They're Always With You

by Mary Clare Lockman

  “Next year we’ll get ‘em,” Coach Brennan said.

  “We will, Coach. We will.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Gramps Goes Home

  It had been three days since the big game. The time had gone quickly since Gramps was getting stronger every day. He had physical therapy twice a day and occupational therapy once a day. The nurses got him up in the chair for meals and even though Gramps still had a bad side, he could stand and pivot on his good leg.

  While he sat in the chair, I liked to tell him all about the big game. He wanted me to tell him about how I stole the basketballs, how I made my hook shot, and everything else that he missed. He made me act out my stealing strategy and my hook shot. I crumpled up a paper and tried to sail it through the air over to Gramp’s wastebasket. It took me three tries until it landed in the wastebasket. I raised my hands in the air and said, “Ta – Da.” Gramps cheered like he would’ve if he’d been there.

  I thought Aunt Florence would be joining in our play-by-play discussion but she said her throat hadn’t hurt this much since she had had strep throat when she was a teenager. To tell you the truth, I would have never believed that Aunt Florence would come to my big game and cheer so much and so loudly that three days later she could barely talk.

  According to Nurse Maggie, Gramps would be moving to the regular floor in the next couple of days. She followed every pronouncement she made with, “If everything goes well.” Then she’d say, “We’ll see.” She said it so often that I kept getting the idea that maybe things wouldn’t be going so well after all. I kept my fingers crossed just in case.

  I felt like I lived at the hospital now. In fact, I wanted to be there when school was done for the day because, otherwise, I sat at home thinking about Gramps.

  The funny thing was that with all the time I’d been spending at the hospital and all my worrying about Gramps, I hadn’t even given a thought to the mysterious Daniel. I wondered if I’d ever find out who he was.

  My days took on a certain routine. Get up, go to school, wait for my mom after school, ride to the hospital, sit with Gramps, eat dinner in the cafeteria, sit with Gramps again, go home, call Sally, and then do homework. Sometimes I got some reading done at the hospital if Gramps was sleeping. No one stayed overnight at the hospital anymore because, thankfully, he was out of the woods.

  Eight days after Gramp’s stroke, my mom and I turned the corner to walk into the ICU and sit in our usual spots. Lo and behold, Gramps was not in his room. Before we could go over to the nurse’s station, one of the nurses came over. “Mr. Rossini moved this afternoon,” she said. “He’s in room 112.”

  My heart skipped a beat like it did when I was scared but this time it was because I was so happy. My mom thanked all of the nurses for being so good to Gramps and taking such wonderful care of him. Then she said she would always remember them.

  We walked into room 112 and there was Gramps, sitting in a chair grinning in his crooked way that I now really liked.

  Aunt Florence walked in with her starched uniform and her perfectly placed hat, holding a clipboard. She was working as the supervisor so she had to check up on all the different floors and keep things running smoothly. I had to admit that Aunt Florence had quite a commanding presence in her uniform and all.

  The overhead page called for the nursing supervisor. Aunt Florence went over to the telephone and said a couple of words. She wrote down something. I tried to catch a glimpse of what she was writing but she moved the clipboard up against her chest. “I gotta go, Dad,” Aunt Florence said. “I’ll stop by when I’m done with work.”

  “Dad, they’re talking about you coming home in a few days,” my mom said. “If everything goes okay, that is.”

  “I can’t wait,” I said.

  “I can’t either,” Gramps said. “I miss my bed.”

  I wondered how he could come home when he needed so much help. And Aunt Florence said that physical therapy was really important. I had quite a few questions to ask my mom. I decided to wait until we were on the way home so Gramps didn’t get confused and worried about his ability to be home.

  I didn’t have to ask my mom all the questions that I was wondering about because she started talking before we even got to the car. “I’ll have to talk to your dad and school but I think I can take off the rest of the year,” she said.

  “Do you think you can take care of Gramps?”

  “I’m going to try. Florence is taking a week off after Gramps comes home to help set things up. Physical therapists will come out to the home every day for a week and then three days a week. We can get a nurse to help Gramps take a bath a couple times a week. Florence will go through all the medications with me so I’m comfortable with that.”

  “What about getting him into the chair and bed?”

  “He can pivot pretty well. The physical therapists here said they would help me feel comfortable with transferring Gramps. We’ll have to play it by ear.”

  “Dad and I can help too. What about the steps, Mom?”

  “We’re going to set up the sunroom with a bed and dresser until he can go up the stairs.”

  Gramps left the hospital five days later. My dad decided to leave Gramp’s dresser upstairs after moving his double bed and bedside stand to the sunroom. It would be just too crowded, my dad said. Gramps agreed. The big stuffed chair would have had to be moved to make room for the dresser. Gramps said the chair was his favorite place to sit. So it was decided. The loveseat had to go. The big chair stayed. We put a couple of folding chairs against the wall in case anyone wanted to visit with Gramps.

  He also had a walker to help him because he still wasn’t very steady when he walked. And of course, my mom and dad, Aunt Florence and I would help Gramps get stronger.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Daniel

  Instead of going to the hospital after school, I went home now. It became my favorite time of day because I went to the sunroom, now Gramp’s bedroom, as soon as I got home. Sitting in the sunroom with the quiet all around us, Gramps talked and talked.

  Aunt Florence had said that after a stroke sometimes the person’s emotions got really funny. Not laughable funny but just different than before the stroke. She used a strange word, labile, meaning the emotions were close to the surface.

  All week Gramps had been talking. He went back over Ellis Island, Giovanni, and, of course, saying goodbye to his mom. Then he jumped ahead to when my mom and Aunt Florence were little and back to how he met Grandma Rose. There were times when I didn’t even know what year we were in. He had been emotional at times, crying over Giovanni’s short life, for instance, but other times he was matter-of-fact. He said things like, “No one said life would be easy,” and “You just have to take it as it comes.”

  Well, anyway, we were talking about all the things we were going to do in the summer such as putting up a new garage, when Gramps started crying. This crying was different than any I had ever seen because even his shoulders slumped and his whole body shook. I thought for a minute he was going to have another stroke.

  As the sun warmed me from the outside in, I heard something that I thought would literally knock my socks off. Even though I’d been waiting for this my whole life, when I heard the name Daniel, I didn’t even react.

  “I can never forgive myself for what I did to Daniel.” Gramps didn’t even look up.

  I didn’t move. I didn’t know if he was even aware of me being there.

  “He was such a good boy. My son. My poor, poor son.”

  There have been times in my life that I’ve been shocked like when I found out Aunt Florence had a wicked hook shot. This time shock didn’t begin to describe how I felt. It was too mild. In fact, I had no word in my vocabulary that even came close. It didn’t matter if I had a word or not because the dam had burst and Gramps couldn’t stop talking and weeping. And when I say weeping I mean furrow upon furrow of tears running down his cheeks until it looked like a waterfall. Niagara had nothing on Gram
ps.

  Gramps cleared his throat, wiped his eyes, and blew his nose. “I’m sorry, Colette. I didn’t mean to talk about this.” He blew his nose again.

  “It’s okay. I don’t mind.” I meant it too because I wanted to hear everything about Gramp’s life. And I now understood what Aunt Florence meant when she talked about the funny emotions of people with strokes.

  “Daniel came to me and showed me his enlistment papers. He had joined the Army.” Gramps squeezed his good hand into a fist. “He said he wanted me to be proud of him.” Gramps leaned forward. “I told him I was proud of him. I tried to convince Daniel to change his mind but he told me his mind was made up.”

  “How old was he?”

  “He was nineteen. Only nineteen. I had to tell Rose that he had enlisted. She screamed when I told her. Then she told me if anything happened to Daniel, she would never forgive me.”

  “Ohh, Gramps.”

  “Daniel was a gentle boy who wasn’t interested in sports or what I thought boys should be doing. I pushed him to be in sports but he wasn’t any good. He thought I wasn’t proud of him.” Gramps wiped his eyes and blew his nose.

  I didn’t know what to say. I was thinking poor Gramps but, of course, I couldn’t say that.

  “Daniel wanted to be a writer but he had dropped out of college. I told him that he might as well join the Army to become a man and figure out what he wanted to do. I didn’t really mean it but I couldn’t take my words back.” He blew his nose again.

  Now I really thought poor Gramps.

  “Daniel finished boot camp in six weeks. He had ten days leave before he was stationed for two months of advanced training. It was 1951 and I prayed and prayed he wouldn’t be sent to Korea. As soon as he finished the advanced training, Daniel volunteered to go.” The tissue Gramps had been holding was now shredded. He stopped talking and stared straight ahead.

  “Maybe he really didn’t know what he wanted to do and thought being in the Army would help him decide,” I said.

  “Maybe. Daniel had been in Korea a little more than a month when the two soldiers came to the door. Rose was home alone and she wouldn’t open the door. She called me at the store and I came right home. While waiting for me, Rose had let the soldiers in but she wouldn’t talk to them until I got there. We both knew that Daniel was dead.”

  “How horrible.”

  “It was. The soldiers told us that Daniel had died with honor. Neither Rose nor I said anything to them. They finally excused themselves. I looked over at Rose. She hadn’t made a sound during the whole time the soldiers were there. She had her fists clenched on her lap and the tears were running down her cheeks. I wanted to hold her so much but I thought she blamed me. So, I did something that I’ve always regretted. I walked out of the room and left poor Rose sitting there all by herself.”

  “Gramps, it wasn’t your fault. Daniel made up his own mind.”

  Gramps took in some deep breaths that sounded like sighs. He looked out the window for a full minute before he continued. “Rose was too kind to say out loud that she blamed me since I blamed myself. But our relationship changed. For the first time in our marriage there was something neither of us could talk about. It became like a heavy weight around our necks.”

  I moved my folding chair closer to Gramps. Then I just took his hand and squeezed it like I used to do when he was in the hospital.

  “Daniel gave me this when he came home on leave.” Gramps reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. “Help me, would you? It’s folded up in there.”

  I looked inside the wallet. In the corner where the paper money goes was a piece of paper. I took it out. “Should I open it?”

  Gramps nodded.

  The paper had obviously been unfolded many, many times. I opened it. As careful as I was one of the creases ripped a little. I looked at Gramps thinking he might want me to put it back.

  “It’s okay, Colette. You can open it.”

  MY POP

  I want to take this time to tell you how proud I am to be your son. When I think of how you came over here by yourself and then made a life for all of us, I have nothing but admiration for you. How hard you worked, Pop! And how you persevered! Finishing high school while learning English and then going on to pharmacy school was really amazing. I promise you I will finish college when I come home.

  I remember how you used to play catch with me even though I never was any good. You pretended that I could be the next Joe Dimaggio if I worked at it but I knew the truth. More than anything I just liked spending time with you. I remember how you put up the basketball court and the only one who could play was Flo. We sure had fun trying to block her hook shots.

  One thing I’ll always remember is how sometimes we couldn’t wait for you to get home so we’d run up to the store to tell you something that had happened at school. You would stop whatever you were doing and then thank us for coming to see you. From the bottom of my heart, I want to thank you for loving all of us and loving Mom. It made our house a happy home to grow up in. I love you so much.

  Daniel

  P. S. If I get lonely, I’ll just think of you listening to your opera records with your eyes closed. Such joy on your face!

  D.

  Now I was crying and Gramps put his arm around me. And I couldn’t stop so he had to hand me a tissue.

  I guess I wasn’t in such a big hurry to grow up anymore. Just when you thought things were going great, something happened that turned your life around forever. Like losing your only son. How do adults stand it?

  Chapter Fifteen

  No More Secrets

  After finding out who Daniel was, even though I’d been waiting my whole life, I was so exhausted I didn’t even ask my mom about him for two days. Instead I listened to every Beatles song I had while I thought about Gramp’s revelation. I found that the Beatles were always good for figuring things out. When Gramps was talking I imagined how parents must feel when they lose a child. Gramps said it was a hole that would never go away. He said to begin with, it’s an actual physical hurt like your heart is being ripped out of your chest. After a while, the physical hurt goes away but the hole remains. All of a sudden it occurred to me that my mom and Aunt Florence had lost a brother. They must have a hole inside them too.

  I told Sally about my Uncle Daniel. She was surprised to begin with but then she said she wasn’t. She said she knew it was something really sad and hurtful since no one talked about it. Then she said she was happy for all of us that the secret had finally come out. We decided we would never have any secrets from each other.

  My mom and I were alone in the kitchen two days after the revelation. “Gramps told me about Daniel,” I said to my mom. I wondered if Gramps had told her about our conversation.

  “I’m glad, Colette. Your dad and I have talked about when we should tell you many times.”

  “Then why didn’t you?”

  “Why don’t we sit down?” My mom pulled out the chairs around the small kitchen table. We both sat. She started talking quietly at first. “Your dad and I wanted to tell you. We thought you were old enough to hear about it. I guess it was because of Gramps. He couldn’t talk about it. We thought we were protecting him.”

  “Didn’t you think I should know that you had a brother and I had an uncle?” I had to admit that I was kind of mad at my mom for not telling me.

  “Yes, I thought you should. I apologize for not answering your questions when you tried to find out who Daniel was.” My mom buttered a piece of toast and gave it to me.

  “Mom, do you miss him?”

  “Terribly. Everyday.”

  After my mom said how much she missed Daniel, I wasn’t one bit mad at any of them. “What was he like?”

  “I find him very hard to explain to someone who didn’t know him,” my mom said. “He was one-of-a-kind. He was funny, never mean but he loved to tease. How he loved to tease! Gramp’s love of opera was one of his favorite subjects. He’d act out the parts. We’d all la
ugh as Gramps protested Daniel’s lack of appreciation for the finest music in the world.” My mom hesitated for a few seconds. Then she continued. “He was intelligent. He loved to discuss poetry and literature with your grandmother. He was one of the most curious people I have ever known. Other than you, that is.” My mom smiled at me. “And so handsome. He looked a lot like Gramps did when he was young. He was always there for Florence and me. Florence was devastated when he died.”

  “Were you devastated too?”

  “Yes, I was devastated. But I had your father. Daniel died about two months before we were married. I felt bad leaving Florence to get married but Gramps said the wedding would go on as planned. Your dad had been living in a tiny apartment about a mile from the house. He had taken out another year’s lease before Daniel died. That’s where we planned to live. Gramps said that we should live where we had planned. So your dad and I married. Florence, my mother, and Gramps lived in the house. My parents were like angry ghosts not talking to each other or to us. Florence was completely lost.”

  “It must have been awful.”

  “It was. We tried to have Florence over as much as possible. Did Gramps tell you that he blamed himself?”

  “Yes. He said he had told Daniel to join the Army. And he said he was harder on his son than you and Aunt Florence. Why do you think Daniel joined the Army?”

  “I don’t know. He always talked about all the places he was going to see. He had pictures of things like the Pyramids of Egypt and the Great Wall of China in his room. I suppose he thought this was a first step to getting away from a small town and seeing the world. Who knows? Do you want anything else to eat?”

  “No thanks.” My mom had been misty-eyed a couple of times as she was talking. Now she was clearing her throat so she probably couldn’t talk much more. I didn’t want another Niagara Falls like Gramps. I left the kitchen and then I thought of something. I went back and stood in the kitchen door. “I’m sorry you lost your brother. I really am.”