He was funny, charming, sweet—he was everything.
But in addition to that, he was needy in the very best way.
He texted the same message every morning:
Connor:You should come over tonight.
And I did.
Every day that week I went home, made my dad dinner, then went over to Connor’s. For the sake of my father, I didn’t sleep over (which was ridiculous because I was an adult, right?), but it was a technicality because every night I crashed with him and then snuck back into my house around four.
My dad wasn’t an idiot, so odds were high he was aware of all of it, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it any other way.
And I found it adorable that Connor was the mastermind behind the ridiculous plan to sneak around. He liked my dad so much that he didn’t want to piss him off, and something about that was too endearing for words.
“I honestly have no idea,” I admitted into the phone, forcing back the emotion that threatened to creep out. “It was filled with scary stuff like talk of lung transplants and how severe the situation is, but the doctor also told us different ways to treat it, like keeping him on oxygen and some medications we can try. So I’mgetting together with my brothers tonight to try to drill down into how severe we actually think this is. The doctor gave us a lot of worst-case scenarios, but I don’t know the genuine prognosis. Joey is going to call him and see if he’ll give us some more information now that my dad isn’t with us.”
“God, that sucks,” Connor said, voice sober.
“Yeah,” I agreed, feeling slightly numb. It was too much to process. “It’s not going to be a fun conversation, but if you want to meet me and my brothers for a beer later, we’ll be at the PNA at seven.”
“What the hell’s a PNA?” he asked.
“Polish National Alliance. A bar in a basement, basically,” I said.
“All right,” he said, not even pausing to think about it. “See you there.”
—
“So here’s what Dr. Sanchez said. He has no way of knowing the future but if he had to guess, he’s giving Dad five years before he might need a lung transplant.”
“Oh my God,” I said, stunned. “Five years? So do we need to start figuring out things like getting on lists and what his insurance covers? That’s not a lot of time.”
“Wait,” Joey added, shaking his head. “He prefaced it by saying Dad could respond really well to some of the medications and steroids, so that could slow down the decline dramatically.”
“So, what…we just roll with it?”
I reached for my beer, the words “five years” playing over and over again in my head.
“I think so, because get this—he said Dad called him. Dad called him for a prognosis and he knows all of this.”
“He knew before today?” I asked.
“Yeah,” Joey said, nodding. “He set up today forus.”
“Oh shit,” I said. “What does that mean?”
“Dr. Sanchez said Dad is very okay with everything. He had a lot of questions and he’s just, like, Joe Cool about it and is allLet’s see how the next five years go.”
“ ‘Very okay.’ What does that mean? Like he’s ready to go meet Mom or something?”
My voice shook as I spoke because I hated this. I didn’t want my dad to be Joe Cool about something he shouldn’t have to be Joe Cool about. I wanted him plowing our roads in the winter and telling me about the pH levels in the water supply and busting my chops every time he had the chance.
I didn’t want him to be sick for the rest of his life.
And I was a selfish, terrible daughter, because in the midst of all the sadness over what my dad’s reality might be, I couldn’t help but think about how this played into my life. If his health was going to decline over the next five years, I couldn’t move out, right? I mean, I would never.
Which meant I was just going to be living at home with my dad forever.
