River Bodies (Northampton County #1)(73)

Jackie turned around. Her face was puffy and tired. She hadn’t slept more than a few hours the night before, and still she managed a smile.

“I just got off the phone with your mother,” she said. “She’s going to catch the next flight out.”

“Oh.” It was all Becca could say. Her mind tried to catch up to the ache inside her heart. “Oh,” she said again. She wanted her mother to come. She wanted her here.

“He doesn’t have much time left.” Jackie was struggling. Her face showed how hard she was trying to hold back her emotions. “You should probably go up and be with him.”

“I’m not too late,” she said with such relief that she wrapped her arms around Jackie and hugged her. She’d never offered any kind of affection to any of her father’s lady friends, but the woman in front of her was so much more. She wondered if her father knew how lucky he was to have not only Becca’s mother but also Jackie, two good women in his life.

“You better go,” Jackie said. “Spend this time with him.” She held Becca’s hands. “And if there’s anything you have to say, you say it to him now. Don’t wait. You may not get a second chance.”

“Okay.” She turned to go, paused, then turned back around. “How do you know?” she asked. “How do you know it’s the end?” She thought of her father’s behavior since she’d arrived: one day he was strong and lucid, the next weak and confused. Perhaps the better days had been more of an effort for him than she’d realized, his strong will coming and going in flashes, offering glimpses of the father she’d remembered from childhood.

“Oh, honey,” Jackie said. “The signs have been there all along. You should know that. I would imagine it’s the same with the animals you treat.”

Becca nodded. “In ways, I guess it is. In other ways, it isn’t.”

Jackie filled the teapot with water and put it on the stove. “When your dad started asking for you to come home, I knew it was close. You see, when a person knows they’re dying, they want to be surrounded by their loved ones.”

“Did he ever ask for my mother?” She didn’t want to hurt Jackie’s feelings, but the child inside of Becca wanted to know. No matter what he’d done, she’d always wanted to believe that he’d loved her mother.

“Oh, yes, he asked your mother to come home too.”

“I’m sorry. That must’ve been hard for you.”

“No, don’t be sorry. I understand. They were married a long time. They share you. And besides, your mother is truly a lovely person. We’ve talked a lot on the phone in the last few months.”

Becca knew they’d talked, but it almost sounded as though Jackie and her mother had become friends.

Jackie continued. “Your mother thought it was best if she stayed away and gave you and your dad some time to be alone together. She wanted the two of you to work things out without her relationship with him interfering. She thinks it interfered enough.”

“And she told you all of this?”

“Yes. She wanted me to call her when the time came,” she said. “But, Becca, it’s you he’s been asking for all this time. You’re the one he wants with him. Go to him and say what you need to say before it’s too late.”

She nodded or thought she might’ve nodded. She wasn’t sure. She turned to go, each step feeling heavier and heavier as she made her way up the stairs and down the hall. More than anything, she wanted her mother here, but she understood her mother’s reasons.

Becca pushed the bedroom door open. Her father’s eyes were closed. His breathing was slow. She stood in the doorway watching him. Sometimes there were long pauses between his breaths.

She walked into the room. The smells of antiseptic and sickness were still there, but there was something more, a weight to the air that hadn’t been there yesterday. She looked over her shoulder, certain she would see a dark figure of some sort, of death, at the door. It was everywhere, the sense of the end settling into the cracks and crevices, filling the space around her.

She pulled the chair close to the bed and sat. “Dad,” she said. She didn’t know if he could hear her, but he must have, because after a few seconds, he opened his eyes. He blinked.

“Becca.” He said her name as though it had taken a lot of effort.

She slipped her hand into his. His skin was paper thin and cool and bluish in color.

“I need to talk to you,” he said, each word coming out thick and slow.

“Take your time. I’m not going anywhere.”

His eyebrows furrowed as though he was angry, his expression a ghost of what it had once been. Becca watched his face and waited.

He coughed and tried to swallow.

She picked up the cup of water from the tray on the nightstand and put the bendy straw to his lips. Helping him drink and eat had been so strange, so foreign a few days ago, but today she felt more at ease with the intimacy. It was hard to stay angry with someone who couldn’t bring a cup of water to his lips when he was thirsty. Although the anger was still there, it was just that she’d set it aside, no longer giving in to its shape and form.

He didn’t even try to sip the water. She put the cup back onto the tray and looked at her hands in her lap.

“Is he a good man?” he asked and coughed. “Jackie told me.”