Waiting for Sunrise (27 page)

I am grateful for the way I was brought up, though, Patsy. Mam’s and Papa’s examples were of godly parenting. I know I learned a lot from them, probably more than I realize. When this baby is born—what do you think? A boy? A girl?—I believe my parenting skills will come naturally because they have been ingrained in me my whole life.

Not much news other than this. Prayed for rain all summer and now praying it’ll stop before the fall crops are all washed up. Georgia farmers and their families are flocking to the churches nearly every night. It’s something to see.

Your loving brother,
Lloyd Buchwald

Sitting atop her made bed, Patsy read and reread the letter. She clutched it to her heart and fought tears as she read it one more time. Each time, her eyes stopped on one line in particular.

Leaving Holly here . . .

“Don’t leave her, Lloyd,” Patsy spoke to the page of legal-sized notepaper. “You should never leave your wife. Even if war calls. Don’t you dare.”

She decided to write him her thoughts on the subject. She went to the small desk made of fabricated blond wood, pulled a sheet of paper from it, and went to the nurses’ desk to ask for a pen. Silly, she thought, returning to the room, that they weren’t allowed to have pen or pencil in their rooms. But those were the rules.

“Dearest Lloyd,” she began . . .

I received your letter just this morning and already I have read it at least five times.

I am doing fine here. In spite of where I am. I can’t imagine what Gil is saying to folks as to why I’m not home right now. Does he tell them I am in a loony bin? Or does he say I’ve gone away to tend to a great-aunt or something? You know how people do things like that. Girls get pregnant before they are supposed to and they go live with a family member “just for this school year.” Somebody goes a little bonkers and suddenly a relative no one has ever even heard of gets sick and needs some TLC.

Well, enough of that. I want you to listen to me because I am your big sister, and even being here under the watchful eyes of loads of doctors and nurses, I still have enough of my faculties to glean a little wisdom and pass it along to my baby brother.

Lloyd, no matter what, don’t you leave Holly alone. It’s a terrible thing, being left alone. I know. Gil has done it nearly since the day we married. Always to better our family, I know, but alone is alone. Let the army fight wherever it wants to fight, but without you. Soldiers they’ve got, but Holly only has one husband.

Even before marrying Gil, I was alone . . .

Patsy sucked in her breath and felt hot tears form behind her eyes. She blinked hard; they spilled down her cheeks. A small box of tissues was at her bedside table; she went to it, pulled one, then another out, wiped her eyes and blew her nose.

My whole life.

There’s so much you don’t know . . .

So much no one knew, not even Gil.

The tears started again. Patsy pulled more tissues. Wiped. Blew.

. . . things we’ve really never discussed. Maybe if I’d talked to someone before now, I wouldn’t be here, in this place. But that’s okay too. Really, it is. Just know you were the lucky one because you had both a mother and father your whole life. I’m not bitter or anything. I love you too much for that.

Don’t leave Holly, Lloyd. Don’t leave your children either. I’m sure this one is the first of many.

I love you too,
Patsy

She tri-folded the paper, slipped it into a letter-sized envelope, addressed it. Odd, she thought, her legs felt weak as dishwater when she walked her correspondence to the nurses’ desk, along with the borrowed pen, and asked that it be mailed as soon as possible.

“Will do, Mrs. Milstrap,” the desk’s receptionist told her. “It’ll go out first thing tomorrow morning.”

“Thank you,” Patsy said. She looked down at her hands. They shook. She took a few deep breaths, exhaled, until both the quivering of her hands left and the strength in her legs returned.

“You all right?” the receptionist asked.

Patsy smiled. Or at least she tried. She could feel how crooked it looked. “I’m fine as frog’s hair all things considered.” She took a stab at smiling again. This time, it felt like it looked real nice.

With that, she walked back to her room, grateful her roommate was elsewhere. Patsy didn’t know where. Didn’t honestly care. She was just glad to be able to lay herself down the length of her bed, swallow back the tears that begged to come, and—only for now—be alone.

30

Sundays were never easy. Much as he loved his wife, for Gilbert, they always came with a sense of dread.

Patsy was tapping a red checker up and down on its game board when Gilbert walked into the recreation room. He gave her his best smile; she returned it with a frown. A scowl, if the truth be told.

She wore a housedress of some orangey color with cream woven through it. Looked like sherbet to him; tasty, but he hadn’t come there to eat. Her hair was in a single plait, straight down the back of her head and then thrown over one shoulder. For a split second he thought of the way it looked down, waving across her back or covering one eye as she worked on a project with one of their children.

Of course, that had been awhile back.

For now, she looked madder than a wet hen; he prepared himself for the onslaught of words sure to come from her just as soon as she made it across the room to where he stood, framed by the door.

“Where have you been?” she hissed. “You’re so late I almost went back to my room.”

Gilbert glanced around, looking to see who may be listening in to their usual greeting. A few of the patients and their visitors gave a cursory look but turned back just as quickly to what they were doing. He gave them a nervous grin as he took his wife by the arms, turned her around, and said, “I’m five minutes late.”

She swung back to face him, wrenching herself free of his hold. “Five, my great-aunt Martha. You’re ten if you’re a minute.”

He forced a smile. “Okay. Ten.” He looked over at the checkerboard table. Oh, happy diversion, he thought, as though he were Shakespeare writing a play. “Were you waiting to play a game with me?”

Her eyes met his and held them for long seconds until she said, “Sure.”

He followed her to the table, sat across from her. “I guess I’ll be black,” he said.

“What does
that
mean?”

He picked up a game piece and waved it at her.

“Oh.”

He realized then she still held the checker he’d seen her with when he’d come in. “You be red.” He hoped she got his double meaning. She
should
be ashamed of herself, acting up so.

“Ha-ha.”

Good. She got it.

“You go first.”

She slid a checker from one square to another. He did the same.

“Why were you so late?” she asked, making her next move.

Gilbert placed the tip of his index finger on a checker, held it there. He pursed his lips as though he were trying to think it through. “It’s Sunday.”

“I know that. Move already.”

He moved. “I have five kids to get ready for church, Pats. Then church. Then I follow your mother and daddy to their house so we can eat and then I jump in the car and head over here. Sometimes there’s traffic and—call me crazy—I just can’t figure out how to get that Ford of mine to fly.”

Patsy blinked at him, looked down at the board, and jumped one of his pieces. “Call
you
crazy . . .”

He chuckled. “Ah, good. There’s my girl.” He had a jump, but he didn’t make it.

“Gil . . . it’s just that . . . I worry when you don’t show up right away.”

He reached across the red and black squares for her hand, which she willingly gave. “You have nothing to worry about, Pats. I’m here for the long haul. I’m here until we get this all worked out.”

He watched her chest heave up, back down. Up again. “And after that? What will you do? Leave me?”

He shook his head. “Never.” She didn’t answer, and when the tears had backed away from spilling, he released her hand and said, “Your move.”

She looked at the board. “I don’t want to play anymore.”

“But you’re winning.”

“Only because you are letting me.”

She stood and he stood with her. “What do you want to do then?”

She shrugged, but even in doing so, said, “Want to see my garden?”

“Sure.”

They walked out of the recreation room, down the hall to the locked doors where one of the staff stood ready to open the door for them. On Sundays, staff members took on posts all over the hospital to assure “no escape.”

No words were spoken until they reached the outside. Gil looked at his wife; in spite of where she was and what she’d been through, he couldn’t help but notice the glow of her skin, the twinkle of her eye. “Look how pretty you look,” he said.

She gave him “the look” that said “I believe not a single word of your flattery.”

“Seriously.” He craned his neck to look closer at her. “You’re not wearing makeup, are you?”

“No.”

“You’ve spent some time outside then. You have a nice rosy tan on your face.”

“I like being in my garden.” She stopped and pointed.

They were at the edge of a colorful display of flowers he knew nothing about. “Nice, hon.” She beamed under his praise. “I never knew you had this in you.”

Her arms folded across her chest. Overhead, birds called to each other. The murmuring of other patients in the garden swirled around them as what little bit of city traffic existed on a Sunday filtered over the high brick wall. “I take care of the flowers at home.” Her voice was almost argumentative. Or maybe a little hurt. Probably because he’d never really noticed.

“Yes, well, I’ve had to hire someone to take care of the yard since . . . since . . . well. You know.”

“You had no idea just how much I did around the house, did you?” She actually smiled at him.

“I do now.” He touched the tip of her nose with his finger. “You know, I kind of like this ‘no makeup’ look you have going. The natural Patsy.”

“I never wore that much, Gil. Pressed powder and sometimes lipstick and a little mascara.”

Something else he’d never really noticed. So much. Had he really been so consumed with his work? Had he not seen, really seen, the role of wife and mother—to all his offspring—she had been?

“How are my children?” she asked when he’d said nothing.

“Good. Ready for their mama to come home.”

Patsy looked at her feet, shuffled them, and said, “Maybe by Christmas, you think?”

“What has the doctor said? Anything?”

“Only that if I’d talk about the things that have hurt me in my past, I’d get to go home sooner. He says I bottle things up, and the bottle finally got too full.”

“Do you?”

Patsy shrugged. Kicked at a small pebble with the toe of her sandal.

Gilbert followed her action with his eyes. It was then he noticed a weed sneaking between two flower stems near the garden’s front edge. He reached down, plucked it from the ground, and handed it to Patsy. “You’ve got a weed growing in your garden, you get it out. Right?”

She nodded.

“Same with hurtful memories.” He paused. Waited for her to say something. When she didn’t, he added, “You want to know what I think?”

She cocked a half grin at him, squinting one eye against the bright sunlight. “If I say no, will you tell me anyway?”

“Probably.”

“Then go ahead.”

“I think,” he said, taking her by the hand and turning around so they could walk the length of the garden, “that your fear of my leaving you goes all the way back to the day your mother put you on the bus for Trinity.”

Patsy stopped, narrowed her eyes at him.

“Maybe even further back. All the way to your daddy—your real daddy—dying.”

She took a step away from him. He reached for her hand, slipped fingers around her wrist. She tugged, but he held firm. “Let me go.”

“I just want you to remember, Pats. I was on that bus too.”

She jerked hard enough to release herself. “So, what of it?”

The anger had returned. Maybe he should have just kept his big mouth shut. “I’m just trying to say, Patsy, that even though that bus took you away from your mother, it brought you to me.”

Her lips twisted. Her breathing became labored. Before he could say anything more, she turned and ran toward the door leading to the hall, which led to the elevators, which led to the fourth floor.

“Pats!” He took a step after her, then stopped. The struggle he’d grown accustomed to fought its way from his stomach to his chest. If he ran after her, she’d only grow angrier. If he didn’t, she’d think he, too, had abandoned her. Still, he was tired now. He wouldn’t leave her. He wouldn’t. But sometimes—times like this—he felt like a fool.

A begging fool.

———

The following day, while at work, Gilbert received a call from Dr. Jennings. Patsy had been fairly upset, he said, since the visit from the day before, and he wanted to know what had transpired between the two of them.

“Do you want the play-by-play or just the part at the very end?”

“Can you bring those two somewhere in the middle?”

Gilbert cleared his throat. He felt a little like a schoolboy, in trouble with the teacher, called in by the principal. “To start with, she was upset about my being a few minutes late. So, we went over the whole ‘I’m not leaving you’ talk. Again.”

“Your wife’s insecurities, Mr. Milstrap, are at the core of her issues. I wish you’d try to take on a more sympathetic tone.”

Gilbert drummed his fingers over a manila file marked “Spartanburg, South Carolina” as he eyed the thick black lettering in Mary Ann’s penmanship. With any luck, and in spite of the recent downturn in his personal life, he still might be able to pull off opening a new Gilly’s there. “Dr. Jennings, let me remind you of how far
I’ve
had to come with all this. I bust my behind to take care of my family—my kids—and run a successful business. A very successful business, I might add.”

“What does that have to do with your wife, Mr. Milstrap?”

“Everything. I am barely hanging on here, Doctor. I’m getting to the hospital every Sunday. I’m sending her cards like you said to. I’m encouraging her family and friends to do the same. I try to stay positive. But, quite frankly, I’m not seeing a whole lot of progress here.”

“What is it you’re looking for, Mr. Milstrap?”

“My wife at home, that’s what I’m looking for.”

“At what price?”

Gilbert felt his temper flare. “Don’t you dare talk to me about price, Dr. Jennings.”

A pause followed. The good doctor obviously had no retort. And why should he? He wasn’t paying the price Gilbert had been paying. What did he know about crawling into bed at night, so bone weary you barely knew your own name but still keenly aware that the warm body that
should
be in the bed next to you, wasn’t. What did he know of not hearing her voice, seeing her smile—really smile, not that fake thing she’d been doing lately—hearing her laugh? And what could he understand about being a man like Gilbert Milstrap? No diplomas on his wall, just hard-earned knowledge for a self-made man who somehow snagged the prettiest little girl in the world. And now . . . he was losing her . . . to something way beyond his control. Death would have been one thing; this was something altogether different.

“Look, Doc, what do you think is the outcome here? Do you think you’ll ever get to the real reason my wife can’t seem to connect to me anymore? To our children? I mean, I know she loves me. Loves them. So, what’s the problem? You’ve told me if I think about bringing her home, I could face another breakdown, this one worse than the last. But, quite honestly, I’m not sure you are doing her any good at all.”

“May I speak?”

“Please.”

“Her nurse has reported that she is starting to talk. To her. She’s not saying anything in group and she certainly is close-mouthed in private sessions. But, if she is starting to open up with Gabrielle, then this may be the opening we’d hoped for. Although, I admit, your wife’s nurse can be pretty close-mouthed herself.”

“So then . . . what are your plans?”

“We are still at the wait and see, Mr. Milstrap. If your wife doesn’t
want
to talk about what happened to her as a child—and I do believe whatever happened with her mother is at the core of this—then I cannot force her. To even try would be futile.”

Gilbert tapped the 1812 Overture on the file. “And you still think this is a simple case of abandonment issues?”

“There’s no such thing as ‘simple’ when it comes to this kind of trauma. But, yes. I think that, even with the medication we have her on, the best thing she can do is talk.”

A tap brought Gilbert’s attention to the door. It opened just enough for Mary Ann to stick her head through. “Thought you might want to know that Mr. Bonfield is on line two.”

Gilbert opened his mouth, but nothing came out.

Dr. Jennings said, “Mr. Milstrap?”

“Ah . . . hold on.”

Mary Ann’s eyes were wide, like a child’s holding the secret of where the cookie jar had been hidden. “He says it’s important.”

“Dr. Jennings, I have a very important call I have to take. Can I call you back?”

Gilbert felt the tension from across the miles and the line. “No need. I think we’ve said all we need to say for now.”

“I’m sorry. I have to go.” He pushed the line two button. “Bonfield?”

“Glad you were in, Gilbert.”

“Do you have something?” He opened the narrow top drawer on the right side of the desk, pulled out a steno pad. He flipped open the rigid tan cover along with a few pages of scribbled notes from a call he’d taken from Greg’s science teacher.