I picked up my fork and ate my eggs without tasting them.
"Meds time." I shook the paper cup so my dad could hear the pills rattle and set it down on the side table, next to the water glass I'd refilled an hour ago.
The TV was on low in the corner, some talk show Dad hadn't been watching. I'd learned to keep it running because the silence made him anxious. The living room had that smell it always had now, Bengay and the lemon cleaner I used on everything, and something underneath that was just old man.
Dad squinted up at me from his recliner, the brown one we'd hauled all the way from Columbus because he wouldn't leave it behind. His face went blank, like a computer trying to load a page that wasn't there anymore.
"Junior?" he said.
"Yeah, Dad. It's me."
"You're still here."
"Where else would I be?"
He didn't have an answer for that. Neither did I, really. I pulled up the footstool and sat down while he worked on the pills. The carpet under my feet was worn thin in the path betweenhis chair and the kitchen, and the afternoon light through the blinds made stripes across the coffee table, across the stack of unopened mail I kept meaning to sort.
He took them the same way every time. Blue one first, then the white oval, then the little yellow bastard, then the capsule. The capsule had to go last, or he'd puke. I'd learned that one the fun way, back in June, holding his head over the bathroom sink and promising myself I'd do better.
I had the whole routine memorized now, every med and every trigger and every tiny thing that could send a good day sideways. I probably knew his schedule better than the nurses at the facility Derek kept pushing.
Dad's hand shook on the third pill, and he got pissed about it, which made it shake worse.
"Take your time," I said. "We're good."
"Thought you had practice," he said, because apparently he was a mind reader now.
"Later. Derek's coming over."
His eyes went foggy, searching for the name. My brother showed up once a week and called twice, and every single time Dad had to work through the math of which son was which.
It shouldn't have stung anymore. It still did.
"Derek," Dad said finally, like he was testing the word. "That's good. You boys should spend time together."
"Yep." I took the empty cup from him and crushed it in my hand. "We're gonna have a blast."
He didn't catch the sarcasm. He used to catch everything. Used to give me shit right back, that dry Ohio humor that I'd gotten from him and Derek had somehow missed entirely. Now he just nodded and looked out the window at the backyard.
His face changed. "Those damn birds are in the garden again." His voice had an edge to it now, that irritation that could tip intosomething worse if I didn't head it off. "Where's your mother? She needs to get them out of there before they get the tomatoes."
My mother had been gone since I was six. Not dead, just gone. Packed a bag and drove to California and never came back.
I looked out the window. The glass had a smudge on it I kept meaning to clean. No birds. No garden either, just the scrubby little juniper, the dirt patch where I'd tried to grow tomatoes last summer and failed, and the empty feeder hanging crooked off the fence post.
"I'll take care of it, Dad." I stood up and put my hand on his shoulder, felt the bone through his flannel shirt. He'd lost weight again. I needed to start making him those protein shakes the doctor recommended, the ones that cost twelve bucks a can. "Hey, you want to watch the game? I think the Buckeyes are playing."
The irritation flickered. He tried to hold on to whatever he'd been upset about, then lost it. His face smoothed out.
"Buckeyes," he said. "Yeah. Yeah, put that on."
I found the remote and turned on the TV. There was no game, but I found a replay from last week and he wouldn't know the difference. The sound of the crowd filled the living room, that familiar roar that used to mean something to both of us. Dad settled back into his recliner, the leather creaking under him, and the breath I'd been holding finally went out of me.
The doorbell rang at six on the dot. Derek was nothing if not punctual.
I hauled myself up from the couch, hip screaming at me for sitting too long, and got to the door before Dad could start wondering who was there. The last thing I needed was him getting worked up about strangers in the house.
Derek was standing on the porch with a casserole dish and that look on his face, the one that said he was bracing himself. Like walking into his own father's house required emotional preparation. Behind him, his Toyota sat in the driveway looking like it had just been washed, which it probably had. Derek washed his car every Sunday. I couldn't remember the last time I'd washed my truck.
