was no longer anyone’s daughter. Lauren had her family still, but what did I have? I buried my face in Adam’s chest and sobbed.

  *

  “WHO’S THIS FROM?” LAUREN asked, inspecting the large bouquet of flowers that was waiting for me on the front porch when we returned from the service. Brett and the kids had left for Los Angeles already, but Lauren was planning to stay a few days longer so we could clean out my father’s room and storage locker.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I thought we said no flowers.”

  “It’s from someone named Rick,” Lauren said, reading the card. “ ‘Dear Anne, Thinking of you during this difficult time. Affectionately, Rick.’ ” She looked at me, her eyes wide. “ ‘Affectionately’?” she asked.

  “He’s just a guy I’m dating,” I said.

  “A guy you’re dating? Since when?”

  “Since I don’t know—October?” I said. “We work together.”

  “He’s a professor?” Lauren asked. “Here at Fairfax?”

  “Uh-huh,” I said. I pulled off my dress and threw it onto my chair. Then I changed into my pajamas, even though it was still the middle of the afternoon.

  “Why wasn’t he there today?” Lauren asked, placing the flowers on my kitchen table and fussing with some of the blooms.

  “He’s out of town at a conference,” I said, lying on the couch and shading my eyes. My head hurt from all the crying. “He wanted to come, but I told him not to cancel his trip.”