THE DAWN PATROL

A Reading

I remember the family dinner we had and everything leading up to it. I keep telling myself it’s funny what can stir your memory — not funny ha-ha, but funny strange — because I remember all those little things — like the weather, and the drive out, even the elevator ride up — and I find myself looking at the similarities of Dad and Grampa as they both lay in their hospital beds, dying. I remember those days for different reasons now, and because I haven’t thought of Uncle Ray for all these years, I find myself wondering what happened to shut him out of the family? I suppose I’ll never know now, will I? Uncle Fred and Auntie Jen are dead. That leaves us with Auntie Win and Uncle Jack, and they aren’t talking to each other.

As Russell and I walk back to the hospital, I find myself thinking of the elevator ride thirty years ago. I remember how we all rode up without saying a word — a family of mutes. I found myself pushed up against the wall by Russell once other people started coming in. Russell leaned back against me on purpose, but I didn’t care; I was looking up at Mom who was holding Dad’s hand tight.

When the elevator doors slid open and we stepped out, there was Uncle Fred — the “Baby” of the family — all six foot four and two hundred and forty-five pounds of him, standing at the end of the hall with Auntie Marge and Angie. He could’ve played football for the B.C. Lions, Dad told us once, or the Edmonton Eskimos if he wanted to, but he said he liked teaching better.

“Bobby!” he called out in that high-pitched nasally voice he used to have — quite deceptive considering his size. “Get over here!” and Uncle Fred hugged him close. Dad looked uncomfortable holding him, and it took him a moment before he finally put his arms around Uncle Fred and hugged him back, but he did.

“Mom’s in shock,” Uncle Fred said, looking at all of us.

He didn’t look, or say hello to Russell and me, but Auntie Marge came along with Angie in tow, hugging me into her oversized breasts until it felt as if I couldn’t breathe anymore. When she let me go, I stood quiet, listening to Uncle Fred.

“It’s like she’s lost, man. She’s a mess. I don’t know how she’s gonna handle this if he lives —”

“What do you mean if he lives?” Dad asked.

“Marge says we can probably take her home with us tonight, but we don’t have a lot of room. And when Jack comes in — did I tell you that I phoned him? Can you pick him up at the airport tomorrow?”

“What? Jack’s coming?”

“Tomorrow. Can you get him? I don’t know what’s gonna happen here, but someone’s gonna have to drive Mom around. I don’t think it’s a good idea to have her driving in this condition.”

“What condition?”

“The pills man. The doctor gave her something because she couldn’t stop crying.”

“Did she love him that much?” Dad asked.

It was like a bombshell. Uncle Fred stopped talking in mid-sentence; Mom and Auntie Marge turned to look at Dad at the same time. Uncle Fred looked down at Russell, Angie, and me, shaking his head slightly, as if to say Dad didn’t mean it the way it came out.

“Did you just say what I think you said?” Mom asked.

“That’s okay. He’s just confused, is all. He knows she loved him. It’s okay,” Uncle Fred said, and put an arm around Dad’s shoulder, hugging him. “That’s it, isn’t it? You’re just confused. Information overload!” he said with another laugh.

“How’s Dad?” Mom asked Auntie Marge.

“It’s definitely a stroke,” Uncle Fred said, and he wiped the tears that came to his eyes just mentioning Grampa’s condition.

Fred was the emotional one, Mom said; he cries at movies, and songs, or books he reads and passes along to Mom. She put an arm around him and hugs him hard, something she knew Dad was unable to do.

“He’s paralyzed on the right side — or so the tests say. He probably can’t talk, but the doctors say he might regain his speech later.”

“The right side?” Mom asked with a note of disbelief. She looked down at me without seeing me, and I wanted to reach out and hold her. Mom and Grampa had always been close. She always said Grampa liked her better than he liked Dad, and sometimes I thought it was true. She did things for him. She sat beside him when they were over for dinner and cut his meat without being asked. She put his water glass to the right of his plate instead of the left, the way she did with us. She did a hundred little things for him that no one seemed to notice, because she knew he was a proud man. Being paralyzed on the right side would be devastating to a one armed man.

“Jesus, how can he have a stroke?” Dad asked. “He still walks everyday — even though it pains him more than we’ll ever know. He’s active. We just saw him a couple of weeks ago, over at your place.”

“I don’t think having a stroke has anything to do with being active,” Mom said.

“It’s a blood clot in the brain,” Uncle Fred said, looking down at Mom who nodded as if they were both consulting physicians on the case.

“There’s no way of knowing about something like this,” Mom said, and it seemed like she was trying to comfort Dad with her words.

“So what’re they doing now?” Dad asked Uncle Fred.

“Watching him. They’ve got all sorts of tubes running in and out of him. They want to thin his blood out - or something like that. It’s possible he might have a heart attack, or another stroke. Who the hell knows how these things work?”

“Is he awake?” Mom asked.

“It’s not like his eyes are open, but I don’t think he’d see anything if he could. You know, the lights are on but there’s nobody home.”

“Jesus Freddy, do you have to say it like that?” Auntie Marge said.

“How’s Mom taking it? I mean, aside from the sedatives, and the shock, does she have any idea what’s going on?”

“It’s shock, man,” Uncle Fred said before Auntie Marge could answer.

“Man? Now you’re calling me, ‘Man’? You’re going to have to stop talking to me like that. You’re not teaching a class.”

“She’s not talking,” Auntie Marge said, ignoring Uncle Fred. “When she says anything, she says things about having to wake Dad up from his nap —”

“He was having a nap when it happened —” Uncle Fred said, and Auntie Marge gave him the look; he turned aside, but I could see he was mad.

“Do you think you can let me finish off one sentence, without you jumping all over it?”

“Sorry. I’m sorry for everything,” he was quick to add, but still not turning around.

“She doesn’t know how long ago it happened,” Auntie Marg went on. “She was getting dinner ready, and thought maybe she’d let him sleep a little longer. Jesus Bev, I think she still believes he’ll be coming home for dinner.”

“Christ,” Mom said, a hand going to her throat. I could see tears in her eyes. She looked down at me for a moment. “Can I bring the kids in to see him? Maybe seeing them will trigger something in his brain? I mean, maybe he’ll recognize their voices?” Her voice seemed to trail off at the end, as if it was an idea she didn’t quite believe herself.

“We’ll have to ask the doctor if he can have visitors,” Uncle Fred said.

“Good,” Auntie Marge said with finality. “Then why don’t you do that? Bev and I will go downstairs and get some coffee up. You want one?”

“Sure. Love one. Thanks,” Uncle Fred said.

“Do you want one, Hon?” Mom asked Dad, but he shook his head.

“How warm can it be by the time you get back?”

“Can I come?” I asked.

“No. I don’t want you hanging around. You go sit in the waiting room with Angie and Russ. You don’t have to listen to us adults talking. What we have to say is none of your business.”

They started walking toward the elevator — Mom watching me over her shoulder to make sure I went to the waiting room — giving her head a quick nod, knowing I’d understand her unspoken command and the tight Vee of her eyebrows.

“Mom finally got tired of you hanging around, did she?” Russell asked when I stepped into the waiting room.

“Yeah, what were you doin’ out there, anyway?” Angie said with a slow shake of her head; she was filing her nails, blowing the dust off. “My mom’d kill me if I was hanging around her all night.”

I watched the elevator doors close and then started to walk out of the waiting room again.

“Where do you think you’re goin’, dill-hole?” Russell asked.

“I wanna ask Dad a question,” I said.
“Leave him alone. He’s got enough on his mind.”

“How would you know? You don’t care.”

“Hey, Shit-for-Brains, at least I know enough to leave Dad an’ Uncle Freddy alone. Why do you think Mom an’ Auntie Marge left?”

“To get coffee.”

“So Dad and Uncle Fred can talk, stoo-pid. It’s their father. Mom an’ Auntie Marge don’t got nothing to do with it.”

“It’s not “don’t got”, Shit-for-Brains,” I said. I looked down the hall. I saw Uncle Fred leading Dad to a chair where he let him sit. They were talking, and though I couldn’t hear everything they were saying, I could see Uncle Fred waving his arms up and down and heard him say it was bullshit more than once.

Russell punched me in the arm. Hard. Right in that spot where the two muscles meet. I felt it go numb, and fought back the tears in my eyes it hurt so much.

“What’d ya do that for?”

“Don’t call me Shit-for-Brains, Shit-for-Brains.”

“You gonna beat me up here? Now? I don’t think Mom’ll like that, not with what’s goin’ on here.”

“She ain’t gonna know ‘cause you’re not gonna tell her.”

“Oh knock it off, both of you, or I’ll tell my mom,” Angie said with a bored voice from the corner of the couch. “You don’t want her comin’ after you. She won’t think twice about slappin’ you up-side the head. An’ you should know Russ, she’s hit you more times than she’s hit me.” She stood on the couch and reached up to the TV, flipping through the only four stations they had.