All We Can Do Is Wait(63)

And then, suddenly, late in the summer, he was better. A little, anyway. The doctor told them, after they called her, elated and hopeful, that this might happen. A swell of energy, a dulling of the pain. But it did not mean her father was getting less sick.

“We’re not always sure why it happens,” she said, over the hum of the phone line. “But you should try to enjoy it.”

So, they did. They went to a game at Fenway, Morgan’s father taking the stairs to their seats very slowly, but staying awake for all nine innings. It was a perfect August night, warm and breezy, a round moon hanging high and serene in the sky, the stadium lights bright and reassuring.

Morgan drove them up to the beach in Nahant, where her father had gone swimming when he was a kid. They sat in beach chairs, two towels over her father’s legs to keep him warm in the wind. He drank a couple of cans of Coors, told Morgan a few rambling stories about his “salad days.” About meeting Morgan’s mother on that very beach, years ago, Morgan hearing a kindness toward her she had not heard in a long time.

His resurgence, his swan song, whatever it was, lasted longer than the doctors said it would. By October he was still mostly alert, still somewhat mobile. Morgan set him up in a chair on the sidewalk so he could supervise her decorating the house for Halloween, a tradition he held dear, doing the little house up in new and elaborate ways every year. It was strange to be hanging cobwebs and skeletons, all these symbols of mustiness and death, but it seemed to make him happy, so Morgan did her best to make the house look good.

“That’ll scare ’em,” her father said when Morgan was done, giving her a pat on the behind, like he used to when she was little and had done well at something—a hit in softball, a good grade, a nice homemade present for her mother.

They had a few more weeks together, Morgan coming straight home from school every day, making sure her father was comfortable, that he was warm enough, seeing if he was hungry, if he needed anything. He would wave her away, say, “Do your homework,” and they’d spend the rest of the evening in the living room, Morgan trying to focus on whatever work was in front of her, some math problem or impenetrable Shakespeare speech, but mostly worrying about her father, about how long they had left.

She did not want him to go, she was not ready for it, but she also hated not knowing, every day, if she would come home to find him dead, her hands trembling as she turned the key in the lock every afternoon, walking hesitantly into each room until she found him. “You snuck up on me!” he’d say sometimes when she discovered him, but usually he was asleep, looking small and frail in his Patriots sweatshirt, lightly snoring, the house smelling strange and sour.

The night before the bridge collapsed, Morgan brought her father dinner, setting up the TV tray so he could stay in his chair, and he ate a few spoonfuls of soup before he said, “Listen, kiddo, we have to talk.”

Morgan didn’t want to talk, not about what he wanted to, anyway. She knew a conversation like this was coming—one about funeral arrangements and what she would do after he was gone—but she was not ready for it. She would never be ready for it. But she knew they had to have the conversation someday, because she would have no idea what to do otherwise. So she nodded, said, “O.K.”

But then her father said something she hadn’t expected.

“I’m gonna do the hospice thing. You’re just a kid. You shouldn’t have to see this, to take care of me like this every day. Not after what you went through with your mother. It’s not right.”

Morgan shook her head. “No. If you go to one of those places, I’ll be alone! Is that even legal? Wouldn’t the state take me away or something? Put me in foster care?

“Only if they find out,” her father said with a shrug. “It’s gonna happen eventually anyway,” he added, giving her a little smile, its corners creased with sorrow.

Morgan stayed firm. “Well, all I know is unless you want to drive yourself there or take a cab, you’re staying here.”

He tensed up, shook his head, said, “No, no, Morgan. This is my decision, this is up to me, come on now. I want to do this. It’s the best thing. It’s what’s right.”

Morgan could see that he wouldn’t let it drop. He may have been physically weak, but he was still stubborn, was still her father. “All right,” she said, a heaviness rising in her throat. “I guess we can look into it tomorrow.”

He nodded, satisfied, and they continued eating, he more pretending to eat, really.

They watched a movie, Casino, one of her father’s favorites, and he fell asleep before Sharon Stone had her freak-out on the lawn, Morgan covering him with a blanket and turning out the light. She always wondered if she should kiss him on the forehead or something, just in case, but it was just not something they did, Morgan and her dad. There was love there, a quiet abundance of it, but it mostly went unsaid, undemonstrated. Morgan knew her father knew. And that was enough. So she went upstairs and went to bed, lying awake thinking about the next day until she drifted off into a restless sleep.

And then, the morning.

Morgan came downstairs and saw her father’s chair empty. Which wasn’t all that unusual, but he wasn’t in the bathroom either, or in the kitchen, or out on the little back porch smoking a cigarette. Morgan didn’t think he’d have gone upstairs, wasn’t sure he could even have made it upstairs, but she checked up there just in case.