She almost laughed. Her mom would freak that it was pizza in a bowling alley instead of a five-course meal at an elegant restaurant.
Bree stood in the empty hallway, the sound of the rain running along the gutters and down the drain spouts. Except for that, the house was silent as a tomb. What an apt expression. It was a tomb. Her father was dying in this place, and she felt as if her mother’s spirit might be dying with him.
Or maybe it only meant that soon her mother would be free.
She padded quietly down the hall that was the leg of the house’s T. The den was empty. Her parents’ room at the end was dark, too. She had the urge to simply walk into her own room and shut the door.
Instead, she pushed on to the end of the hall and her parents’ doorway. It seemed to gape eerily. She forced herself to step over the threshold. Her father’s hospital bed was silhouetted against the rainy sky. And against that silhouette stood her mother. One small lamp was on behind the head of the bed, shining on her father’s face.
Bree could swear she heard voices, as if her father had come out of the semi-coma he’d been drifting in for the last thirty-six hours.
But no, as she moved closer, her feet silent on the carpet, it was only her mother’s voice. Soft words, almost nonexistent, but there nonetheless.
Bree strained to hear them. As if they held the meaning of life, the meaning of death.
Until finally they coalesced beneath the rain’s chatter. “Die, you old fuck, die.”
She had never heard her mother use that word, not once in her entire life.
She couldn’t speak, couldn’t hear for a moment over the roar of blood in her ears as if it were a great waterfall. Yet the next thing she knew, she was by her mother’s side, her father’s emaciated, inert body in the bed before them. He didn’t move, nothing but the incessant twitch of his eyes back and forth beneath his half-open lids.
Is that what her mother had been doing the past few days, sitting beside his bed willing him to die?
“If you felt that way, why didn’t you ever leave him?”
Her mother didn’t startle, didn’t turn. “I was afraid,” she said.
“So was I, Mom,” Bree finally whispered into a quiet broken only by the rain and her father’s torturous breaths.
Until her mother spoke again. “I thought whatever was out there was worse than staying with him.”
“It wasn’t worse,” Bree said so softly she thought her mother wouldn’t hear.
Yet she heard. “I did my best, Brianna.”
Bree wanted to say she understood. But she didn’t. She probably never would. They stood beside his bed, the man that been the most important thing in their lives for so long that neither of them knew how life would continue without him. He was all they’d ever known. Would you even recognize freedom if you’d never known it?
Finally, Bree took her mother’s hand, laced their fingers. “Let’s watch him die together.”
Her mother squeezed. And hands clasped, they waited.
THEY WERE STILL WAITING AT EIGHT ON SUNDAY MORNING. BREE had wanted to run screaming into the sunrise, throwing herself into a blinding blaze of glory that blotted out everything else. But there was no escape. She’d taken her mother’s hand, said they’d do it together, and now she couldn’t let go.
When finally she couldn’t stand on her feet anymore, she’d slept fully clothed on her mother’s bed with only a blanket pulled over her. Her mom had taken her father’s side of the bed, still touching Bree in the darkness deep in the middle of that endless night.
Upon waking, she’d gone to her bathroom to brush away the taste of a long night, but returned to her parents’ room without changing or showering.
The doorbell broke through the gurgle of her father’s breathing. He sounded like he was choking.
Please don’t make me do this. No one listened.
“Get the door, Brianna,” her mother said, once again ensconced on the stool by his bedside.
After the things her mom had said last night, Bree almost believed she sat there simply to make sure he was really dead when it finally happened.
The two aides she hadn’t met before, one man, one woman, followed her back to the bedroom. Despite the fact that the sun was out after the rain, she felt as if she were leading them to a dungeon where she and her mother held her father captive, chained to a wall and spread out on a dirty straw mattress.
“This is Meredith and Geoffrey, Mom.” They’d each given her a card when she let them in.
“How’s Dad doing today?” Geoffrey said as he passed behind Bree’s mom, trailing his hand across her back in comfort. Her mother still wore yesterday’s housecoat.
How she’d changed; a few short weeks ago, she wouldn’t have been caught dead in a housecoat, not even by a delivery boy.
Her mom murmured something in reply that Bree didn’t catch, and Geoffrey smiled. Tall with fair skin and a bald head, he was big, not fat but muscled. Though the aides were well-trained in how to move patients with the least amount of physical exertion, rolling them to one side, then the other to change the sheets beneath them, wash them, put on new pajamas, et cetera, a big man made the procedure run more smoothly. Meredith was a slight blonde with curly hair she’d tamed back into a bun. Having Geoffrey as her partner surely made things easier.
Leaning over the head of the bed, Geoffrey adjusted the oxygen tubes in her father’s nostrils, then stroked his cheek in the gentlest of gestures. Meredith moved to the other side of the mattress, next to the window. Behind her, the sun shone on the roof of the dollhouse, glittering in the raindrops as it dried them. The miniature house looked so pretty with its scallops and flowers painted along the sides. So inviting, so innocent.
Bree suddenly hugged herself and looked at Geoffrey.
As he caressed her father’s face, Meredith trailed a hand down his emaciated arm. They gave him a series of touches and caresses that were both a comfort and a test of his condition. Bree wondered idly if they’d have been so tender and caring if they’d known him before he was comatose. He didn’t twitch, didn’t move, didn’t respond, not even a flutter of his eyelids that still hovered at half-mast.
“Ladies,” Geoffrey said, his voice soft and gentle for such a big man. “You can see the mottled black and blue coloring along his bottom half. Dad has increased lividity. This means his circulatory system is shutting down.”
Once again, her mother murmured a sound. Maybe she was saying nothing at all, just acknowledging Geoffrey’s comments.
“If we move Dad,” he went on, “we stand the chance of losing him. He’s very close, and we could push him over by so much as turning him to wash him. How do you feel about that?”
Let him die. Do it now.
Her mom’s back to her, Bree couldn’t see her expression. But she said nothing, didn’t even touch him. In the ensuing silence, Meredith pulled some prepackaged single-use cloths from her pocket and ripped one open. She soothed his brow, wiping gently, then his cheeks, his cracked lips.
“What would you like us to do, ladies? Meredith and I will wash him gently to prepare him, if you’d like to discuss it between you.”
Bree couldn’t find any voice with which to agree or even talk to her mother. Her heart beat in a staccato rhythm, and she heard her mother’s words from last night.
Die, you old fuck, die.
She wanted it, Jesus, she wanted it. Just let it be done, let it be over, let him be gone.
“Turn him,” her mother said, her voice a crack in the gentle, soothing atmosphere Geoffrey created with Meredith.
Wasn’t that killing him, wasn’t it murder? Or was it more mercy than he deserved?
Geoffrey closed his eyes and dipped his head in the briefest nod of agreement, then smiled. For him, it was an act of mercy. He must do it all the time, must know when the end is close, so close that a simple push could release the soul.
For a moment, Bree wished she was capable of that kind of delicate, caring emotion
.
“Come close,” Geoffrey whispered to her when she hung back. “You’ll want to see. I believe it helps keep the loved ones in our hearts forever.”
No, she didn’t want to see, didn’t want to remember or know. Her father hadn’t been in her heart for years. He’d been in her head, telling her what to do, how to do it, and how miserable her attempts at life were. But the hypnotic quality of Geoffrey’s deep yet so very tender voice drew her near.
Please don’t make me, Daddy.
Geoffrey’s voice compelled her.
Closer, closer, she could now see the dark bruising along the underside of her father’s arms and shoulders where the blood had settled.
How could a man die so quickly? Four days ago she’d fed him whiskey and morphine to shut him up. Now he was silent, still, even the twitching of his eyeballs back and forth had ceased. The bottom half of his irises—the only thing she could see other than the whites of his eyes—were milky. Like the corpses you see on TV.
By her side, she felt her mother’s body pressed to hers. Don’t touch me. Bree wanted to scream, to shout, to run.
When he was gone, who would she blame for the way she was?
“Meredith.” That was all Geoffrey said as he lightly massaged her father’s shoulders, then his neck, his fingers blunt and thick.
Meredith pulled the sheet aside. Her father’s legs were nothing more than sticks protruding from the bottom of his hospital-style gown. His backside rested on a towel laid across the mattress. Meredith grasped one edge of the towel, pulling up, slowly turning his body.
“Watch his face with me, Bree.” Geoffrey’s words were little more than a voice in her head, and yet, as if he were a magician, she obeyed.
Her father’s mouth hung grotesquely open, and his head seemed to move on its own, as if it were disconnected from his body, lolling backward on his neck. If her mother hadn’t been holding fast to her sweaty hand, Bree might have touched him. Poked the waxen skin. Screamed at him.
Then Geoffrey cupped the back of his neck and held his head up, paper-thin flesh covering a skull.
There was a sound like a breath, with none of the gurgle that had rattled constantly with every rise and fall of his chest. Then a gentle whoosh of air like the wings of a butterfly right next to her cheek.
“There he goes,” Geoffrey whispered.
Her heart contracted. A shimmering stream of breath slipped from her father’s lips and rose gently, lightly, airily to the ceiling. He had never been a light and airy man. He had never been gentle. Yet his essence, if that’s what it was, was all of those things.
“I see him,” her mother murmured with the softness of awe. They watched the ceiling as if . . . well, as if they were really watching her father’s soul rise to heaven or the hereafter or whatever.
Later he would fall back down to hell where he belonged.
14
GEOFFREY AND MEREDITH HAD OFFICIALLY TAKEN HER FATHER’S vitals—or rather his lack of them—and recorded the time. They’d washed and prepared him as if for some sacrament. When they were done, Geoffrey had pulled the covers over his chest and tucked them around him as if he were a father putting his son to bed. He hadn’t covered her father’s face. He’d left him as if he were sleeping.
Bree had watched the whole ritual as if it would somehow confirm his death.
After she let them out, Bree stood in the doorway of her mother’s bedroom—because it wasn’t her parents’ room anymore; it belonged only to her mom—and watched the dead man on the hospital bed as if he might rise again. Because really, how could the old fuck be dead? Her mother’s voice drifted eerily down the hallway from the den as she phoned the funeral home to come get him, like he was a package they had to send out.
He was gone. It was strange. Bree didn’t know what to do now.
She couldn’t walk in and look more closely; she could only stand there on the threshold and watch as sunlight streamed across the bed in which his body lay.
“I’ll make some coffee, Bree,” her mother called as if there wasn’t a dead man in her bedroom.
Bree couldn’t feel her arms, couldn’t feel her legs, her lips. He was gone; he was really gone. She wanted to feel free. She felt only . . . numb. Unreal.
“Bree?”
Her mother’s voice, suddenly so close, startled her. Bree’s pulse raced.
“Coffee?” her mom asked again.
“Yes. Please. Thank you.”
Were you supposed to drink coffee after your father died? Maybe you were supposed to cry. Coffee seemed too . . . routine.
She must have stood there a while staring at his unmoving body because finally there was the whistle of the kettle bleating down the long hallway. Her mom was making instant. Bree tore herself from the threshold, backing toward the kitchen as if she were afraid he might come after her.
“Would you like a chocolate chip cookie with your coffee?” Her mother held out the bear-shaped cookie jar Bree had given her a Christmas ago. Her mom loved cookie jars in fun and distinctive shapes. Bree’s father, however, would let her put out only one at a time because, he said, the kitchen looked cluttered and messy with them all. Then he’d groused about how much room her collection took up in the cupboards.
Instead of grabbing a cookie, Bree planned what jar shape she’d buy for her mother’s birthday.
Is this what people did after a death? Act like nothing had happened, even planning the next birthday gift. Really, what did they do? Hug and cry in each other’s arms? Share all the wonderful memories they had? Make breakfast? Have coffee and a cookie and pretend there were wonderful memories to be had?
“I’d rather have a piece of toast with marmalade,” Bree said.
Her mother tapped her forehead. “Silly me, of course. We haven’t eaten breakfast yet. I’ll make toast.”
“Can I have juice as well?”
“Of course, dear.”
Bree poured them both a glass as her mother put two pieces of wheat bread in the toaster.
“They said it’ll be a couple of hours,” her mother said.
Bree froze. Two hours with just his body in the house? It was weird. It was creepy. She couldn’t stand it.
“I was wondering if you’d go out and get a few things,” her mom added conversationally. “We’re almost out of milk. And oatmeal. I’ll make a list.”
Bree’s voice seemed to come from far away, totally out of her own body. “Sure. I’ll do it this afternoon.”
“Oh, no, you can go as soon as we’ve had our toast and coffee.” Her mother smiled the oddest beatific smile as she retrieved the marmalade from the fridge.
Bree stared at her. Were there fewer lines around her eyes, as if she’d suddenly been released from a terrible strain? Were her shoulders less rounded? “Don’t you want me to stay at least until . . .”
She didn’t know how to finish the sentence. Until they cart away the dead body? Or maybe it should be until they haul the old fuck out of the house? She couldn’t figure out what was appropriate. Except that leaving her mother alone didn’t feel like the right thing to do. After all, her mom hadn’t wanted to be alone when he died, so how could it be okay to stay in the house all alone with a dead body?
“You go. I’ll be fine.”
It was wrong. It was bad. It was freaking weird. But after their toast, juice, and coffee were consumed, Bree left her mother alone with her dead husband.
She couldn’t think properly. She actually had a grocery list in her purse. Though her mother hadn’t said it in words, Bree knew she wasn’t supposed to come back until the house was empty.
Her hands shook on the steering wheel even as she turned the heater on full blast. The sun on the concrete was blinding after the days of rain. She couldn’t go to the grocery store. She couldn’t do her shopping on a Sunday morning with all the mothers and children and families running around. In days of old, they would all be at church, but these days, the grocery stores were equally as busy no matter the weekend
day. She couldn’t pick out broccoli or bananas or apples or oatmeal with all those people around as if today was a normal day.
Please don’t make me do it.
Funny, she’d thought that little-girl voice inside her head would go away once he was dead. Her flesh chilled suddenly, goose bumps rising along her arms beneath her jacket, and she was terrified the voice would never go away. Never, never, ever. Panic started to rise, choking her. She accidentally ran through a yellow light that had already turned to red before she’d entered the intersection, and a furious driver honked.
Let me go, get me out of here.
If she skipped the grocery store, there was only one other place she could go. The place she had to go. The person she needed to run to more than anything.
LUKE WAS REVIEWING THE BOARD MEETING MINUTES, BUT HE couldn’t keep his mind on the subject. Not after last night with Bree. He’d wanted perfection, and he’d sure as hell gotten it. He’d tried saying that the pieces of herself she gave him up to that point were enough, but now he knew they would never be enough. Last night made him thirst for more, her brilliant smile, the multiple personality that lurked beneath the facade. She was such an odd mixture of creatures, submissive yet demanding, willing to do anything he told her yet controlling every moment of the experience.
He’d called her cell phone both last night and this morning, but she’d turned it off.
She hadn’t been answering his calls since Thursday. Yet she hadn’t cancelled the date. He wondered how her father was doing this morning. Her mom. If she’d been okay without Bree last evening. What was happening at that house now? He needed to know, needed to make sure he was there for Bree the moment she needed him.
He was about to reach for the phone again when his doorbell chimed. It was probably Redfield from next door wanting to borrow the hedge trimmer or leaf blower or any other number of yard tools Redfield didn’t feel he needed to buy because Luke had them all. When he and Beth divorced, Luke kept the house and almost everything in it since she’d wanted a small condo she could manage more easily. But he went over there to fix things for her, a leaky faucet, a blocked drain. He had all the indoor tools required. Redfield borrowed those, too.
What Happens After Dark Page 11
