The bad stuff
MOM BRINGS ME UPSTAIRS TO THE CANCER WARD. WE STOP IN THE waiting
room, briefly, so I can see my sister. Maryanne rushes up to me and hugs me tight. She’s not crying, but she looks afraid as she tilts her head to peer at me.
“Daddy’s going to die,” she says, and I almost break down in tears.
“I know,” I tell her, kneeling to hug her again. “I’ll be right back, squirt, ’kay?”
Mom leads me down the corridor and stops in front of a closed door. “This is him. I’ll give you some time alone.”
Nodding, I push open the door. The room is white and sterile, filled with a hum of machines punctuated by occasional beeps and the muffled sounds of footsteps from the hall. The blinds are closed, and the fluorescent lighting instantly hurts my eyes.
I force myself to focus on the bed. On my father lying in it.
I can’t believe I saw him only a few days ago. He has dark circles under his eyes now. The lines on his face, etched by years of laughter, appear deeper now. It looks like he’s lost fifty pounds overnight.
How on earth did this happen? How did he deteriorate so fast?
“Hey, kid.” His voice, although soft, doesn’t waver. He sounds the way he always sounds. Like my dad.
“You should have told me,” I say dully.
I stop at the foot of the bed. I can’t bring myself to go to the chair at his bedside. I glance at his hands, his arms, the IVs, and the tubes. Mom said he’s on a lot of painkillers, but his eyes are alert.
“I didn’t want you to worry.”
“How can I not? Look at you!” I shout before taking a breath. My pulse is out of control.
“Come sit down.” “No.”
“Shane.”
The helplessness lodged in my throat is suffocating. I’m seconds away from collapsing on the floor in tears. I don’t know what to do, but I can’t just submit to this. The second I accept it’s happening, then that makes it true.
But he’s pleading at me with his eyes. Those familiar hazel eyes. Without a word, I walk to the chair and sink into it. My whole body feels weak. I inhale the scent of antiseptic and battle the urge to throw up.
“I didn’t want to tell you and your sister because then you would have spent the rest of our time together feeling sad and fussing and making yourself miserable. That’s not how I wanted you to remember me. Hell, I wish you weren’t even here right now.”
“Oh, thanks.”
“That’s not what I mean. I mean…I wish it happened when I was asleep or something. Fast. Without warning. So I don’t have to lie here while you guys watch me die.” He twists his face away, and I see the curl of his lips. The anger. When he turns back, it’s with resignation. “I wanted to spare you the pain.”
“But you can’t. You can’t shield us from this.”
“I’ve shielded you your entire life. That’s what I do. I’m your dad. I try to make sure the bad stuff doesn’t reach you.”
A knife of pain twists into my heart. The bad stuff has reached us. My dad’s lying there with sunken eyes and tubes in his arms. Inoperable and untreatable.
Unsavable.
Dead.
Pain clouds his expression for a moment, and I watch him breathe through it. I can’t imagine what’s happening in his body right now as the cancerous cells ravage him from the inside out. And I’m angry again. Because he’s been fighting this valiant battle. He’s been fighting it all alone and didn’t ask me to fight beside him.
“These past six months have been so nice,” he tells me. “I got to see you win the Frozen Four in the spring. I got to see you fall in love with a good woman. I got to see you be happy. That’s really all I want.”
“If you’d told me—”
“Then what?” he challenges. “It would just have been a longer death sentence for both of us. You would’ve been feeling six months of agony as opposed to the few days you’ll suffer through now before this poison finally takes me from you.”
I almost choke on the lump in my throat.
“I didn’t say anything to you and Maryanne because I wanted her to enjoy her science camps and her school. I wanted you to enjoy hockey. I didn’t want either of you to worry. And I don’t want you to blame your mother or be upset with her after I’m gone because—”
“Stop talking like that,” I hiss out. “Stop it.”
I can’t see anymore. The sheen of tears has rendered me blind.
“No, I have to say this. And you have to hear it. I know you’ve had it easy so far in life. Your mom and I wanted that for you. We’ve tried to make things as easy as we could for you to be able to meet your dreams. Let you pursue hockey, make sure you don’t need to worry about rent or expenses, or struggle for anything. You still won’t have to worry about money, but you will struggle now because I’m going to be gone, and your mom and your sister are going to need you.”
“Stop it,” I mumble.
“No. I need you to promise me that you’ll always take care of them and you’ll always be there for them, especially Maryanne.”
I can’t breathe.
“Can we please stop talking like you’re about to die right this second?
You’re not dying right now. Just let me absorb this.”
“No. Now is the time for me to say it.” He weakly raises one arm. “Before this morphine turns my brain into mush. I can think clearly right now, and I can see you clearly, and I want you to know I couldn’t be prouder of the man you’ve become. You are everything to me. You and your sister.”
His voice is finally starting to shake, and the tears now run freely down my face.
“Please stop saying this,” I beg.
“No, you’re going to hear it. You’re going to hear how much I love you. You’re going to hear how proud I am of you. You’re going to hear how sad I am that I can’t be there for your rookie season, sitting at center ice for your first Blackhawks game.”
I’m done for. That’s it. I curl over onto his bed with my face pressed against his arm, unable to control the tears. I shake harder when I feel his hand gently stroking my hair and the nape of my neck.
“It’s all right. It’s okay, son.”
“No, it’s not okay,” I mumble through the pain. “How could you keep this from us?”
But I understand it now. I do. As angry as I am, I think I would do the exact same thing in his situation. I wouldn’t want people pitying me for six months, worrying and fussing. I suddenly remember how Mom didn’t want him to go for a walk after Thanksgiving dinner, claiming there’d been too much activity already. I thought she’d been worried about Maryanne. Now I realize she was talking to Dad. She wanted him to take it easy.
I shut my eyes tight and breathe deep. My heartbeat is throbbing in my fingertips, and it’s more adrenaline than I need right now. When my breathing slows down enough for me to open my eyes, the weight on my shoulders is heavier than ever.
I slowly lift my head, swiping at my tears with the sleeve of my hoodie. “You can’t go,” I say. Because there’s simply no alternative. “You can’t go.”
“I’m going to have to, kid. But I promise you, you’re going to be just fine.”
“No, I won’t.” My eyes are burning.
“You will because you’re the strongest man I know. I’ve loved you from the second you opened your eyes. The nurse handed me your tiny, slimy, little body—”
I choke out a laugh.
“And you peered up at me with this knowing look on your face. Your mom says I was imagining it, that there’s no way you could have recognized me. She says babies aren’t even able to focus their eyes right after they’re born, but I knew you saw me. And that day you became my best friend.”
I have to swallow the howl of pain that wants to escape.
“You’re my best friend too,” I say simply. “And you’re the best father anyone could ever hope for. Like, you put other dads to shame. They ought to feel humiliated.”
He cracks a smile. “Damn right.” His breathing goes shallow again, as his voice trembles with emotion. “I want you to remember that no matter where I am, I’ll always be with you. Watching out for you.”
I squeeze his hand, feeling the unbearable crushing weight of this impending loss. I can’t do this. I can’t say goodbye to him. My heart aches with the knowledge that this might be one of the last conversations we ever have. This man shaped my life. Taught me the values that I live by. What the hell am I going to do without his wisdom? His guidance?
“And I need you to promise to stay on the path that we tried to help you create for yourself. You’re going to go to Chicago and report to training camp. You’re going to step onto that ice for your very first NHL game, and when you do, you’re going to look up and I’m going to be looking down on you.”
I start to cry again. “Promise, Shane.”
I manage a nod, squeezing his hand tighter. “I promise.”
“Good.” He chuckles softly. “Just one more and then I swear I’m done making demands.”
I can’t return the laugh. I’m in too much agony.
“I need to hear you say that you’ll take care of your mom and your sister.”
“Of course I will. I’ll always take care of them.” “Good,” he says again.
A short silence falls. I listen to his breathing. It sounds shallow again.
Wispy. And his eyes are starting to get hazy. “Are you okay?” I ask.
“Just tired. Maybe I’ll take a nap.” “Do you want me to go get Mom?” “Yeah.”
I wipe my eyes and walk to the door, but his voice stops me before I can leave.
“I love you, kid,” he says from the bed. “I love you too, Dad.”
Three days later, my father is dead.
