Some anniversaries should always be remembered,
but never celebrated.
Ron Carnell, 2002
September 2001
Chapter One
Madelyn Henry was in a fine pickle, indeed. The plus sign leached bright blue rendering her not only pregnant but late for work. This, in turn, made her sister late which was never a good thing. The only consolation was Maddy wasn’t dying. It had been the hormones wreaking havoc on her daily routine the past several weeks; morning sickness and the frequent trips to the bathroom not to mention exhaustion from carrying something inside her that turned out to be the size of a seed. A loud knocking on the bathroom door startled her off her pity-pot.
“Who are you? Elvis? Can you please hurry up?” Tina’s sarcastic interrogatories seeped like smoke through the door cracks. “I’d like to get to work before lunch!”
“I’ll be right out.” Maddy muttered while wrapping the used test strip in toilet paper and dropping it in the trash bin. She waited for the familiar click-clack of her sister’s three-inch Manolos on the old hardwood steps before exiting the bathroom. Instead of heading downstairs, Maddy veered in the opposite direction toward the bedroom at the end of the hall.
When she reached the beveled oak door, she gave a light rap-tap-tap and pushed it open. Her father, Charles, appeared asleep as she made her way across the modestly furnished master bedroom and eased down on the edge of his bed. She smoothed back his fine silver hair and he smiled, one eye closed and the other conspicuously squinting at her.
“Morning, Daddy.” Smiling back down at him, Maddy spoke in hushed tones. “Sorry about all the noise. My fault we missed the train again. Apparently, there’s this pesky thing called employment that Tina has her knickers in a twist over.”
“It’s New Jersey into New York, for heaven’s sake. Get the next train, there’s always a next train,” he said gruffly, suddenly wide awake. “Don’t let Tina bully you, hear me? She’s already tried to micromanage me this morning. Imagine her telling me I need to use the little boy’s room before she leaves? I’m in my late seventies for Christ sakes, and her parent to boot. Stroke or no stroke, I politely told her to get the hell out of my room, but she came back ten minutes later anyway to find me in the john. Then, she yelled at me for getting out of bed!” He pushed himself into a semi-sitting position and gave a throaty chuckle, which precipitated a cough so deep, Maddy feared he may not catch his breath, but he did.
“Dad, you know you’re not supposed to get up without calling one of us to help you, it’s how you ended up with hip problems to begin with.” Maddy knew she sounded like a nag but she just didn’t want him to have any more medical emergencies, especially preventable ones.
“Are you going to start telling me when to poop, too?” He patted her knee conciliatorily and she realized he wasn’t the least bit concerned about falling. Gesturing to the pillow at the foot of the bed, he asked, “Sweetie, can you put that up behind my head?”
As the soft down settled behind him, Maddy caught the faint scent of yesterday’s Old Spice aftershave mixed with sweet, warm breath; a symptom her dad had in the morning while his insulin kicked in, something about ketones. She spied the used syringe on the side table and an alcohol pad and its packaging crumpled together like origami. On most days, Maddy gave her father his two, daily insulin shots, but this morning Maddy probably had her head in the toilet when Tina took care of it. She felt a pang of guilt, as if she had dropped the ball.
“Ah there, perfect.” He looked about as comfortable as possible given his chronic back pain. “See what an angel you are? Both you girls are gifts, Tina’s just a bit more…,” he rubbed his bristly chin, “….feisty, you know what I’m saying? A pain in the backside but a damn good attorney.”
Dad reached for his magnifiers and with a shaky hand, propped them low on the bridge of his nose though these days the glasses didn’t much help his failing vision. He tilted his head upward and looked thoughtfully into his younger daughter’s face as if trying to memorize her features.
“And, yes, you could be more cognizant of time, always a pet peeve everyone had with Mommy, as well. Not that I’m assigning blame or anything. Actually, I found her fashionable lateness rather charming but then, I loved her, too.” Lately, his eyes were always watery and bloodstained and Maddy was hard pressed to tell if he had been crying or if his cataracts were getting worse. Either way, when it came to her father’s mortality, it was as if her own heart had a slow leak.
“Well anyway, how did your hip feel this morning when you walked alone to the bathroom?” One of the few parts of his body that showed promise, she mused.
“I may have been born at night but not last night, Maddy. Of course I used my walker.” So, he was listening after all. Her dad’s voice was raspy. “Hip’s good, so far, knock on wood.” With that, he gently tapped his knuckles on his daughter’s head. Maddy saw it coming and couldn’t help but giggle, 33 going on thirteen.
“I see Tina already gave you your insulin and Rosie’s in the kitchen making you something for breakfast that resembles tree bark, so I’m going to leave you to it. Love you, Daddy.” She leaned forward and kissed his forehead at the exact moment Tina barged through the opened bedroom door.
“What? Am I missing something profound, Dad’s final words?” Tina smiled broadly in her father’s direction and then shot her sister a scowl. “Tomorrow, I am having a driver take me to the train station and you’re welcome to ride with me but we will be fu...frigging…on time!” Tina paced a few steps and put a hand to her chin, the other on her hip. She was now center stage, court room mode. “I mean, how many times do you expect me to fall in the same frigging hole over and over until I figure out I can walk around said hole? Huh?”
Curse words notwithstanding, Maddy was certain by the look on her father’s face, he was enjoying this. Maddy tried to make a lucid connection to the holes Tina was going on about, but failed.
“Sorry about the bad language, Dad, no disrespect to you, but enough is enough.” Tina pointed at Maddy. “I can’t believe I asked my firm, my dear friends, to hire you! What the hell was I thinking? We’re late twice this week and it’s only Tuesday, imagine that? It’s been the family joke, forever; Maddy will be late for her own funeral.” Tina rattled off rhetorical questions and mimicked her last statement without even taking a breath. “No more, okay? Are we clear?” Slightly calmer now, “If need be, we will take separate vehicles to the train station. Pathetic, not to mention unfriendly to the environment, however, my killing you wouldn’t be very friendly either.” Tina snickered. “And just for the record, you would never be late for your own funeral because I would have made all the arrangements. On the other hand, I’ll probably end up wrapped in trash bags in your trunk for a few days until you bury me somewhere in the yard for dogs to dig up.” Tina sighed with relief and turned to leave, apparently she had rested her case.
“That’s not true, Tina, we’d have you stuffed.” Dad knew he’d get a smile. Despite themselves, the girls laughed like grade-schoolers.
“Okay, okay, enough family bonding, can we go now, Madelyn?” Tina was at the door, calm as a clam, checking her cell phone. “Bye, Daddy, again for the second time this morning.”
“Fifth, but who’s counting?” Dad winked at Tina and gently squeezed Maddy’s hand.
Tina turned to her sister as if just named Miss Congeniality. “I’ll be waiting in the car, Maddy-cakes, emphasis on waiting.” Tina sang the last word then proudly strode from the room, already moved on to the next item on her agenda.
Alone again with her dad, Maddy readied his bed tray for the breakfast she knew was on its way, food she definitely didn’t want to see or smell.
“Why would anyone want to be on time for their own funeral?” Her father asked no one in particular. “I’d want to be so late you’d have to reschedule mine.”
Maddy pecked a light kiss on her father’s cheek and stood. “I know I need to get better at being on time. I’ll start tomorrow.” This time, Maddy winked at her dad. It felt a little odd winking at him; his wink always meaning so much more while simply conveying; everything’s okay, kiddo.
When she heard the sound of her car horn honking, Maddy snapped into action. “Got to go, Daddy-O!” She pinched her dad’s big toe sticking out from his white, elastic support stocking, always one foot out of the blanket just like her.
“Hey, you listen to me. Who says we have to obey time? Where’s the spontaneity, the romance? No more of this late for your funeral nonsense.” He made quotation gestures with his fingers around the expression as she made her way towards the door. “I don’t want to hear that anymore. Go on now, get to work.” He dismissed her with a blown kiss.
“Bye, Daddy, love you.” As she gently shut his bedroom door, the car horn bleated several more times. Just before the door closed all the way, she had to smile at what she thought she heard.
“……. Jesus, Tina, you’d be early for your own execution.”