An Uncomplicated Life (38 page)

Number 47 has, in fact, been king. But not in the way we might have guessed. We knew it would limit her intellectually. We understood that the physical traits it mandated would have
permanent social consequences. We were ready to make her life as good as it could be.

We just didn’t understand how good Jillian would be. In the literal sense.

If you believe there are no coincidences, you have to at least entertain the notion that Number 47 has a purpose beyond sadness. If you are anything other than terminally pessimistic, you believe the extra chromosome has some beneficial reason for being.

Number 47 contains a lot that makes us good. It has to. Somewhere in that bonus wiring is a connection to compassion and kindness—a plan for how to be better. Number 47 puts out the fires of ego and envy and vanity and guile. It filters anger. Thanks to 47, Jillian lives a life of joy, giving and receiving in equal time. Nothing defines her more. Number 47 isn’t a governor on her aspirations. It’s an extra storage tank for all her good stuff.

Not long ago, I sat with my mother in the living room of my parents’ home in Florida. She was nearing 80 years old when we gathered in the morning to have coffee. We talked about Jillian, as we have lots of times over the years. And my mother said this: “Jillian is the best Christian I know.”

Elsye Daugherty isn’t devout. She is spiritual. It’s an important part of her life and my father’s. It isn’t an important part of mine. So I asked her, “What does that mean?”

Twenty-three years earlier, a day after Jillian was born, my mother had had a vision of Christ, telling her Jillian would be fine. I’ve never had a similar experience, nor has anyone else, as far as I know. All our visions have been self-generated. What
has come true has been the result of an all-earthly-angels-on-deck offensive, not some assurance from on high.

What does that mean, being the best Christian? “She’s kind,” my mother said.

“She loves genuinely. She gives. She enjoys life. Do you remember the story you told me about Jillian on the Metro bus?”

I said yes.

I’d gotten an e-mail from a passenger on the bus Jillian rides daily to and from downtown Cincinnati. He knew me because of my job. I’d written about Jillian several times. He wanted me to know some things he saw one winter morning:

Paul,

Just wanted to send you a quick note. I was in a sour mood this morning when my bus didn’t show up so I had to wait an extra 40 minutes in the cold for the next bus to arrive. This bus was packed, standing room only, but a young woman in an NKU sweatshirt gave up her seat to a passenger who just got on the bus. Then, this same young woman offered her coat to someone else on the bus who said she was cold. I overheard someone else talking to her and called her “Jillian.” I struck up a conversation with her about school and the NKU basketball team (of which she told me she was a manager). I concluded that I just met your daughter. What a terrific person she is. She brightened the day for me and a few others packed into the bus today because of her kind actions, and I just wanted to pass it along.

Mike Herrel

“That’s Jillian,” my mother said. “She acts like the rest of the world should act but doesn’t.”

Jillian not only has those qualities. She inspires them in others. Those who know her are moved to do better, to be better. To do good. We’re only as good as the way we treat each other. It’s hard not to be good when Jillian is around.

“You and Mom and my brother are my heart,” Jillian says. I couldn’t tell you when, exactly. She says it a lot.

“What about Ryan?” I ask. “Isn’t he your heart, too?”

“Oh, definitely,” she says. “Ryan is my favorite boy.”

To get to Jillian’s heart, simply open yours. If her heart ever breaks, we’ll all be lesser for it. Maybe that’s what my mother meant.

It’s an intrinsic knowing. Knowing what matters, and what to do with it. Knowing the smallest of joys. A hug offered, a smile received. Jillian’s knowing isn’t learned. It’s not inherited. It’s innate. It’s Number 47 on her shoulder, riding shotgun. Her nearest angel.

Without 47, Jillian isn’t Jillian. Maybe she keeps her seat and her coat and for Mike Herrel, the day stays gray. She doesn’t change Nancy Croskey’s life or Dave Bezold’s perspective. Kelly Daugherty doesn’t spend an extra hour on yet another analysis of Hemingway.

Without 47, Kerry doesn’t get to express her true calling to its fullest. Motherhood satisfies her, but it isn’t triumphant. Without 47, maybe I forget the feel of Jillian’s hand in mine as we walk to the school bus stop. Maybe I never even notice.

I’m not allowed to take life for granted, not for the last 23 years. Forty-Seven did that for me.

Forty-Seven won’t allow Jillian to attend Harvard Law or
complete the Sunday crossword in the
New York Times
. She won’t drive a car or bear a child. She will draw the occasional double-glance and misguided wonderment. She will be subject to simple minds and judged by hearts too weak to know.

All this is true and sad and immutable.

Forty-Seven is a soul engine, though. It doesn’t quit. It’s there every time Jillian asks about Grandpa’s heart or misses Uncle Pete. It is front and center in her declarations of affection for people and experiences and life. Forty-Seven is right there, earnest in its simplicity.

If you love someone, they’ll love you back.

Anna Quindlen wrote, “All of us want to do well. But if we do not do good, too, then doing well will never be enough.”

Jillian bridges the gap between doing well and doing good. Lots of us do well. We have successful careers, we make enough money, we live easily, we enjoy a certain physical comfort. We’re not especially tolerant when we don’t.

How many of us do good?

A friend of mine once described her grandfather as someone who “lived in quiet appreciation of all that God provided.” No one would describe the Jillian Daugherty Show as quiet. But the appreciation part never strays.

That’s Number 47 at work, I think. I hope. I believe.

CHAPTER 34

A Dream

He did not know he could not fly;
And so he did.
—
GUY CLARK

Paul, Jillian, Kerry and Kelly in St. Augustine, Florida.

In the dream, I am flying a box kite on the beach in St. Augustine, Florida, a place where we have spent many family vacations. It is the gentle end to a timeless day, a breezy early evening, clear and a deepening blue. The box kite is adept at handling big winds. On two of its sides are the faces of Jillian and Ryan.

The kite is soaring in the updraft. The faces of Jillian and Ryan are tugging at the string, laughing as they pull away. Higher and higher.

I dream rarely. When I do, I remember only nonsensical shards. But this dream is clear.

I am the keeper of the string. My hands and fingers claim a thrilling ache as they struggle to keep the string taut and the kite rising. I love this kite. I love the way it owns the wind and tempts the heavens as it escapes. It is fearless and yearning. It is limited only by my hands and the length of string my hands control.

Jillian and Ryan appear on the beach, in person, to stand with me as the day’s light ebbs. They laugh when they see their likenesses, way up there. They watch me struggle with the kite and the wind. The ache spreads from my fingers and hands to my arms, until all are joined in a collective, thrilling pain. I am Santiago, fighting the marlin.

I run down the beach with the wind. I am fighting the kite, while accepting its needs. The push-pull is comforting and familiar. Jillian and Ryan run alongside, our bare feet in triplicate on the firm, damp sand. They laugh at their likenesses, far above.

The beach is empty, the tide is receding. I stop to catch my breath. As the sun slips below the dunes and toward the
marsh and the river beyond, its reclining light paints pastels across Jillian’s gaze. It’s the same glow from long ago, when she was a baby in her crib and the moon was doing the painting.

So many years pass so quickly. The mantra—expect, don’t accept—has done its duty. The battles at school are long since decided. They’re monuments in a field, dedicated to all who strive. The aspirations we’ve had for Jillian have become reality. The race has been run. We will still be here for her. But only when she needs us. Pride and melancholia mix. They feel like my arms and hands. Worthwhile pain as my kite tugs at me, seeking its own place in the sky.

“It’s time to let go, Dad,” Jillian says.

“No. I still got it.” The kite is a dot, but somehow, I still see the faces on it, of Jillian and Ryan. I see them, and it makes me hold on tighter. The ache extends to everywhere. Jillian says, “You need to let it go.”

But why? Just a little longer. “I still got it,” I repeat.

Ryan says then, “Sir. It’s time.”

He’s right. It’s time. I uncurl my cramping hands to unleash the string. The string tears through my fingers and into the air, so quickly. The kite sails away, higher. The faces disappear. When last I see them, they’re on the horizon, borne on the wind, laughing and seeking their way.

EPILOGUE

Jillian and Ryan Get Engaged

I was happy-crying.
—
JILLIAN

O
n the afternoon of December 19, 2013, my cell phone beeped with a message from the estimable Ryan Mavriplis. “Sir,” he said, “there is something I would like to talk to you about.”

I’ve known Ryan for nearly a decade, and he still calls me “sir.” I know what he wants to discuss. “I would like it if maybe we could go have a beer,” he says.

A month earlier, Ryan and Jillian had shopped for a ring setting in which to put a diamond that belonged to Ryan’s great-grandmother. They’d been together for more than nine years, the last year of which they’d shared an apartment. It was time.

Ryan’s uncle Rick worked in a jewelry store, so the shopping
was easy. Ryan was serious that day. His gaze could have cut steel. Jillian, meanwhile, wouldn’t have needed a rocket to reach the moon. She could have jumped. She gazed at the display case with eyes like pie plates.

I picked up Ryan at their apartment at 5:30 p.m. “What do you want to talk about,” I asked. “How the Reds are going to do this year?”

“I always take care of your daughter, sir,” Ryan said. This was serious business. No time for joking.

“I’m glad about that,” I said. “What’s on your mind?”

After a big pull on his beer, Ryan got right to the point. “You know I love your daughter, right?”

“Yes, I believe I do.”

“And I love her and protect her.”

“Thank you.”

“She’s been my girlfriend for a long time.”

“Nine years, yes.”

“I would be very happy if you would allow me to marry her,” Ryan said.

I said, “Can I get back to you on that?”

“Oh,” Ryan said. “Okay.” He looked as if I’d backed my car over his foot.

“Ryan?”

“Yes, sir?”

“I’m joking. I’m thrilled you want to marry Jillian. I’d be proud to be your father-in-law.”

Then we talked about how the Cincinnati Bengals might do in Pittsburgh that weekend.

It was another of those emotional moments that lacked
emotion. Everything builds, so when the crescendo arrives, it is satisfying, not loud. The little wins along the way were always more telling.

Ryan will make a fine son-in-law. He’s bright, open and inquisitive. He puts up with my consistent needling, a skill honed by years of observing athletes in locker rooms. If Ryan can hit my pitches, he’s ready for the majors.

I am reminded of a conversation we’d had a few years earlier at the vacation house in St. Augustine.

“Good morning, sir,” Ryan said. “What are you doing?”

I was on the laptop, paying bills.

“I’m paying bills,” I said.

“What bills are you paying?”

“Credit card bills.”

“For this house?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Why what!?”

“Why are you paying bills, sir?”

“Because if I don’t, they’ll lock me up.”

“What does that mean, sir?” Ryan knows what that means. He just wanted to keep talking.

“That means I won’t be able to pay for your wedding,” I said.

“My wedding?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, don’t get locked up,” Ryan said.

Later that same day, Ryan spied me on the front porch, scribbling notes in the margins of Buzz Bissinger’s book
Father’s Day
.
It’s about Bissinger’s relationship with his son, Zach, who is mentally disabled.

“Why are you writing in your book, sir?” Ryan wanted to know.

“I’m inspired by something, for my book about Jillian,” I said.

“I’m gonna be in it, right?” he said.

“Yeah.”

“I’m going to be famous, too?”

“Yeah. Fame by association.”

“What does that mean?” Ryan asked.

“That means get outta here so I can work.”

“Yes, sir,” Ryan said. He went back into the house. I heard him tell Jillian, “Honey, I’m gonna be famous.”