Dan’s eyebrows lifted high over his forehead as he walked slowly into his room, as though he was reluctant, or didn’t trust her to mean what she said.
“Daniel, show Kathleen where the bathroom is, and where to find the towels.” She fussed at the doorway, glancing up and down the hall like she was looking for something. “I’ll start the tea—but no pressure to come down for a cup. You must be tired, do as you please.”
Eleanor strolled into the room and gripped me by the shoulders, placing a kiss on my cheek. “If I don’t see you before you go to bed, sleep tight.” Then she turned to Dan and did the same, reaching for the doorknob as she left, and pulled the door shut behind her.
I stared at the closed door for a moment, then looked to Dan. “I like your mom.”
“Yeah. I like her, too.” He smiled, then frowned, his gaze moving over me. “I want to ask if you’re okay, but I don’t want to keep asking if you’re okay. So I’m gonna limit myself to asking once every six hours.”
Huffing a laugh at that, I walked to the bed and sat, placing my elbows on my knees and my head in my hands. “I don’t know what I am.”
I felt the bed depress as he sat next to me, his hand coming to my back and moving in slow, massaging circles. “You be whatever you want to be. Good cop, bad cop, I’ll be here to role-play whichever part you need.”
That made me laugh and I turned, tucking myself under his neck, and wrapped my arms around his chest while he encircled me and held tight.
“I’m sad,” I said.
He sighed. “That seems normal.”
“Is it? Because I don’t have one good memory of my father.”
“Now that is sad. My dad wasn’t around much, and he might be a sonofabitch, but I got a handful of good memories with the guy.”
“I don’t know why I cried, at the hospital.”
“My mother has that effect on people. She’s like a Hallmark commercial that way.”
I shook my head at him, adding, “Mostly, all I feel is acceptance.”
“Acceptance?”
I nodded, not really understanding it myself. “This was inevitable. He’s been sick for years. He hasn’t recognized me for years. And, even before that, he never really knew me. And maybe I didn’t know him. So I am sad, but mostly about that . . . I think.” I shook my head, blinking away the image of my father hooked up to all those machines—or the shell of him—and rubbed my forehead. “I’m not making any sense.”
“You don’t have to make sense.” Dan guided me to his chest as he lay us back on the bed. “Your father is dying. If there were ever a time in your life to make no sense, now is the time.”
I stared at the ceiling of Dan’s room, also covered in posters, looking but not seeing. “It’s so strange.”
“What’s that?”
“My mother doesn’t speak. When I visit her, she stares at nothing. But I’ve always felt—” my voice broke, so I swallowed and cleared my throat before continuing. “I’ve always felt she knows I’m there. That’s she’s locked inside herself, but she knows when I come to visit. She can’t speak to me, but she can hear me. But my father, he never heard me. Even when he was well, he could see me, but he never looked.”
Dan was quiet for a moment, then asked, “How often do you visit your mom?”
“Every time I’m in town, so usually twice a month.”
We were quiet for a moment, Dan stroking his hand up and down my arm. “Can I come with you?”
“Yes. Absolutely.” I lifted to my elbow, gazing down at him, feeling a rush of warmth that he’d want to come with me. “We’ll—we’ll go next week.” Or maybe the week after.
Tomorrow they take him off life support. He’ll be gone next week.
I didn’t look forward to telling my mother about my dad, and I’d have to talk to her doctor’s first. I’d need their input before sharing the news of his death. I knew that in a way, in the way that mattered, he was already gone. He’d been slipping away even before that.
Dan nodded, his fingers moving into my hair to push it away from my face while his stare turned introspective. “Things are going to be tough for the next few weeks.”
“That’s okay. I can handle it.”
His mouth curved subtly while his gaze moved over me, his eyes warm. “I know. You’re tough. It’s one of the things I like and admire most about you. But know I’m here for you. I want to handle some of it.”
I studied him, unable to stop myself from wondering how much more it would take—how much more drama, how much more of my dysfunction and baggage—before he threw his hands up in the air and walked away.