With You and Without You

  We sat there and cried for at least five minutes. Then we sniffled and sighed for fifteen or twenty more. But when we finally stopped, I felt very relieved. I hoped Denise did, too.

  “Don’t tell the kids at school yet, okay?” I asked Denise.

  “Okay. I won’t say a word.” Denise stared at my eyes. “You look terrible. You want to wear the Blushing Plum to school tomorrow?”

  I grinned. Life would go on. Not the same as usual, but it would go on.

  Chapter Four

  DURING THE NEXT FEW days, two important things happened. First of all, Mr. Landi held the auditions for the pageant. I had been wrapped up in a cocoon of worry about Dad and had completely forgotten about the pageant, the auditions, everything. I was lucky to remember where I lived. So when English class began one afternoon with Mr. Landi handing out scripts for A Christmas Carol, I was startled, to say the least.

  “Class,” he said, “our part in the pageant will be a production of this updated version of Dickens’s classic Christmas story. I would like each one of you to be in the play. There are plenty of nonspeaking parts for those of you who are … who have a touch of stage fright.” He glanced at me. I had sort of a reputation at Neuport Middle School. “The auditions are very casual. In fact, I’m going to hold them today.”

  This news was greeted with groans from all the kids who wanted time to prepare or who (like me) had planned to miss the auditions somehow.

  But Mr. Landi was firm. He gave us fifteen minutes to read the script. Then he asked for a show of hands of those students who wanted speaking parts. He listened to them read. And that was it. I didn’t have to do anything.

  Imagine my surprise when I walked into school the next day, looked at the posting of the assigned roles Mr. Landi had tacked to the bulletin board, and found out I’d been cast as the Spirit of the Future. I just about died. That sounded like a huge role.

  Mr. Landi pulled me aside when he saw how upset I was. “Don’t worry, Liza,” he told me. “It’s not as bad as you think. It’s a nonspeaking role. I needed someone tall for it. You seemed like the perfect choice.”

  “Perfect,” I repeated. I was dumbstruck.

  Me, the Spirit of the Future …

  The second important thing happened the following day when Dad came home. Mom hadn’t known exactly when the doctors would spring him, so it was a nice surprise to run into 25 Bayberry after school and find him sitting in the living room with Hope in his lap.

  “Dad!” I cried. I dropped my books on the floor and ran to him, throwing my arms around him. He smelled of soap and after-shave. He’d probably just taken a shower.

  “Daddy’s back,” Hopie exclaimed. She sounded awed. I hoped she didn’t think he’d already died and had come back to us.

  “Liza, I missed you!” Dad said. “Boy, is it good to be home. No more hospital food!”

  I stood back to look at Dad. He seemed, well, okay. His eyes were sparkling, but his face looked sort of gray, and I had a feeling he’d lost some weight.

  “I missed you, too,” I said. Suddenly I wished I were little enough to sit in his lap like Hopie and feel his arms gather me up protectively. I knew why Hopie liked to sit in laps so much. It was because she felt safe that way—all folded in and loved.

  “Where’s Mom?” I asked.

  “Picking up some work at school. She’ll be home in about an hour.”

  I nodded.

  “Emmy,” Dad said to Hope, “could you please go get me a glass of water?”

  “Sure,” said Hope, eager to please. She scrambled out of his lap and ran into the kitchen.

  “Dad,” I began, when Hope was out of earshot. I sat on the floor at his feet. “I think Hope thinks … that you …”

  “I know,” he answered. “Your mother and I realized that when we picked her up at the HECC this afternoon. We’ll just have to be very frank with her during the next months.”

  Dad was being frank, all right. I hadn’t known how he would feel about talking about what was going on. But he was just talking about it, as if he were talking about what he was going to wear tomorrow. How could he do that? … And why should he have to do that?

  I could feel tears welling up in my eyes. “Dad,” I whispered.

  Dad reached down and stroked my hair. But all he said was, “Not now, sweetheart, okay?”

  I swallowed the lump in my throat just as Hopie came back, carrying the glass of water as if it might jump out of her hands at any moment, and Brent burst through the front door.

  I moved to an armchair and leaned back into it, holding Charlie, who had appeared and jumped into my lap. Then I watched everybody as if they were actors in a play and I were a member of the audience.

  I watched Dad greet Brent. Then I watched Dad swallow four huge pills. I watched Hopie take the glass back to the kitchen, proud to be able to help. And I watched Carrie arrive home and fling herself at Dad. All the while Charlie slept soundly, his head resting against my stomach.

  When Mom got home later, Dad and us kids were still sitting around the living room.

  “What a nice scene!” Mom exclaimed, putting her briefcase down. Mom likes nice scenes.

  “Hi, Mom,” Carrie and I said.

  “Hi, Mommy,” Hope said.

  “What’s for dinner?” Brent asked.

  “I’m glad you asked,” replied Mom, “although you do realize that you should be cooking tonight, don’t you?”

  “Yeah,” said Brent guiltily.

  “Well,” said Mom, “I thought we could either go out to celebrate”—I saw her glance at Dad, and I saw Dad shake his head ever so slightly—“or,” Mom went on without missing a beat, “we could send out for a pizza or for Chinese food.”

  At the mention of Chinese food, Hopie threw herself out of Dad’s lap and began leaping around the living room, more animated than I’d seen her since the night we found out Dad had gone into the hospital.

  “Chinese, Chinese, Chinese, please, please, please, please, please! Can we get egg ropes and chicken flied rice and chopped phooey, please?” Hope jumped up and down.

  Everyone began laughing and trying not to show it.

  “I guess we’ll send out for Chinese food,” Dad said. He was smiling, but he looked kind of relieved at the same time. I realized he hadn’t moved out of the chair since I’d come home. And twice he had leaned his head back and closed his eyes for a few seconds. Why didn’t he have more energy? He’d just had a whole week of bedrest. “Emmy, baby, go get the menu, okay?” he asked Hope.

  Hope galloped into the kitchen and returned with the menu from Chef Ho’s Hunan House. We put in a huge order. The food arrived an hour later, and we sat down to a real family meal, the six of us together again.

  “Mmm. Yum-yum,” said Hope. “An egg rope. My favorite.”

  “It’s called an egg roll,” Carrie corrected her.

  “That’s what I said.”

  Carrie giggled.

  When everyone had been served, Dad said, “So tell me what you guys have been up to. I feel as if I’ve been away for a year instead of a week.” He reached for his fork.

  We all began talking at once. Brent told him about this wreck of a car he and Jeff Wilmont were supposedly fixing up. Carrie told him about a math test she’d gotten a 97 on, and Hopie told him about her school, of course.

  “It’s almost Christmas,” she exclaimed, crunching on a large water chestnut. (There were still five weeks until Christmas.) “We’re going to make macaroni chains for our trees. And we’re going to make snowflakes. And a Santa Claus. And presents. And we’re going to go to church to see the navy.”

  “The what?” gulped Carrie.

  “The Nativity?” suggested Dad.

  “Yeah. That.”

  “And you, Liza?” asked Dad.

  Hopie had reminded me of our winter pageant. I decided to break the news to my family. “You won’t believe this,” I began, “but there’s going to be this winter pageant at school. Our whole class is
going to be in it.”

  “Your whole class?” ventured Mom. “You, too?”

  Everyone was looking at me. They were remembering when I fainted before I gave my book report. They were remembering how I quit piano lessons because I couldn’t handle the recitals. They were remembering how I had to leave my own tenth birthday party because there were too many people watching me open presents.

  I cleared my throat. “Yeah. Me, too.”

  Dad finally asked the question all the others wanted to ask. “What are you going to be … or do?”

  I sighed. “Our class is putting on an updated version of A Christmas Carol. I’m the Spirit of the Future. They needed someone tall.”

  “Isn’t that sort of a … major role?” Brent asked carefully.

  “Yeah. It is. But the Spirit of the Future doesn’t speak. I don’t have any lines.”

  “Well, that’s something,” said Carrie.

  “I want to ask a huge favor of you right now,” I said to my family. “I don’t want any of you to come to the pageant. I mean it. I’m going to be horrible and I don’t want you to see me. You’ll make it worse.” I looked at Dad. I can usually count on him to understand things like this.

  “Well, honey,” he said, “we’d like to see you in the pageant, of course, but if you don’t want us to come, we won’t. Why don’t you wait until the pageant, though, and make up your mind then, okay?”

  “Okay. I won’t want you to come, but I’ll wait.”

  “Fair enough.” Dad smiled at me.

  Mom changed the subject. “Thanksgiving is just a week off,” she said.

  Thanksgiving. I’d almost forgotten about it.

  We started talking about what we wanted to do. Before we’d decided on anything, we’d finished dinner and leaned back in our chairs. Hope was rubbing her eyes.

  “I think it’s time for this little bunny to be in bed,” said Dad.

  “Will you take me, Daddy?” Hope asked.

  “Honey, Daddy’s too—” Mom started to say, but Dad was already on his feet.

  “Sure, come on, Emmy.”

  While Dad put Hope to bed, Mom and Brent and Carrie and I cleared the table.

  “Family meeting in twenty minutes,” Mom informed us.

  “Without Tink?” I asked.

  “Just this once,” said Mom.

  Twenty minutes later we were in the living room. Dad sat between Carrie and me on the couch, his arms around us.

  Charlie trotted into the room. Mrow? he asked, and bounded lightly into my lap. I stroked him as Mom began talking.

  “You all know what the doctors have been saying.”

  We nodded. I glanced sideways at Dad. He was looking at Mom.

  “You know that there’s really not much we can do. Apparently, a heart transplant isn’t what Dad needs—”

  “What about an artificial heart?” Brent interrupted.

  Mom sighed.

  “We don’t want that,” said Dad. “It’s not worth it for the few extra weeks of life it might bring.”

  “So you mean we just sit around and wait for you to die?” Brent said explosively.

  “Brent!” I exclaimed.

  “It’s all right, Liza,” Dad said. “Brent, you have every right to feel angry. I feel angry, too, and cheated. I won’t be able to see what you kids do with your lives. I won’t even be able to see Hope grow up. I—” Dad’s voice sounded choked. He took his arm from around me and dabbed at his eyes with a shaking hand.

  Then I began to cry, too. So did Carrie. And Mom. And Brent. For a few minutes, the five of us sat there silently, brushing at tears and swallowing hard. Nobody spoke. After a couple of minutes, Dad took a handkerchief out of his pocket and blew his nose. Then he reached for Carrie’s hand and mine.

  “Well,” he said, his voice returning to normal, “we have a year, maybe. And Christmas is coming soon. So we’ve got one terrific Christmas left together. Let’s concentrate on that. There’s a lot to do. We’ve got gifts to buy and decorations to make and food to bake.”

  I began to smile. Dad is like a little kid about Christmas. He plays carols on the stereo in July because he can’t wait until December. He likes Christmas secrets. He buys gifts for almost everybody in the world. He’s always made Christmas a magic time of year for our family.

  We began planning things. Mom said we were going to buy Hopie a two-wheel bicycle. Dad said he wanted to buy chestnuts so we could roast them in the fireplace. Brent asked casually if he could a have a car, and Dad told him he was living in Fantasyland. We laughed.

  A little while later, Dad and I were alone in the living room. He was still holding my hand.

  “Dad?” I said. “You don’t have to answer this, but I was just wondering. Do you think you’ll miss things after you’re … gone?”

  “Well, I don’t know, Liza. I suppose so.”

  “What do you think you’ll miss the most?”

  Dad thought. Then he gave a little laugh. “I’d like to say I’m going to miss Peanut M&M’s or football, or that I’m not going to miss poison ivy, or something like that, but it wouldn’t be true. I’m just going to miss my family. You kids and your mom. In a way, you know, we’re lucky,” said Dad.

  “Lucky? Us?” I asked.

  “Only in that we have time to prepare for the death. We’ll have a chance to say everything to each other during the next few months that we want or need to say.

  “I think the hardest kind of death,” continued Dad, “is a sudden one. Because of all the things left unsaid. There can be a lot of guilt that way.” He paused. “Things left unsaid,” he repeated slowly.

  “Let’s try to say everything,” I suggested.

  “Deal,” agreed Dad.

  I laid my head on Dad’s shoulder. In my lap, Charlie stirred, rearranged himself, and went back to sleep.

  Dad and I sat together until he said he had to take some pills.

  Chapter Five

  TWO DAYS LATER, I was sitting on the front porch with Charlie. Mom and Dad were inside, Brent was out back somewhere, and Carrie was walking Hope down the street to the Whites’ house to play with Susie and Mandy.

  “Charlie-man,” I said, “if cats could make wishes, what would you wish for?”

  Charlie looked at me as if he were trying to understand. He was perched on the top porch step, and I was a few steps down, leaning against a railing. So he was about at eye level. We had a little staring contest. Charlie won.

  “I’ll tell you what I’d wish for,” I said. “I’d wish for Dad to get well. I guess that’s a pretty obvious wish, isn’t it?”

  Charlie ambled down the stairs and stepped delicately into my lap. Then he pushed his face against mine, giving me a cat kiss.

  “Well, it’s what I’d wish for anyway. And if you could, I bet you’d wish to meet a nice girl cat. Nicer than Mouse,” I added as she came padding silently around a corner of the house and sat down a little distance away from us, “and have a litter of kittens together. You’d be a good daddy.”

  Charlie gave me another kiss. Then he turned his head toward the street. I turned my head, too, to see what had attracted his attention. Sometimes he would go after dogs. But the road was empty. The whole neighborhood was quiet.

  “What is it, Charlie?” I asked. “There’s nothing over there.”

  Charlie leaped off my lap, though, and bounded toward the street. I watched him go, his ginger tail held high. And just as he reached the sidewalk, I saw a car coming.

  “Charlie! No!” I cried, jumping up. What was he doing by the street, anyway? He never went near it. He usually stayed in back of the house.

  Charlie didn’t stop. I don’t think he ever saw the car.

  I watched him run under the wheels in a yellow blur. Then I watched the driver, a young man, try to swerve around him, tires squealing, then speed up and zoom away when he realized what had happened.

  “Charlie! Charlie!” I started screaming and couldn’t stop. I raced halfway to him, the
n paused, afraid to go near him. He was just a very still, crumpled heap by the side of the road.

  His head was lying in a pool of blood. I could see that much from where I stood.

  From far away I heard voices. “Liza? Liza!” the voices called. It was Mom and Dad. Mom ran out the front door and Dad followed more slowly. Then Brent came around from behind the house. Across the street, the Washburns’ garage door opened.

  Suddenly people were everywhere. Mr. and Mrs. Washburn dashed to the roadside and saw Charlie, and Mrs. Washburn dashed back to their garage, then returned with some flares, which she set up in the road around Charlie’s body. Brent stood by me with his arm across my shoulders. Dad knelt to examine Charlie, and Mom ran into the house to call the vet. Mr. Washburn took his sweater off and laid it over Charlie.

  I saw all this very clearly and can remember every detail.

  A few minutes later, Mom came back. She was carrying a small board. “We’re supposed to slide Charlie on this and get him to the Pet Emergency Center as fast as we can,” she said briskly.

  “Nancy,” my father said quietly, “I don’t think there’s really any p—”

  “Of course there is. Brent, will you help me?”

  Brent hurried to Mom and helped her get Charlie on the board. All I kept thinking was that Mr. Washburn’s sweater was soaked with blood and we’d have to buy him a new one.

  Fifi appeared and stood next to me, watching things worriedly and poking her wet nose into my hands.

  Just as Mom and Brent pulled out of the driveway and Mrs. Washburn began taking the flares down, I saw Carrie and Denise across the street. I was glad Hope was at the Whites’. She didn’t need to see this.

  Denise ran across the street to me, but I didn’t feel like talking to anybody. “I’m going to my room,” I said. “I want to be alone.” Charlie was dead. I knew that. The Pet Emergency Center couldn’t do anything except ask Mom how she wanted to dispose of his body.

  Denise nodded. “Okay,” she said.

  I started across the lawn to the house and the haven of my bedroom.

  “Liza?” Dad called.