The last time you say goodnight

Driving along the parkway at night, it was easy to forget yourself.

Moonlight glowed on the dark surface of the Potomac; the river my guide and companion on these drives to my parents’ house. The road was a series of gentle curves; turn the wheel to the right, turn it back to the left. I was rowing a canoe, leaving gentle ripples in my wake, not driving a silver sedan on black asphalt.

The flash of a yellow diamond with the black silhouette of a deer warned me to leave my reverie. I shook my head and sat up straighter in my seat.

The heavy limbs of the trees bordering the road drooped overhead, forming a canopy. In the early dark of evening, I could see the abundant leaves were still green. In a few weeks, they would begin to change color, then dry out, shrivel, and drop to the ground.

In their last gasps, they were glorious. They left life in a burst of flames, blazing in bright gold, rich red, and glowing orange. In Fall, you drove through a hall of purifying fire to reach your final destination.

I remembered another passage on this road, just a few months before. A brief phone call with my mother. An answer to a question I didn’t want to ask.

An answer, after months of following a doctor’s prescription to just wait and see.

Wait and see; he’ll improve. He had a crisis, but it has passed. He’ll get better. It’ll take time.

We waited. We saw.

My father was wasting away.

We found another doctor. Now, at last, a diagnosis.

Tumor. Malignant. Inoperable. Metastasized.

I could hardly see as I drove home that night, my vision clouded by cascading curtains of water. It was Spring, then. The leaves were just unfolding, shiny green and new.

I reached the end of the parkway, its terminus the home of another Father. Hello, George. Hello, Martha. Only a couple years ago, I hawked historical knickknacks in their home to pay my way through college. It was only polite to greet them when I passed by.

Four more turns, and I arrived at my parents’ house. I couldn’t think of it as home. Built and inhabited after I left the nest, it was a place to rest my head. It was where my parents and my sister lived. I was a visitor, despite my mother’s efforts to keep a room set aside for me, filled with forgotten relics of my childhood.

I walked in the house and quietly called out, “Hello.” My mother’s quiet “Hello” came echoing back.

We were always quiet these days. Were we preparing my father for everlasting silence? I think I’d want to gather all the noise of life I could.

I entered the living room. “Sorry, I’m so late.”

My mother sat on the couch. My father lay on a makeshift bed of two stacked cushions on the floor. Their bedroom had become a distance too far. My mother held my father’s bony hand in her soft palm, her other hand stroking his fingers.

“It’s okay. We’re just getting ready to go to bed. Your sister’s already asleep.”

My mother gently placed my father’s hand on his chest and stood up. “I’ll be back.”

I took my mother’s place on the couch and watched as my father lay on the cushions. His eyes were closed. His chest rose up and down slowly.

“Hey, dad.”

His eyes opened. “Hey there,” he said softly. “How was work?”

“It was good. Busy. Long day.”

“Yes,” he said. “Long day. It’s time to sleep, I think.”

“Yes, time to sleep.” I bent down and kissed the hollow of his cheek, a sunken valley between his cheekbone and his jaw. “Good night, Dad.”

“Good night.”

I went back into the front hall. I picked up my overnight bag from where I’d left it on the floor and threw the strap over my shoulder. My mother met me there.

“Thanks for coming,” she said, her voice hoarse. Her mouth turned up into something resembling a smile. Her lips clenched tightly over her teeth, trembling. Her eyes were red, the skin underneath and at the corners damp.

“Of course,” I breathed.

“The nurse thinks,” her voice broke. “It won’t be long.”

I let the bag fall to the floor and put my arms around her. She wrapped her arms tightly around me. Her body shuddered as I held her. We stood that way until she took one last stormy breath and released me.

“Good night, sweetheart.”

“Good night, Mom.”

I watched her as she squared her shoulders and walked steadily back to the living room. I picked up my bag again and trudged up the stairs.

Sometime in the edge of night, shortly before dawn, I woke to a hand gently shaking my shoulder. I turned over and faced a shadow.

“He’s gone.”

Downstairs on my own, I went to where my father lay. His eyes were closed, his hands folded over his stomach. I sat down on the couch next to him. As I watched, his chest didn’t move.

I reached out and stroked his wispy hair.

I looked closely at his face. The skin stretched thin over the bones. Every edge was sharp, every angle outlined. There was no flesh to soften, to hide the hard skull underneath. It was the same face I had kissed the night before. And, it wasn’t.

I bent over and pressed my lips to his forehead. It was so cold, like marble. I wished I hadn’t.

I sat up and looked at the effigy that now lay where my father had been.

“I love you, Dad.”

I stood and fled back upstairs.

A while later, I looked out the windows in a room on the second floor that faced the street. I watched as a man led a cart carrying a long, black bag down the driveway. He slid the bag from the cart into the back of a van. He closed the doors.

I put my hand on the cold glass of the window pane as the man got in the car and drove away down the street.

Originally published at https://thestorypub.com.