Benediction

  Well. You done that.

  Yeah. He laughed. I’ve done that, all right. I’ve been out on my own. A lot of good it did me.

  But you done all right, didn’t you?

  What are you talking about, Dad? I’ve been a waiter. A night clerk. A janitor. A hired hand. A garbage man. A taxi driver. You don’t want to know what all I’ve done for money.

  But that’s just somebody getting started. You’re still getting on your feet.

  Dad, I’m fifty years old. What am I going to do now? How can I start now?

  Dad moved in the bed and then lay still.

  Hand me one of those pills there, he said.

  Here?

  Yeah.

  You want some water?

  Yeah. He took the glass and drank and handed it back and lay still again.

  You can always come back here, he said. After I’m gone you can come back.

  And do what, Dad?

  Help run the store.

  Lorraine’s running the store.

  You can help her.

  It wouldn’t work. It’s not going to happen.

  Then you can have some of the value of it, Dad said. You and Mom and Lorraine can divide it up. Take your third of it. Do something. Start over.

  No. I don’t want any money from you. I won’t take your money. I swore I wouldn’t.

  Dad stared at him a long time. Frank looked past Dad at the wall and turned again to stare out the window. He lit another cigarette.

  You never forgave me, did you, Dad said.

  You never forgave yourself.

  I couldn’t. How could I? Now it’s too late.

  You’re still alive, Frank said. Maybe you’ll have a deathbed conversion.

  Dad studied Frank’s face. You’re being cynical. You’re just talking.

  Of course.

  You don’t mean what you said.

  No, I don’t mean it. I’ve been too goddamn angry. I’ve been too filled up to my throat with bitterness. Oh Jesus. I could smash your dying face right now.

  Why don’t you? I wish you would. Go ahead. I want you to.

  Frank stood up. I got to go. He stepped on his cigarette and put it out.

  Wait. You don’t have to leave yet, Dad said. You should see your mother. Are you going now?

  Yeah. I better.

  Well. Good-bye, then, son.

  Frank moved toward the door.

  Wait. Would you give me your hand? Dad said. Before you go. But he was gone on out into the doorway now. Dad still watched him. This tall middle-aged balding man. Broad in the doorway. Not too old yet. But wearing old clothes. Ragged-looking. Still, there was something there. He was still a good-looking man. There was something there yet. It hadn’t come out yet.

  38

  THE NEXT MORNING Mary lay in the old soft double bed with Dad until the sunlight streamed into the room. She got up and went into the bathroom and returned and put on her shirt and jeans and leaned close over the bed to look at him.

  Dear. Are you waking up now? He didn’t move. Dad?

  He lay staring up at the ceiling out of half-open eyes. Then he breathed deeply, a kind of rattle. She felt his forehead. He felt cool, clammy to the touch.

  Can you hear me? she whispered.

  She bent and kissed him and went quickly upstairs to Lorraine’s room.

  Honey, can I come in?

  Lorraine had just gotten out of bed in her light summer nightgown.

  What’s wrong?

  He’s going now. I’m afraid he is.

  Is something different?

  He won’t wake up. I can’t get him to talk. He feels cold.

  Lorraine put her arms around her. We knew this was coming, Mom.

  Come down with me, would you. I want to turn him on his side. The nurse said he’d breathe a little better on his side if we turned him.

  Lorraine put on a robe over the nightgown and followed her mother downstairs. Dad’s eyes were shut now. He breathed and stopped and breathed again, rattling in his throat. They folded back the summer blanket and the sheet and turned him so he was facing the door, and placed an old flat pillow under his head, and put another between his knees. His feet looked mottled with blotches climbing up his legs and his hands were blue and on the undersides of his arms were more blue spots that were like faint bruises.

  Look at his poor fingernails, Mary said.

  Yes.

  They covered him again with the sheet and blanket and stood together beside the bed, watching him. His mouth stayed open. He breathed and made a little involuntary noise and breathed again.

  He never woke that day. He lay quietly in the bed, his mouth open and dry and his lips cracked, his face yellow and washed out. Lorraine called the nurse and she came and examined him and looked at his feet and hands, the blue places and mottling on his arms and legs, and told them he was in the final stages. They talked about what they should do. They said they would bathe and dress him themselves after he died, they preferred that, they wanted that last duty and moments of caretaking for themselves, and the nurse said, That’s fine. But you still need to call me so I can certify his death and dispose of the unused medicine. When you’re ready we can call the mortician. But there’s no rush. You take as long as you want.

  We’ve already talked to George Hill, Lorraine said. He’ll take care of all the details for the cremation and there’ll be a service at the church and a brief graveside service. Some of his ashes will be buried at the cemetery. But we’ll keep most of them here.

  Just please call me if you need something, the nurse said. It doesn’t matter what time it is.

  What about his pain now, while he’s like this? Mary said. I’m afraid he’ll choke if we give him a pill.

  Give him liquid morphine under his tongue, with the eyedropper. That’ll be all right. And just keep him dry and clean and turn him regularly. That’s about all you can do.

  Will it bother him for us to talk in the room here while he’s sleeping like this?

  No, I wouldn’t think so. He might even like hearing you even if he doesn’t seem to.

  I think he might, Mary said. It might comfort him.

  They checked on him every half hour. And then at midmorning they turned him again, toward the wall now, and he was wet and they changed his diaper and washed him. He slept on as before, breathing, stopping, starting again, the rattle still there in his throat.

  In the afternoon Berta May called and she came over, and they called Rob Lyle and he came too. Lorraine met him at the door. He put his arm around her.

  Thank you for coming, she said. She brought him into the living room and he hugged Mary.

  I’m glad you’re here, Reverend Lyle.

  I’m not a preacher anymore, he said.

  Aren’t you still a reverend?

  No.

  You do still pray?

  Yes, I still pray. That hasn’t changed.

  Will you pray for Dad?

  They went in the room and sat on the bedside chairs and Mary and Lorraine and Berta May and Lyle held hands, looking at Dad. He lay facing the door now. They bowed their heads. May we be at peace together with Dad Lewis here, Lyle said softly. May there be peace and love and harmony in this room. May there be the same in all the difficult and conflicted world outside this house. May this man—he stopped and spoke directly to Dad in the bed—may you leave this physical world without any more pain or regrets or unhappiness or remorse or self-doubt or worry and may you let all your trials and troubles and cares pass away. May you simply be at peace. May each of us here in this room be at peace as well. Now we ask all of these blessings in the name of Jesus, who himself was the Prince of Peace. Amen.

  Thank you, Lorraine whispered.

  Afterward they talked quietly and watched Dad and looked out the window to the hot summer day, to the flatland beyond the house.

  Would you be willing to tell us about your life? Lyle said. This would be a good time to talk.

  Oh, nobody wants to hear th
at, Mary said.

  Yes, we do. Of course we do.

  She looked at him and then looked at her old husband lying in the bed with the sheet and blanket spread over him.

  We met on the corner of Second and Main Street in the summer of 1947 right here in Holt. I was coming out of a store and Dad was crossing the street.

  What store was it, Mom? Was it the Tavern?

  Don’t be funny, Mary said. It was the department store. I was standing in front of Schulte’s on the corner trying to think about something.

  What were you thinking about?

  I was deciding if I had got everything I needed. I was sewing something. And Dad was walking toward me. I was thinking about my sewing and I stepped off the curb and walked right into him. I almost fell down but he reached and caught me. He helped me back up onto the curb. I was embarrassed. Oh excuse me, I said. Please. I wasn’t watching. And he said, I was coming toward you anyways, miss. You didn’t have to fall for me.

  They looked at Dad in the bed, trying to see him as a young man. They looked at his back and the shape of his sharp hip and puny legs under the blanket.

  That was his little joke. I suppose it doesn’t sound very funny anymore. But I did fall for him. That’s the whole truth. I did with my whole heart. And that’s how and when I fell.

  Then what, Mom?

  Oh, you’ve heard all this before.

  I want to hear it again. We all do.

  Well, then we went to the pharmacy. Brown’s Drugstore. They had some little round drugstore tables to sit down at, at the back. We drank soda drinks and got acquainted. Then he asked me out that weekend to a picture show and six months later we got married and two years after that you came along and in three more years we had your brother.

  Lyle and Berta May looked at Lorraine now and looked again at Dad, breathing so slow and hard.

  What were you wearing? Lorraine said.

  What was I wearing when?

  When you met Daddy at the corner on Main.

  Well, it was in the summer. I’m sure I was wearing a dress. We only wore dresses back then, didn’t we, Berta May.

  Stockings too if we was leaving the house, she said.

  What was Dad wearing? Lyle said.

  Mary looked at Dad. I suppose he was wearing pants.

  They laughed, but quietly.

  I mean trousers. He wasn’t wearing overalls, like a lot of men did. And he had on a light blue long-sleeved shirt with stripes in it. He was already working at the hardware store. His sleeves were rolled up on his arms. Oh, I can still see him.

  Did he own the store then? Lyle said.

  Oh no. He was only a skinny young single man then. He had been in the army. But the war ended while he was still in training. He never got sent overseas. He felt bad about that. I didn’t. Who knows what might have happened to him.

  They left Dad to himself for a while, he seemed to be making some private effort that he had to make, and they went out to the living room where Mary brought them each a cup of coffee. They sat down on the couch and Mary sat in the rocking chair, leaving Dad’s chair by the window empty.

  You all just please help yourselves if you want more coffee, Mary said. She sipped at her cup. She looked at Lyle. I don’t think we ever asked you. I guess we just assumed. So I want to ask you now.

  Yes? he said.

  We’d like you to do the service for Dad, for all of us. At the church.

  Lorraine and Berta May looked at her, then at him.

  Yes. I’d be honored to do that, he said. But I doubt they’d allow me to perform any kind of service in the church now. I’m not sure I’d want to anyway. We’re going separate ways.

  But you still live in the parsonage, Mary said. They’ve allowed that.

  They’ve agreed to let me stay two months. So it’s not a clean break. Is that what you mean?

  I don’t know what I mean, she said.

  Could you perform the service somewhere else? Lorraine said.

  Maybe. But it depends. The other churches in Holt wouldn’t want to interfere by hosting it in one of their sanctuaries.

  What about the yard here at the house? Lorraine said. We could borrow chairs from somebody, or rent them from George Hill maybe, and have the memorial right here in the shade in the side yard. That might even be better.

  Yes, I’ve done services outdoors many times.

  What do you think, Mom? It’s up to you.

  Well, I don’t know. I haven’t thought about it before. I know Dad sure looked out that window for hours on end. I never understood what he was looking at, but it seemed to give him a lot of pleasure. Yes, it might be just right to have his memorial in the very place he spent so much time looking at.

  Could we still do a graveside service at the cemetery afterward? Lorraine said.

  Yes, Lyle said. I’m sure we could do that too. That wouldn’t involve any of the churches.

  It’s a public cemetery, Berta May said. We pay taxes for its upkeep. Nobody would stop us.

  We’ll take care of all the practical details, Lorraine said. If that’s what you decide to do.

  Yes, Lyle said. I think so.

  Thank you, Mary said. Thank you all.

  In the evening Dad woke once and looked around and asked for water. Only Mary and Lorraine were sitting with him now in the bedroom. He stared at Mary for a long time while she held his hand. He stared over at Lorraine, then he pulled his hand back under the blanket and fell into his restless sleep again.

  Later that evening, Mary said, I have to go to bed. I can’t sit up any longer.

  Do you want me to stay with Dad? You could have my room.

  No. I want to be here with him.

  You’re not afraid?

  Why no. This is my husband. I’ve been with this man most of my life. Over half a century. I know him better than I know anybody else in the world.

  But you’re not afraid to be here now.

  No, honey. There’s nothing here to scare me. I might be afraid about the future, but not of this man in this room here.

  Mom, I’ll be here to help in the future.

  I know, dear. Now you should go to bed too.

  After Lorraine went upstairs Mary lifted the blanket and slid in beside Dad. He was lying on his back now. She patted his hand under the blanket and rose up to kiss him.

  I’m right here. I’m not going anyplace, she whispered. You do what you have to do. Did you hear us talking about you? I hope you didn’t mind.

  She kissed him again on his cracked mouth and lay back beside him and lay still, peering up into the dark room where the barn light was forming dim shapes and shadows and strange figures, and suddenly she began to weep.

  Later in the night she woke abruptly and switched on the bedside lamp and looked at him and felt his head, he was still breathing the same slow irregular breath. She got up and went to the bathroom and went out to the kitchen, looking out into the backyard and the corral and barn and stood staring at the darkness, and then drank a glass of water and came back and checked Dad again and got in beside him and took his hand again. When she woke in the morning he was still alive.

  He lived through all of that day. He’d stop breathing for a while, then begin again with a gasp, coughing, trying feebly to clear his throat. They moistened the inside of his mouth with a swab and spread balm on his lips. He lay facing the door or the wall, or lay stretched on his back, his face gray and faded, strained-looking, and his eyes under the thin eyelids were fixed now, not moving.

  They sat with him beside the bed talking softly and touching him now and then, holding his icy hands, and whispered to him, telling him their feelings for him. They cried every so often, then one would stay with him while the other went out.

  In the afternoon Berta May came again and helped with the straightening in the house and brought in dinner to eat, a casserole of meat and pasta and a green salad. Can I do something else? she said.

  You’ve done too much already, Mary said. You shouldn
’t have done all of this.

  Yes, I should of. You would for me.

  Well, you know we thank you.

  Now what else?

  If you wouldn’t mind … people have been calling all morning long on the phone and some of them want to come visit. I can’t have that. I told Willa and Alene to come. They’re the only ones. I think they would be good. But I don’t want anyone else. Could you answer the door for us, and explain to people?

  The Johnson women drove up to the house in the afternoon and Berta May let them in. They entered the front hall very quietly and she told them Dad was still alive, that Mary and Lorraine were in the bedroom with him, they’d been sitting there almost all the day. They’re just about worn out, she said.

  Oh, wouldn’t they be? Willa said. Is there something we can do?

  Everything’s done. You can go in if you want. They said to tell you to come in.

  Berta May led them back down the hall and eased the bedroom door open and stuck her head in. Mary gestured for them to come in, and Lorraine got up and brought two more chairs from the dining room, then the four women sat near the bed together. Dad lay on his back, his mouth open and his eyes shut, with the blanket covering him.

  We can talk, Mary said. It’s all right to speak, if we’re quiet.

  How is he? Willa whispered. Is there any change?

  He’s worse, I think. Her eyes filled with tears. Willa and Alene leaned toward her and took her hands.

  I’m glad you’ve come, she said. I don’t want others to be here. That would bother Dad.

  No, Willa said. We don’t want to bother any one of you.

  I just don’t want some people.

  No. Of course.

  Dad coughed, his eyes opened, staring, he stopped breathing. They watched him, then he breathed in, a hard gasp, and shut his eyes and went on as before.

  The poor man, Willa said softly. You know my husband always thought so much of him. Dad Lewis is somebody to know, he said. Dad Lewis is a man you can set your clock by. I don’t think he was talking about time.

  Yes, Mary said. He was always reliable.

  Yes, but my husband meant he was somebody that was straight up and down, like the hands of a clock, somebody you could depend on, somebody to trust completely.