Chapter 34
Chapter Thirty-Four
Delilah
It takes a lot of coaxing and a healthy dose of sedation, but eventually Dad falls into a restless sleep in his hospital bed. His eyelids flutter with movement. Every once in a while, he moans or mumbles something unintelligible. It’s an improvement, I tell myself, ignoring the tubes and the monitors and the thin, scratchy hospital sheets. At least he’s not afraid anymore.
I fold myself into the recliner in the corner. A kind nurse fixed it up with a plastic pillow and a thin sheet to match Dad’s. It’s no Four Seasons, but it’s comfortable enough. I won’t be sleeping anyway, not after the night we’ve had.
They found a urinary tract infection but are waiting on blood tests to be sure it hasn’t spread to Dad’s kidneys. I fired off a text letting Roberta and Truett know what was happening, and that we’d be staying overnight at a minimum. Roberta responded saying that it wasn’t unusual for dementia patients to get them and to be extra confused as a result. Truett responded with a phone call.
A call I declined the second it appeared. Much as I hate myself for it, I know it’s for the best. Tonight showed us one thing for certain: I cannot let myself get swept up in Truett’s orbit, because it’ll be my dad who suffers if I do.
My head flops against the pillow. Its flimsy plastic cover squeaks in my ear. I swap it for my hand, propping my chin on my palm as I study my father. To be so young, he suddenly looks ancient. A complete stranger with his scraggly beard and graying hair that hangs limply against his sweat-slicked forehead. I want to brush his hair back and thread a dollop of hair cream through it, revealing the tousled starving-artist look he had before I left. My fingers itch to take a straight razor to that beard, like I might shave it off and find the father I once knew hiding beneath, patiently waiting for his chance to say, Gotcha!
A tear rolls down my cheek, dripping from my chin onto the fake leather armrest my elbow is indenting.
This wasn’t supposed to be how it went. I was supposed to come here and find answers that could finally mend my heart. It wasn’t supposed to be broken further. I certainly wasn’t meant to break someone else’s in the process.
As if on cue, my phone lights up on the mobile bedside table. Truett’s name hits me like a bullet aimed by a talented marksman. I blink rapidly, but it only spreads the tears across my vision with added vigor. By the time the phone goes dark, I’m underwater.
Time ticks by, each second punctuated by the clock on the wall by the door. Eventually my shoulders sag and I loose the breath I’d been holding. I grab the foam water cup the nurse left on the table and stand, my sheet pooling at my feet. My phone lights up again, this time with a text. I unlock it with shaky hands, but my heart is still. Braced for the blow it knows is coming.
Truett: I hope you’re getting some much needed rest. I’ll be by in the morning to check on you both. Do you need anything from home?
My teeth scrape over my bottom lip. I debate backing out of the message and powering down my phone when another comes through on the first’s heels.
Truett: You know you have your read receipts on, right?
“Shit.”
Dad stirs, rolling toward the sound of my voice with a grimace and a moan that plucks right at my heart. I hold still until he settles once more, and then take the phone and the water cup into the hall, closing the door behind me with a soft click.
Me: Sorry, it’s been hectic. We can’t have visitors, unfortunately, but thanks for offering.
Truett: I understand. I can drop them off but not stay, if you’d like. Bring some warm food for you?
Me: I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about it.
I find the nurse’s station mostly abandoned save for a woman in her midforties with long braids gathered in a knot at the nape of her neck and a stern expression aimed at the computer in front of her. When I set the cup on the counter, she glances up, that tightness melting into a gentle smile.
“Everything all right, sugar?”
“Yes, ma’am.” I offer my best smile in return, but it feels pained. I can only imagine how it looks. “I was wondering if I could refill my dad’s water cup?”
“Absolutely. It’s right this way.” She stands and navigates around the U-shaped desk to meet me where it opens into the hall. There’s another opening a few feet later, which she guides me into. It’s a hallway connected to their station from a center juncture, with a sink, some cabinets, and a water and ice machine. She pops the cup under the ice maker with one hand while retrieving a second cup from a nearby drawer. To my raised brow, she says, “We can’t have you getting dehydrated in this dry hospital air, now can we?”
I smile, more genuinely this time. “Thank you. ”
“No problem.” She hands me both cups. “I’m Judith. You call if you or your dad needs anything, okay?”
“Yes, ma’am,” I say. Then, when she glares, “Er, Judith.”
“There you go.” She shuffles toward that juncture and turns. By the time I walk back by the counter, she’s tucked back into her chair, gaze locked on the computer once more. Our moment falls by the wayside, a drop in the bucket of her day.
When my phone vibrates again, I slip both cups carefully into the crooks of my fingers on one hand and retrieve it from my pocket. He’s calling again. I watch it, forcing myself to bear witness to my undoing until his contact disappears.
Only to be replaced by a voicemail.
I laugh, but there’s no humor in it. It is not lost on me that this all started with a voicemail. And here we are, ending it all with one, too.
I can’t be what Truett needs. Hell, I can’t be what Dad needs. So what’s the point in any of this? In dragging someone along toward my own unhappy ending?
From my spot outside Dad’s door, I can barely see the corner of the nurses’ station. I anchor myself to it. A point in the distance. A reminder that what I’ve done is not the end of the world; it’s only the end of us.
I press play and drag the phone to my ear.
“Delilah, I know you’re awake. Hell, you’re probably staring at the phone as this call comes through and biting that pretty little lip of yours while you wait for me to give up and stop calling. News flash, Temptress. I’m never giving up.”
I tip my forehead into the textured wallpaper and press the foam cups against my heart. Something like ice for a fresh bruise. Only this isn’t a bruise, it’s a fucking massacre.
“You’re running, and I get it. You’re scared and feeling like you let your dad down tonight. I know because I’ve been there. But here’s the thing, Delilah. You can turn tail and run all you want, but I’m not the same scared boy you left behind nine years ago. The one who sat back and let you go without a fight. I’m all grown up. I’m the man who will come for you. Who will find you and bring you home as many times as I have to until you finally realize I’m not giving up on you.”
Sobs rack my body. Through the blur of my tears, I catch Judith peeking around the corner. Whatever she reads on my face keeps her from coming closer. I’m left alone in the hospital corridor, but I’ve never felt less lonely. Truett’s words offer comfort I haven’t earned—which is honestly the kind I struggle to accept the most—but he knows that. Knows me. And he offered it anyway.
I’m trying to see the blessing in that, but it’s so damn hard. Nothing feels clear anymore. Nothing feels guaranteed.
I lock my phone and slip it back into my pocket, then use my free hand to wipe my face clean. I take a moment to tuck this all away so I can go in there and be strong for my dad, even when I don’t feel it.
Even when I’m too afraid to let Truett be strong for me.
“I should’ve known.” I push the orange chunks around my fruit cup, searching for any remaining pineapple I might’ve missed. “How did I not see he was sick?”
Roberta sits with her chin resting on interlocked fingers, watching me thoughtfully. I’m glad she’s here, even if I feel guilty for inviting her. I told Truett we couldn’t have visitors, but really I just couldn’t handle him. Couldn’t trust myself to stay focused with him around.
A twinge of pain turns my stomach. I drop my fork.
Roberta’s gaze tracks the movement. Her eyebrows pull together. “Do you remember that night you and your dad got the stomach flu?”
“Yeah. He was a little confused, but nothing like this.”
She shakes her head. “That’s not what I mean.” Her chest rises and falls around a deep breath. She’s measuring her words carefully, which is how I know to lean in and listen closely. She nods when I do, like she’s acknowledging that I’m ready. “Think about that night. Before you went to bed, how did you feel?”
I try to think back without dwelling too much on the endless vomiting or the man who pulled my hair up when I was too weak to do it myself. I purse my lips and shrug. “I guess I felt normal. Nothing crazy or out of the ordinary.”
“Exactly.” She thumbs her nose and shrugs. “Sometimes illnesses are like that. The symptoms were so minor, if they existed at all, that your dad didn’t really have the awareness to call it out. But then it got so bad it disoriented him. It happens a lot. You had no way of knowing.”
I think of the stomachache he complained about during our card game and wince.
Roberta misses nothing. Her gaze flickers over my face, and her lips turn down at the corners in a rare frown. “Do you wanna talk about what’s really bothering you?”
A different version of me would say, Absolutely not. She’d clamp her lips shut and insist on taking care of everyone else in order to keep the spotlight off herself, even if it meant leaving her bruised and battered heart unmended. But I’m exhausted, ashamed, and more than a little desperate for comfort. And maybe Truett’s on to something, whether I like to admit it or not. Perhaps it’d be nice for someone to find me for a change. To see me, in all my brokenness, and tell me I’m not too far gone to be saved.
I may not be ready for Truett, but Roberta feels like a safe place to start.
“I couldn’t even drive my own father to the hospital because I’d been drinking.” I stare at the fruit cup. The cheap plastic table. The cuticle sticking straight up on my thumb. Anywhere but at her. “So fucking irresponsible. I’m supposed to take care of him.”
Her hand covers mine. Rings glint on every finger, a mix of silver and gold. They catch the fluorescent light as she rubs my knuckles softly. “You’re twenty-six years old, Delilah. You’re allowed to make mistakes. To be the child in the relationship. This disease takes so much. It doesn’t have to take your whole life, too. Your dad wouldn’t want that. He doesn’t. He’s told me as much, not just now but long ago when we watched Truett walk through the very same ordeal with his mama.
“You two are such good, kind children. You love your parents a whole awful lot. Anyone can see it. But Delilah…” She tilts her head to capture my gaze and offers a smile that’s meant to be reassuring. “You’ve gotta love yourself too every once in a while, you know?”
No, I don’t know. And I’m not sure how to tell her that. To make her see all the obligations, the sense of fealty that weighs on me so heavily. That in all the gaps between who I am and who I should be, I find myself lacking. Unlovable.
That it feels impossible to trust Truett to feel something for me that I can’t even feel for myself.
I clear my throat. “I should go check on him. They said he could be discharged soon.” I rise, gathering my trash in my hand. “Thanks for coming by, and for bringing the car.”
“Always. I was happy to help.” Roberta stands and reaches for my forearm, pulling my gaze to hers. “You two are family to me, Delilah. And I meant what I said that first day. I’ll be here through it all. I promise.”
It’s too early in the morning for mercy. And I’m not quite sure I deserve it, anyway.
I duck my head, studying the scuffed tile at my feet. “Thanks, Roberta. ”
She pulls me into one of her million-dollar hugs. I’m two seconds from collapsing and begging her to stay, to make all these decisions for me. To take this immovable burden from my shoulders, if only for a second so I can breathe without the weight of it compressing my lungs.
Before the words can tumble out, though, I extricate myself from her arms. Take two steps back. Breathe in, then out. I allow myself one more glimpse at the compassion in her face. File it away for a time in the future when I can look at it and believe I’m worthy. It’s not everything, or even a lot, but it’s as much hope as I’ll allow myself here in this sterile place where the reality of my father’s condition looms so much closer than it ever does at home.
“See you later.”
Her lips stretch into a feeble smile, but her gaze is strong. Determined. “Call me when you’re home.”
I wave a hand by way of response. She’s still watching me with that same intensity when I turn the corner toward the elevator and disappear from view.