5. Jo
Chapter 5
Jo
Second Year of Medical School
11 Years Ago, September
T he truck door slams and I take off running towards him. His blue flannel is cuffed at the sleeves.
“Dad!”
Six months away from home feels like an entire lifetime, especially with the blood, sweat, and tears of medical school. His arms envelop me, tight and warm, and my heart soars.
“Hi, honey,” he whispers into the side of my head and I rest my chin on his shoulder, tears accumulating silently behind my eyelids. For as long as I can remember, I’ve always cried around my dad. When he arrives. When he leaves.
When I leave.
When I think about leaving.
When I think about him leaving.
Recently, it’s been worse. The cancer diagnosis, though it’s now been over a year, has me on edge. His oncologist says remission is on the horizon, but I just can’t shake the feeling that time is running out.
And here I am, not even making time to see him but twice a year.
I’ll accept the worst daughter award now.
“How was the drive?” Dad releases me from his grasp and I’m interrupted by an outbreak of muffled barks from the backseat. “No way!” I exclaim, yanking the door handle. Her cold, wet nose immediately makes contact with my face. “Hi, Charlie girl!” I gather her in my arms as she drags her stinky dog tongue along the side of my face.
Gross, yet completely welcomed.
“You can’t keep her.” Dad closes the door with a gentle push. “No matter what your mother says.” He chuckles, rounding the truck to grab his bag. Charlie calms herself just enough and settles into my hold before deciding she’s had enough of me. She shimmies out of my arms and lands with a thud, taking off towards Dad. He appears again, a duffle in one hand and Charlie’s leash in the other.
“Alright, kid, I’m starving. What’s for dinner?” Charlie trots alongside us as we approach my apartment. Of one thing I am certain: he’s not actually hungry, but he knows I am.
It’s something I’ve never understood about him. He’s never been a food guy. Some people eat for enjoyment and some people eat to sustain life. Leo Carello is one thousand percent in the latter group. I, however, fall into the first.
I push open the unlocked front door to reveal the spread I’ve spent the last six hours on. A table’s worth of food fit for a king. Dad shakes his head, scanning the countertop. “Where’d you learn to cook like this?” he asks curiously. “And if you say YouTube, I will get my ass in the truck and drive right back home.”
“No, I’m just incredibly talented like my father.” I smirk, grabbing a bowl from the open shelving on the wall and filling it with water. Do not tell him I used the internet. He can live in stubborn, ignorant bliss. He picks up a cracker and nibbles at the corner, watching as I kneel down to meet Charlie. She immediately starts lapping up water, her floppy ears falling right into the bowl with a splash.
“Did you bring her ear drops?” I glance up at Dad, who is now picking at a piece of salami on the charcuterie board and nodding silently. He brings a piece of cheese to his mouth and chews slowly, settling down into one of the three counter-height stools.
“Good luck getting her to sit still for those…” He chuckles. “She’s a menace, just like you were.”
“That was one time .” We don’t need to talk about the time they had to straightjacket me for my routine shots. I still remember the sound the blue vinyl made while they velcroed me in. “I’m pretty sure that’s illegal now, father .”
“Eh, you turned out okay,” he shrugs, staring vacantly out the small kitchen window. The chime of my phone’s ringtone startles him out of the daze, and he slides it towards me where I stand at the edge of the kitchen island. I glance down at the phone. A photo of Isaac and me illuminates the screen—a night maybe six months ago. My tongue is purple-red from the wine we were drunk on. He’s throwing up his signature peace sign. He says it’s to be ironic, but I think he just loves it.
“Oh, it’s just Isaac. I’ll call him back later.” I press the side button on my phone to silence the ringer and stuff it into the back pocket of my light wash jeans. Almost immediately, the muffled ringtone begins again.
“It’s okay, honey, you can answer him.” I huff, yanking the phone out of my pocket and pressing it to my ear.
“Hello?”
“Jo, I’m so sorry. I know your dad is there and I didn’t want to bother you, but my car won’t start.” I squeeze my eyes shut as he speaks, panicked and rushed. “I have work in the morning and I don’t know what to do. Could you drive me?”
Dad must hear Isaac’s anxious replies. He stands from the stool and gathers his keys and flannel. I shoot him an inquisitive stare, raising my eyebrows. Isaac’s voice continues uninterrupted on the other end of the line, but I’m only focused on Dad.
“Let’s go,” he mouths silently, nodding his head toward the door, and I already know Leo is about to save the day.
“Isaac.” His scattered bumbling comes to a halt with my utterance of his name. “I think we’re coming over?” I shrug, as if he can see me through the phone. I end the call before he can respond and follow Dad out the front door. “Be a good girl, Charlie. We’ll be right back!” Her tail wags in response, and I close the door just as she finds a spot on the living room carpet for her late afternoon nap.
The drive to Isaac’s apartment is less than five minutes, but I’m silent nearly the entire way, only speaking to give directions. Dad and Isaac have never met, though they’ve both heard enough about each other to skip awkward introductions.
What if they hate each other?
The truck slows to a stop at the curb. Isaac is standing, hands on his hips, peering under the hood of his beat-up hatchback. Based on the amount of knowledge I know he has about cars, I’d bet he couldn’t even identify one of the items he’s gazing so intently towards.
“Grab my tool box out of the back.” Dad means business, pushing open the door and stepping down right onto the asphalt, bypassing the running board completely. Okay, he definitely means business. I watch as he strides confidently towards Isaac, pausing to see how my friend responds. I can’t help but smile when Isaac extends his hand to shake, but Dad side steps and pulls him into a tight embrace. The moment of hesitation before Isaac returns the hug is apparent, even from a distance. I grab the tool box as instructed, lifting the tailgate back to its closed position.
As I approach my two favorite men and their conversation comes within ear shot, I already know these two together are going to be a giant pain in my ass.
“I’ll grab my speaker,” Isaac responds to Dad, turning and bouncing up the stairs to his second-floor apartment. I set the red Craftsman toolbox down on the concrete driveway next to the front bumper and peer under the hood. Dad pulls a flashlight out from his breast pocket and flips it on, examining each part of the engine. Cars are not unlike the human body. Each individual component has its own job as part of a larger network, and when one constituent fails to do its job, the whole system suffers.
I like to think of Dad as a car doctor. And one day, I’ll be a human doctor.
The family business.
“Well hell, these battery terminals are corroded,” Dad mutters, glancing up as Isaac descends the stairs towards us. “Go get me some baking soda and a glass of water, son. I have junk rags in my truck.”
Isaac nods, setting down the speaker and pulling his phone out of his pocket before turning back around.
Full. Stop.
Son? Excuse me? Son?
The opening notes to “Hotel California” fall from the speaker, and I watch as Isaac glances back at Dad, who promptly throws him a thumbs up.
What the fuck is happening right now?
I make myself useful while my brain goes into overdrive, grabbing a stack of spare rags from the trunk of the truck. Cut up t-shirts and old dish rags from the kitchen whose first life purpose was fulfilled.
“Thanks, honey,” Dad says, taking the rags from my hand. Isaac comes into view at the top of the wooden staircase, balancing two boxes of baking soda and a glass of water filled to the absolute brim.
Dad moves around the car with ease, kneeling down next to his tool box and rummaging through the top layer of equipment. He pulls out a small red and black rectangle. I’ve seen him use it many times before to test batteries. Isaac kneels down next to Dad, setting down his materials.
“Do you know what this is?” he asks, pressing and holding the power button.
“Yes.” Of course I do.
“No,” Isaac answers, his voice overpowering mine just enough to make my cheeks flush.
They both look up at me, mouths agape.
“Oh, sorry.” Well, I will just see myself out.
Dad continues to explain the workings of his multimeter and how they will test the battery. It’s a routine I’ve seen a million times.
“The battery seems okay. Hopefully a cleaning will do, but if not, we might need to run to the store to replace the terminals.” Isaac nods, listening intently to every word coming out of my father’s mouth. Far more concentration than I’ve ever seen him use, even during our hardest exams.
Watching them together is surreal. Leo Carello has always been an incredible girl dad. Barbies and gymnastics. Sidewalk chalk and the swing set he built for us. Makeup and fashion shows in the living room. But he was never quiet about the fact that he wanted a son and only got two sassy daughters. A pang of pain hits just under my sternum thinking about our family name ending with Chloe and me.
“Jo, honey?” My eyes find him from where I’m seated on the curb. “We need to go to the autopart store.” Isaac’s gaze is locked on me in my periphery. I don’t even need to look at him to know. “Do you want to come with us?”
“Or you could stay here,” Isaac chimes in, wiping grease from his hands with a scrap of my old t-shirt. I’m almost unable to make out the faces of the boy band I once loved, but I know they’re there. Remnants of a person I used to be. “Up to you,” he adds, taking a hint from my dramatic eye roll. Seeing Dad and Isaac together, bonding like old pals, has my stomach doing backflips like an Olympic gymnast.
“Yeah, that’s fine. You guys go.” I want Dad to like him. To love him like I do.
“The door’s unlocked,” Isaac adds, dropping the hood of his car with a startling clunk.
I trudge up the stairs to the apartment that holds so many hours of study time, turning back only for a moment to see Dad’s truck pull away from the curb and start down the street.