A Curve in the Road(22)
“Is Dr. Payne here?” I ask Ruby as I rise uncomfortably to my feet on legs that still ache from the accident. “I’d like to thank him.”
“I’m sorry—he left to pick up his daughter from school. The poor little thing’s sick. I shifted a few of his morning appointments around, so I don’t expect to see him until this afternoon.”
“I see,” I reply. “Will you thank him for me when you see him?”
“I most certainly will.”
Ruby hands me a sheet of paper with instructions about Winston’s care over the next few days. Then she fastens a large plastic cone around his neck to prevent him from licking his incision. She also gives me pain pills for him and schedules a follow-up appointment for us to return in a week.
“Don’t hesitate to call if you have any concerns or questions,” Ruby says. “And I wrote Dr. Payne’s personal cell phone number on that sheet of paper as well, just in case you need to call after hours. He explicitly asked me to do that.”
“Thanks so much, Ruby. I can’t tell you how grateful we are.”
I reach under the cone, hook Winston’s leash on to his collar, and hand it to Zack. A few minutes later, we are buckled into my mother’s car with Winston in the back seat, heading home to her place for what I assume will be a quiet, somber day before the wake.
But I should know by now that life doesn’t always go the way one expects.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
My father-in-law, Lester Sedgewick, surprises all of us by arriving at my mother’s house unannounced at lunchtime, when he said on the phone that he would see us at the wake. With him is Alan’s older brother, Bruce, a car mechanic I’ve met a handful of times, and their stepmother, Verna, who is Lester’s second wife. Lester married Verna ten months after Alan’s mother passed away. According to Alan, she showed very little affection or compassion toward him or Bruce—two teenage boys who had just lost their mother and were in dire need of loving arms. To Verna, they were nothing but a couple of inconvenient add-ons she was forced to tolerate until they were old enough to move out on their own. As soon as Alan left home, that was it. She made no effort to keep in touch. He reciprocated in kind.
“My goodness. Hello.” I invite them in and hug each of them in turn, because it’s the proper thing to do. “It’s good to see you. Thank you so much for coming.”
While I say all the words one is expected to say in circumstances such as these, I try to hide the fact that I am sickened by the stench of stale cigarette smoke on their clothing.
Mom—who only met Lester and Verna once, at my wedding—walks out of the kitchen and greets them. “Hello. Welcome. I’m so sorry about Alan. We’re all just devastated.”
She hugs them as well, and we take everyone’s coats.
“When did you arrive?” Mom asks as she opens the closet door and reaches for a hanger.
“We flew from Victoria yesterday,” Lester replies in a deep, guttural voice as he glances around the foyer and peers into the living room. Without covering his mouth, he hacks out a phlegmy cough. “Lost four hours with the time difference. Now we’re all jet-lagged.”
“It’s a long trip,” I politely agree.
He didn’t call to let us know where they will be staying, so I feel a twinge of unease about their expectations. We certainly don’t have room here in my mother’s house.
“Did you book into a hotel last night?” I ask as I hang up Verna’s coat. Bruce insists on keeping his on.
“Yes, we did,” Verna replies triumphantly. “Thought we’d make a vacation out of it, so we rented a car at the airport and drove straight to the casino hotel in Halifax. What a glitzy place! They had a minibar in the room, and Bruce won a hundred and sixty dollars at the slot machines. I’m telling you, we had a ball!”
“Lucky bastard,” Lester adds with a chuckle under his breath, elbowing Bruce in the ribs and knocking him into the wall.
Bruce shoves him back. “Frig off.”
I clear my throat and try to suppress my annoyance, because everyone seems to be missing the main point, which is that Alan is dead. And yet, here is his family, celebrating Bruce’s winnings and their extravagant night in the hotel. It all feels terribly disrespectful.
“That’s wonderful,” I reply with sarcasm, which goes right over their heads. Part of me would like to hand their coats back to them and send them on their merry way, but they’re Alan’s family, and I don’t want to cause a scene or stir up conflict, which is exactly what happened the last time we visited them in BC, ten years ago.
We had flown across the country so that Zack could meet his grandfather for the first time. Unfortunately—but not surprisingly—Lester was his usual bigoted self. He said some horrendous, insensitive things about a neighbor across the street, and since Alan was tired of letting things slide, he stood up to his father for the first time.
It was a loud, ugly argument that nearly became violent, but I was proud of my husband. We had originally planned to stay a full week. We returned home after three days.
Over the years, part of me always entertained the hope that Lester might reflect upon his behavior that day and turn over a new leaf or gain some wisdom with age. I also secretly dreamed that he and Alan might bury the hatchet, but it’s too late for that now.