On Shifting Sand (36 page)

“It’s a great opportunity God has given me. To do his work and meet our needs. I’ll be back before you know it.”

“Saturday. Noon.”

“Saturday, noon. Yes. And in the meantime, isn’t it nice to have your brother here for company? It’ll be good for the two of you to catch up.”

I offer up a sly, coy smile. “We were always able to get into some kind of mischief together, but I’ll try to keep us out of trouble.”

Trouble, though, soon finds us. Over the next three days, Pa’s health declines rapidly, with a fever that refuses to break and breath that comes through lungs as full of dust as the constant wind outside. I wondered if he wouldn’t be better off upstairs, set up in our bedroom, with a
window’s view to the Oklahoma sky, which, when it isn’t a dusky brown, shines blue as water during the day. But Pa won’t budge.

“Ain’t gonna die in my daughter’s bed.” A racking cough envelops the last words, accompanied by brownish spume.

“You’re too stubborn to die in any way,” I say, gently wiping the corners of his mouth. “How about we move your bed up to the front room instead? You can listen to the radio, and Ariel could spend more time with you.”

It is the mention of Ariel’s name that softens his reserve, working into his heart the way she alone ever could.

I think the move can wait until Russ gets back, but Greg insists the transition is something we can handle. We allow him to make his own slow-going gait up to the apartment, where I have a tepid bath waiting, not only as a means to bring down his fever, but also to temper the sourness that comes from so many bedridden days in the heat of summer. Ronnie stays close by the door, keeping it mostly shut to protect Pa’s privacy, but open enough to maintain that all is well. While Pa soaks, Greg and I work to move the bed frame and mattress, flipping it to a fresh side, and making it up with fresh linens and pillows. It fills the majority of the space in our front room, especially as it is angled to allow Pa to look out the window while keeping the kitchen out of view.

We work quickly and, for the most part, silently. While I attend to the finishing touches—a narrow side table with a pitcher of water and a stack of clean handkerchiefs—Greg goes into the bathroom to help Pa with a shave and into a pair of crisp, clean pajamas. Years of living with my father’s contrary nature have me bracing myself for his disapproval at being treated like some kind of invalid, but as Greg escorts him into the room, Pa seems not to notice that he is in any kind of a new place. He climbs into the bed without question, while we pile and prop pillows behind him. When he is settled, I offer him a drink of water.

“Glass clean?” The question almost disappears in the storm of his cough, but I’ve anticipated it as always.

“It’s clean, Pa.”

He drinks it down, along with a spoonful of the elixir Russ brought home, and drifts off into a somewhat-peaceful sleep. I go into the kitchen and make a lunch of cheese sandwiches and iced tea, to which Greg adds half a chocolate bar for each of the children, as well as one for me, which I say I will eat later—maybe after supper. With lunch finished, I excuse Ronnie to go outside to play ball with his friends, making him promise to wear his mask, no matter if the wind seems dusty or not.

“Oh, Ma,” he complains, as he does every time I admonish him, “none of the other kids have to wear ’em.”

“Well, they should. And since you said so, I’ll bring it up at the next church meeting, so all your friends know you were the one who ratted them out.”

He leaves, sulking, baseball mitt in hand, with the once-white mask looped around his neck, and a promise to cover up his nose and mouth properly once he gets outside. I figure that promise is as valid as the one I’d given to eat the chocolate bar, but let him go anyway. Besides, later I’ll send Ariel out to spy.

Greg and I take our tea to the sofa, where we watch Pa sleep, his once-powerful chest rising and falling with labored rhythm.

“Russ should be here,” Greg says. Not accusatory, but as a point of fact. “This is too much for you to handle alone.”

“He can’t right now. We have bills. Obligations. There’s no choice.”

“There’s always a choice, Sis. Is this what you want?”

I take a long drink of tea, letting it fill the void left by my unfinished sandwich. “No. Not a bit of it.”

“You need to get out.” He picks up the conversation as if three days haven’t passed since its inception.

“We’re stuck here, Greg. Buried.”

“If you’re that miserable, you can leave, you know.”

“Spoken like a true bachelor.” I laugh, hoping the sound will lighten the moment, and cool my skin against my glass.

“I’m serious. When we were kids, we talked about getting out. I meant everything I said about wanting you to go to college, but even then I
knew you wouldn’t have much choice. But that’s changed now. You’re an adult; you’re the parent. You need to do what’s best for your family.”

“I’m the wife, Greg. That limits me.”

He considers that for a moment. As he’s never had to answer to anyone since leaving home, I can understand his bluster.

“There’s something wrong, Nola. I can tell.”

“What can you tell? You haven’t laid eyes on me but half a dozen times since the wedding.”

“But I
know
you. You’ve always been so full of life. It’s the one thing Pa was always on you about. To calm down. Slow down. And I’m looking at you now—since I got here, actually. You look defeated.”

I glance pointedly at our father. “Looks like he won.”

“He’s not going to win. You can’t let him. I won’t let him. Nola, you’re stronger than that. You always have been, even though I’m not sure you can see it.”

I take another long, slow sip and rest my near-empty glass against my leg. “Can you keep a secret?”

“I work for the government,” he says, taking his turn to joke. “It’s what I do best.”

“I left him once.”

“Pa?”

I shake my head. “Russ. Just for a little while. For an afternoon.”

“Where’d you go?”

I stare at Pa, at the tiny stream of spittle coming from the corner of his mouth. “Nowhere.”

“Did you go alone?”

“No.” I barely say the word aloud, but the meaning rings clear between us, and Greg asks no more questions. “It’s taken a long time for me to come back. I almost didn’t—that’s why I had to go to the hospital. That’s why Russ has to work at the hospital: because I went away and took too long coming back. And sometimes, I have to wonder if I’m really here at all. The whole world, it seems, is blowing away around me. Nothing but dirt and wind. And Russ. And the kids, and Pa. And then, for a time—”

He takes my hand, his touch cold and clammy from the glass. “You’ve got me, too, Sis.”

“You’re too far away. You’re not a part of this.”

“I’m sorry about that, but I’m here now. Let me help.”

“How? And don’t tell me to pack up and leave, because that’s impossible. We have the store here, for whatever it’ll be. And the farm.”

“Sell it.”

His words come out with such finality, it seems the deed’s already done.

“We just paid the back taxes.”

He shrugs. “So? We’re going to buy farms all over the country.”

“But why? You won’t be able to grow anything. Land’s dead.”

“Land’s never dead. It’s just overworked. We can bring it back. Replant the grasslands, rotate the crops. It might take a while—years, maybe. Probably. But we can bring it back.”

“It’s not too late?”

“It’s never too late.”

“You know Pa’ll never go for that.”

“Then we won’t tell him. Not until we have to.”

We sit a little longer, until Barney’s appearance heralds Ariel’s arrival, her face pink from sleep and her hair askew. Pa chooses that moment, too, to open his eyes, and seems momentarily startled at his surroundings. I explain his change in venue after sending Ariel into the kitchen to fetch him the uneaten half of my sandwich and a fresh glass of tea, which she brings in, expertly balanced on a tray. Next, I’ve intended to send her out to call her brother home, but the sky has turned our view to a sepia tone, and I rely on Ronnie’s experience to get himself inside before the wind kicks itself into something dangerous. Sure enough, the bell downstairs sounds, followed by the familiar, healthy stomp of my son’s footsteps.

“Go wash up,” I order, without hardly giving him a glance.

“Yes, ma’am,” he complies without argument.

He’ll be hungry again, so I set about cooking a small pot of rice, to which I will add sugar and butter and cinnamon, and pour out the last of the cold milk into two clean cups. I offer Greg the same snack—like
Mother used to make for us when we were children—but he declines. Pa, however, perks up at the mere mention of it, and I prepare a heaping cup for him, too.

As a special treat, I allow the children to eat in the front room with Pa, where they listen to the radio. Ariel takes full advantage of the privilege, allowing Barney to nibble bits of the warm rice off her spoon. When the comedy team on the radio tells a joke, she laughs along with her brother and grandfather, though it is clear she hasn’t understood. Greg and I laugh too, though I suspect more at the relief of seeing Pa so lucid and, possibly, happy.

“It’s a beautiful family,” Greg says.

“Thank you.” I go to the sink to rinse out the rice pot.

He follows. “I’m only going to ask you this one time.” His voice is so low, I barely hear it over the sound of running water. “What happened to him?”

Greg doesn’t need to know his name, let alone say it. Without a single glance away from my chore, I answer.

“You’d have to ask Pa. He took him away.”

I ask Pa too. Late at night, while the children sleep in their rooms—Uncle Greg in Ronnie’s bed, Ronnie on the floor. I lean in close, trying to catch him in the weakness of semisleep.

“Where is he, Pa? What did you do? Did you kill him?”

But I get only garbled sounds in response.

By Thursday it is clear that Pa is bad. Worse. His breathing labored, his fever rolling and breaking. We can hear his wheezing above the wind, throughout the house, and there is no way to describe what spews forth during his fits of coughing.

“We need to take him to the hospital, Greg. It’s time.”

“Nola . . .” And nothing else. No other words needed. There will be no drive to the hospital. There is nothing they can do.

Russ arrives in the wee hours of the next morning, bringing with him a small, brown paper bag from which he pulls a glass bottle that looks minuscule in his large, strong hand.

“Morphine,” he says, following with the doctor’s instructions for how many drops to administer. “To help him sleep.”

“I don’t want him to sleep. I need more time.”

“We only have the time that God gives us.” These words, I am sure, have been uttered at the bedside of countless people in Featherling—old and young. In this moment, he is not my husband, not the son-in-law of this dying man, but a pastor. A man of God, versed in the gift of mercy.

He brings a chair out from the kitchen and positions it at Pa’s side. Folding one of the old man’s hands between his own, Russ bows in prayer. “Father God, we are here in your presence, ready to do your will.”

Pa’s eyelids flutter in the soft light of the lamp. In a voice thick with death he says, “You took my girl. Took her away.”

“Denola’s right here,” Russ replies, his voice gentle. He stretches out his other arm, beckoning me to his side. “I didn’t take her anywhere.”

“And we’re all of us payin’ for that sin.”

“Jesus paid the price for our sins, Lee. I know you believe that.”

“Jesus,” Pa says, his eyes tracking along the ceiling. Then he looks at Russ. “He tried to take her, you know. Wanted to take everything. He told me. Everything.”

I stand, breathless as my father, listening to him confess my sins.

“Nobody took her.” Russ has looped his arm around my hip and drawn me closer.

“I ain’t a good man,” Pa says.

“Of course you are.” I go to my knees, laying my brow on the sheet next to his arm. “Everything you’ve ever done, it was all to protect me. And I’m here.”

Pa pulls his hand free of Russ’s grip and touches my face. “You look like your ma.”

I press his hand closer, turn my face to kiss his palm. “You’ve always said so.”

“I loved your mother.”

After that, there’s no need to administer drops to help him sleep. There are seven more shuddering breaths, and my father’s spirit is swept away.

  CHAPTER 23