Chapter 20
John died ten days later. There was no fanfare, no white light, no portal or doorway that I saw, but instead, he slowly stopped breathing while I sat there and held his large, cold hand. Vicky stood behind me with her hands on my shoulders and cried softly as we said goodbye. I’ll never forget her leaning down to his ear and telling him it was going to be all right. That she would take care of me. To think, he might have been worried about me. The kids, six and three, didn’t understand. Sean cried a little, but soon his attention was elsewhere and he was back to giggling and having adventures. John would’ve liked that.
We went home and I made a few phone calls. Those were moments that I had expected to live through in my life. I had pictured myself calling Danny and Matt and breaking the sad news, inviting their families to John’s funeral, making arrangements. But they’d never gotten the chance to have families. I’d pictured the whole thing differently. I’d pictured myself much older when I saw it in my head. I had gray hair and Vicky’s was died some unnatural color. We were chubby and the kids were in high school or maybe even college.
I counted all the funerals I’d been to in my life. Granny McNeill, Robin, Mom, Matt, Danny...and Sean was in there too, but we hadn’t been allowed to go. All family. All lost, except for Granny McNeill. Scary or not, she’d lived a full life. I guess John’s life was full too or I hoped it was.
The service was small and it satisfied all the requisite things one expected from a funeral. Flowers and donations to charity in his name lined the front of the parlor and John looked peaceful in his casket wearing the grey suit Vicky had picked out for him. The children were curious upon approach, but seemed okay once we told them he was sleeping, on his trip to heaven—like the way they slept in the car. I wasn’t so sure that’s where he was headed.
The minister gave the eulogy, a generic thing that didn’t speak much about the man who raised me, but about fathers in general and what they mean to us. I wouldn’t have given that speech as John didn’t much fit that mold, but I did, in the end, at least owe him my existence, and in the end, he turned out to be not so bad.
At the grave site, another few words were spoken—ashes to ashes and all that—before his body was lowered into the ground. I was glad that I outlived him and that he didn’t have to see all three of his children buried before he went. I looked at my kids, Sean in a tiny suit and tie and Robin in a midnight blue velvet dress with miniature patent leather shoes. They squirmed on their mother’s lap, and I couldn’t imagine seeing one of them in that half-size casket in which Robin was buried. That was when I started to cry. Not for John as much as for the thought of losing my own children. For not knowing how long we had here on Earth and for not knowing when my last day would come and when I would be forced to say goodbye. For not knowing if I would ever get to say hello to them again.
*****
I’d had a few more tests after Vicky called me that day at the office to tell me about John, the day I bumped my head. After we’d gotten him settled into hospice for his last few days, I went back to the doctor to get my head looked at because it was still throbbing and I worried about concussion or worse. He’d scanned it and found something he hadn’t expected but it was a thing that came as no surprise to me.
When he called, the day before John’s funeral, he said there were three different tumors growing in my brain. He wasn’t sure how long I had without more information and a few more tests, but he wanted me to come in and talk to him and talk to an oncologist about treatment options.
“I’m not really interested in brain surgery,” I said.
“There may be other treatments available,” he said.
I said, “Huh,” or a noise that sounded like it to let him know I was there. I didn’t tell him I knew it was coming, that I knew it was going to get me because a ghost had prophesized It eats during a game I played with the greatest friends I ever had. I didn’t tell him that I'd known somehow because of a cryptic message received in 1981 when I was chubby and had only seen one naked girl in my life.
I hoped Nataliya would find her door, that she would find her peace, and when she got there, someone who loved her would be waiting…or maybe my friends would be there, all of us still young as the day we first met her, and that we could all be friends, at least until my Vicky came looking for me again.
I didn’t tell him I’d seen a ghost the day I bumped my head and I thought at first she was there to warn me about my father’s death. Yes, my father. In the end, I suppose John McNeill earned the title.
I didn’t tell Vicky about the ghost or the cancer either. Not yet. I wanted to know what my options were at first. I didn’t think it would come as much of a shock to her either since we both knew something was coming for me—something that eats. Vicky knew me. She was my girl. A girl I’ve loved since I was eleven and we shared that one embarrassing and beautiful moment, the first of many such moments.
After the funeral was over, I took that same girl home and ate dinner with her and my kids. Later that same evening, we all played with Matt and Danny in the back yard.
END.
His Books:
DEMONS AND OTHER INCONVENIENCES
WHAT TANGLED WEBS
THE UNAUTHORIZED AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ETHAN JACOBS
LUNACY
HOW TO EAT A HUMAN BEING
GIVING UP THE GHOST
THE TOOTHLESS DEAD
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