Chapter 11 Cecily #2
I glare at her traitorous face. She knows this marriage was an accident.
She knows we plan to get an annulment today.
I told her on the phone on Saturday at the pool, sitting beside Dom, and then again last night when she called, after she knew I'd returned from Vegas. "It's just a party. Who cares?"
My dad has always thought of Kerrigan as agreeable, but that's not accurate. She is a peacekeeper, someone who flits around on the periphery of family strife, managing emotions.
Duke sighs. "Can you please choose the easy route for once in your life, Cecily?"
Growing up, this is how it always was. I make a fuss, and my siblings beg me to capitulate.
They were never willing to meet my father in the proverbial boxing ring, whereas I was willing to go round after round with him.
Until the day I escaped Olive Township, putting enough physical distance between us that I could breathe.
I look at my big brother. "Oh, are you siding with Dad? That's hardly headline news. It might as well be the Phoenix weather forecast. Predictable, boring, the same every day."
Dad says something else, but I can't hear.
Kerrigan is speaking, then Mom sits back in her seat and disappears into whatever realm it is she retreats to when the family becomes too much for her.
Duke cuts in with a scathing remark. I'd be embarrassed this is how we're acting in front of Dom, but what does it matter?
We're pulling an Uno reverse on our marriage in a couple hours. No need to be on my best behavior.
Insults are flung. There are assertions, declarations, stinging snubs. It's every man for himself, and it's ugly.
And then, in the midst of the verbal rumpus, a quiet voice slices through it all.
"I have end-stage heart failure."
The words perched on my lips tumble off. My grandma sits serenely, hands folded in her lap. The voices around the table recede.
The shock brings me up short. Cuts out the noise. "What? You...what?"
There's a soft press to my lower back. A supportive hand. Dom.
"Grandma." I step around the table, crouching at her side. She smells so good, so familiar, like Red Door and cinnamon gum.
"It's ok, my girl." The corners of her lips pull into the saddest smile. "It'll all be ok."
But it won't be. It's not possible, not now. Grandma is the only person in this family who is squarely on my side. Even Kerrigan, who I know loves me, splits her loyalty. But not my grandma. She is independently wealthy, beholden to nobody, and gave no fucks before it was cool.
When she is gone, I'll be more alone than ever.
"Mom?" To my dad's credit, he sounds appropriately gobsmacked.
"End-stage sounds so final, and I suppose it is." She pats my forearm. Shouldn't it be me comforting her?
Duke is already on his phone, almost certainly looking up everything there is to know about heart failure. Ways to combat it. It's the problem solver in him. "It says there are medications—"
"I'm already on them. Have been for a while. This diagnosis isn't new to me. Only to all of you."
"Mom," my dad says sharply. "How long have you known?"
"A while," she answers, firm. "And I don't want to hear a word about how I should've told you. It's my body and my future and I made my choice."
"Mom—"
"Now," she says, steamrolling him. "That news is only part of why I asked you all here today." She looks at us all in turn. "I have a request."
"Anything," Kerrigan says immediately. "Whatever you need. Right, everyone?" She looks around at us, brown eyes wide. The baby of the family again.
"Obviously," I answer. If Grandma said it was her dying wish for me to crab walk across the Sonoran desert in July, I'd do it.
Everyone around the table nods, except Dom. He looks uncomfortable, wary, like he wishes he could be somewhere else. I don't blame him. After this, he'll think twice about marrying someone in Vegas.
"Great," Grandma beams, clasping her hands together on the tabletop. "Because I already set it all up."
"What have you set up?" my dad asks. There is trepidation in his tone, the same way each one of us would sound if we'd asked the question.
"A road trip, starting next Monday. I can't play fast and loose with time right now.
I no longer have that luxury." She nods decisively.
"Three weeks in a luxury motor coach. Staying in hotels, cabins, and glamping in various places around Arizona.
" Grandma looks at each of us, a devious smirk tugging on her lips.
"I want my whole family together. Under the same roof, so to speak. "
"Are you sure?" My dad looks like he has a lot to say, but the good sense to swallow it down. "This is how you want to spend your..." He struggles for the words. "Your time?"
"No," she answers plainly. "Stuck with you all for days and days on end is not my idea of a good time. You're so dysfunctional someone should put you on reality TV. However." She glances at me before continuing, "You need it. Think of it as an intervention."
"Ophelia," my mother says, looking as if she's swallowed something that tastes bad. "You've found a vehicle large enough to comfortably fit the six of us?"
"Eight," Grandma corrects.
Mom and Dad share a concerned look. Dad gently says, "The five of us, and you."
Grandma shakes her head. "I've hired a death doula, and she's coming with us."
A fresh round of blank stares. Duke coughs into his fist. "A death doula is what, exactly?"
"Just what it sounds like. Rainbow will assist me in end-of-life matters."
Kerrigan, arguably the most woo-woo out of all of us, arches an eyebrow. "Your death doula's name is Rainbow?"
In total seriousness, Grandma replies, "Her mother almost certainly dropped acid. But yes, that's her name."
Duke speaks up. "That's still only seven people, Grandma. Not eight." His voice is thicker than usual. He's trying not to cry.
Grandma pins her gaze on the man beside me. "Dominic makes eight."