All We Can Do Is Wait(64)

His bedroom was still and empty. He wasn’t in the bathroom. And he obviously wasn’t in her room. Panicked now, Morgan raced downstairs and out the front door, the decorations from Halloween still there, damp from rain, fake cobwebs billowing in the cold morning air. The car was gone. Her father had driven somewhere, even though he could barely stay awake for a half hour at a time.

She went back inside, figuring she’d call one of her father’s friends who was still on the force. They’d be able to find him, track him down, get him back home safely. But before she could get her phone, the landline in the kitchen rang, a loud, jarring sound that froze Morgan in place. That was the bad-news phone. Morgan’s dad’s friends never called, they just showed up. The phone really only rang when it was telemarketers, or, back when Morgan’s mother was still living with them, a new minor disaster had happened—it was usually some police station, giving Morgan’s father information about his wife’s whereabouts. Morgan hesitated, not wanting to know who or what was on the other end.

She answered on the fifth ring, her voice shaky as she said, “Hello?” There was a fuzz, the crackle of a not-great connection. And then she heard the familiar voice of Mike Murray, her father’s childhood friend, a police sergeant in Lynn, where her father had grown up. “Hey, Morgan, honey, it’s Uncle Mike. Listen, I need you to head up to the hospital. They’ve got your dad here. He’s . . .” The rest of what Mike said was blurry, Morgan saying, “Thank you, thank you, I’ll be right there.” She called a cab and waited out on the front stoop, her mind oddly blank. Her father had done something. Somewhere he knew she wouldn’t be the first one to find him.

When she got to the hospital, running into the emergency room in leggings and a hoodie she’d dug out of her closet (laundry had gone by the wayside in recent weeks), the one she’d stuck safety pins through during a long-gone punk phase, she saw Mike waiting for her, talking to her mom’s old co-worker, Mary Oakes. Mary had been more than a co-worker, really, she’d been a friend of the family. But when Morgan’s mom started stealing pills from the hospital, Mary had been the one to report her, saying it was for her own good. “A real stickler for the rules,” Morgan’s father had called her.

Mike gave Morgan a hug, looking weary and sad. “Where is he?” Morgan asked, pulling away from Mike and knowing from the expression on his face, before he said it, that her father was gone.

“He took some of his pain pills, honey. Drove up to Nahant, must have been early this morning, parked by the water. Trooper found him about an hour ago. They tried to get him back in the ambulance, but he was already gone. There was nothing they could do, honey, there was nothing they could do.”

Mary nodded, her eyes glistening. “They tried, Morgan. I promise they tried.”

“I know, I know,” Morgan said, instinctively giving Mary a hug, to reassure her as much as herself. “I know, I know.” She said it over and over again, not knowing what else to do.

“I don’t . . .” she started. She had no idea what came next. Were there arrangements? Had her father left any instructions?

“There was this,” Mike said, reaching into his coat pocket and pulling out an envelope, legal-sized, most likely from the desk in the corner of her dad’s bedroom, largely untouched since Morgan’s mother left. Mike handed the envelope to Morgan. Her name was written on the front in her father’s wobbly script. She wondered when he’d written it. How long he’d planned on doing this. If the discussion about the hospice the night before was just a test, to see if she’d agree to send him on his way. She was angry at her father, that he left without saying goodbye. But she also, in a way she didn’t quite understand, felt glad for him. Or, at least, relieved.

She hated the thought of him dead in his car, but it was good at least that he’d been somewhere he loved when it happened, looking out at the water, hearing the seagulls, smelling the salty air. It was peaceful, in a way that dying in the house maybe wasn’t. And now it was done. He’d decided it for both of them, the final thing he could do for Morgan. She hadn’t been the one to find him, as she had so often feared. She put the envelope in her bag, unsure when she would, or could, read it.

“I don’t . . .” Morgan said again. Mike put an arm around her. “I’ll help you with all the paperwork. And then, we’ll, well, we’ll figure the rest out when we can.”

Morgan said thank you. She turned to Mary. “Can I see him?”

Mary looked to Mike, then back at Morgan. She gave her a quick nod. “Of course. He’s . . . he’s downstairs. I’ll take you.” Mike gave her another hug, and Morgan turned to follow Mary further into the hospital.

Mary led her downstairs and into a small room, where Morgan’s father, a sheet covering most of his body, was lying on a table. Morgan found herself worrying that he was cold and almost asked for a blanket. She walked up to the table, stared down at her father. It was his familiar face, but there was something different about it. A distance, a dimness. He was gone.

She began to cry. “Oh, Dad . . .” she said, her voice cracking, the sobs now coming in big heaves. She felt a hand on her back, and there was Mary, giving her a sympathetic look. Morgan turned and hugged her, crying into her blazer, Mary stroking her hair, saying, “I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”