Cathy looks affronted. “I know you’re not suggesting thatIcan’t provide the best long-term care.…”
Things devolve further when Harold’s wife, who barely ever looks up from her phone, rolls her eyes at Cathy, and then Cathy’s boyfriend, a man named Curtis who Harold obviously doesnotapprove of, interjects to say that since he doesn’t work full-time, he’d be able to look after Mr. Friedrich during the day. Harold tells him he won’t be getting in the will even if he wipes Mr. Friedrich’s ass for the next three months, and I can feel Dennise wince beside me. It’s never good when a will comes up. Or ass wiping, for that matter.
I sit forward in my chair, trying, as best I can, to remind the family that I’m a meaningful bodily presence in the room. “Hal,” I say, using Harold’s preferred nickname, my voice firmer now, spurred on by the fear that Dennise will have to take over for me, that she’ll see me as too weak to get the job done. “It can be tempting to think of this meeting as a chance to talk about end-of-life matters. But remember, what we’re doing here is thinking about your father’s life as it will be going forward, for however long that may be.”
Hal’s eyes track to me, almost as though he’s surprised to find me in the room, obviously not an unusual experience for me.Except when it comes to Alex,my brain interrupts, and in spite of the fact that I’m 100 percent invested in work right now, I feel my face heat—memories of the last few days swirlinginconveniently.
I clear my throat, keep my eyes on Hal’s, making sure I assert myself as the person in charge here. I may not have the padfolio, but I spent two hours on the Friedrich case this morning, between looking at the file and talking to the head nurse on the critical care floor. I’ve researched every available hospice facility Hal and Cathy’s father is eligible for, and I know every agency they can rely on for in-home services, if that’s the route they decide to go.
I’m good at this part, the part where I cycle through some of their options, alert to the ways Cathy and Hal respond subtly to some of the details. Both seem reluctant about larger facilities that are more suburban, distant from the hospital, and while Cathy looks apprehensive about in-home services, Hal leans in, and I’m pretty sure that’ll be the ultimate compromise—Mr. Friedrich at home with Cathy, with professional aides and nurses. I can feel Dennise’s approval, and when she takes over to address some of the finer points about the rest of Mr. Friedrich’s stay here in the hospital, she pats the table next to her padfolio, a small gesture that tells me Idid a nice job.
Toward the end, when I’m making notes about additional information Cathy and Hal want, I sense a familiar shift in the room. It doesn’t always happen, especially if you’ve got a family who isn’t close at all, or if the practicalities you’ve got to solve are far more financially or medically complex than what the Friedrichs are facing. But Cathy and Hal, they’ve got an eighty-six-year-old father with good insurance, a good pension—and advanced stage lung cancer. Now that they’ve dealt with enough of the logistics, they feel the full weight of what they’re really facing: a goodbye.
“We’ll be all right, Cath,” says Hal, reaching out to pat his sister’s hand across the table, and her chin quivers. Curtis takes off his camouflage-print baseball cap and puts his arm around her as she sniffles. Hal’s wife has finally put away her phone, and she’s patting Hal’s back in a way that feels slightly forced, but at least it’s something. My own superhero power—invisibility—comes in handy here, and for a few minutes I fade into the background, making my notes, tuning out the quiet murmurs of the familyas they leave.
“That was wonderful, Greer,” Dennise says, tucking a pen into her bag. “You get better and better.”
“Thank you.” I keep my head down, flushing with pride. It’s the second time I’ve felt such a flush in so many hours, since last night Professor Hiltunen picked my ladybug as the class example, and I don’t even care if afterward he name-dropped Alex three times. Actually, if I’m counting being flushed from anticipation, from arousal, from Alex all together, then maybe I’ve spent every day since Tuesday with an entirely different complexion. This morning I’d come to this hospital fresh from a shower I’d shared with him, my hair still damp behind my ears, my mascara a little unevenly applied.
Given the look I got from Dennise when I’d rushed in a minute before my shift started, those Chico’s blouses also seem to give her the power of knowing when you’ve gotten laid.
We pack up our things and move out of the conference room into a sunlit corridor. It’s our last case of the day, and we’re pushing 4 p.m., my usual quitting time on Fridays, and I feel good—tired, what with how my nights have been going—but all in all, good. I’ve done something useful at work, accomplished something for a family who needed help. What soreness I have—in my hips, along the insides of my thighs—feels earned, not imposed, a warming reminder of what wonderful thingsmy body can do.
So when I say goodbye to Dennise at the bay of elevators, I’m riding high, maybe even a bit reckless—eager to check my phone for any message I might have from Alex. A small voice warns that this in itself is foolish, dangerous—no version of my future involves getting off work and expecting something from Alex. “For as long as I’m here,” he’d said, on that first night we spent together, and even though we’ve both let go of any anxieties about being at Kit’s, spending most of our nights there, it still feels like both of us have tried to run up against the time limit as a reminder of what this is.We should go to Betty’s trivia night, while you’re here. I ought to go see Henry, while I’m here. You should go to that camera shop again, while you’re here. Might as well see Patricia as much as I can,while I’m here.
Still, a small-voice-drowning zing of pleasure passes through me when I look down and see his name on my screen.Call me when you have a chance,he’s written, which is about as banal as a text can get, but I imagine he looked dead sexy when he typed it. I think about his forearms for what I’d guess is the one millionth time today, and forgo the elevator so I cancall him back.
“You know there’s a bowling alley out on the east side of town called the Lucky Strike?” he asks when he picks up, no greeting, but there’s an edge of excitement to his voice, nothingterse about it.
“Hello to you too. Yes, I know about the Lucky Strike. Humph had his fifteenth birthday party there.”
“Crowd shot,” Alex says, referring to my next photography assignment. “We can get it there, and it’ll be on your theme. Let’s go out tonight.”
Let’s go out tonight,I repeat to myself, an adolescent thrill going through me. When I was young, the Lucky Strike was a teenage hangout, a place kids in my class would go with groups of friends. All the muted, complicated flirting from the school hallways during the week would translate into Friday night pair-offs at the old bowling alley, where there were fourteen lanes and six arcade games, a concession counter that let kids mix all different kinds of soda in massive Styrofoam cups. Ava had her first kiss at the Lucky Strike, a fact she’d announced with great pride when my mother and I had picked her up on a Friday night, me ducking low in the front seat, afraid of being seen by all the kids who actually got invitedto such things.
I cannot picture Alex bowling, playing an arcade game, or drinking soda out of a Styrofoam cup, but I can absolutely picture myself feeling awesome walking into a place like that with him, no matter that I’m twenty-seven years old.
I open my mouth to agree, but then remember with a guilty sense of deflation that I’ve got plans tonight. “I can’t,” I say, not succeeding at keeping this disappointment out of my voice. “I’ve got a party at my parents’ house tonight. It’s my mom’shalf birthday.”
“Oh.” I try not to smile at the way he’s not been able to keep the disappointment out of his voice either. “Her…half birthday?”
I laugh a little as I reach the ground floor, swiping my keycard and pushing the heavy door out, emerging into the bright sunlight of a clear summer afternoon. “She feels strongly that her real birthday in December is too close to Christmas. Thus dulling the impact of the occasionof her birth.”
There’s only a second of quiet before Alex says, “Okay. Maybe tomorrow.”
But I make a lot of that second. I make a lot of Alex alone at Kit’s house tonight; I make a lot of the fact that he spent time today looking up a place of business with the nameLuckyin it for my photography project. I make a lot of how manyfor as long as I’m heredays we have left. And I make a lot of the fact that I had a good day, that I just corralled a grieving family into seriously considering options for a terminally ill family member, that Dennise is proud of me and that I’m proud of myself.
I want to see him tonight, even if it’s not for the kind of date I never got to have.
I tilt my face to the sun, take a deep breath. “You want to come to my mom’s half birthdayparty with me?”
* * * *
In the hour and a half I have between the time I leave the hospital and the time I pick up Alex, I do a lot of frantic preparation for what is absolutely the dumbest idea I have ever had. I send a group text to my siblings and tell them that I am bringing aFRIENDwho isABSOLUTELY NOTa boyfriend. I send an additional, separate text to Ava who’s not yet home from work and tell her he does not take headshots and she shouldn’t ask him to. Then I go back to the group text and add another one:Don’t say anything to him,and I guess the good thing about our family dynamic is, they’ll know exactly whatI mean by that.
I call my parents’ house, but my mom can’t come to the phone because she’s got a face mask on, and while I try to convey the importance of “acting normal” around Alex to my dad, he makes a joke about whether it’s okay for him to be cleaning his hunting rifle when we arrive. Then he gets distracted by my mom’s singing in the other room—I’m pretty sure she’s doing her Stevie Nicks voice, which is basically like a siren song for my dad, face mask or no—and makes an unconvincing excuse about marinating hamburger meat for the party. Gross. He hangs up before I feel like I’ve really gotten mymessage across.
I also change my outfit six times, less for Alex’s benefit than for my family’s. Kenneth seems to find this so offensive that he stalks from the bedroom, disappointed with my people-pleasing. I call Zoe and ask her what would look good for showing that I care about my mother’s half birthday but that I don’t care what my absolutely-not-a-boyfriend will think of my appearance. She has me on speaker phone, and I hear Aiden make the coughing sound he makes when he’s suppressing laughter. Zoe tells me to stop being weird but also says showing my legs wouldn’t be the worst thing. I hang up on her, but still I decide on a pair of kelly-green shorts and a faded denim shirt that is the exact same color as my eyes.
