Читать книгу The Complete Collection - William Wharton, Уильям Уортон - Страница 39

The next day I phone Dr Ethridge. He’s been Dad’s doctor at Perpetual the past fifteen years. After being put off several times by switchboard operators and nurses, I get through.

I explain what’s happened. Ethridge goes into his act.

‘Ahh, Mr Tremont, this kind of thing happens all the time. Dr Santana knows exactly what he’s doing; he’s a fine young surgeon. I’ll go see your father this morning; he’s been a patient of mine a long time. You know, we both come from Wisconsin.

‘We might just have to accept it, Mr Tremont, this could be the onset of senility.’

He’s giving me the same bullshit as Santana.

‘So fast, Dr Ethridge, instant senility? I’ve never heard of such a thing.’

‘Well, Mr Tremont, you know he was getting forgetful.’

I keep at him.

‘But, Dr Ethridge, he went in for the operation perfectly aware and now … well, wait till you see him.’

I pause, he doesn’t say anything.

‘Dr Ethridge, would it be all right if I come with you when you see him this morning?’

There’s a pause again. He could be reading or writing something at the same time he’s phoning.

‘Oh, no, that won’t be necessary. I’ll see him on the morning rounds and phone you after lunch.’

He hangs up.

I tell Mother I’ve talked to Dr Ethridge and he feels everything is going to be all right, we aren’t to worry. Of course, she wants to go see Dad.

‘No, Mom, the doctor says we’re not to visit; he needs rest and sedation. Dad’s nervous and anxious about the operation; an older man like him doesn’t adapt easily.’

‘Jacky, if we can only get him home, he’ll be all right.’

She’s convinced if we can get him out of the hospital he’ll be perfectly fine. She can take care of him and that’s what he’s used to, ‘instead of niggers pawing him over.’

‘Mother, you can’t take care of him. If we bring him home, I’d have to do it and I’m sure they can do a better job with him at the hospital.’

Dr Ethridge finally calls at four.

‘Mr Tremont, I saw your father and at this time he seems confused. I also talked with Dr Santana and he feels you’ve attacked his professional judgment.’

This gets me.

‘Dr Ethridge, Dr Santana was absolutely wrong telling my father he had cancer after I’d warned him repeatedly concerning his unnatural fear of this disease. The result is there now. My father fell into this state immediately after Dr Santana told him.’

‘Mr Tremont, these are decisions we doctors make. If your father uses our hospital facilities, you must trust our judgment in these matters.’

Then he goes into a harangue on the theme ‘we know our business.’ I listen till he winds down.

At this point, I’m ready to drop Ethridge, Santana, Perpetual, the whole mess, and start over. But I don’t; I’m too unsure, angry, scared.

Dad’s in the hospital five days. I spend all the time with him I can. Joan spells me with Mother. I talk to Dr Santana every day and he’s getting more and more nervous. I never let a day go by without asking for neurological and psychiatric testing, observations. I’m combing a new copy of the Merck Manual I bought at the UCLA medical library, looking for some reasonable explanation to what’s happened.

I’m up against stone walls with the hospital staff. At the same time, I’m trying to stay calm at home around Mother, assuring her everything is proceeding fine.

At the hospital they keep telling me it will all go away when he recovers from the shock. But Dad continues in his deep, disturbed, anxious, removed condition. He’s lost control of his bowels and bladder. He needs to be hand-fed and it’s very difficult feeding him. He doesn’t have any desire to eat, and is beginning to waste away. All his senses seem cut off.

The nurses are too busy to get sufficient food into him. I take over the feeding; they don’t mind much. It can be two hours just getting half a small meal down. It’s worse than feeding a six-month-old infant. He bites down on the spoon so it’s hard to get out. He twists his head back and forth. A good part of the time I’m waiting for him to swallow. He’ll tuck the food into one side of his mouth or the other like a squirrel, or sometimes spit it out. He avoids my eyes or stares at the spoon, or nothing, but not my eyes. I talk to him about the food, about Mom, about Joan, anything I can think of, but there’s no response.

Now the hospital starts taking up Mom’s idea he might ‘come around’ at home. I’m beginning to agree.

But I know it would never work with Mom there. She’d have to live with Joan and that would be hard. But something happens which decides me.

A part of Dad’s dilemma is he’s constantly twisting, turning, trying to escape. He’s also continually pulling at his catheter. After the first few days, they lace him into a sort of straitjacket. It’s tied behind and has straps attached to wristlets which can be slipped over his hands. He has relative freedom but can’t reach down to the catheter.

He fights against this; it’s pitiful watching him struggle, like a puppy on a leash. When I feed him, I take it off but keep an eye on his hands.

The nurses are also afraid Dad will develop bedsores. He’s losing weight fast and with the constant twisting-turning of his struggle, he’s rubbing his butt and back sore; the skin is wearing off.

Starting about the fourth day, they sit him in a chair beside the bed while they change sheets. They leave him out there an hour or two to get air on his back but he’s secured by his straitjacket.

I come in one evening for the dinner feeding and find Dad still tied to the chair. He’s defecated and somehow pulled out the catheter so he’s soaked in his own urine. He’s twisted and one of his hands is caught under the handle of the chair. The circulation is cut off; the hand is blue. Also, he’s wiggled around so his hospital gown is twisted up to his waist and he’s naked from there down.

I’m shocked. I kneel beside him and his legs are ice cold. This is all happening in the surgery ward of a modern hospital, not in a nineteenth-century mental institution. I don’t know how long he’s been this way but his legs and feet are mottled red and white and the urine is drying on them.

I ring and holler out. A nurse comes running in and I lay it on her hard. She helps me untie Dad and change his gown. We slide him back into bed. I yearn to comfort Dad but he doesn’t seem to realize what’s happening.

Next day I plow into both Ethridge and Santana. They say it’s difficult to care for somebody in my father’s state at a normal hospital. I tell them I’m taking him home; he’s not getting proper care at Perpetual.

I go home and try to avoid Mom. I sneak back into the garden bedroom with a can of beer. I drink in the quiet and try to think. I want to do the right thing for Dad and Mom, not just work off my own anger.

I get Mom down for her nap and phone Joan. I want to tell it straight, not too much artist-type exaggeration, no heightening for effect. When I finish, there’s a long pause. She’s crying.

‘That’s awful, Jack. We’ve got to do something. Mom’s right; we must bring him home. Could you take care of him there if Mom comes out here with us?’

‘I think I can do it; I know I’ll do better than they’re doing at the hospital. But can you handle Mom there with Mario and all? You know how she is.’

‘We’ll manage. I’ll put her in Maryellen’s room; it’s next to the bathroom and I’ll keep her in bed as much as possible. Mario can work out in his garage or in the garden. With playground supervision, he’s not home till six anyhow. Mario understands; don’t you worry about it.’

So it’s decided. When Mom wakes, I tell her. She wants to stay with me and help. I’m firm. I tell her it’s impossible. She’d have another heart attack for sure and I can’t take care of them both at the same time. She can come visit when Dad’s better.

I help her pack. We get in the car, she puts on her eyeshades, and I drive her to Joan’s over Sepulveda, not the freeway.

When I go get Dad next day, the nursing supervisor comes tearing out. She’s a big matronly type and gives me a time about telling off the nurse yesterday, but I’m not so easily managed. I tell her to get out of my way. All these people are only thinking of their own prerogatives.

She calls in the security man. I explain to him what’s been going on. He nods and pretends to listen. Together we get it worked out. He helps me dress Dad in his pajamas and bathrobe. I gather the rest of his personal effects in a paper bag. I tell the supervisor to hurry it up, to get me discharge papers and a wheelchair.

The security guard gives me a wink; perfect man for the job. Together we maneuver the wheelchair into the elevator. Dad’s sitting there shivering, jibbering, worrying his bathrobe with his fingers. It’s hard to believe this could ever have been a functioning human being. Even his fingers and toes are curled under, practically cramped; his head hangs as if it’s too heavy. He looks like the drawing van Gogh did in an insane asylum, the one with a man pushing his face into his fists, only Dad doesn’t even have enough control to do that.

I roll him across the parking lot in the wheelchair and struggle him into our car. He has no idea what’s happening. I drive him home.

I almost have to carry him across the patio, up those steps and into the house. He puts one foot in front of the other but they don’t take any weight; it’s like walking a giant doll. He’s wearing his old aircraft-carrier cap and it gets twisted around to the side. He’s nodding and mumbling, not noticing where he is.

I decide to dress him in his regular clothes. He’s not actually sick, only debilitated. I’m sure if he can regain the feeling of being his own self, he’ll recover. I take him into the back bedroom, sit him in the armchair and dress him. I choose slacks, a blue shirt, a button-down-the-front sweater and his other cap, the one I gave him.

He reaches up, takes the cap and throws it on the floor. Then he almost falls off the chair bending down for it. I put it back on his head. This time he leaves the cap on. I think maybe a warm head will increase the blood circulation and rejuvenate some neurons in his brain. I’m grasping at any straw.

I guide him into the living room and sit him in his platform rocker. It’s a comfort for me seeing him sit there after all the days tied to that sterile hospital bed. I don’t know if it’s doing him any good, but it’s great for my morale. Appearance means much to me, probably too much; could be why I’m an artist, redoing things to the way I want.

I’m hoping if we can only go on as if there’s nothing wrong, he might slip a gear and get it all on track again.

I go into the kitchen and start making my parents’ classic lunch. It’s a toasted cheese sandwich, served with relish, about ten Ritz crackers and a glass of beer. I run back and forth checking him. He’s sitting there, more or less calm, staring at their clock over the TV.

I bring the sandwiches into the living room and set up a collapsible tray between his chair and Mother’s. They use these trays when they watch TV. While I’m running back and forth, Dad leans forward a few times as if he’s going to get up, but the rocking action of the chair defeats him and he falls back.

I turn on the television and find one of their favorite ‘Crying Annie’ shows. That’s what they call them themselves. Dad stares at the TV but with blank incomprehension. He leans slightly forward, reaching slowly with one hand as if to pick something out of the air about two feet in front of his face. He does this several times, then gives up.

I slide the glass of beer into his hand but he doesn’t do anything. He looks at it, then at me. It’s as if we have no relationship, nothing of being the same species, let alone related. I’ve seen circus acts where chimpanzees have been trained to drink out of a cup and eat off a plate. Those chimpanzees looked more human than my father. He stares at that glass of beer, no idea what to do with it. I put my hand over his, around the glass, and bring it up slowly to his lips; his hands are cool, trembling. I tilt it so the beer goes into his mouth. About half runs out the corners but he gets some and swallows. I lower his hand and wait to see what happens.

Nothing. I take the beer out of his hand and fit half a sandwich into it. Then I bend his arm again, moving it up to his mouth, but he won’t open his lips. His jaws are locked tight.

So I cut the sandwich into small squares and have more luck. He opens his mouth to take the squares, chews and swallows. This way, I get half a sandwich down. He’s tasting and it’s something he likes. I try the beer again. It’s easier this time but he hasn’t worked out the difference between eating and drinking; he chews the beer. He almost bites off the edge of the glass. Next time I’ll use a mug.

City Hospital comes on TV. This is one of my parents’ favorites but I’m not up to watching it right then. Dad doesn’t seem to notice what’s on; he’s only staring at the movements and colors. I flip around until I find the Dinah Shore show. Dad is watching TV the way you’d look in a kaleidoscope. He’s watching the movement, hearing the sounds; it calms him, holds him in one place but that’s about all.

I chatter on, about the TV, about anything, but he doesn’t pay attention. I’m getting restless; patience is not my strong suit, especially when there’s no feedback. I talk about Joan, her kids, about Vron, our kids, about Mother; about what I remember from the work he did at G.E. and then at Douglas. Nothing.

The television is fine in the daytime, but when evening comes, things get difficult. There’s something about colored TV light flickering on the rug.

My parents have the weirdest damned pattern in their living-room rug. Mother bought this rug because she said it wouldn’t show the dirt. It’s different colors: red, green, brown, orange, yellow in tiny dots, like a mad pointillist painting but with no image.

The flickering of TV colors on that rug drives Dad crazy. He keeps sliding off his rocker to the floor; feeling the surface, or trying to pick up the lights and shadows or smoothing them out.

I kneel with him. I run my hand over the rug saying it’s nothing and trying to calm him. I help him back up on the rocker several times but then inevitably he slides down again.

Finally I let him do it; he isn’t hurting himself and it’s something to do, better than sitting in the rocker like a vegetable. He crawls along on his hands and knees, touching and wiping the rug. It’s night by now and eerie. He doesn’t make any sound, nothing but the rubbing of his hand on the rug. It reminds me of when he taught Joan and me to shine pennies.

It’s painful seeing him reduced to walking on all fours; but I don’t know what else to do. Nobody’d ever prepared me for anything like this. I’m totally spooked sitting there in the dark while he crawls along the floor in the quiet house. I know I should be starting dinner but I can’t get myself to move.

Whenever there’s a sudden sound or a change in light coming from the TV, he springs back and cowers, pushing himself into a sitting position. This is primitive man, man before he’s gotten up on two legs. He’s frightened by any change and doesn’t understand what’s going on around him. It’s as if he’s come from some other planet, another star; this world is totally unfamiliar to him. Here he is a grown creature with a certain motor skill and no idea what to do with it. Whatever he is, whatever his intellect might be, he’s unrelated. His worldwise, rational capacity is gone. He’s back there in the furthest part of his mind.

I squat and stare at the new light. I think of everybody still sleeping up at the house, still safe in that other place inside themselves. Meadowlarks start from the grass, they fly just over the reed tops. Twisting, turning, catching early insects. Almost like barn swallows.

I begin to feel maybe some kind of serious cerebral accident has happened, that he’s stroked and a big part of his brain is permanently lost to him.

I’m thinking if he can only regain control of his bladder and bowels it’ll be a big step. Every hour, I lead him to the bathroom. This works, sometimes, at least for peeing. I take his penis out and aim but he wants to hold it himself. He mostly makes the toilet but sprays the wall when he loses concentration. I’d rather wipe up than take away this one pleasure. The urine is a fairly normal color, not bloody, but it stinks to high heaven.

We don’t eat much for dinner, French fries and hamburger. I feed him French fries one at a time and chop the hamburger into small pieces. He eats about half.

At ten o’clock, I lead him into the bedroom. I’ve arranged the room to make it safe for him to sleep. Normally, everything in that room is symmetric. The bed’s in the center of the wall with night tables on each side. The dresser is on my mother’s side, the closet on my father’s. The cedar chest is at the foot of the bed, with a desk under the window. It’s been this basic arrangement in our house as long as I can remember.

But I’ve changed it around. I’ve put both night tables on one side of the bed. Then I shoved the bed against the wall. I’ve lined up three dining-room chairs to block him from falling off the open side. He’ll be safe this way, I hope. In the hospital he’s had a high-sided bed.

I get Dad undressed and into his pajamas. He doesn’t fight me, he’s nervous and twitching, but he lets me lift his arms or legs. He’s very sensitive or maybe I’m rougher than I think, because, several times, in my shifting around, getting trousers off, or an arm in a sleeve, he moans or grunts as if I’ve hurt him.

I pull back two chairs and ease him onto the bed. It’s hard getting him to relax and lie back. I slowly lower his head till he’s resting on the pillow. He stares at the pink ceiling, his eyes wide open, hardly blinking, as if he’s watching something.

I begin to think lying down is a major event for him; maybe he’s lost his ability to compensate movements in space. Maybe, lying down, he’s seeing everything sideways. What used to be on top is straight ahead, and he can’t adjust. It’s as if a motion picture camera were tilted up. I try to think that way, get inside him somehow.

His eyes have begun drifting over the light-and-shadow patterns on the ceiling as if it’s a whole new world, at least as interesting as the sidewise world. He’s seeing the way an infant sees. If it weren’t my own father and I weren’t so emotionally involved, this could be fascinating. It’s amazing to see how he’s participating in this world with such intensity. He’s probably seeing forms, shadows, colors and movements in an original, personal sense, the way an artist tries to see and never can.

So I tuck him in, folding his hands across his chest. I pull the covers up. To protect the bed, I’ve put a plastic tablecloth under the sheet; but I’m not sure about an electric blanket. If he urinates in the night, can he electrocute himself?

I take off the electric blanket and throw on a couple regular blankets from the cedar chest. Before I leave, I get some water, tilt his head with my hand and give him his regular medicines plus five milligrams of Mom’s Valium. I say good night and hope for the best.

In the side bedroom, I change into my sleeping suit. Then I go out into the living room. I’m looking for something to read; the only thing around is that lousy Hearst paper the Herald-Examiner. I make a snack, and sit in the rocker letting myself be worked through several articles about murders, rapes and Communist plots to destroy the moral fabric of America. Half an hour later, I go back to see how Dad is. I peek through the door carefully, trying not to make a sound. He’s gone!

I can’t believe it. I push the door open all the way and turn on the lights. The bed’s empty! The room’s empty! I dash back down the hall and look in the bathroom. Nobody! I look in the middle room but he isn’t there either. He’s vanished! I stop for a minute and try to breathe. I look in the kitchen, then back in the living room.

I don’t know what gives me the idea, finally, to look under the bed but that’s where he is. He isn’t asleep, he’s quietly moaning to himself under there. I should’ve heard this when I was looking but I was looking so hard I wasn’t listening. He’s moaning and trying to turn onto his stomach. He’s up on his side pushing his shoulder against the springs of the bed. The bed’s too low and he can’t turn over.

I try to get hold of his feet but he kicks my hands away. I can’t pull him onto his back because he’s wedged. I try pulling on his arm but he moans louder. I’m getting wedged under there myself, and feeling claustrophobic. I wriggle out for a fresh start.

I’m afraid to slide the bed for fear I’ll crush him. I try lifting one corner and holding it up, hoping he’ll roll onto his stomach. But when I lower the bed carefully, it’s worse. He’s rolled up on his side in a fetal position and is jammed tight by the springs. He moans louder and grunts in pain. I quickly lift the bed again.

‘Turn over, Dad, turn over!’ I yell, and let the bed down again. He’s moaning and screaming now; I’m crushing him! I lift the bed. I have a sacroiliac condition and I don’t know how long I can hold up.

I stretch out a foot and hook one of the chairs. I edge the chair toward me and muscle the bed up at the same time until the bed-spring rests on the chair. I’m shaking and sweating like a hog. I sit on the floor to get my breath.

I look under; he’s still curled up but the bed isn’t on his shoulder. I can’t tell if he’s asleep, but at least he isn’t moaning. I consider pulling the covers off the bed and wrapping them around him under there. If he’s asleep, I certainly don’t want to wake him. This room is warm and the carpet is thick, especially under the bed where nobody’s ever walked.

But then he starts moaning again. I slip off my dripping sweat-suit top. I check to make sure the bed is secure on the chair. I wedge another chair against the bed just in case. It’d be a scene if we both got trapped there; nobody could ever explain a thing like that. I slide under with him.

I squeeze close and fit myself tight against his back. I put my arms around his waist and start pulling backwards. I inch myself back, pulling on him, watching out for the chairs. He doesn’t resist except to moan and curl deeper into his fetal position. I’m afraid I’ll pull too hard; he seems so fragile I might break him. His coordination is shot; he could easily get an arm or leg twisted without my knowing it. After ten minutes’ struggling, we’re out from under. He’s still curled up on himself. His eyes are shut, squeezed shut.

We’re both covered with streaks of dirt and dust. Mother might be one of the world’s greatest housekeepers, but nobody dusts the springs under a bed, not at seventy anyway.

I take off Dad’s pajamas, twisting and pulling to get them loose from his clamped-down arms and legs. I pull the chairs from under the bed and lower it to the floor again. I lift Dad in my arms; he starts to uncurl. I maneuver him to the bathroom.

I sponge him, wipe the dirt off his head, hands and a few other places. I guide him back to the bedroom, prop him on the side of the bed. Now his eyes are full open, pinpoint pupils, watching me carefully. I get new pajamas and wrestle him into them. It’s exactly like dressing a giant ten-month-old.

Then, slowly, I straighten him onto the bed again, lower his head to the pillow. When I get him down, I sit and watch. He’s so incredibly nervous; his lips, his whole mouth is twitching; his fingers and hands are shaking and rubbing on the edge of the sheet where I’ve pulled it to his neck. He’s in a total state of negative anticipation.

I run fast into the bathroom, fill a glass of water and come back. He’s still there, he hasn’t moved. I tilt his head with one hand again and slip a Valium between his teeth; another use for that space beside long-distance spitting. I slip it through there because his jaws are locked tight. He chews and swallows it like candy. I pour water gently between his teeth and he swallows that, too. I hope I’m not killing him with Valium. What the hell would I say at an inquest? These aren’t even his Valium pills; they’re Mother’s. I gently settle his head on the pillow, put out the overhead light and sit.

I fall asleep, half naked, dirty. I wake up with my head in my arm on the bed. He’s asleep. It’s so good to see him relaxed, his face smooth, absolutely quiet, in a dead sleep; but he’s breathing. It gives me some hope. I didn’t see him asleep like this even once in the hospital. I quietly sneak away. I wash myself in the bathroom and spread my sweaty sweat suit over the shower-curtain rod to dry. I put on jockey shorts and a T-shirt, then climb into bed. It’s past one-thirty.

I don’t know what wakes me, but it’s almost five o’clock. I decide to check how he’s doing. I tiptoe down the hall and try pushing his bedroom door open quietly. It won’t open! I push till it’s open enough for me to stick my head in. He’s on the floor against the door at my feet, curled up naked, covered with shit! His face, hands, feet and legs, everything smeared with it! The smell almost knocks me down.

There’s a moment then when I’m not sure I can go on. There’s a strong animal impulse to just close the door and run. I want to run as fast and far as possible, get on a plane and go home. I want to call Joan, call the hospital, call anybody and ask for help.

I push the door open carefully. Dad’s chattering, muttering and shaking. He’s ice cold. He isn’t asleep. When I lean over him he looks at me with locked eyes, as if somebody’d turned on a light, but no recognition. I take off my T-shirt and lift him in my arms. As I said, I have a bad back; I’m amazed at what I’m doing. Dad’s not a heavy man but he still weighs over a hundred and forty pounds.

I ease him into the bathtub and turn on the water. God, he’s a mess. It’s in his hair, in his pubic hairs, all over. I fill the tub and scrub as best I can. The smell fills the bathroom. Mother’d have two fits. I drain the brown water when I’ve got most of it off and fill the tub again. I rinse him, try to wipe off what I’ve gotten on my chest and arms while carrying him.

Dad only watches me. I drain this tubload and dry him in the tub. I dash into the bedroom to grab his last pair of pajamas. One pair is covered in bed dust, the other with shit. Then I lift him from the tub and sit him on the toilet, just in case. I want to get out anything left; it can’t be much, but I’m taking no chances.

We’re into flannel pajamas now, the ones Joan bought for his birthday.

I stagger with him back to the bedroom. The bed’s clean, thank God. He must’ve fallen or gotten out first. I put him in the bed, this time on his side and curled in his fetal position. Maybe that’s the way he likes to sleep. I pull the covers over him and watch for five minutes or so; he doesn’t budge.

I go back to the bathroom, fill a bucket with warm water and pour in a cup of laundry soap. I take one of the more ragged towels and hurry back to the bedroom. He’s still quiet but I can’t tell if he’s asleep. The smell is overwhelming. I’m usually good with things like shit, garbage or vomit but this is at the limits of my endurance. It’s on everything. It’s on the walls, the woodwork, the door and, worst of all, the rug. I scrub, wipe and scrape. Mom is always so worried about dirt; boy, this is the end of dirt. She has a special thing about shit, anyway.

Now, I’m an anal personality by Freud’s or almost anybody’s definition. I like to preserve things, hold on, I’m a nest maker, husbander and conserver; but I think there’s good reason.

There was an event when I was two years old – not even that. Mother likes to brag about it. And it’s strange, while I’m wiping all this up, it comes to me clearly. To be honest, I don’t think I ever really remembered this incident, but there on the floor against the closet door, it comes back; I have a memory, not a memory of Mother telling the story, but a real memory of it actually happening.

This memory draws open a curtain and allows me to have some empathy with Mom. I’ve always felt I should have remembered because it must have been a terrible shock but I’d never been able to.

My mother had me ‘trained’ by the time I was eighteen months old. One day she dressed me in a white suit without diapers and was taking me to South Philadelphia for a visit with her mother and some of her sisters. She was going to show me off: ‘Look, curly blond hair; look, no diapers.’ My mother was twenty; I’ve got to give her credit; at least I was alive.

Mother has me ready and stops to take a pee or put on some powder. She comes out and I’m standing there, red-faced, smiling, legs apart, proud. I’ve crapped in the white pants. The story at this point goes, ‘I’ll tell you, I gave him the best smacking he’d ever had. I take those pants, filled with it, pin them around his face and lock him in the hall closet.’

I’m remembering this. There’s something about the combination of the smell, the woodwork, the door and Dad’s helplessness which brings it all back. I’m crying. I’m scrubbing and crying. I could be crying for my father but I think I’m crying for myself, still crying out a fifty-year-old event. I might also be crying for Mom. I hope so. There’s something of wanting to tell her I won’t do it again.

I wipe things up as best I can. I dump the bucket in the toilet, wash out the tub, rinse and soap everything down. I spray pine deodorizer. I change jockey shorts and put on my T-shirt. I go back to Dad; he’s still curled up. I’m dead tired. It’s about six-thirty now. The lack of sleep, the strain is getting to me.

This time I decide to do it differently. I close off the side of the bed with chairs again. Then I lie out across the foot of his bed with my hand on his left foot. I don’t want to tie him down. I go to sleep like that, at the foot of his bed. When I wake, it’s light. Dad’s still there. I look at my watch and it’s almost nine o’clock. He’s asleep.

Everything still smells shitty so I go in and take a shower. I don’t take a bath in the tub, even though I’ve cleaned it out with Ajax. I swear I have the smell of shit caught in my nose hairs. I take my shower fast, running back and forth to check while I dry myself, brush my teeth and get dressed. I’m like a mother with a young baby. Now I know what Vron means when she says that for seven years she never went to the bathroom without a baby on her lap.

At about ten, Dad wakes up. I get him dressed. I want to try giving him breakfast as if there’s nothing wrong. I sit him in the armchair at his end of the table.

But he won’t eat; all he does is play with it. So I feed him. He doesn’t fight me; just keeps opening his mouth. We get down two eggs, some roll and orange juice; at least he won’t starve today. I watch him carefully. When he reaches for anything, he misses. It’s almost as if he’s half blind. Then, when he tries to compensate, like as not, he moves his hand in the wrong direction.

I turn on the record player; Guy Lombardo this time.

Dad’s just as interested in the table, the legs of the table, the pattern on the tablecloth and, of course, the rug as he is in food. He keeps leaning over trying to touch the floor. So, while I do the dishes, I tie him to the chair lightly with the belt from his bathrobe. I can’t think of any other way.

Just after I’ve gotten the dishes off the table and put them in the hot water, I look out and see he’s leaning so far he’s tilting the chair over with him. I run fast as I can, but he hits with a thump before I get there. He looks up at me in noncomprehension, probably thinks I’m standing on my head. He makes no effort to get up, only whimpers.

I feel terrible. I untie and lift him to his feet. I look him over and there’s a big, black-and-blue mark rising on his hip and elbow. I never knew old people bruised so easily. People are going to think I’m beating up my own Dad.

It’s a gorgeous sunny day. I finish the dishes and take Dad out to the patio. That’s one thing Dad and Mom like to do, sit out there and sunbathe; it’s part of their dream come true. I lower him into one of the redwood chaise longues he made. I have him in his button-down sweater, gray trousers, socks, black shoes, and he has the cap on his head. If you just looked at him lying there, you’d never know anything was wrong.

I settle into a chaise longue beside him and start up a running conversation. I try remembering everything of my childhood with him. I ask questions, and when he doesn’t respond I go on. I talk about his brothers, his sisters, his mother and father, all his life I know of. I feel he’s beginning to listen; in some passive way, he’s tuned into it; but I don’t think he understands. He’s listening as a dog or a child listens; for the tone of voice only, without comprehension.

I close my eyes and listen to the sounds. There’s the beginning hum of insects and the twitter of ground thrushes. I hear the sound of the screen door slam; must be Johnny going out to feed the chickens before school. I’d better be getting on up there with this water.

After more than an hour, he stirs, and tries to speak. I lean close. He speaks in a deep breathy voice with a heavy stutter. It’s as if he’s forcing his voice out.

‘They’ll get mad at us if we stay here. Where’s the owner of this house?’

It’s such a wild, crazy thing for him to say; still it’s something, words with sequence. But it breaks my heart. He’s built this house, nail by nail, from the ground up, foundations, framing, electricity, plumbing, the whole thing. Now he thinks it’s somebody else’s. He can’t claim for himself this one visible proof he’s even lived.

He reaches out tentatively with his shaking hand and pats me lightly on the knee, very tenderly; I can barely feel it, a ghost tap. He lifts his head again, looks left and right, then up at the sky. He almost seems to sniff the air the way I’ve always thought the groundhog would on Groundhog Day. He leans toward me again and whispers excitedly.

‘They’re going to throw us out on our ear! Let’s get going.’

I put my hand over his and try to look into his eyes; the pupils are somewhat dilated but he won’t look at me.

‘Relax, Dad, you own this house. Nobody’s going to throw us out. This whole property is yours.’

He looks at me quickly, a fast, sneak look; a faint quivering smile goes across his face. I can’t tell if the smile is saying, ‘Is that so, isn’t that marvelous?’ or, ‘You must be out of your mind.’

That’s the only contact all morning. The rest of the time I’m mostly talking to myself. Dad once rigged a little loudspeaker system connected to the record player in the living room for music in the patio. I go put on a big stack of Bing Crosby, Perry Como and the Hawaiian music. Dad and Mom have a passion for fake Hawaiian music. We listen to Bing Crosby sing ‘Sweet Lailani’, then something about a little grass shack. Dad seems to relax; he even falls asleep sometimes. But each time he wakes it’s the same nervous shaking.

At two I make lunch; we get most of the beer down and a whole sandwich. I’m starving so I have two sandwiches and a second glass of beer. I’m bored out of my mind. That sounds terrible but it’s the truth. I don’t know how people who do this professionally stick it. It’s so discouraging, and by nature I’m not the endurance type.

At three, I take him in to try for a nap. He falls asleep with me holding on to his foot again. I’m worrying what we’ll do for the coming night.

That evening I get Dad to eat a reasonable amount but he’s not drinking much. I’m worried about dehydration. It’s hard getting fluids in him, and he definitely has diarrhea. I tried giving him hot chocolate but I almost burned him, a combination of his shaking and my lack of skill pouring liquids down another person’s throat.

I lean him back in his rocker before the TV. I run back and forth, clearing dishes and washing, watching him.

He’s having the same damned problem with the rug. He’s lowered himself onto the floor and is crawling on all fours picking at the pattern and the flickering TV shadows.

I settle in Mother’s chair and watch. He crawls on his knees to investigate a vase of fake flowers on the coffee table. He’s very careful, touching lightly, studying, trying to understand. I keep up a running commentary, explaining the things he’s looking at, but he doesn’t react.

Then he kneels with his knees on the floor, his head and shoulders on the couch. He stays that way for almost ten minutes till I think he might be asleep. I sneak over to look in his eyes; they’re wide, unblinkingly open. God, I’m glad Mom isn’t here to see this! I wish I weren’t!

I sit at the dining-room table where I can keep an eye on him and try writing a letter to Vron. I tell her Dad’s been operated on, so I have to stay longer. I tell her I’m taking care of Dad, now he’s out of the hospital. Then I can’t stop myself, I spill all the beans. I’m practically crying, writing that letter and knowing all the time it isn’t fair.

After the letter, I call Joan. I don’t want to upset her, so I just say things are going OK. I tell her Dad hasn’t changed much but we’re getting along. She tells me how Mom’s been playing hearts with Maryellen; no big scene with Mario, yet.

I’m dreading the night. Something happened to me the night before. I’m not afraid of the dark. I really have this advantage, I like the dark. I like being alone in it; there’s something about darkness that comforts me. Billy’s afraid of the dark and so’s Jacky. Marty’s petrified.

For a long time at the mill we had our john in the cellar. Marty wouldn’t go down unless somebody went with her. She’d seen a Dracula film when she was about fourteen and it got to her. After that, Marty even kept a crucifix over the head of her bed. She has no religious convictions but she had a crucifix. I’m sure if I could’ve gotten her a gun with a silver bullet, she’d’ve slept with it under her pillow.

That crucifix made a great impression on Mom the one time they came to visit us in Paris. She’s always been worried about the lack of religiousness in our family. We’ve never had The Sacred Heart or pieces of palm hanging over religious pictures, all the paraphernalia of a primitive Catholic family. But Marty had a crucifix over her bed, so we weren’t completely lost.

Now I’m seeing things out of the corners of my eyes, just beyond vision. I keep turning my head fast. I’m jumpy all right.

I undress Dad and sit him on the toilet hoping for the best, but nothing comes. I put on his pajamas and lead him back to the bedroom. He doesn’t know what’s going on, he’s gone.

I put him in bed. What can I do to avoid last night’s catastrophe? I decide I’ll sit on a chair beside him and read. The only book I find in the house is a book on different ways to psych yourself up when you’re about to crack. It’s Mom’s all-time standby. It’s filled with mundane solutions but it’s not bad, written in an easy-to-understand style, not too far off the mark; sort of front-line therapy.

This is the first night Dad starts reaching out as if there are butterflies going across in front of him. He’s reaching up with his fingers, very gently, very delicately, trying to catch something out of the air in front of him. There’s nothing I can see, but he’s tracking with his eyes and closing his fingers carefully, like a child picking motes from the sunlight.

I put down the book and lay my head close to his on the pillow. He continues his graceful plucking. I try to see what he’s seeing. Whatever he’s reaching for, he isn’t catching it. He reaches with the frustrated movement one makes when unsuccessfully pulling a piece of thread through the other side of a needle. Whatever they are, he can’t get hold of them. But he isn’t complaining; only gibbering away with his chattering teeth and lips; saying nothing, expressing extreme concentration.

I slip my hand over his as he reaches, strokes, grabs.

‘What is it, Dad? What are you seeing?’

He doesn’t look at me. His eyes are focused two or three feet in front of him.

When someone is with you and seeing something you’re not seeing, you begin to feel invisible yourself.

First, I turn on the overhead light; maybe this will help; maybe the dim light is causing some kind of hallucination. He pauses briefly and stares at the light, then one of his ‘things’ catches his eye and he reaches for it, his hand carefully inching up.

I turn out the overhead. He slows for a few seconds, then starts again.

I turn off the bedside lamp to see what will happen. In the near dark we watch each other. There’s enough light so I can see he isn’t reaching anymore. Whatever it is he’s trying to catch doesn’t fly in the dark. I listen to his trembling, babbling – ‘bebebebedebdedebgegbebe –’

God, it’s scary! I run my hand over his forehead, over his shoulder and down his arm on the outside of the blankets. He’s as tense as if he’s on the mark ready to run a hundred-yard dash. You could do an anatomy lesson on his tensed-up body. You don’t expect those kinds of muscles in a feeble old man. Also, I haven’t had much experience feeling a man’s arms or shoulders. Except for drawing or painting the figure, I have practically no experience with what a man’s body is like except my own. It certainly feels different from a woman’s.

I stroke him like that for maybe fifteen minutes and the chattering dies down. In the dark I can’t see if he’s asleep. I lean close; his breathing is shallow but I’m not sure.

I reach back and turn on the bed light. He’s staring at me when the light comes on. Somehow, in the dark, he knew just where my eyes were all the time! He’s boring into my eyes with those unblinking, pinpoint eyes. He’s looking at me the same way he’d look at anything else, including his butterflies. He’s not looking with any recognition, only with a vague curiosity. He looks as if he has a desire to understand or know, but no expectation of doing so. He looks at me the way I might stare at the Milky Way on a starry night, not being able to put together what I see with what I know.

I smile; it doesn’t mean anything to him. He watches and seems satisfied so long as I don’t move too fast. After what seems forever, his eyes blink a few times. Then they start flickering, then closing slowly, like the sun going over a hill. He looks dead when they’re halfway down and the pupils turn up under the lids. I listen for breathing and he begins to breathe long, staggering breaths. I settle back in the chair and read but can’t hold concentration. I vary between anxiety and falling asleep; there doesn’t seem to be any comfortable place for my mind between those two.

Then I think, What if I fall asleep? I don’t want to find him on the floor again. What am I going to do? I can’t leave him and I can’t sit up all night. I decide I’ll get in bed with him. It might help if he feels somebody close. He’s slept all his life with someone; it must be a terrible change sleeping alone.

I slide him against the wall so he’s blocked in, put on my sleep suit, spread out on my back and listen to his breathing. It isn’t long before I’m asleep.

I wake scared. What wakes me is the smell of him. He’s on his hands and knees straddling me in the bed. I’m flat on my back and he’s on top of me with his head directly over mine. He’s looking straight into my face in the dark, his nose practically touching my nose.

I jump so hard and fast I thump his head with mine. It takes me a minute to know where I am, what’s happening. I grab his shoulders and carefully roll him back into place on his side of the bed. My heart’s going blubablubulub in the dark, and I’m convinced I’m about to have a heart attack. God, how much strain can a fifty-two-year-old heart take? I’m completely freaked out.

Dad’s lying tense beside me. I put the bedside lamp on again and look at him. He stares back at me with empty eyes, then starts after the butterflies again. Lord!

I get up and go to the bathroom. Going back in the room, I still catch the shit smell.

He’s picking away at his butterflies. I lie beside him and breathe slowly, trying to relax. It’s then, lying there, I figure out what he’s doing. He’s picking the pattern off the wallpaper across the room. Something’s wrong with his perception and he’s seeing that flower pattern hanging in front of his face. He’s picking flowers. I watch some more and I’m sure of it.

I roll out of bed and pull one of the extra white sheets from the cedar chest. I drape it over the two small photographs hung on the wall. One is of Joan in third grade, a school picture at Saint Alice’s, back in Philadelphia. She has her thumbs pressed onto the desk in front of her. The other is me, seventh grade, same position. Those pictures have been on that wall since my parents moved into this house, over twenty-five years ago. I drape the sheet over them so it covers that whole wall. Then I get in bed beside Dad.

Almost immediately he subsides. What in hell can be wrong with his perception?

I put my arm over top of him, across his chest. That way, I’ll know if he moves. So I lie on my side, one arm over his shoulder. I can feel his body tense, shivering, jerking, kicking; like a dog dreaming.

I can’t get to sleep. About the time he seems to settle down and I’m drifting off, he’ll jump, kick a foot or push out an arm. But he must have settled down because finally I do sleep. I’m to the point where I could sleep on a pile of nails.

This time I wake and I’ve been punched in the eye! What he’s done is throw out his arm in a violent swing and smashed it across my face. My nose is bleeding, my lip is cut. He’s really given me a good one.

I go into the bathroom and look. I could be in for a shiner. The nose stops bleeding and the lip is cut inside my mouth. It’s eight o’clock in the morning; I don’t feel I’ve gotten any sleep at all.

But Dad’s been in bed for nine hours and he’s slept most of that time; it isn’t all bad. When I go back to the bedroom, he’s awake. I walk him to the bathroom. He takes his own weight and I only have to guide him. He goes to the toilet, both a piss and a shit. I’ll never get used to wiping the ass of a grown man. I’m not tuned to being a nurse. It’s something I’m finding out about myself. I take him back to the bedroom and help him get dressed. He’s better than he was last night, more with it. He even helps some with the arms of his shirt and lifts himself so I can pull his pants on.

I feed him breakfast, take him out to the patio, tuck him into one of the chaise longues and turn on the music. I’m talking all the time but nothing’s coming back. My chatter means no more to him than the chatter of a squirrel.

Then, sometime in the afternoon, and I can’t tell what the turning point is, he sits up straighter and takes notice. He turns and looks at me, straight in the eye, with a weird twinkle of recognition. Surprised, I lean forward and he points into the garden.

‘Mandy’s out of the pasture, Ed.’

Who’s Ed, who’s Mandy, what pasture? My mind spins. There’s just that; then he nods his head a few times to reassure himself, a habit he’s always had, then settles back. I try to think. Ed has to be his brother, an even year older than Dad. They grew up as farm boys together in Wisconsin.

The best thing is go along.

‘Don’t worry about it, Jack; it’s OK.’

I want him to stay in there. I wait. Then, about fifteen minutes later:

‘Hand me the eighteen wrench there, Jim.’

‘OK.’

He starts the business of putting two things together. He’s holding something invisible in his left hand and pushing something invisible in his right hand against it. He’s pressing hard as he can, applying full strength and gritting his teeth. He’s pushing from one direction to another, grunting with the effort and completely concentrated.

‘How’s it going there, Jack?’

But he only keeps grinding away and won’t answer.

Those are the two big moments of that day. I put him down for a nap and climb in with him again. I sleep, I don’t know whether he does or not. He doesn’t clobber me or anything and we get in two peaceful hours.

After that, I cook dinner and we eat. Then I turn on the television. This time I leave the lights on. I put him in his platform rocker and sit a little behind it. I rock his chair the way you would a baby’s cradle, the way he always did himself; he’d keep it rocking with a slight body movement while he watched. I want to reproduce things as much as possible.

But it doesn’t matter. He begins leaning forward; then he falls to his hands and knees on the floor. He starts scooping up those phantoms of his and picking at the patterns on the rug. He crawls down the hall and into the bathroom. He looks into the toilet the way a dog does; I half expect him to push his head in and take a drink. He pulls himself up, using the sides of the sink, and stares at himself in the mirror, not moving, not doing anything; just staring. Then he grabs hold of the hot and cold faucets and pulls on those. He isn’t trying to turn them on, only tugging. I lead him back into the living room and put him in his chair.

It starts all over again. He does the doorjamb-inspection routine several times. I’m watching, trying to get some idea of what’s going on in his mind.

Silken ears filled with seed, every shining hair connected to a single kernel. I gently squeeze drops of oil in each ear. Some stalks have four or five, it should be a fine crop.

The sky’s hot but the ground’s still moist on my feet, sheltered from the sun and wind. The glistening, blue-reflecting, green, wide leaves and pollen-heavy tassels rise around me. I step carefully, slowly through my self-made jungle, shaking new pollen into open crotches of waiting leaves. A slight breeze blossoms. I stop and listen to the rattling clatter as tassels and twisting leaves bend into each other.

What can be the matter? Who is this giant infant? Is this the way he was as a child? Is he back there with no memory of his entire life? Is nothing left? Can a whole lifetime be lost just like that? It’s as if somebody passed a gigantic magnet over the memory tapes of a computer and wiped it all out. The computer, the tapes look the same, but there’s nothing in there anymore.

He ends up on the floor stretched in front of the TV like a dead Indian from a cowboy movie. Do I wake him? What do I do? I’m having a hard time making decisions. I bring some blankets out and cover him. I slip a pillow under his head carefully not to wake him. He’s sleeping deeply.

I’ll sit there in the chair and keep an eye on him. I close and lock all the outside doors; pull the venetian blinds. There’s no door to the hallway or the kitchen, but I close all the doors in the hall. I feel safe enough, even if I do drop off.

I also do the same kinds of things you’d do with a baby. I move the junk from the coffee table and low tables, things with which he might be able to hurt himself. I sit back in the rocker, call Joan and tell her things are OK. She tells me Mom is behaving herself, Mario’s keeping out of sight. I hang up and then don’t last five minutes.

When I wake he’s gone again! For a minute it doesn’t register. I try to hold down the panic. Well, he can’t have gone far; he’s probably in the kitchen. I go in there but it’s empty. I go through and look in the hall. He isn’t there. The doors to the bedrooms and bathroom are still closed. I dash down the hall and look in each of them. He isn’t to be seen.

Hell, it isn’t a big house, I don’t think it has a thousand square feet. I make a quick check of the front and back doors; they’re still locked. Then I run back and look under his bed; I look behind the door; I look in the closet and under the cedar chest, the dresser. I’m getting desperate. What will I tell Mother and Joan if I’ve lost him?

I go into the middle bedroom, I look under that bed; in that closet, under everything. I’m about ready to start pulling out drawers in chests and looking there. I run into the kitchen, look under the table, in the oven. I go back to the living room. I look behind the couch, behind the chair. There’s no place left. It’s one of those locked-room mysteries. What happened to the body? It walked away, that’s what; maybe right through a wall. Maybe he’s turned invisible! I’m thinking all these things. That ‘invisible butterfly’ business has made a deep impression.

I collapse on the platform rocker. Should I call the cops? No, I’ve got to think this out. I take some deep yoga breaths. I get up and carefully go over all the doors. There’s no way he could’ve gotten out, the screen-door latch is still on. Even if he’d suddenly come back to his full strength and sense, opened the doors and walked away, closing the doors after him, there’s no way he could’ve latched the screen door behind him!

Then I notice there’s one door I haven’t checked. In the hallway, on the left, just after the kitchen and before the bathroom door, there’s a louvered door opening into a tiny two-by-three closet with the heater in it. They also keep the vacuum cleaner and brooms in there. It takes all my courage to open that door.

I open it, not really expecting he’ll be there. It’s the only place left, that’s all.

He’s standing with his back to me, fully clothed, leaning against the heater. I don’t know how he got the door closed behind him. I don’t know how long he’s been in there, but long enough to have crapped his pants. It’s amazing I didn’t pick up the smell; then again, the nostril hairs inside my nose are still coated.

I stand there, my heart’s pounding away, and I feel light in the head.

‘Hi, Dad. What’re you doing in here?’

He turns at the sound of my voice. He looks through me for several seconds, then turns back to the heater. I gently take him by the arm and lead him toward the bathroom. He doesn’t resist actively but there’s a low-level reluctance. He’d like to stay in that closet.

It’s two-thirty in the morning. I undress him, clean him off, fill the tub and throw the dirty clothes in. I wipe him off as best I can and put on the washed pajamas. I lead him back toward the bedroom. My nerves are on the very edge; it wouldn’t be hard for me to start bawling.

Now I’ve got him in my arms leaning against the hall wall and I’m afraid to open the bedroom door. Opening any door is getting to be a traumatic event. I tell myself I’ve got to call Joan in the morning. I need time to recuperate.

Dad lies out stiff on the bed when I finally get him in the room and stretched out. He lies there chattering and whining or whimpering sporadically like a puppy. What to do? I think of tying his hands so he can’t whack me again. My face is swollen and sore; I’d hate like hell to get hit in the face again. I bring my sweat suit into the bedroom, get undressed and put it on while I’m watching him, hoping he’ll go to sleep. I climb in bed with him. This time I do what I do with my wife.

Vron typically turns her back to me in bed and I tuck in behind her, knees behind her knees and my arm over her. I don’t sleep all night that way but that’s the way I start.

I find it a great comfort to sleep with someone. Sleeping with another human is one of the great life pleasures, maybe even a necessity. I’m sure it’s only recently humans have been sleeping alone. The single bed and separate rooms are probably partly responsible for our anxiety-ridden world.

Especially, asking children to sleep alone in the dark is cruel; time is different for a child, longer.

And, right now, Dad is like a child. I sleep with him. Small as he is, he seems monstrous. I’ve never slept with a man before. I’d slept spoon-style in a pup tent or in a foxhole, but we were in separate fart sacks and there was no direct physical contact except bulk. The smell is different, the feel, the height of shoulders, the breadth of chest, the all-over hardness, feeling of density; it’s entirely another thing.

But I figure I’ll hold him down if I have to.

We sleep! He sleeps; I sleep! We sleep through the night like mice. I never move and he doesn’t either. God, it’s nice!

I wake at nine o’clock and he’s still asleep, snoring lightly. I carefully unwrap myself. He’s in a tight, curled, fetal position again, still on his side. I pull the covers up over his shoulders. I’ll let him sleep long as he wants. If he sleeps through thirty-six hours, that’s OK with me. I take his pulse, it’s slow and regular.

I go into the bathroom and the shitty clothes are still in the tub. Maybe I expected the brownies would wash them. I run in hot water, scrub and rinse till the water is clear, not yellow. Then I hang them on the line in back. I Ajax out the tub and fill it to near the top. I keep peeking back at Dad; he’s dead to the world. I lower myself into the tub and try to relax.

After a ten-minute soak, I check him again and get dressed. I cook up my kind of breakfast; three eggs with cheese on top and some pieces of Canadian bacon. I organize Dad’s medicine and it’s coming onto ten-thirty. I keep checking but he’s still sleeping. I do the dishes and pick up around the house, sweep the living room, kitchen, bathroom and hall. I sweep off the patio. It’s almost noon.

So I begin to get worried. Maybe he’s had a stroke. Maybe he’s in a coma. Maybe I haven’t been getting enough food or liquid into him and he’s dying.

I calculate he’s been asleep for over twelve hours. That’s not counting whatever he was doing when he was in the closet draped over the heater.

Quietly I go in the bedroom. I pull back the curtains and open the venetian blinds. They’re always closed tight; even in the day you need to turn on a light back there. It’s a conviction of the poverty mind that bedrooms should be permanently dark. Maybe it has to do with working swing and graveyard shifts in factories. Dad’s done a lot of that in his time. I think he worked swing shift most of the time he’s been in California. Or maybe dark bedrooms are Irish or French.

But I want to let some light and air into that room. Otherwise, I’ll never get rid of the shit smell. Also, I want to let out the dark, poor spirits, let in the good fairies and sunshine.

I sit in front of the window. Sun’s streaming in so I open my shirt; I drift off in the chair with my head leaning against the wall.

When I wake, it’s two in the afternoon. He’s awake and I don’t know for how long. He’s on his back. He isn’t trembling or shaking, his eyes are more relaxed; but then I see his face is wet. He’s lying with his head on the pillow, crying. His whole face is wet with tears. Tears are running down the sides. I go close. The pillow’s soaking wet too. He’s crying quietly, not sobbing, only a long, continuous, uncontrolled crying.

I run my hand over his head, then put my hand on his. For the first time, he grabs my hand and holds it.

‘What’s the matter, Dad? Everything’s OK.’

He begins crying harder. He cries so hard, so hard, and now he’s sobbing. He won’t look at me. His eyes are open, staring at the ceiling and he’s sobbing deep, twisting sobs. I keep talking to him, rubbing my hand over his, his other hand clutching mine.

What can it be now? What’s brought this on? I carefully lift, shift him to the edge of the bed so I can dress him, and he cries the whole way. It isn’t often you hear a man cry deep, sobbing non-hysterical crying like this.

I bundle him up and take him out on the patio. He leans his head back on the chaise longue and cries. I watch a few minutes and go in to make something to eat. I’m feeling completely helpless. I whip up a quick cheese sandwich and a glass of beer. When I come out, he hasn’t moved and he’s still crying. He’s going to dehydrate from tears alone.

I can’t get him to eat. He won’t open his mouth, he won’t chew when I force a bit of sandwich into his mouth. He isn’t resisting, he just isn’t paying attention, isn’t noticing the food. I try pouring beer between his teeth and almost drown him. He doesn’t clear the path to his stomach and it goes down his bronchial tube. I’m liable to bring on pneumonia! I sit there for half an hour holding his hands and hoping it will stop, that he’ll cry his way through whatever it is. But it goes on and on.

I dash inside and pull out the phone extension so I can sit on the steps and keep an eye on him while I’m talking. I call Joan. She’s psychic or something; before I open my mouth, before she even knows it’s me, she says, ‘What’s the matter; Jack? What’s happening?’

‘Joan, I don’t know what’s the matter; Dad keeps crying. He woke up crying and he’s been crying ever since.’

‘Mother of God! Is there anything I can do?’

‘Could you come over, Joan? I’m at the end of my rope.’

‘OK, I’ll be right there. John and Maryellen should be home soon, they can watch Mom. Have you called Dr Ethridge?’

I’m listening to Joan and watching Dad. He isn’t paying any attention to me or what I’m doing.

‘Good idea, Joan; I’ll call Ethridge. I hate to bother you with all this but I’m definitely not cut out for nursing. Thank God, I never got involved with clinical work; I think if I worked with abnormals for a month, I’d be the most abnormal character on the ward.’

‘This is your father, Jack. Even doctors don’t treat their own families.’

It’s so good to hear her sane, calm voice. I hate to hang up.

‘OK, Joan. I’ll call Ethridge and wait for you. While you’re here, maybe I can shop, and do some washing. I’m out of underwear and socks.’

‘I’ll bring the wash I’ve already done; some of your things are in it. I’ll be there at about four; that way I can beat the traffic.’

‘OK, but be careful. We don’t want any more casualties; the emergency ward’s full.’

‘All right, “Mother Hen Jack.” I’ll be careful.’

She laughs lightly, privately, over the phone. There’s something so soothing, healing about a mild, content laugh, even when everything’s upside down. If I could bottle that laugh, or record it, and play it up and down the corridors of mental institutions, we could empty half of them in three months. I hang up.

I pull out the Perpetual card and dial Ethridge. Dad’s still crying in front of me.

After the usual runaround, I’m put through; I tell Ethridge Dad’s home with me on Dr Santana’s suggestion. I get a very cold response; he’s still on his high horse, playing ‘boss man’.

‘Dr Ethridge, I don’t know why it is but my father keeps crying. He’s been crying the whole day; he won’t eat and is not responding.’

There’s a slight delay.

‘Does he seem depressed?’

I guess that’s a logical question but it sounds stupid. No, Doctor, he’s not depressed, he’s only crying.

‘I would say he is, Doctor. He seems terribly depressed.’

‘Well, it sounds as if we should try some Elavil; that will bring him around. These kinds of severe depressions are not unusual with older people after surgery.’

He’s talking as if we’re discussing a puppy with a case of worms.

‘Mr Tremont, if you can come into the hospital I’ll have a prescription left at the pharmacy.’

He has ‘hang up’ in his voice, so I let him. I sit there with the phone in my hands for several minutes, not able to move. I feel cut off. I need more of Joan’s magical laughing.

I sit with Dad out there on the patio holding his hand. I have Hawaiian music playing and I take off my shirt to get some more sun. I’m going to get something out of all this, if it’s only a tan. I hold Dad’s hand and pretend I’m on the deck of a ship sailing to Hawaii on my honeymoon. I’m distinctly going kooky!

When Joan arrives, she has the clean clothes and a roast she’s prepared. I tell her what Ethridge said. She latches on to that and wants me to go for the medicine right away.

She sits beside Dad, watches him cry and starts crying herself. She holds on to his hands and tries to get his attention but he won’t look at her. The exception is when she kisses him. Then he puckers up his lips for the kiss as usual. It’s almost instinctive, the way an infant will start sucking when you touch its lips. He stays puckered after the kiss for almost five seconds. There’s no change in his facial expression, just the puckering up.

Joan says the situation at her house with Mother is getting impossible. Mom has cast Mario in the combined role of Mafia chieftain and Nero. She calls him the ‘big shot’ and keeps talking him down to the kids. Joan doesn’t know how long she can keep Mario from blowing up. She’s convinced Mother can’t live in any environment without dominating it.

‘You know, Jack, if Mom had only been born thirty years later, she’d’ve made a great feminist.’

I go over some of the things that have happened with Dad. She’s deeply sympathetic, laughing when it’s funny, reaching out to touch my arm, crying at the sad parts. Dad sits next to us, weeping away almost silently. You can’t believe a person could keep crying continuously for so long. He’s been crying over three hours I know of.

I dash to the hospital, get the Elavil. When I come back, Joan’s sitting close beside Dad. She shakes her head.

‘This is terrible, Johnny. He won’t look at me. He’s like a little boy who’s been bad and feels guilty. What can be the matter?’

I smash two tablets of Elavil in a glass of water. He’d for sure choke on pills. I don’t know what to tell Joan. She sees me as the one in the family who’s supposed to know something about psychology. I don’t know, can’t figure, what’s the matter. Joan tips Dad’s head back, I hold his nose and we pour the Elavil slowly between his teeth; thank God, he swallows this time.

I sit and wait. I have no idea how long this stuff takes. Joan’s inside getting dinner ready. After about fifteen minutes, Dad stops crying. The tears seem to dry on his eyes. He stops sobbing and begins with the chattering lip-bouncing again. He has brief spasms as if he’s reacting to small sudden pains.

I call out.

‘Wow, Joan; look at this. These modern drugs are incredible. Less than half an hour and he’s stopped crying completely. He doesn’t seem sad anymore.’

She comes out and leans over Dad.

‘He doesn’t look happy either. He looks as if a whole war’s going on inside his head.’

About ten minutes later he gets to be— Well, it’s hard to describe. He becomes supersensitive to every sound, every change in light, every movement, everything. Even his own breathing sends him off. He’s in a continual state of agitation; every part of him is moving, vibrating, twitching, twisting.

It’s like the time in California our washing machine broke loose from its mooring and I tried holding it down. The machine was jumping around while I was grappling with it and hollering for Vron to pull the plug.

I lean across to hold him. I’m afraid he’s going to wear himself out. He hasn’t had anything to eat all day and here he is giving off calories like crazy.

‘My God, Joan! He’s elevated all right. Maybe this is what Elavil is supposed to do but it can’t be good for him.’

Joan wraps her arms around his legs. We’re both talking, trying to soothe him, holding on.

I need to give him a tranquilizer before he totally shatters; he can’t keep on like this. I run in to get Valium from Mother’s room. We smash it and force some through his teeth. I take his blood pressure. It’s two twenty over one ten. His pulse is so fast I can’t count it, a fluttering.

Joan holds on while I call the hospital and fight my way through to Ethridge. I tell him what’s happening and what I’ve done so far.

‘Mr Tremont. Who took your father’s blood pressure?’

‘I did, Dr Ethridge.’

‘What do you think you are, a doctor, Mr Tremont?’

Somehow, by having taken Dad’s blood pressure I’ve threatened this schmuck. Then he comes on with the next thing.

‘And do you have the right to prescribe medication, Mr Tremont?’

I figure now’s the time to do a little lying. In fact, I don’t even think it out, I just do it.

‘Dr Tremont, Dr Ethridge. Yes, I do have the right to prescribe. It’s well within the range of my prerogatives as a member of APA. And I do not like your attitude, Dr Ethridge, it is distinctly unethical and inappropriate in a moment of emergency.’

Actually, I haven’t been a member of APA for over twenty years. It’s one of the little luxuries I let slide. There’s a pause. I give him his chance but he doesn’t say anything.

‘All I want from you right now, Dr Ethridge, and as quickly as possible, is a recommendation as to what we should do to compensate for the results of the Elavil you prescribed over the phone.’

I know I’ve got him. There’s another long pause. I swear if he hangs up we’re going to have a shoot-out.

‘Well, Mr Tremont, I don’t like your attitude either. For the moment, with your father, perhaps you should wait until he calms down or shows further signs of depression before you give him any more Elavil. The Valium you’ve given him should calm him but he’s liable to become depressed again. Experiment till you find a balance. If that doesn’t work, bring him in.’

I say thank you and hang up. It’s best to get off the phone before I say what I’m thinking.

It takes a while, but Dad slowly unwinds. Joan and I sit and talk with him or with each other. We recognize we can’t go on like this. With Mom acting crazy at her place and Dad not getting any better, we’re stymied. It’s not only that Dad hasn’t shown any signs of improving, but he’s physically and mentally deteriorating. I can’t get him to stand straight on the scale in the bathroom to weigh him, but he’s wasting away. His elbows and knees are like ball-bearing sockets and his muscles are stringy.

We decide we’ll take him back to the hospital. I call and tell them we’re coming in.

But first we want to get him clean. Even with all my care, he definitely smells. He smells the way my grandparents used to smell when I was a kid and we went to visit them in Philadelphia. It’s the smell of age: old sweat, constipation and dried urine. Maybe it isn’t bad as that with Dad, but Joan and I have a compulsive mother so we need to clean him before we take him into the hospital. We’re embarrassed because he smells.

We slide the plastic cover from the bed and spread it on the living-room floor. We take his clothes off and turn the heat up. He lies back, watching us, not resisting in any way. Joan takes one arm and rubs all along it with a washcloth, soap and warm water; then she does the other; he lets her do it, not helping, not resisting or even watching. Joan washes his hands, rubs between his fingers and cleans his fingernails. Then she cuts them.

I’m doing the same things with the bottom parts. I’m cleaning his toes and between his toes, the bottoms of his feet. I cut his toenails with the big toenail clippers from the bedside table. I clean out his crotch, wipe him and pull the foreskin back to clean his penis. I’m lifting his legs up and down as I do these things, exactly the way you would with a baby. It’s so hard putting this together with Dad.

We dress him in a clean pair of pajamas and his terry-cloth bathrobe. It takes the two of us getting pajamas on him. He’s disintegrated to a point where he can’t help. He can’t walk, either. He won’t put one foot in front of another. He stands and rocks.

Joan makes up the bed in her V W camper. I scoop him up and carry him out there. Joan gets in front and I stay back with Dad, sitting on the edge of the bed and trying to comfort him. Through all this he’s anxious, chattering his lips, fixing us in a helpless way with his eyes or staring at whatever happens to be in front of him.

When we get to the hospital, I run around trying to get a wheelchair but when they come out and see the condition Dad’s in, they bring a stretcher. We roll him into the emergency ward. Two doctors and a nurse begin working him up right away. I explain the situation while they’re working. They put him on IV immediately. The doctor is a concerned young guy. It turns out Dad’s BUN is up; blood tests don’t look good; he’s definitely dehydrating. The BUN, he explains, is the amount of nitrogen and urea in his blood.

They say Dad needs to stay in the hospital. We sign all the forms. By now, Dad’s been given a sedative and looks more relaxed. We stay with him till they roll him upstairs. We kiss him goodbye but he’s asleep.

When we get home, Joan and I eat the dinner she’s cooked. Then I drive over to the Valley, following Joan in Mother’s car. We tell Mom that Dad took a bad turn so we brought him back to the hospital.

This springs off a whole scene. It would all’ve been fine if we’d only let her look after him. It’s her he’s missing.

‘After all, it’s my husband! You kids have no idea what a tender man he is; he can’t do without me. Now look what’s happened.’

Joan and I nod, agree; we don’t need another heart attack. It doesn’t take much to talk Mom into going home with me. You’d think staying with Joan was some kind of penance she’s having to pay for the heart attacks: five Our Fathers, ten Hail Marys and a week at your daughter’s.

Thank God, Mario isn’t there; he takes an awful beating. I think Mario’s gotten more or less inured to it all but you can’t ask anybody to put up with this kind of nonsense.

I feel sorry for Joan. I’m sure it hurts. I know from bitter, personal experience it hurts. I know also how that kind of poison does get into good relationships; you can’t completely wipe it out. Mom’s just a smart enough amateur psychologist to pick up minor dissatisfactions, vulnerabilities and lean on them. But she’d better be careful; better yet, I’d best get her out of there.

I drive her home. It’s getting late and she still hasn’t eaten. I don’t feel like cooking and I don’t want Mother in the kitchen, so I take her to one of her favorite restaurants, a crappy place called the Williamsburg Inn. I can always eat a second dinner, especially when I’m anxious and feeling pressed or depressed.

This Williamsburg Inn is a phony colonial-style place on the corner of National and Sawtelle in West Los Angeles. It has a red-brick façade with colonial white woodwork and thin, fake, wooden columns across a narrow porch. It even has one of those intolerable little statues of a black boy in a red suit with knickers where you’re supposed to tie your horse. Hell, there isn’t a horse within twenty miles, but there are a lot of blacks.

Then there’s all the superpatriotic business with flags draped over everything. Fake copies of the Declaration of Independence blown up fifty times are on the walls along with about twenty copies of Stuart’s George Washington. It’s awful. The waitresses are dressed in Martha Washington-style costumes with a deep decolleté. They must hire these girls by bra size. Also, the whole place is pervaded with a vague, antiblack feeling, very superpatriot, very Virginian.

They probably have several not so subtle ways to discourage any black who might walk in by mistake, little things you can’t quite put your finger on: smaller portions, overseasoning, slow service – that kind of stuff.

Normally, this is a restaurant Mother loves. She says things like ‘Such a nice type of people eat there,’ or, ‘It’s so “refined”.’

But now she’s into complaining. Nothing is any good. Nothing is good as it used to be. Jews must have bought the place. The drink before dinner is no good; they didn’t put any alcohol in it, just fancy ice, water and fruit. So what else is new? That’s why the cocktail was invented; people can think they’re drinking without using much alcohol.

Then it’s the service. That poor girl with her boobs falling into our plates can’t do anything right for Mother.

The food is mediocre at best, and expensive. I listen to Mother gripe through each course. I let her go on; she’s enjoying herself, at least it keeps her mind off Dad. I listen again to all the details of their visit to Williamsburg in Virginia with the Barlittles. It must have been ten years ago and I’m sure I’ve heard about it five times. Williamsburg is a town the Rockefellers fixed up the way it never was so people won’t ask for the money robbed from them by crooked oil deals.

When we get home, I tell Mom I’m going to sleep out in the garden back bedroom. I show her the signal system Dad’s rigged and how to use it. She wants to know why I’m not sleeping in the house. I know if I’d said I’d sleep in the side bedroom, she’d want me to sleep in the garden. I know that. I’m not evasive enough to deal with Mom.

But I do sleep. Mom gets through the night without any problems, too.

But the next day I have to stop her five different times from doing crazy things that could kill her. Also, she can’t believe I can cook dinner.

Mom has the ultimate put-down when everything goes wrong; that is, when somebody else is doing anything right without her help. It goes like this.

‘My God, look what my idiot child can do, he can boil an egg! Who’d ever believe it? I didn’t know you had so many talents, Jacky. Soon you’ll be the best water-boiler for men over fifty on Colby Lane.’

We work through various versions of this during the entire dinner process.

Afterward, we go in and watch TV. Mother sits in Dad’s chair with a stool pulled up to put her feet on. She has a habit of crossing her legs or feet, and the doctor has made a point about how this is bad for circulation. It’s one of the things heart patients aren’t supposed to do. She’s always forgetting and I keep reminding her. I spend more time watching her feet than watching TV. Probably I’m trying to get even for the dinner put-down.

Also, the back-seating on the dishwashing was overwhelming. I happen to know she’s a sloppy dishwasher, sloppier than I am, and that’s saying something. But you’d swear we were preparing those dishes for brain surgery.

At about eleven o’clock, I get so tired I go back to the bedroom. She’s still sitting up in the chair and says she’s not sleepy yet. I don’t feel like fighting her.