I pull off my scrubs and dump them on the floor in the vicinity of the laundry hamper and drop onto my bed, pulling the covers up over my head. I just want to disappear.
I wake up five and a half hours later. I’m still cocooned under the covers. I was dreaming throughout—chaotic, nonsensical, unrelated dreams—but I only remember random moments of it all. Griffin, shirtless. Winnie crying. And me caught in the ocean, in pitch blackness, fighting wave after wave. That’s been my stress dream since I was a kid, so it doesn’t surprise me, but as always it leaves me feeling less refreshed than I would normally be after sleeping for so long. I sigh, and my brain is flooded with the memories of what went on with my family, and I suddenly feel tired again.
But I am also hungry and there’s no denying it. I have to emerge from my room and face my family or die of starvation. Feeling numb, I walk into my bathroom again. I take a scalding hot shower, washing my hair and body twice because I just feel gross, inside and out. Afterward I towel off and walk, like a robot, over to my dresser and throw on leggings and a T-shirt and reluctantly open the door to my bedroom.
I’m greeted by silence, which is an unexpected relief. I wonder if they’ve all left, but it seems doubtful, because it takes a lot of effort to take my dad anywhere right now. I walk slowly, almost tentatively, like a skittish mouse, down the main hall of the massive penthouse apartment. I glance into the den, but no one is there. The small home office my mom turned into a craft room: no one. The main hall powder room’s door is open, and it’s empty too. Winnie’s bedroom door is closed so I just scoot by that, praying the very old oak floorboards don’t creek. In the kitchen I open the fridge and find a plate with shakshuka and naan, covered in plastic wrap and topped with a Post-It note with my name on it, in my mom’s handwriting. I grab the plate, unwrap it, and stick it in the microwave.
When it’s heated through, I move to the dining room, which is also empty, and devour my food. It’s still fantastic, even reheated. I finish it and even shamelessly lick the plate. Then I stick it in the dishwasher, grab another kombucha out of the fridge, and am about to head back into my room when my dad calls to me from his bedroom.
“Pumpkin, can we talk for a minute?”
I sigh and turn toward his bedroom. From the doorway I can see him lying in his special hospital-style bed, with his head elevated and a book in his lap. “You’re alone?”
“No. You’re here. Winnie and Dixie took Mom to the movies. Jude and Eli went to practice. Zoey and Declan went home,” he explains. “Maria should be here in about twenty minutes to help me shower and do some physical therapy.”
“Okay,” I say simply and play with a strand of my damp hair while I lean on the doorjamb.
“Can you come in and keep your old man company until she gets here?”
“Depends,” I reply and give him a small smile. “Is my old man going to act like a pod person or play psychiatrist or is he just going to be my fantastic old man?”
“Just your dad. I promise.”
I walk into the room, and he moves his legs so I can sit at the foot of the bed, facing him. My eyes fall to the book on his lap. Not surprisingly it’s a novel about nineteenth-century New England. Historical novels are his favorite. New England is his favorite. I nod toward the book. “Is it any good?”
“It’s fascinating,” he replies. “This farmer has only daughters, five of them, and is struggling to find them good partners.”
“Ah, the good old days when women weren’t allowed to make their own decisions.” I roll my eyes, and he chuckles.
“It was the good old days,” he counters with a wink. “Because at least then I would be able to make sure you didn’t become an old maid.”
I let out a whoop of amused shock, and it makes him grin so big it warms my heart. “There is not enough time in the world to talk about how annoyingly misogynistic that statement is, Dad.”
“You know I was kidding,” he replies, his smile still big enough to warm my heart, but it starts to soften. “But I do worry about you. I didn’t mean to put too much on you.”
“You didn’t,” I promise, and our eyes connect. That sixth sense of his is seeing right through me. “Okay, it’s a lot. It hurts. It’s hard, but I want to be here for everyone. I want to be there for you most of all. Whatever you need. Please don’t stop relying on me. I need you to rely on me. It’s hard because you’re dying and I can’t change that. So let me be there.”
There is a lump in the center of my throat the size of a monster truck tire. I struggle against it. He reaches up and cups the side of my face, and I grab his hand and hold onto it. “You’re the only one who has the balls to use the D word. No one else can say I’m dying. That’s why I rely on you. But I need you to have someone to rely on too. Like this Griffin fellow. He seems to be looking out for you.”
He pauses and takes some labored breathes. Talking is physically draining for him, but I am so grateful he is making the effort. The day I can no longer hear his voice is too close.
“Griffin is incredible,” I admit, and a tiny sharp stab of pain hits me in the chest, like just admitting that is the equivalent of stabbing myself in the heart. “But his life is complicated right now too. He’s got a young daughter and he’s going through a custody problem with the ex, who wants to move to New York and take the daughter with her. If that happens…he’ll quit his job and move too.” My father absorbs that information and gives my hand another squeeze. “I don’t want to get more involved with him if I’m just going to lose him. I can’t willingly set myself up for heartbreak.”
“He doesn’t feel the same way.”
“He agreed with me.”
“But he’s still looking out for you, making sure someone is there for you since you don’t want him there,” he replies.
“I want him there. I just can’t.”
“I’m not trying to pressure you, Sadie, I promise, but consider this,” my dad says and pauses until I look up and meet his eye. “If you told me, back when I was a kid, that my life was going to end this way, too soon and in such a shitty way, I would have still let myself fall in love with your mom. I would have still had every single one of you. The only thing I would have changed is I would have enjoyed the hell out of every single second even more than I did and not taken any of them for granted or worried about what-ifs or tried to protect myself.”
I want to respond, but I’m choking on my emotions right now and can barely breathe, let alone speak. My dad pauses to rein in his own emotions, his eyes a little more watery than they should be. I panic he’s going to cry, but he pulls himself together. “The only reason I’m still here and I haven’t given up is because of the love I have for my family and your mother. It’s the only thing that’s made me fight this disease. Nothing is promised to us forever. But we have to take it when we can get it. Even if we see the expiration date coming.”
I hear noise in the hall, and Maria calls out her arrival. I take a shallow, shaky breath because my chest is aching so hard. “In here, Maria!” I call and stand up and walk over to the head of the bed and hug my dad.
“Love you, pumpkin,” he says as he rubs my back.
