Chapter 47. Micah
MICAH
“Micah, are you there?
“Micah?”
“Granddad, I’m here. What’s up?” I sit up in bed, rubbing my eyes with the bottom of my palm, my phone pressed to my ear. Been over a week since my last ECT procedure and five since I left New York. I must have answered the phone in my sleep.
“I’m calling it.” He sighs.
“What do you need? I’m not in the city—should I call for an ambulance?
” I blink hard a few times, adjusting to the dark room.
Beside this narrow bed floats a lone nightstand attached to the wall, a plastic-upholstered armchair, and my notebooks piled on the carpeted floor, along with my slippers near the bed.
My mind’s foggy with fragments of Brynn from my dream; my damp T-shirt sags against my skin.
Another momentous day in the psych ward.
“She had a good ride, Sally. Shame what happened to those astronauts in ’86.”
Granddad should have been an astronaut. The guy loves all things space.
From NASA to SpaceX, he can rattle off past missions, launch dates, and many of the crew members’ names faster than Wikipedia.
He used to let me admire, never touch, his collectable astronaut figures and trading cards dating back to 1963.
“Granddad, you’re mixing up your Challenger missions. What’s going on, you alone?”
“Eeeeyah, look at her go!”
I hear a pop, followed by a crash. “Are you launching one of your rockets? You still there? Granddad!”
“I’m fine. Stop shouting!”
“You almost gave me a heart attack.”
“Micah, I need to tell you something. Can you listen for a moment, son? Your Aunt Max got an offer this morning. We’re selling the agency to those snotnosed bastards at Day & Foster.”
“What? But—”
“Time to let this thing go.”
I fall back onto my pillow, exhaling into the phone. Brynn’s face, then Eunice’s, emerges in my head.
“I need you home, son.”
“Granddad—I don’t know how to tell you . . . I need to stay here.”
“Dang it to high heaven, she’s back.”
“Who are you yelling at, Mr. Kershaw?” another voice says. “I swear, these damn rockets. It better not be the police again. Hand me the phone. Hand. Me. The. Phone! You are going to put me into an early grave. Who’s this, now?” she says into the phone.
“I’m his grandson, Micah. And you are?”
“Deidre, his nurse. Sorry Gabriel called you. He’s having one of his episodes and refuses to take his meds. Like I’ve told him a million times. I swear.”
Episodes? What sort of meds? Not sure she can tell me anything due to medical privacy, something I know plenty about. “Anything I can do to help, Deidre?” Besides charm you to death with my smooth demeanor.
“Actually, yeah. Are you in contact with his daughter?”
“Yes, I talk to my Aunt Maxine every day about my granddad. We’re all worried about him. She keeps me updated on his condition.”
“Oh. So you know about the lithium he’s taking.”
“Of course.” It helps I’m an expert on the drug. “He’s at twelve hundred milligrams a day? Do we need to adjust to eighteen?”
“I think that’s a fine idea.”
Whoa. Lucky guess.
“Have Miss Maxine contact me, okay? Or, better yet, ask her to set up a doctor’s appointment for him. Once they see what he’s doing, they’ll up the dosage for sure. I don’t want him endangering himself—or anybody else, if you know what I mean.”
“I understand. It won’t be a problem, Deidre. I’ll place a call now. Thanks for taking such good care of him.”
“Thank you. I appreciate that. You have a good day.”
What the hell—Granddad’s on lithium? Since when?
I toss in bed, my mind racing along with my pulse. I help myself to a cup of decaf from the nurses’ lounge and stroll through the halls a while. Hearing Granddad’s voice and knowing he’s not right has put a dent in my self-imposed exile. I can’t lose him too.
I book the next flight to New York.
I step out of Granddad’s private elevator and into the foyer.
Deidre, a stocky, muscular Black woman in her thirties dressed in a white polo and matching cargo pants and sneakers, jumps up from the navy velvet settee in the living room, sending her book toppling to the floor.
I drop my bag and catch my reflection in the oversize arched entry mirror, unshaven and bleary-eyed from the meds and long flight.
Her light blue eyes stall on my face. “Oh my goodness, I love all your music.”
“Wrong Kershaw.” I drag a hand across my chin. “You mean my dad.”
She rearranges her slack-jawed mouth into a frown. “Your grandfather’s out here.”
Paying Granddad a visit outside one of our obligatory familial functions, where most of the extended Kershaw family members remain oblivious to my psychosis, doesn’t happen often.
I prefer not to be watched like an animal in a zoo or asked questions I can’t answer. Yeah, I could be a better grandson.
He moved from the MacDougal house and bought this swanky five-bedroom, six-and-a-half-bath penthouse on Sutton Place South to spite my grandmother after they separated. Grandmother preferred the uptown socialites to the bohemian West Village hippies and had wanted to make the move for years.
I met Granddad and Aunt Max the year my grandparents divorced and lived with Granddad in the penthouse until I hit eighteen, two years after my diagnosis.
Dr. Val suggested I live on my own to get me out more and perhaps make some friends.
I may live in the MacDougal house, but I don’t call it home.
With its glossy wood floors and snow-white walls peppered with oversize pop art, a few from the agency’s iconic campaigns, Granddad’s penthouse reminds me of the Whitney Museum.
As a kid, I skated around these floors in my socks, ignoring the maid’s warnings and scuffing up the walls with my frequent misjudgments in speed.
It wasn’t bad living here, aside from being the only small person around.
My mind liked to wander and I often found trouble—like the time I built a campfire in the living room.
When Granddad got home, he stood over me and said, Draw it next time.
Notebooks from my father began arriving shortly after, and ideas spilled out of me.
At first I came up with short, illustrated stories sprinkled with crayon captions.
In time, I drew less and wrote more, filling up every notebook he sent.
Once, Granddad asked me to draw an ad for an opening of a new children’s museum.
It still hangs in the dining room today.
I walk through the sparse rooms and stop in front of our space wall, a floor-to-ceiling display of the NASA replicas we built together, all pointing left and mounted at a 45-degree angle on a clear plexiglass stand. If you unfocus your eyes, they appear to be flying.
I continue on from the wall and find Granddad reclining on one of the balconies, rocket debris on the ground next to him.
He once towered over clients with his athletic shoulders, thick onyx-colored comb-over, and perpetual suntan.
Today he’s a scarecrow version of his former self—thirty pounds lighter, skin translucent, hair Einstein-wild—napping under a blanket in emerald paisley pajamas.
“There you are.”
His obsidian eyes pop open, big like craters. “Oh, Micah. You came back. Eunice told me you would.”
Impossible, but okay. I veer away from the long drop off the side of the balcony and slide onto the other chaise. “How are you feeling?”
“Tired. They drugged me up good this time.”
“I don’t like you being out here by yourself. I’ll talk with Deidre.”
He waves me off. “Can’t move anyway. She has my walker. Sly devil, that one.”
“Do you want a new nurse? I can let Aunt Max know.”
“Forget it. I finally broke this one in.”
I prop my hands behind my head. “What’s going on?”
He cocks his head. “Nothing. What do you think is going on?”
“You sounded funny on the phone.”
“How would you know? You didn’t call me.”
I stare at him for a beat. “Do you want to talk about the agency?”
His black brows fly up to his hairline, then dip low. “Ole Sally’s sinking. Sad, really. My father’s life’s work.” He snaps this fingers.
Bingo. Losing the agency prompted this temporary breakdown. Nothing more than that. I get it. The man devoted every ounce of himself to that place. It was his baby. He’s crushed.
My eyes tear up without warning. “Ugh, these allergies.” I pinch the bridge of my nose. “Bad this summer. If it’s any consolation, you’ve always been more than Kershaw McKenzie to me.”
“Shut up, Beck. You never appreciated a goddamn thing.”
I catch myself before falling off the chaise. “I’m Micah, Granddad.”
He blinks a few times. “Am I dying? Why are you here, blubbering?” His large pupils harden like black ice.
“I’m not.” I pat his arm, looking away. “Just wanted to spend time with you.” I close my eyes, containing the dam, indulging in long breaths under the crackling afternoon sun.
A moment or two passes.
A light snore floats through the breeze.
I peek over at his strong warrior nose, which he passed on to me. I bet he could still reel in the ladies today, if he wasn’t so out of it.
He honks louder.
Silent tears spill down my face and neck.
The thing about Granddad, he’s incapable of expressing his emotions and doesn’t tolerate anyone else’s.
Dr. Val calls it cold parent syndrome.
When I was a kid, he’d make me chase him in parks and across busy streets, laughing when I fell. If I reached out to be comforted, he’d push me away.
She said it most likely triggered a traumatic memory for him.
The guy can be an a-hole. Yet he’s the only father who stuck around.
Who read to me when I got mono from kissing Sydney Oliver, the prettiest girl in elementary school.
He was the first one out of his seat when I received the creative writing award in sixth grade and the same guy who came home with a new bat when I made all-star baseball.
He couldn’t look at me in the eye when I tried to explain the Shadow People.
Yet he spent all those afternoons with me, building rockets.
A sob rips from my chest. I can’t lose him too. I just can’t.