Chapter Thirty-Nine
My mother’s eyes go wide. My father squints like he can’t quite make out what I’m holding.
“It’s Sylvia’s,” I say. “She gave it to me.”
Marcella gasps. My father does not shift his gaze from my hand.
“We have it now,” I say.
“I can’t believe this,” my mother says. She is still stuck on Sylvia, on her mother, on this folded story, tucked away.
“All this time,” Marcella says. “She never said anything.”
“The question is just how far back we’ll need to go. What did the doctor say? We can’t put a stent in now but maybe ten years ago? Twelve? What do you think?” I look between them.
I see my mother blink at me and then something settles over her face. I don’t want to read it, don’t want to recognize it, and so I turn to my father.
His face is more set, more stoic.
“Dad,” I say. “Say something.”
He shakes his head. “Honey,” he says. He looks to me. I see it all there, right in his eyes. “No.”
“You heard me,” I say. “I have this.”
Dave exhales lightly. “We can’t use it.”
I think for a moment that they don’t understand, that they think that it won’t work, that the ticket is meant for Sylvia alone. “It’ll work,” I say. “I can feel it. You’re going to die if we don’t.”
“Listen to her,” Marcella says.
Dave and she lock eyes, and he says everything he can’t out loud to her. I don’t know what he is saying, but I know she understands it all. She blinks away from him, steadies herself with a breath.
“You’ll do the surgery,” my mother says. “It won’t be fun but they’ve advanced the technology. It’ll buy us more time.”
“What?” I turn on her. “You can’t be serious.”
“I’m not doing the surgery,” Dave says. “You heard the doctor, I’m not a good candidate.”
“Dad!”
I look between them. I feel like a ghost, like I’m from the future or the past and they can’t see me. Here I am, trying to change the course of history, with the ability to do it, but they can’t hear my shouts. All they feel is a cool, unusual presence.
“What are you guys talking about?” I say. “Didn’t you hear me?”
When I was little—seven or eight—I remember getting lost in the ocean.
We were out at Point Dume and a big set came in, bigger than we were anticipating.
Dad would always make me wear the surf leash.
In the early years—before six, maybe—we’d share a board.
But as I got older we’d take two out. Mine wasn’t long—I still wouldn’t have been able to carry it—but it was a real board.
Dad always taught me the importance of the ankle leash.
“For one thing, your board can never go missing,” he said. “And for another, neither can you.”
Stray boards could knock a surfer unconscious, but a leash prevented a lot of foreseeable accidents. We always strapped in.
I wiped out farther in—I had caught the last wave of the set and rode it high. I turned back to Dad, hoping to see him cheering, or maybe falling off in the water near me, but he was nowhere in sight.
I paddled back out. The waves were choppy. I kept trying to ride over them at the right time, but it was hard. I had to duck under as I swam farther out.
“Dad?” I called.
No one was out there. It had been a late morning; maybe I was off from school, I don’t remember. Everyone else had turned in hours ago.
I scanned the horizon—nothing. Another wave came, and as I inhaled I saw a small patch of color about five yards to my left.
The wave passed; I sputtered to the surface and started swimming hard.
Paddle, don’t scream; paddle, don’t scream.
I found him, knocked nearly unconscious, his board gone, getting jostled in the waves like a piece of stray clothing.
“Dad!”
I wasn’t a small kid, but I wasn’t a big one, either, and I couldn’t lift him. I was too young. I put his arms over my board, and I held his side as I tried to swim us in.
“Come on, Dad,” I said. “Hold on.”
I brought him to shore that way. It was the most herculean act of strength I’d ever mustered, and have mustered since. I saved his life.
When we finally got to the sand, he was coming to. We collapsed down, side by side, the water still at our feet, licking up our legs.
I tried to catch my breath—big, heaving inhales and exhales. I knew I had to go get Mom. I knew we had to call a doctor. But I couldn’t move. All the strength I’d had I used to bring him in. I was clear out.
And then Marcella came down the beach. We were farther from our house than I’d realized—she ran at a clip. She reached us breathless. Somehow, she had known. Or, more probably: She was always watching.
“What happened?”
“Dad got knocked out,” I said. I sat up. I saw that blood was running down his face from his temple. He blinked at us. Slowly. We held our breath.
And then he smiled. And I remember that smile righting the whole world. I remember that smile setting us back on our feet, back in the world.
“What’s all the fuss about?” he asked. “Something happen?”
My mom shoved him. We walked back to the house—Dad limping, my arms shaking, carrying the board tucked to my side.
“You didn’t wear a leash,” I told him as we climbed the stairs.
“And now you see why we should,” he said.
From the hospital bed Dad looks almost himself.
His color is faded and he looks tired, hair flat on top.
But his weight is good, his shoulders broad.
It’s impossible to think that something is happening inside of him that we can stop and won’t.
I say it to him the only way I know he’ll understand, the way he has to.
“Let me put your leash on,” I say. “Please.”
I see his eyes soften. His hand winds out of the blankets, and he reaches for my open palm. There are wires coming out of his fingers, and his hands are cold—colder than I remember—but they warm as soon as I cover his with both of mine.
“Daddy,” I say. “There’s so much still ahead.”
He squeezes my hand and clears his throat. Marcella turns toward the windows. I can see how much anger is still in her, how much she’s struggling with.
“We can’t go back,” he says.
I make a move to respond, but he holds my hand tightly. Not yet.
“For so many reasons. We’d still end up here.”
“No we wouldn’t,” I say. “We’d put the stent in. It could buy us a decade.”
“But what about the decade we’ve already had?” His voice grows loud. It sounds, in this hospital room, almost booming. “I don’t want to take it back. I loved that decade. I loved my life.”
I look to Marcella, but her back is still to us. I see, from her reflection, that she is crying.
“We had all that time,” he says. “We spent it.”
“So let’s spend it again.”
“We can’t,” he says.
“Why?”
His face softens. He delivers the next part gently.
“Because,” he says. “You wouldn’t have Leo.”
Leo. Suddenly he rushes into frame, and then he’s all I can see.
Our first meeting, almost five years ago on the beach in Santa Monica.
Bowling on one of our early dates at Highland Park Bowl, me getting three strikes in a row, even though I hadn’t bowled since childhood.
Our engagement. Our wedding in Malibu. Leo cooking short ribs in the kitchen, the bungalow filling with smoke from a forgotten head of cauliflower in the oven.
Director equipment all over the dining table, boxes of unfiled mail.
His shoes by the door scattered like leaves.
Morning coffee and walks to Kings Road Café and his arms—wide and warm and beating with life.
Leo.
I look at my dad. And in him I see it, too.
I see our first paddle out, barely three years old, eyes red with sea water.
I see afternoons at school, running to his Toyota, knowing there would always be a chocolate chip cookie from Emil’s.
I see homework in the living room and trips to the Country Mart for fresh wax and turkey sandwiches and dinners on the deck—white wine late into the night.
I see volleyball games out of state and Dad at the airport Starbucks, taking every kid’s order. I see our mornings and midnights.
I see our moments like heartbeats. Next and next and next.
How can I choose? My father and my husband.
“Dad,” I tell him. “I can’t lose you.”
From on top of the hospital blankets he squeezes my hand. “Lauren,” he says. He looks into my eyes.
My dear papa, my dad.
“You never will.”