“I’ll take anyone else,” Grayson says, wiping beer off his chin and any evidence of drunkenness.
“I’d like to go,” Wyatt says, calmer than anyone else.
“And who are you again?” Grayson asks.
He wants to yell that this is his goddamn grandson and they need to show respect, but it’s not the right time to make them believers.
“A good friend,” Wyatt says, meekly.
“Well, I don’t know who the fuck you are. Elson, you and Sammi take the back seat.”
“I want to help,” Wyatt tells Trav, who stares back as if he doesn’t recognize him for a moment.
“Wyatt, just…thanks, but we need to go.” Trav heads for the car, but Wyatt grabs him by the sleeve.
“I was talking to your grandfather,” Wyatt mumbles. “I was learning about who he was.”
Callie picks up Eli and rushes him into the car. Cora stands at the side door, waving over Trav.
“C’mon, let’s go,” Cora screeches.
“You all are family, like family and…”
“Wyatt, let go, man. We don’t have time for this.”
“What’s the name of the hospital?” Wyatt pleads.
“Jefferson over in Killey.” Trav yanks his arm out of Wyatt’s grasp, gives a foreboding look, one full of curiosity and concern.
Wyatt stutters to form words. “I-I’m sorry, I wish his health to be okay.”
A car horn beeps, Cora pressed against the wheel. “Travis, what’s wrong with you?”
“Coming!”
Trav gives a hop and books it toward the car without properly ending the conversation in Wyatt’s eyes. He longs for reassurance and the desire to be needed, for the family to include him and crave his wisdom at this pressing time. But Trav hadn’t thought of him at all. Trav is in his car with those he actually considers his family, leaving Wyatt to pas-ture.
Wyatt gets pushed from behind, but the attack doesn’t register at first.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Grayson yells, a threatening finger thrust in Wyatt’s nose.
“I mean to help.”
“You have a fucking screw loose. I’ve seen you hanging around Travis too much. I don’t know what your game is.”
“Game?”
“Your MO, man. Whatever you want from him.”
“We are connected, he and I, in more ways than you can imagine.”
Grayson gives another push. “You’re batshit.”
“A bat’s shit?”
“Means you’re crazy, loco. You want me to bring you in for disturbing the peace?”
Grayson flashes his badge, and Wyatt goes silent. “I thought so. Stay away from the Barlows.”
“I am a Barlow,” he says, so softly but Grayson hears, his ear twitching. Instead of fighting anymore, Grayson gets in his car and drives away.
When all the other guests have gone, Wyatt kneels and picks up Papa’s discarded blanket. A thick wool with a scratchy feel. He brings it to his nose, takes in a whiff, smell of leather and cabbage. He covers himself with the wooly scent as he makes the long trek to the next town over.
Rotation of doctors and nurses in an out of the room. Drips and oxygen. CT scan, MRI, carotid ultrasound, cerebral angiogram, echocardiogram, TPA injection in Papa’s arm.
It’s hours before the family is spoken to: ischemic stroke, hard to tell if they got him here in time, the next twenty-four hours being key. Papa Clifford resting from medication but can be seen. Grayson leaves with Elson and his wife while the Barlows push inside.
Papa looks mummified in bed with the blankets tucked tight. Mouth open in shock, eyes fluttering, half of his face still like putty. Bare feet exposed, the toes horny with nails sharp and yellow. He seems to have lost weight since the party. Cora a mess of tears. Callie taking Eli outside when he gets afraid. Travis with his hand on Papa’s exposed shoulder, the flesh pale. Stu limps over.
“Son of a bitch can survive anything,” Stu says, his voice sounding like a croak. The fear apparent. “Right, Papa?”
“Honey, it’s okay,” Cora says, hugging him at the waist. “Let yourself be vulnerable.”
When Stu doesn’t respond, she goes to Travis.
“Your grandfather loved you very much.”
“He’s still alive, Ma.”
“We need to prepare,” she whispers, as if she doesn’t want Papa to hear. She hugs Travis at the waist, who’s more inclined to comfort her.
A nurse comes in: stocky, no-nonsense, gray hair pulled into a bun. “You can talk to him,” she says. “He’s listening.” And then she gets closer to Stu. “This may be the last time to tell him anything you need to.”
Stu’s angry gaze sends her away fast.
“Tell him a story you remember,” Cora says, nodding until Stu finally nods as well.
Stu crouches down, his bum leg trembling. He thinks how tiny Papa’s tongue looks, shriveled up and receded into his mouth, a sign that he doesn’t have long. He’s seen enough deaths to guesstimate. Hours? Days? What ninety-three-year-old man gets sent to the hospital and makes it out alive?
There’s a memory that shines. When Stu decided on his calling for law enforcement sometime around high school. And Papa took him into the wilderness, not to hunt, but to comb through the land for the gnarliest sight they could witness. He wanted to put him to the test, see how much he’d squirm. There was a carcass, hard to tell what it once was, possibly elk. Maggots devoured until a cave of a body remained, organs turned black.
“You wanna be a sheriff, this is the kind of thing you’ll see. ’Cept it might be a human.”
Stu waited for the acid in his stomach to become a violent spew. But he wasn’t grossed out. He poked the carcass with a stick as the maggots erupted into a frenzy. Animal, human, it didn’t matter. Once we’re dead, only a vessel remains. But how this animal met its fate, that rocked his brain. The steps leading to a death, the mystery to our ends if we’re suddenly cut short. That’s what mystified him, caused the gears in his mind to keep him up at night.
“Yep, you’re cut out for it,” Papa Clifford had said. He had massive hands like they should be holding an axe at all times. His hand rough against Stu’s chin but calming, always calming. His father from another era when people took their time to say what they needed to. “You have my blessing, son.”
“And on the way back,” Stu says, the saliva heavy in his mouth, “we stopped at Ambee’s for a beer and fried fish, that tiny little outpost by the docks that used to serve the fish in newspaper. And you didn’t just let me drink your beer, you got me my own, and toasted me like I was a man in your eyes for the first time. I wasn’t a little kid no more. I had exceeded your expectations.”
“That’s lovely,” Cora says. “I know he can hear you.”
“Would you get me a coffee, Cor?” Stu asks. “Hot as can be.”
“Of course, honey. Of course.”
She scuttles out of the room, and Stu closes the door behind her.
“We need to talk, son.”
Travis blinks in confusion. “Of course.”
“Papa’s insurance won’t cover the entire hospital visit. That’s why we’ve been keeping him at home. He should’ve been in a facility.”
“Stu, you can’t blame yourself. He’s old, this could have happened just as easily at some place.”
“Will you listen? Now I’m tapped, in debt.”
“Debt like how?”
“Debt like I’m in the shitter. These poker games I’ve been going to. And don’t get on your high horse about them being illegal.”
“I wasn’t gonna say nothing.”
“Anyway, so yeah, your mother doesn’t know. It’s been my, well, my escape. God knows I deserve an escape after the last few years.”
“Why are you telling me this right now?”
“Because we don’t have the funds to pay for Papa’s care here. The stroke could clean us out.”
The air in the room gets prickly. “What are you say
ing?”
Stu puts his face his hands, emerging a different man. “I don’t know. I don’t goddamn know.” And then, as if he realizes, “What have you got saved?”
“I don’t have anything. Since the refinery let me go, I haven’t been able to save dick.”
“That fish shack you’ve gone on about, like the one I mentioned Papa took me to, what about funds for that?”
“Emptied those accounts. Went to diapers.”
Stu eyes him closely, one tiny black pupil zeroing in. “I don’t believe you.”
“What? I’ve been out of work for two years and only recently started on the Cutthroat.”
“What about Callie?”
“Waitressing tips?”
“Her parents have money,” Stu says, his lips wet. “What if you asked them?”
“Asked them to help Papa, or for your gambling debts?”
“I go to that underground site we play at for reasons beyond which you can understand.”
“Yeah to get away from Bobby.”
“To what? No, son. No. To get closer to him. Don’t you see? That was his world. I’m trying to find breadcrumbs.”
“I don’t want to talk about this here.”
Travis observes his father, and Stu can tell what he sees: smaller in stature than usual, braying and desperate when normally larger than life, so Travis gives him a hug.
“Get offa me,” Stu says, pushing away and heading out of the room.
“The fuck…” Travis says, as Cora comes in with two coffees.
“Where’s your father going?” she asks, innocent like a child.
“I’ll take his coffee,” Travis says. “Let him be for now.”
Stu doesn’t buy cigarette packs but always keeps a solitary rolled tobacco joint in his inner coat pocket for emergencies. He sucks hard, enjoying the burn and heavy cough. He winces, wanting to rewind time because of what he unloaded on Travis, but at some point, Travis would need to know the state of the family’s affairs. He has until the end of the month to pay off any poker debts, the ringleader of the game not threatening to chop off his fingers, but worse, expose his leniency to certain illegal trades in town. And with a reelection coming up soon, he can’t go into it with dipping numbers.
“Can I have a drag?” a voice asks, Callie creeping up behind.
He coughs. “You smoke?”
“When it’s necessary.”
He passes over the rolled cigarette. “Drag away.”
“Cora’s right, you don’t always have to be the steady one.”
“Trust me, I’m not.”
“I heard you and Travis fighting,” she says, her eyes darting every which way.
“Not my proudest moment.”
“We really don’t have any savings.”
“I shouldn’t have asked. I’ll take a second on the house. We’ll give Papa a little more time. I was just venting.”
“I would ask my parents, but they aren’t generous with money. They would want it paid back with interest.”
Stu shoos the thought. “Don’t need to get into more debt than I already am.”
She steps closer, fingering the lavender crystal around her neck. “I admire you.”
Stu lets out a gruff laugh.
“I do. You’ve devoted yourself to finding out what happened to Bobby.”
He looks at her like she’s not allowed to say his son’s name.
“But you have family here, Stu. They love you. Give them your focus too.”
She passes back the cigarette, a hint of lipstick on the nub. He takes a final hit, the smoke roiling throughout his body, exhaled in a streaming cloud. Then he pivots back inside like a solider returning to war.
29
“He’s out of the woods,” the doctor says, but then adds, “for now.” The doctor, a slender man with a severe part in his hair and barely any lips, who speaks in a monotone. “Injured brain tissue mimics healthy tissue on the scanner so possible infarction strokes can be deceiving. We’ll monitor closely overnight.”
“Should we stay?” Cora asks, both to the doctor and Stu and Travis. Callie had already taken Eli home. Everyone tired, ready for bed.
“I can’t make that decision for you,” the doctor says. “But there is nothing you can do here. He might wake up at some point to talk, but likely he’ll stay sedated.”
“I can’t feel my legs,” Cora says, embarrassed. “I’d do well to lie down.”
“I’ll stay,” Travis says, turning to Stu. “We’ll stay.”
“There’s a waiting area with couches,” the doctor says. “The nurse can get you blankets.”
“That would be fine,” Stu says, surprising them both because he hasn’t spoken at all during this exchange.
They kiss Cora goodbye and call her a taxi. A nurse brings them thick soups for a late dinner along with pillows and blankets. The lights click off in the hospital’s hallways, only a few rooms betraying the darkness with thin florescent lights. The sound of whirring machines, the occasional squeak of clogs against the floor, the murmur of a phone ringing. They’re facing each other on separate couches.
“Forget what I told you,” Stu says, fluffing his pillow. “Money is money, who cares if we owe more of it?”
Travis uncertain how much he believes that but doesn’t want to argue.
“Night, Stu,” he says, but Stu is already snoring.
Wyatt waits until the hallway lights snap off. He’d stayed close enough to hear Papa Clifford’s prognosis and watched Trav and Stu retire to the waiting area. He’d timed how often the nurse checked on Papa, every hour on the half hour. He makes sure Travis and Stu are sound asleep, and once the nurse goes to check on another patient, he tiptoes inside Papa’s room and closes the door.
His grandson a more depleted version from when he talked to him at the party. The decay that just twelve hours can bring. He scoots a chair up to the bedside, takes Papa’s wrinkled hand. It’s cold but still has some life: a twitch, the fingernails pale pink. The face turns to him, a phantom’s mask. Eyes unglue, peer out through a layer of mucous, teeth develop into a lopsided smile.
“You came,” Papa says, throat full of nails, the words gargled.
“Yes. Do you know who I am?”
The oxygen mask makes Papa’s nod difficult.
“I’m your grandfather,” Wyatt says.
Papa’s eyes go wide, the mucous flaking away. Now that Wyatt has said it out loud, he is at peace. At least one person knows the truth. He’s no longer carrying the burden of the secret alone.
“Yes,” Papa says, like he had to take a second to decide whether to believe.
“You never met me before. I left your father Joe when he was a very little boy to find gold.”
He’s still holding Papa’s hand, stunned when Papa slides it out of his grasp. He could have held on forever.
“I don’t understand.” Papa rotates so he’s facing the crescent moon out of the window, as if it could provide answers. “Am I dreaming?” he croaks. “Have I died?”
“Neither. You are here and I am as well. Can you tell me about your father? Anything you can remember. It all would be such a gift to me.”
Papa gums his lip, mouth dry. Wyatt brings a plastic cup of water to his mouth but Pa-pa declines.
“How old were you when he died?”
“He was killed.”
The cup trembles in Wyatt’s hand as some water spills. “Killed, you say?”
“I was very young, maybe six years old. Times were tough. We had nothing. Mother and father would forgo a meal at times but they always made sure I ate. Common during the thirties.”
“What did your father do for work?”
Papa scratches at the droopy side of his face, realizing the futility since there’s no sensation. “He…we had a small farm in Alaska.”
“I raised him on a farm.”
Papa scrunches up his nose. “I don’t know of that. I don’t recall him speaking much about his upbringing. He came to
Alaska before I was born.”
“What about his mother? Your grandmother?” Wyatt wants to say my wife, but chooses not to confuse Papa any more.
“I remember her once,” Papa says. “Lovely red hair.”
“Yes, yes.”
“I must have been three or so, but I can recall being in her lap. She gave me a sucker, what we called candy at the time. I finished it by biting and she gave me another. She had a very sweet voice that sounded like music.”
“How come you only have that one memory?”
“She died around when the Depression began. Sickness. I don’t remember what. I have an image of my father crying on my mother’s shoulder when he got the news and them bringing me into their huddle. Crying with them because it seemed like the right thing to do. But I didn’t understand.”
Papa looks over at the beeping machine, mouth open in awe. “What is going on?”
“You’re in the hospital.”
“Is that what this is? I’m so very tired.”
“I have a few more questions.”
“And who are you again?” he wheezes, the words more spaced out than before.
“I am your grandfather.”
“I am your grandfather.” Papa taps his chin, then shakes his head. “No, you are not Travis.”
“Correct. I am your grandfather.”
“But how is that possible?”
“Because not everything can be logically explained. We are surrounded by unan-swered questions that might never be fulfilled. I awoke suspended in ice, but for a reason, there has to be for a reason. You are my closest link!”
“To what?”
“To who I was, to Adalaide, Little Joe, everything I once held dear. I am in foreign territory here. A century swept by without me and I’m trying to catch up.”
Papa lets out a cough laced with a thick substance that he spits into the cup of water.
He checks his arm and sees the drip.
“They have me hooked up to some good stuff, don’t they?”
“Hospitals were very different in my time so I can’t tell you what.”
Papa gives a sad laugh, resigning himself to what’s occurring.
“How did my son die?” Wyatt asks. “Little Joe, your father?”
“Ah,” Papa says, his eyelids fluttering. “My father came and went a lot. The farm was never for him and too little to make a living off of. He always had a scheme.”
The Ancestor Page 17
