Epilogue — Knox
Four Years Later
The roast is drying out.
I can smell it from the living room where I'm helping Jim from his wheelchair to the walker. His hands shake worse on Sundays for some reason, worse in the evenings, and transferring from chair to walker takes longer than it used to.
"I've got you," I say when his left leg buckles slightly.
"I know you do." His grip on my forearm is weak, but his voice is steady. "Getting slower, aren't I?"
"You're doing fine."
"Liar."
I get him standing and position the walker in front of him. He shuffles forward six inches at a time while I stay close enough to catch him if he goes down. The fifteen feet from living room to kitchen table takes three minutes.
Francis is pulling the roast from the oven when we make it to the table.
She glances over, sees us, doesn't rush to help. She learned early that Jim needs to do what he can do for as long as he can do it.
I get him settled in his chair, the one closest to the bathroom because that matters now.
Francis sets the roast on the table beside mashed potatoes and green beans. Real green beans this time, not from a can. She's been trying new recipes lately, things her mother used to make.
"Smells good, Frannie," Jim says.
"It's dry. I left it in too long."
"It's fine."
She portions out the food, and I pour water for Jim, iced tea for Francis and myself. We've done this every Sunday for three years.
Since we got married. Since Jim moved in six months ago when living alone stopped being possible.
The first ten minutes are quiet. Just the sound of forks on plates, Jim's occasional grunt when his hands won't cooperate with cutting meat.
Francis reaches over and cuts his roast into smaller pieces without being asked. He doesn't thank her. Doesn't need to.
"Clint's daughter sang at church this morning," Jim says. "Little Ava. Has perfect pitch, that one."
"She's seven now," Francis says. "Not so little anymore."
"Still little to me." Jim takes a bite of potato, chews slowly. "Your mother would've liked her. She always wanted grandkids."
Francis's fork pauses halfway to her mouth, but she doesn't say anything. We've had the grandkids conversation. Not happening. We're both fine with it.
"You remember that apartment we had?" Jim says, looking at me. "The one I told you about? With the bathroom so small you had to step in the tub to close the door?"
"I remember."
"Your mother used to say it was good practice for marriage. Learning to share small spaces." He smiles slightly. "This house is bigger but the principle's the same. You're doing good with the small spaces."
"Thanks, Jim."
"I mean it. Not every man would take in his wife's dying father. Most would've pushed for a nursing home."
"You're not dying," Francis says.
"Frannie, we both know I am. Just taking my time about it."
She sets down her fork. "Can we not do this tonight?"
"Just stating facts. I'm allowed to state facts at my own dinner table."
"It's not your dinner table. It's ours."
"Semantics."
They bicker back and forth and I eat my dry roast and listen to them do this dance they've been doing for six months. Francis pretending her father isn't declining as fast as he is, Jim refusing to pretend.
Both of them stubborn as hell.
Jim reaches for his water glass and his hand shakes badly enough that I can see it from across the table. He tries to grip it but his fingers won't close right. Water sloshes over the rim.
I reach over and take the glass from his hand, set it down, use my napkin to wipe up the spilled water.
The whole thing takes maybe five seconds.
When I look up Francis is watching me.
Something passes between us across three feet of dinner table and six months of this routine and three years of marriage and four years since that first dinner when I did the exact same thing.
Jim clears his throat. "Thank you."
"No problem."
We finish dinner. Jim tells the story about how he met Francis's mother at a church social in 1978, the same story he tells every few weeks now. His memory's starting to go in places. Not bad yet, but getting there.
Francis and I clean up while Jim watches from the table. She washes, I dry. The same routine we've had since that first night four years ago.
When the kitchen's clean I help Jim back to his room. The converted bedroom on the ground floor, close to the bathroom like we planned.
Francis already turned down his bed earlier, laid out his pajamas. I help him change and get settled while she brings his evening medication.
"You need anything else?" I ask.
"I'm good. You two go on. I know you've got your porch time."
"We can stay if you want."
"I don't want. Go sit with your wife."
Francis kisses his forehead. "Call if you need anything."
"I will. Now go."
Outside the air is cooler than it's been all week, the first hint of fall.
We sit in the chairs on the back porch, the same chairs that were here when I bought this house years ago. Francis brings two beers from the fridge and hands me one.
We don't talk for a while. Just sit and drink and listen to the cicadas winding down for the season.
"He's getting weaker," I say eventually.
"I know."
"Probably should talk to his doctor about increasing the evening dose. Help him sleep better."
"I'll call tomorrow."
More silence. Her hand finds mine in the space between the chairs. Our fingers lace together automatically, the same way they have a thousand times over three years.
"You okay?" I ask.
"Yeah. Just tired."
"Want me to handle breakfast tomorrow? Give you a break?"
"No. I like doing it."
She squeezes my hand and I squeeze back and we sit there in the gathering dark while lights come on in houses down the street and someone two doors down starts grilling something that smells like charcoal and lighter fluid.
This is what three years of marriage looks like.
Not avoiding the hard parts but integrating them.
Getting up every morning and making coffee and helping her father get dressed because his hands shake too badly to manage buttons.
Coming home from club business and sitting down to dinner at six.
Doing dishes together. Sitting on the porch after Jim's in bed and just being quiet together because sometimes quiet is all you need.
"I'm glad you're here," Francis says.
"Where else would I be?"
"I don't know. Anywhere else. This isn't what you signed up for when we got back together."
"This is exactly what I signed up for."
"Knox."
"What? You think I didn't know your dad was sick when I asked you to move in? You think I didn't know what it would look like when he got worse?"
"I think you knew in theory. Knowing in practice is different."
"I'm here in practice. Still here. Going to keep being here."
She turns to look at me and there's something in her face that's softer than usual, more vulnerable. "Thank you."
"For what?"
"For staying. For helping with Dad. For not making me do this alone."
"You're not alone. You're never going to be alone."
I pull her chair closer to mine and she leans against my shoulder.
We sit like that until our beers are warm and the streetlights come on and Jim calls from inside asking if we remembered to set his alarm for his seven am medication.
"I'll get it," I say, and kiss Francis's temple before going inside.
Later we lie in bed with her head on my chest and my hand on her hip, the same position we've slept in for four years.
She's half asleep already but I'm still awake, thinking about Jim's water glass and the way her hand found mine on the porch and the morning routine we'll do tomorrow and the hundred Sundays we've done this exact same thing.
I spent seventeen years alone before Francis came back. Told myself I preferred it that way. That being alone meant being free, being uncomplicated.
Now I've got a wife and a father-in-law who needs help getting dressed and club business that still pulls me out at strange hours and a house full of curtains and plants and photos on the walls.
It's complicated as hell.
And I wouldn't change a single thing.
Francis shifts in her sleep, her arm coming around my waist. I pull her closer and close my eyes and let myself settle into this life we've built.
One Sunday dinner at a time. One morning routine at a time. One quiet evening on the porch at a time.
This is what I was missing for years. Not just her. This. The specific weight of someone who matters, someone you'd do anything for, someone you choose again every single day even when it's hard.
Especially when it's hard.
I fall asleep with her breathing evening out against my chest and the house quiet around us and tomorrow already waiting.
And for the first time in my life, I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be.
Thank you for reading!