by Claire Adams
“Uh . . .” Jonathan appeared to be about to dispute that but thought better of it. Instead of standing there watching her, though, he started talking to me. I listened to what he was saying, but continued to watch her over his shoulder.
She somehow managed to get the bottle up and on the dispenser, without actually spilling a drop. It wasn’t the most coordinated effort to watch, but she had done it, and was now trying to hide the fact that the whole thing had left her a little winded.
Jonathan was still talking when I walked past him and over to the water cooler. I grabbed one of the cups and held it under the spigot, pressing the button for cold water. I filled it up and then offered it to Daisy.
“That was quite an effort,” I said.
“It wasn’t really.” Still, she took the cup from me and took a sip. I wanted to reach over and brush a wisp of hair from her forehead, but I restrained myself. When she finished the water, I held my hand out and took the cup, then dropped it into the trash for her.
“Thanks,” she said.
I could tell by the look on his face that Jonathan was just wishing that he had thought to do that first.
Every Wednesday evening, after I left the work, I’d drive on over to Eagle Hollow Nursing Home and Rehabilitation Center. I’d bypass the main parking lot in favor of the smaller employee lot on the side of the building, right where the window to his room looked out. He was on the second floor, which meant he’d have a great view of the car.
My car.
Well, it wasn’t actually my car, that blue ’67 Camaro. It still technically belonged to Pete. I kept the thing maintained, and I drove the hell out of it. That car was his pride and joy, perhaps the only thing he ever truly loved. And somehow, somehow, it had ended up in my hands.
I’d requested that the nurses make sure Pete be wheeled over to the window right before I’d show up every Wednesday. “He loves that car,” I told them. “And nothing would make him happier than to be able to see it, even if it is just a glimpse from a window.”
The nurses there all fawned over me; they thought it was so sweet how I visited my stepfather on a regular basis, even though he was no longer able to communicate. He’d had one stroke that left the whole left side of his body paralyzed, but it was the second stroke that had robbed him of his ability to speak.
I parked the car and walked around the side of the building, past the manicured lawn and the immaculately kept flower beds. Inside, I waved to the receptionist, said hello to some of the nurses, and made my way to the elevator. Wendy was walking down the hall and hurried over just in time to make it in before the door shut.
“Ian!” she said. “I thought that was you.”
She was saying it like she was surprised, but I knew this was an act. I’d been coming here every week for over a year now. I had fucked Wendy in the parking lot a few months ago; her shift had been ending right when I’d been leaving. She was in her mid-forties, unhappily married, her body ravaged by multiple pregnancies. She had stretch marks, loose skin, sagging breasts. She could stand to lose about fifteen pounds, and her face was average, at best. But I wasn’t the sort of guy who only fucked hot women. I knew I could probably sleep with any woman of my choosing, and I certainly had been with plenty of gorgeous ones, but I also enjoyed the occasional romp with those who you wouldn’t necessarily consider fine physical specimens. Such as Wendy. She was wise enough to know that we weren’t in love and this wasn’t going to end with some happily ever after, but she could still enjoy it. And when you sleep with someone like Wendy, who knows they’re average looking at best, they are so grateful, so appreciative, that the sex usually ends up being quite phenomenal.
“How have you been?” she asked.
“Decent,” I said. She was wearing lavender scrubs that I easily could have reached over and torn off, taken her right there in the elevator. “How are you?”
“Work has been busy. But I can’t complain. Too much, anyway.” She laughed, as though this were some sort of great joke. “Pete will be glad to see you. He’s seemed . . . I don’t know, more agitated than usual this week. It will be good for him to visit with you.”
The elevator stopped at the second floor, and the doors opened. A long, linoleum hallway stretched in front of us.
“Hmm,” I said. “I wonder what’s bothering him.”
“Well,” Wendy said, “my guess is that the anniversary of your mother’s death is coming up. Pete may not be able to communicate verbally any more, but he’s still very much aware of what is going on.”
Good. I was glad to hear it. If Pete was suffering from dementia or something, and his mind was so far gone that he had no idea who I was or no recollection of all the horrible shit he’d done to me, I probably wouldn’t be coming here. The fun was in the fact that he was the one suffering now. He was the one who was helpless to do anything about it, but just sit there and take it.
“You think he knows what date it is?” I asked as we walked down the hallway.
Wendy nodded. “Oh, absolutely. He goes down to the activity room every day, and there’s a big wall calendar where they list all the activities for that day. And sometimes he’ll be in the lounge when the news is on. I’m sure he knows what date it is.” Wendy leaned toward me, her arm brushing mine. “You might be able to help him,” she said.
“Oh yeah? How so?”
She stopped walking, so I stopped too. She looked to her left, then her right, as though making sure that no one else was walking down the hallway. When she saw that the hall was momentarily empty, she reached out and touched my arm. “Forgive him,” she said.
A look of surprise shot across my face that I tried to quickly rearrange into an expression of neutrality. Forgive him? How did she know everything that he’d done to me? Had he told her? But he’d come here after the second stroke, after he’d been unable to speak. Did he have another way of communicating that I wasn’t aware of? And: Did he really want my forgiveness?
“Now, I know Pete can’t come out and say it,” Wendy said as we resumed walking, “but it’s clear as day to me why he’s more agitated now.”
“I’m sorry, but I’m not quite following. And why am I supposed to forgive him?”
“Because he didn’t mean it.”
“He didn’t mean it. And he told you this?”
“No, of course not. But it’s almost June twenty-fourth, and that’s the day anniversary of your mother’s death, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” I said slowly, still not following.
“And I’m sure Pete feels immense guilt because of it. The cause of the fire was a cigarette, wasn’t it?”
“Yes,” I said.
“So you should forgive him. If you can find it in yourself to do so. It would give him some closure. Can you imagine having all this guilt within you, but not having an outlet for it? A way to express it? You could really help him come to terms with this.”
I nodded, feeling my shoulders relax a bit. Wendy had no clue about my childhood, that wasn’t what she was talking about at all. What she was talking about was the fact that after his first stroke, Pete was still able to smoke cigarettes, which he did, in his recliner, where he fell asleep with one still lit. The ashtray had tipped over or something, and the stack of newspapers, then the blinds, had caught on fire. The first stroke had been a minor one, so Pete had been able to get himself out, though just barely. My mother, who had fallen asleep upstairs, had not been so lucky. The living room had been right by the front door; had the layout of the house not been so, it was highly probable that Pete would not have made it out either.
Wendy must have taken my nod as a sign that I would do as she suggested; when we reached Pete’s door, she gave my arm a squeeze and said she hoped she’d see me on the way out.
“Sure thing,” I said.
Pete’s door was ajar. I knocked lightly, waited a moment, and then went in. He’d never given me the courtesy of a door knock when I’d been younger, but I wasn’t doing it out of courtesy now. Rather, I like
d to think that he knew exactly who it was when I knocked—two medium, followed by two short, sort of like the start of “The Imperial March” (aka Darth Vader’s theme song)—and then pause for a few seconds, thereby allowing a beat or two of dread to form as a precursor of my entrance.
I stepped into the room. It was medium-sized, with a twin bed, hospital style, with side rails and the ability to adjust. It was made, the tan cotton blanket tucked in tight at the corners, the pillow fluffed. There was a side table, and then two chairs for visitors to sit in. There was also a dresser with a small flat-screen TV, a few paperback books that I don’t think anyone had ever read, and a couple folded newspapers. I caught sight of myself in the full-length mirror that hung next to the dresser, and what I saw, of course, pleased me. It was a mild day out, and I was wearing a black T-shirt, fitted just enough that you could tell I was in really good fucking shape. The sleeves hugged my biceps. My jeans sat low on my hips, and were I to lift my arms high enough above my head, the bottom of my shirt would ride up just enough to give a glimpse of a very enviable V cut. My hair, which I’d kept buzzed short when I’d been in the service, had grown out maybe an inch and a half, and was slightly wavy, thus giving me a tousled bedroom look without any effort exerted on my part. I report all this not because I’m full of myself or because I even give a shit about how I look, but because my physical experienced screamed vitality and good health, and that was exactly what I wanted Pete to see.
His back was to me, because he was positioned facing the window.
“Hey there, Pete,” I said. I turned the wheelchair slightly. I could see the car out in the parking lot. “Hi, Pete,” I said again, looking straight into his face.
His mouth hung open on one side, drool periodically dribbling its way down his chin. He needed a shave. If I asked, I’m sure the nurses would have set me up with a razor and some shaving cream, but I wasn’t going to ask because I didn’t want to do Pete that kindness. I didn’t want to do him any kindness, actually, and me coming here only made him miserable. The nurses saw what they wanted; they were always exclaiming how Pete’s spirits seemed lifted for days after we had a visit, and that it was doing him a world of good that I hadn’t just forgotten about him there, the way so many other people would have.
The truth was, Pete fucking hated me, all the more now because I was healthy, able-bodied, and I was driving his car. He just had no way to express this, other than a wild shifting of his eyes that always happened whenever I first appeared in the doorway.
“I’ve had quite the day,” I said. I put my hand on his shoulder and squeezed lightly. If Wendy were to stick her head in the room right now, she’d smile because on the surface, this was the sort of picture you could put on the landing page of Eagle Hollow’s website. But really, I felt repulsed. I left my hand there for as long as I could stomach. Pete’s muscles had atrophied; he was little more than bones and soft flesh. Hard to believe that this was the same person that had kicked the shit out of me so many times. Hard to believe that it wouldn’t require much more effort than what I’d exert to wipe my ass to break Pete in half now. Just be done with it. But this was more fun, actually. Why end his suffering when I could prolong it, and make it even worse? I looked out the window, down at the car. “She’s lookin good, isn’t she? Still driving like a dream. There’s really nothing better than stepping on that accelerator and feeling the way the engine just comes to life.”
He made a gurgling sound.
“We hired a new girl at work,” I continued. I pulled over one of the chairs and sat so we were facing each other, our knees almost touching. “Annie left. Remember Annie? I told you all about her. I tried to be very specific with the details because I wanted you to know that everything you used to tell me was wrong. You remember all that shit you used to tell me? How I was a pussy, a fag, how no girl would ever look twice at me? You remember that?”
I kept my tone light as I spoke. Pete’s eyes swiveled in their sockets. “Anyway,” I said. “Wendy mentioned that you seemed kind of agitated lately. You’re probably agitated because you knew it was Wednesday and that I’d be paying you a visit, right? You probably get this feeling of dread in the pit of your stomach on Tuesday night. Maybe even earlier. Maybe it starts when you wake up Tuesday morning, and you know that the next day is Wednesday and there isn’t shit you can do about the fact that I’m going to be dropping in on you. You probably just assumed that after Mom died, you’d never have to see me again. Well, guess what, Pete? You were wrong. If you had left me the fuck alone when I was a kid, then maybe we could’ve parted ways after Mom died, or, maybe I’d come visit you like I am now, except it’d actually be because I wanted to see you, not because I hated your fucking guts. And nothing makes me happier than getting to drive up in that car of yours and knowing that you’re right here at the window, having to see the whole damn thing.”
He made a coughing sound, like something was stuck in his throat. I sat back and let the words sink in, let my very presence be an irritant that he couldn’t get rid of. What Pete had failed to realize, all those years ago when I was just a kid, was that the balance of power could shift. He had just assumed he’d always have the upper hand; he’d always be bigger, stronger. But the balance of power had indeed shifted, and I had no intention of ever letting it tilt back the other way.
Chapter Six
Daisy
Every couple of months, my mother and I would get together for coffee. We used to try to go out to a restaurant and get a meal, but we were seldom able to spend that much time together without getting into some sort of argument. Getting coffee could take as long—or as short—as you wanted, and that seemed to work out far better for the two of us.
It was a little sad, though. We both lived here in the same city—shouldn’t we be able to get together more than every few months? There were girls I’d gone to college with who were best friends with their moms. They hung out all the time, they confided in their mothers, they went shopping together or out to the movies. I wanted something similar but wasn’t sure how to go about getting it. Also, I wasn’t sure if my mother would be on board with that.
She was a formidable woman, my mother. She had a way of walking into a room that people would notice, though she wasn’t doing it for attention. She was tall, which might have had something to do with it, but it was mostly because she was incredibly self-assured. And people like that exude that sort of confidence, and it’s something that those who lack it will notice. Ian was the same way.
When I showed up to the café, my mother waved me over to the corner table she was sitting at. I ordered a mocha and then made my way over and sat down.
“Hi, Mom,” I said. “Sorry I’m late. I got held up at work.”
“Busy day at the salon?”
I was about to answer when the barista called my name. “I’ll be right back,” I said. I went over to the counter and got my drink. I could feel my mother’s eyes on me the whole time. I knew she thought I was wasting my time at the salon. Maybe she’d be glad to hear that I had a new job. I took a tiny sip of my drink and then walked back over to the table and sat down again.
“I actually started working at a new place,” I said. My mother raised her eyebrows.
“Oh?” she said. “I didn’t realize that you’d left the hair salon.”
“Yeah, I did. I was ready for a change.” I hadn’t mentioned any of that to her; I wanted to wait until I had a new job before I told her I’d left.
“I thought you were pretty happy there.”
“I was.”
“So where is this new job?”
“It’s at Hard Tail Security.”
“Hard Tail Security? What is that, exactly?”
“It’s a security firm. I’m handling the administrative work there mostly. This guy I know from the gym, Jonathan, he’s the manager there and he got me the interview.”
Mom nodded. “Does it have potential for growth?”
I nodded, even though I wasn’
t sure. “Probably,” I said. “I haven’t really talked to them about that though, since I just started. I wanted to get used to everything before I began asking about moving up.”
“What about going back to school?”
“I don’t think now’s the right time for that.”
Mom pursed her lips. A few tables over from us, a girl who was probably just a few years younger than me sat with her laptop, textbooks open on the table in front of her. She had that focused expression of someone who was deeply involved in whatever she was studying. Mom cast a sidelong glance her way and then looked at me pointedly. “You’re not getting any younger, Daisy. The longer you stay away from school, the harder it’s going to be to get back into it when you finally decide that you want to go back.”
“But what if I don’t want to go back?”
“What are you talking about? You’re going to work in offices for the rest of your life?”
“It’s a job, Mom. And there’s nothing wrong with working in offices. It’s the sort of low-stress work environment that will let me focus on my writing when I’m not there. I don’t want a job that comes home with me every night; I don’t want to work at some high-stress company.”
“How is your writing going, anyway?”
I bit my lip, not wanting to lie to her, but not wanting to admit that I hadn’t worked on anything in at least a month. Maybe more. This whole thing with Noah was just completely taking my focus away from pretty much everything else. What made things worse was the fact that she was working on a book of her own, though a nonfiction one, something about the effects of women’s empowerment on economic growth. In other words, something that I’d never write about, but there was now a rather unpleasant competitive underpinning whenever she asked me about writing.
“I’ve had a lot going on lately,” I said, purposefully not asking her about her own book, which I was sure was going swimmingly. “I’m . . . I’m thinking about moving to a new place.”
She had been about to take a sip of her coffee, but after I spoke, she put her cup down before it had the chance to reach her lips. “You’re what?” she said.
