“Oh my god…that’swhat we’ll call the collection: Manifest Destiny.” A dreamy look comes over her face as she says, “Go West, young woman, go West andglow upwith the country.”
I cringe, but Gemma is alight with a sense of her own brilliance. “Actually, can you write that up real quick? Like a mini marketing strategy that I can share with the team. It’s April, so we need to get going if this is going to happen for Holiday.”
Right. We only have six months to persuade people to buy a $130 bucket come November.
“Actually… I can’t.” I am suddenly overcome with a sense of resistance.
“Oh,” says Gemma, confused. I’ve never denied a request from her before. “This afternoon, then.”
“No, Gemma. I can’t do this anymore.” The words leave my mouth hastily, and as they do, I feel a jolt of excitement, a fundamental rightness coursing through my veins. “I quit.”
Gemma looks dumbfounded. “What? Cricket…”
It is so impulsive that I feel as though I am learning of this plan right along with her. It’s as if the decision has made itself, and I’m just being pulled along in its wake. I feel a frenzy within, then a surge of certainty.
“I know it seems sudden, but there’s somewhere else I need to be.” I stand up from the cream-hued chair, walk past the sand-toned couch, and leave my boss dumbstruck, her hand still clenching the boar-bristle body brush.
I escape the Actualize office and immediately call Nina. She doesn’t pick up at first, so I ring her twice more as I pace the sidewalk, my heart pounding.
When I finally get through, she sounds worried. “Cricket? Is everything okay?”
“Yes. Sorry to stress you. Just have a question. Have you listed the house yet?”
“No, that’s next week, once we take the photos.”
“Okay, good. Don’t. I don’t want to sell it.”
“Um, okay…”
“I want to move there. I want to take care of Dad.”
“Cricket.” Nina pauses, and I can sense her taking a deep breath. “That’s a really generous thought, but do you know what that would actually entail?”
Of course I don’t. But I’m tired of being underestimated, underutilized. “I can learn.”
“It’s a lot of work, and it’s only going to get harder as he gets sicker. He’s really slipping,” Nina explains. “It’s a huge burden to bear. And a few days ago, you seemed pretty clear that you weren’t up for it.”
“I know, but things changed.”
“Is it that you’re feeling guilty? He’ll be perfectly happy at Orchard Hills once he settles in.”
“But he doesn’t want to go. He wants to be at home,” I say. “Shouldn’t we take his wishes into account?”
“He’ll acclimate. And more importantly, he’ll be safe.”
“I can keep him safe.” Neither of us speaks for a moment, and then I say plaintively: “I want more time with him.”
“But we have no idea how much longer he’ll be himself. What if you rearrange your whole life, and then he completely forgets who he is? Caregiving is nonstop, and it’s not glamorous. Dad can be a real pain in the ass, you know. A few weeks ago, he decided to do the laundry while I was out, and he poured an entire liter of detergent into the drum of the dryer. Thedryer, Cricket.”
“Ooof.” I didn’t know that. Nina and I speak every week, but I realize she has been sparing me the details of her day-to-day, probably in an attempt to protect me.
“Stuff like that is happening more and more often,” she says.
“I get it. I can handle it.” I don’t know how to explain my rationale, other than there is an urgent energy flowing through me. I have a sudden conviction that my father and I have things to do together, and that this is our last chance to do them.
Of course Nina, being Nina, is focused on the practical. She bombards me with a slew of questions, finally landing on: “What about money? Dad doesn’t have a lot of savings, and you know his licensing deal expires at the end of this year, right?”
Our father sold a series of patents in his thirties and secured a lucrative deal for one of them—a nanofiltration membrane that removes bacteria from water—that has provided royalties ever since.
