Homesick

him?”

Mr. Stutz solemnly nodded.

“He was a prince of a fellow,” declared one of them with fervour. That seemed to sum up, exhaust all that there was to say.

Murmuring agreement they filed out, stumbling hard upon one another’s heels in their haste to quit the room.

Mr. Stutz was sadly, dutifully resigned to this business of dying. When Alec was both conscious and quiet, Stutz would draw back the blankets on his bed, hike up his hospital gown, take his penis delicately between thumb and forefinger, aim it into the neck of a plastic flask, and patiently wait for the trickle. If he wasn’t given the opportunity to frequently relieve himself, the old man would wet the bed. During his “spells,” when he tore at the I.V. tube, jerked his head from side to side, kicked and tangled the sheets about his legs, and cried out unintelligibly, Mr. Stutz pinned him to the mattress, leaned his face close to the old man’s ear, and advised him in a whisper, “Don’t you fight it now, Alec. Let it be. Let it come,” until he grew quiet again.

In the course of Vera’s and Daniel’s vigils these upsets were uncommon, and, if they did occur, were much milder. Stutz told them they were lucky the old man kept banking hours. Daniel dreaded having to sit with the old man, feared his “spells,” feared even more that it would be his bad luck to have him die when they were alone together. He had never seen anyone die and didn’t intend to if he could help it. Once, when he was offering lame excuses as to why he couldn’t take his shift – something about decorating the gym for a dance – Vera nearly told him he needn’t worry, most people didn’t die in the evening. She had read that somewhere, or heard it, she couldn’t recall. Something made people hold out through the dark hours. It was in the morning they gave up the ghost, in the light, at the end of their strength. But Vera caught herself in time and didn’t make the observation.

No one had come right out and said it yet, that her father was dying, and she didn’t know how Daniel would take to hearing it, especially coming from her. When he said, “I thought it was the nurses’ job to look after sick people,” Vera replied, “It is. But they can’t be with him every minute. I know it’s not easy for you but it has to be done and there’s no one else to do it but us, the family. This is part of being a family. Take your school books and study. If he gets bad, call a nurse. If you occupy your mind you won’t think of it, you won’t feel so bad.”

This was Vera’s tactic. She wasn’t sure she had anything to feel, but if she had, she didn’t want to turn it loose now, let it run wild when it might interfere with what needed to be done. At present she had to be cool and calm. But it wasn’t easy. She was finding how much turned on the smallest, most insignificant things. Take teeth. The nurses had removed her father’s dentures and now she didn’t quite feel the same about him as she had before. His sunken mouth made him look weak, frail, pitiable. Not much of an enemy. Robbed of those big, white, aggressive teeth he was a less domineering figure. It seemed the wall she had been pushing against all her life was giving way, collapsing before her very eyes.

Vera was out of his hands and he was into hers. He would be sure to hate that if he knew. If he had to be in anybody’s hands he would have wished to rest in Earl’s. Earl was the one he trusted, loved. Earl was who he had turned to for comfort when their mother died. It was Earl he went riding with through the night. Earl the weakling. There, she had put a name to him. Her brother was a weakling and because of his weakness it had fallen to her to try and stop it. There was another reason that had led her to interfere. Jealousy. Why was Earl his choice to ride with? Didn’t he realize it was she who was capable of riding through anything? The two of them could have swept through the darkness at any speed, invincible. Faster? You’re goddamn right faster. As fast as you like.

It was ironic that the punishment which was intended for her had become her father’s. If he hadn’t refused to give her Earl’s address, her brother could be summoned home now. And Earl ought to be home because death in Connaught was a family business. It was what people always said with hushed voices: They had a death in the family.

Mr. Stutz wanted to pick Vera up each night at The Bluebird and deliver her to the hospital but she preferred to walk. Vera said if he wished to make himself useful he could see Daniel safely home and ease her mind that way. Which Mr. Stutz was only too willing to do. Anything to oblige. Each night she could see his vehicle in the deserted parking lot, waiting to carry Daniel home when she relieved him at half-past eleven. Vera never crossed the lot to say hello. The best Stutz got was a casual wave from under the fan light above the main entrance to the hospital. Vera had concluded that any and all encouragement of Mr. Stutz was to be devoutly avoided.

It wasn’t just to prevent finding herself alone with him that Vera refused a nightly ride, the walk provided her with a rare opportunity to think. She had plenty to think about. Vera pondered what she might say to Daniel in his present obvious misery, what words might help him to accept what was happening to the old man, happening to them all. But she dismissed every possibility. Her own hard experience had taught her there was nothing to say. The few people who had tried to speak to her after Stanley died had not succeeded in comforting her. Their words were inadequate. Now what they had had to say seemed merely clumsy. The same words, but perspective had changed their meaning. Something like that was happening to her at the moment. The whole story of her life was rearranging itself.

The wind of the previous Saturday had recently returned, a little less savage but more persistent and enduring, and for several nights Vera had had to brave it on her way to the hospital. A cold, stinging wind, it brought winter if not snow. Each night froze harder than the last. The dirt of the roadways thudded under her heels; even the dust seemed to have turned hard as iron filings. Vera stepped in a puddle in the dark and the ice crackled so explosively she nearly jumped clean out of her skin.

By the fourth day of her father’s hospitalization the constant wind had swept every trace of cloud beyond the horizon and the night skies appeared black and infinite, tiny distant stars showing like a scattering of salt grains. After a fifteen-minute walk Vera’s cheeks were burning and her eyes red and streaming with tears so that she looked as if she had been weeping for days. The matronly nurse on the desk noted all this when Vera checked in and shot her a sympathetic smile.

As usual, before sending Daniel home, Vera cautioned him to be sure to lock the door and go straight to bed. However, unlike other nights, he seemed in no hurry to quit the hospital. He hung in the doorway of his grandfather’s sickroom, tracing and retracing the shape of a floor tile with the toe of his runner.

“Stutz is waiting,” Vera reminded him.

Daniel drew in the last side of the square tile with the tip of his shoe, closing it, and lifted his face to his mother. “I was wondering…” he said hesitantly. “Do you think he can hear us talking when he’s like that?”

“You mean when he’s unconscious?”

Daniel returned his eyes to the tile. “Yeah, unconscious.” He took a deep breath. “Do you think maybe he can hear us?”

“I doubt it,” said Vera. “Why do you ask?”

“I was just wondering.”

“Why were you wondering?”

Daniel did not reply.

“Did you say something around him you wouldn’t want him to hear?”

Daniel glanced up at her. “No,” he said definitely.

Another possibility came to mind. “Is there something maybe you wanted him to hear you saying? Is that it?”

Daniel bit down hard on his lower lip, shifted his weight back and forth uneasily. When he felt he could trust himself, he began. “There was something he asked me to do for him. Something he thought was pretty important. I needed to tell him I would do it, just like he asked -” Daniel broke off, shrugging his shoulders. A moment later he straightened himself up and gave his mother an uncertain look. “So I did it this afternoon. I promised. Promised him I’d do it, just like he wanted.”

“Then it’s all right, isn’t it?” said Vera gently. “You took care of it. You did all you could, right?”

“If you’d like,” he said, “I could stay on tonight. Then there’d be two of us. It can’t be any fun sitting here by yourself all night.”

“And what about school tomorrow morning?” said Vera, struggling to hide how his offer had touched her.

“I missed school for him once,” Daniel confessed abruptly. “We did the garden.”

“It was very nice of you to volunteer to stay with me,” said Vera, “but I think you’ve had enough of this place for one day. And you need your rest.”

“I just thought maybe you’d want the company. It can’t be any fun sitting here by yourself all night,” he repeated lamely.