The Last Cadillac (32 page)

“Tell me about it.”

And I did, starting with high school. Tick hated high school, and I did, too, because Dad made me go to the new Catholic school in North Hammond, instead of letting me go to the new public high school in town where all my buddies from eighth grade were going. Tick and I both understood that same feeling of disconnect at the time of our lives when every minute of every young day was the very end of the world.

Somehow the conversation landed on that morning I found his dad's car in the alley at four in the morning, that searing, ripping feeling of when I found him at that woman's house. I had screamed and railed, and Tick had heard all of it, including my rage following the call from Mrs. Minkiewicz—about another tryst. That morning in the kitchen should have been a wake up call for me, but it wasn't. I let things spiral away, until Tick and I found ourselves at the edge of a discussion that was a long time coming. Tick, so young, had already gone through searing, ripping feelings of his own.

“What I said—it's you, it's Dad. It's Erin. I can't stand it.”

“You're talking around it. What exactly is it?”

“All of it. It's just too … too confusing. It's just all of it.”

“What? Like we're all just bouncing off walls, making a bunch of noise?”

“Something like that. I guess I feel like things are broken,” he said.

And then I knew what he meant.

“Mom, we're not together. We're just a bunch of parts and we're not a family. Is this a family?”

“Yes, Tick, this is our family. And family can get weird sometimes.”

Tick grinned then, and he laughed like a man. Yet, I saw the face of my young son when he was four years old and he danced on the piano bench, singing, all the words to “Memory” from
Cats
.

“I feel weird a lot,” he said. “Really out of place and time.”

“What do you mean?” Of course, I'd dragged him out of childhood to Florida. Who wouldn't be confused? He was always serious, putting Legos and toy ships together, playing the guitar and listening to music. He did all of these things with such concentration and intent, while the rest of the world went by.

“I mean, I've never felt young.”

“Is that good, Tick? Or bad?”

“It's good,” he said. “I look at the Gampers, and I see myself sometimes.”

“And?”

“That's good, Ma. That's real good.”

The yellow Mustang wouldn't move out of the way. We were behind it in the ambulance, with the siren blaring, and it still wouldn't move. It stayed in front of us, weaving side-to-side, until I thought I'd scream.

The siren on top of the ambulance didn't seem very loud from inside, but it must have burned a hole in the eardrum of the driver in front of us. At least I hoped it did.

I would just ride out this nightmare, if I could. Actually, I had no choice. I would never wake up from it anyway, never forget the whole miserable day, and if I ever caught up with the driver of that yellow mustang, I would forgive myself for what I did to him. One beefy, hairy arm hung out the window and his fat head rose out of a blob of shoulders. I had murder in my heart. But the obstinate, pockmarked roof of the car ahead just stared back at me, as other cars parted the way and moved to the shoulder of the road.

“Can't you do something?” I shouted at the ambulance driver. I made a mental note to get the Mustang driver's license plate number, which I promptly forgot.

The young crew-cut driver next to me clenched his jaw
and looked over the wheel before glancing at me briefly. He was cool and appropriately calm, all the while he had a crazy person in the shotgun seat. But there was not a thing I could do, and I was beside myself, because I couldn't do anything to get rid of the jerk that lingered in our path to the hospital.

“All right now, ma'am,” the driver said. “We'll be there, yes, we will. You just stay peaceful-like.” It must have been part of the job training, and he was doing well. He had an immediate calming effect on me.

But it didn't last more than a second. I tried again, frantically. “Please. Can't you rev up this siren or something? Do you have a gun?”

He looked at me sideways. “Ma'am that will be puttin' more trouble on top of your troubles.”

“I'm sorry. I know. Does this happen often?”

“Happens almost every day. World is full of jerks, except for the dead ones. Sorry, ma'am.” He turned red then.

I stared forward, unthinking.

“Ma'am, I'm sorry about this but there's not much we can do.” He bounced the heel of his hand off the steering wheel for emphasis. “Never fails. But I'd sure like to get a-holt of one of these dopes. Just once. They'd need an ambulance they-selves.”

“Why don't you honk?”

“Ma'am, he don't pay 'tention to the siren. How he gonna hear that horn? Or give a hoot?”

Someone was making sense. I wasn't. But the jerk in the yellow Mustang still didn't move.

The ambulance driver gripped the steering wheel and pushed the cab forward a few more feet, so that he nearly rode up on the rusted bumper of the Mustang. He raised his
elbows slightly, and I had the feeling we were going to fly over the yellow hunk of junk in front of us.

The driver gritted his teeth. “Let's make up some time now.”

But in that moment, I knew we didn't need time. Time was up.

I had the sick feeling it didn't matter anyway. We could have crawled to the hospital. My father was dead. I was sure of it, although they hadn't pronounced him dead. The words could not be said over him in his bedroom, while he was lying on the floor and the technicians worked over him. That was for the doctor to pronounce, and that meant the never-ending trip to the emergency room.

Marilyn had been part of the goodbye, and it was hard for her, although she'd had a lot of goodbyes in her time, she told me.

“Oh, Miss, it's hard sometimes, especially with ones like the Commando. But there aren't many of those; I should say, there aren't any.” Hiring her had been one of the sterling decisions of my life. She made Dad laugh, and she made him comfortable. She knew her job, and she did it well and with a sense of humor.

She wasn't there at the end. But, many times, she had gone the extra mile. She had told me firmly, stating the obvious, “You need help, Miss.” I knew that her administrator didn't approve of the extra days Marilyn worked. So I always wanted to make sure she didn't get into trouble. But that didn't stand in the way. I never saw her in action at the agency, but I imagined tiny Marilyn facing her boss, giving it all-hell.

“Oh, I'll do what I want,” she said. “I'm too old not to.”

I could only guess where she got her strength. She was one of those rare ones who has the built-in ability not to stop. Not to give up. She had wiry, blond hair and tobacco-stained teeth, and the most patience I'd seen since Mother Teresa. Marilyn continued to smoke, but she didn't smoke with the Commando anymore, not after the hospital episode. Instead, she went out on the dock and puffed away and then hurried back, her polyester jacket with blue bears rustling as she pumped her arms to return quickly to duty. Dad told Marilyn that her place would be “higher in the kingdom of heaven” for all her help.

“Well, I don't know about any high place in heaven,” she said. “And frankly, I'd prefer a hillbilly heaven, don'cha know, if there ever is such a thing. Oh, just let me at that Billy Ray Cyrus.”

I cringed at the thought. But there had to be a place in heaven for Marilyn. She certainly went through difficult times on earth, lugging around old people and cleaning up after them, all with a good dose of loving care. She was supposed to be giving me some time off, but I usually stuck around to make sure they came out all right in their travels from the bathroom, to the family room, and down for a movie. Marilyn had all the angles and holds and methods to maneuver Dad up and down, and around.

One morning, not long before he died, she said, “Oh, lookee, now the Commando is bobbing away again. He gets so tired, don't he? I believe it's about time for that nap.”

“Marilyn, he just got up.”

“I know. I know. It don't hurt to humor him. He sure likes that pillow.”

The morning Dad died, he was sparkling clean, powdered and Old-Spiced, and freshly dressed up in new khakis. He was shining top-to-toe, and even his cheeks had a smooth pink glow about them. He carried his slouch hat with the pins from places he'd traveled and presidents he'd voted for (Republican). His hair was fluffy from his “head wash.” When he came lurching out of his bedroom on the walker, he stopped for me to appreciate the spectacle, and he gave me a cheek to sniff and peck at. I loved the smell of Old Spice, and he knew it.

I fixed him a peanut butter-and-ham sandwich for breakfast. He had insisted. I reminded him that it was breakfast, and it was poached-egg day.

“What the hell. It's Saturday,” I said.

I came to sit at the table with Dad in the sunny family room. All the windows were cranked out, letting in a perfect, early spring breeze. When he picked up the grilled sandwich, dripping with peanut butter, he told me again about his first date with his beautiful wife. I heard all about it, sitting at the table while he finished off the sandwich and glass of milk, afterward picking at a bowl of melon. I was planning to make sure Dad was clean and dry and wrapped into bed for his nap by 3:00 p.m.

Dad was still hunched over his plate. All of a sudden, he looked so tired. I figured it was the ordeal of showering and getting dressed, especially putting the dress socks over his swollen feet and into his slip-on boat shoes. He loved the idea that he wore deck shoes, although he hadn't commanded a deck in sixty years.

Dad was eighty-one and one week. When I looked at him, I was struck at how much he'd aged—and just recently, it seemed. The effects of his refreshing shower had begun to
sag, the skin hanging on his cheeks, and lately he'd had an unusual grey pallor.

Leave it to my brother—not long before Dad died—to remind me that Dad was not looking well. It was around the holidays, and Jack made an appearance in a rented convertible.

“He doesn't look so hot,” my brother said.

“I wonder how you'll look when you're eighty,” I said. My brother had no concept of ever being eighty. Life was one long round of tennis.

As usual, the conversation took another unpleasant turn from there. We were in the kitchen, each of us leaning against our respective counters for support. He was wearing a cream, fine-cotton knit argyle with a V-neck.

“New Irish sweater? From Glin or Dingle or some other playground?” I said.

“Scotland,” he said. His lip stuck out. He was too old for pouting.

He was drinking a glass of some French red wine he'd bought for fifty dollars at Island Liquors, which catered to the elite who didn't buy at Publix. I didn't drink it. Red wine gave me a headache. He said he wanted to talk. I fortified myself with a Publix pinot grigio and braced myself. It was no fun talking to any of them anymore.

“I want to see all the bills from Dad's charge accounts and other expenses,” he said.

“Excuse me?”

“Yeah, you heard me.” He had a sort of light, offhand tone in his voice, like he was ordering the janitor to sweep his office.

“I think we've had this conversation before.”

“Well, we're having it again.”

“And since when do I need to answer to you?”

“Since now, and I think I'm speaking for the other members of this family, as well.”

“Really.”

“Really.”

“What is your point?”

“Well, I want to see what you're spending his money on. He has a pension, and credit cards. I want to know.”

I looked around at the kitchen. What could he possibly be talking about? I'd bought a frying pan, some stainless steel flatware, and a bunch of linens to replace those Dad had burned a hole through, and wet the bed on every night. His diapers alone were approaching the weekly food ration.

I stood up straight and stared at him. I wanted him to look at me, but he was studying the tip of one of his Cole Haans.

“I think you are way out of line,” I said.

“No, I am not. Where are those bills?” He looked toward the other room, as if to make off for every drawer in the house. I couldn't believe what I was hearing and seeing from this spoiled brat of a millionaire, who played tennis and swilled fine wine and wore expensive sweaters from all over the world, and who had been to see his father twice this year. All I could think was: I made you chocolate chip cookies and sent them to you at camp. I felt cold inside, although it was eighty-six degrees outside.

“He has one charge card. I closed all the rest, and you know that. I do not answer to you. I answer to Dad's accountant and his lawyer, and it is none of your business how I run this household.”

I put my glass on the counter with an authoritative clink and left him standing there, along with his insults hanging in the air.

My brother had dutifully visited Dad for his birthday on March 24, making an appearance the day before and the day after, and then he'd disappeared to the Naples Country Club. He dropped in another holiday or two over the years, and I wondered how different it would have been had Dad stayed in the dollhouse up North.

But my brother was right about one thing. It was true Dad didn't look well. The doctor had made the prognosis that he would experience a sort of deterioration involving mini-strokes until a massive stroke ended his life, a condition that killed his mother. Dr. Parks said this as gently as possible when I asked about Dad's health.

“We don't know much. We're just looking at history and your father's records to make an assumption.”

He also reminded me that Dad's condition was a genetic pre-disposition that affected alternating generations by gender, as he wagged a finger at me and told me to exercise and never take up smoking again. I gave my sisters the news, and they acted like it was my idea they'd all catch mini-strokes.