The phone rings early Sunday morning. It must be my dad—we often share answers to the Sunday Crossword.
But today his voice shakes, his emotions barely in check. “Mom is worse.”
I can almost hear his tears. Mom’s cancer is back. Just last month she’d assured us everything was as it should be and we believed her—until this morning.
“What did the doctor say?” I ask.
A pause, then he says, “I don’t know.”
I hear the frustration in his words. I sense the grief in his heart. “She doesn’t want to know,” he explains. “She doesn’t want me to ask.”
I call her doctor. Although no law prevents our inquiry, I defy patient privilege, looking for guidance.
“She’s in a lot of pain,” I tell the oncologist. “coughing up black bile.” Having a medical background, I know this is not a good sign. “How do we know when to hospitalize her?”
“Don’t,” he says bluntly. “Keep her comfortable and keep her home. She has a few weeks at best. Let her die in peace.”
I struggle to say calm as I relay the doctor’s verdict to my siblings.
“Can you come this weekend?” I ask them. “We need to talk.”
We gather as quickly as we can, postponing our jobs and our pastimes, arriving by car or by plane.
Two days spent together, disbelief, anger, and grief the emotions of the day. Why didn’t she tell us? Does she know? Is she unwilling to hear? Dad, ever loyal to his beloved spouse, requests that nothing be said, no words of the impending death be spoken aloud.
“She doesn’t want anyone to know,” he explains. “Not even us.”
We go home. To wait.
I struggle at work—the same school where she taught for twenty years. How do I not tell her friends and co-workers? What do I say when they ask how she is?
A half-dozen weeks go by, our lives turned upside-down. Those of us living close by take turns caring for her and keep the rest informed. Exhaustion mixes with helplessness, frustration. Time moves slowly, the hours spent on watch crawl by, fly much too quickly. The ravages of the disease have confiscated her strength, bloated her face until we barely know her, decimated her brain until she cannot recognize us. Her speech becomes slurred, her gestures confusing. Communication is difficult, her frustration evident. The pain that overtakes her becomes unbearable and she cries out at night unable to sleep, unable to express her fear.
And yet at times she is surprisingly lucid, chatting animatedly about the mundane things, skirting the issues at hand. “Oh, by the way,” she casually remarks, “I want you to get my grandmother’s bracelet from the bottom drawer. It’s yours now. Take it today, I don’t want to forget.”
The next day she does not know us again. “Who’s here?” she asks my brother as he speaks to her. “Is that you?” she asks, choosing the wrong name.
“No, it’s me,” he answers gently.
“The one you love best,” he adds with a laugh, laughter now the only thing that keeps him from blurting out the secret. “I love you, Mom!” is what he wants to say. “We know you’re dying! Please, can’t we talk about it?” But that’s not allowed, an admission of reality that mustn’t be made, the truth that is known by both but acknowledged by neither, and as he prepares to go, the goodbye he hugs is an everyday one, not the forever goodbye that he wishes to give, fearing that this goodbye may be the last.
Finally the phone call we’ve all expected. “Come now,” Dad pleads to each of us in turn. “She is very weak.”
Once again we gather at her bedside. To say goodbye without saying goodbye. To exchange the final embraces that must not seem final. The hugs are tighter than usual, lingering a few seconds longer, each of us stealthily taking what he dares. But she knows. And we know. And she knows we know. And we know she knows. Yet no one speaks it.
Mom plucks at the sheet that covers her frail and wasted body, as if its weight is too much to bear. Her eyes stare vacantly past us all, her hand reaches out towards everyone and no one. Kate reaches for her but Mom quickly pulls away. “No,” she says, “not you. Where did he go?”
“Who?” we ask together. “We’re all here.”
“No,” she says. Her quivering voice becomes firm. “The man who keeps coming to see me. He reaches out his hand, but when I try to take it he’s gone again.”
Looks of anguish pass between us. This can’t be good. No one speaks what we all believe of this invisible creature, but our eyes say it all. She wants to go. It will be soon.
The weekend passes. No one knows what to expect. Will she linger? For how long? Do we stay or go home? Finally we agree we will leave the next day. As we prepare for one more night of vigilance, Pat whispers in desperate prayer, “If you please, God, take her now. Don’t make her suffer—don’t make us suffer—any longer.”
In the morning we awake to Dad’s insistent call, “Come quickly! Come now!” His voice is ragged. From exhaustion, from worry, from grief. What now? we wonder.
But as we enter the bedroom we know the answer. It happened while we slept: the stranger returned, held out his hand, and finally, finally she was able to grasp it. Things that needed to be said were unsaid. Things that needed to be done were undone. Just as Mom wanted. Finally she was able to go.
Once again we change our plans, suspend our lives for a little longer. But it’s different now: the waiting and worrying are over and we can finish what we’ve known all along. A few more days. Just a few more days, and life will be almost (but never exactly) normal again.
II.
The surgery was routine, after a few days in hospital Dad would be home.
“Minor problems,” I report to my siblings. “But he is old,” I add, a verbal crossing-of-fingers against unseen evils, “and you never know…”
But something goes wrong, his heart is weakened, irreparably damaged. He’s not going home. Intensive care will be his haven a few more days, his final days.
“We’ll keep him comfortable,” the nurses reassure us. “We’ll let him die in peace.”
Again we are summoned. “Come quickly!” The phrase is getting old and tiresome; it is one we wish not to hear again. But we come, postponing our jobs and our pastimes, arriving by car or by plane to be with him at the end. To wait. It will come soon.
Dad plucks at the sheet that covers his frail and wasted body, as if he must arrange it just so for his guests, as if its weight is too much to bear. We have been here before, déjà vu. Someone different lay dying, but still it is the same. A hospital bed exchanged for the comforts of home, but still it is the same. Life in suspension; everything stops while we attend our dying father.
There are no secrets in this hospital room. We will not hide the truth from one another. The air is heavy with impending grief, yet light with the understanding that we can acknowledge this ending. He explains his final wishes, prepares his will, signs the order against resuscitation. We will admit that time is short, sharing what little is left, wringing every last second from it.
“I have a funeral to go to,” Dad says.
“Mine,” he adds matter-of-factly. “Isn’t that why you’re all here?”
We laugh, laughter now the only thing that keeps us from our grief, humor our most potent weapon against despair. At times the room is filled with family; at times the laughter is loud. The nurses gently quiet us, remind us that this is a place of healing and solitude, then melt into the background to administer the medicines that keep him from pain, adjust the mechanisms that allow him to breathe, and allow his children to bid him farewell in the ways that we know best.
He plucks at the sheet, pulls at the oxygen mask, reaches for the tube that noiselessly delivers his sustenance. His eyes stare vacantly past us all. He knows we are there, yet he searches for something.
“What is it, Dad?” we inquire in unison. “We’re all here.”
“Not you,” he replies. “Where is the one who was here before? Where did he go? He keeps coming but when I try to touch him he is gone again.”
The looks of anguish return. The memory is fresh, and it cannot be denied. Perhaps before it was coincidence but not now. Not twice. He wants to go. It will be soon.
The weekend passes. No one can say if he will linger, no one can say how long it will be. We must decide whether to stay or go. Finally we choose: We will go home and wait.
As we prepare to leave the goodbye hugs are forever; this goodbye may be the last. He knows. And we know. And he knows we know. And we know he knows. And we all speak it.
“Goodbye, Dad. Behave yourself. We love you,” It is as final as we can make it. Our grief is not hidden, our tears are not hidden.
We assemble at Dad’s house to prepare for one last evening of vigilance before returning home. As we walk in the front door the phone is ringing, we know before we answer what it must be. It happened just after we left: the stranger returned to his bedside, held out his hand, and finally, finally he was able to grasp it. Everything that needed to be said was said. Everything that needed to be done was done. Just as he wanted. Finally he was able to go.
New plans are made, previous arrangements discarded, lives once again suspended. For the last time. We have no more parents to lose. The waiting is over, the worry is over, and we can now do what we have known all along we must. A few more days. Just a few more days, and life will be almost (but never exactly) normal again.
Susannah Willey Writes 