Samson and Sunset (37 page)

  He had me there.

  ***

We took the whole family and were off to
Mexico. It was winter and we went out on Interstate 80, through
Salt Lake City, Utah, then Highway 15 to Vegas, into California, to
the border. We stayed at the Hotel del Coronado in San Diego. All
of the patients stayed there. A van came and took us to the clinic
across the border into Mexico.

  It was a clean, fancy place and the
patient would be seeing several doctors all day. They would decide
on the correct treatment, send the patient home to do the
treatments; then see them again in six months. Daddy really liked
this place. They had cabinets full of files on every patient,
listed by the types of cancer. You could go through the files if
you liked and get anyone’s name and phone number. You were welcome
to call them and see how the treatment had worked for them.

  Doc Etherton, Kelly’s old O.B. doctor,
had had lymph cancer, and every year he left for a few weeks and
stayed at the clinic. I found his name in the file and it was a
Hudson number. He was still alive; that was encouraging to me.

  When it was time for the patients to
get ready to leave, they all received a bill. There was a small
desk where you went to pay. X-rays were separate. The total of the
bill for the whole day, X-rays, treatment, medicine and everything,
was six-hundred-and-fifty-three dollars. Guess Shay should have
kept quiet about all the money he had.

  Not that it mattered; I just wanted my
daddy to get well.

  Like A Thief In The Night

  Daddy lived seventeen months total
after he was diagnosed. The tumor was gone but he had emphysema and
then he got pneumonia. School was out for the year, so I took the
children to my parents’ house, where we stayed for all of June.
Helping mom and being near Daddy was something the kids and I
wanted to do. Daddy didn’t want us to leave.

  Shay spent as much time as he could
with us, but he also did a little more trucking. There was no
reason for him to be home alone nights, so he took some grain loads
out of state. I missed him so much. I needed his strong, loving
arms to give me strength. I asked God to bring him home soon, as
Daddy was getting weaker by the day. I couldn’t stand to watch his
dignity leave him. But let me tell you a little secret I’ve always
had, maybe Dad thought his dignity had left him, but I always only
saw a hero. I saw a man who wanted to shield his family from his
pain; a real man, with more dignity then I will ever have in life
or death. There were days he couldn’t look at us; it was too
painful for him. I’m sure he thought he was letting us down. He
probably wondered how we’d survive without him. Daddy was always
our rock.

  One Saturday night Shay called from
somewhere in North Dakota, where he was deadheading to pick up a
load. He said he would be home Monday before noon.

  “Please hurry, Shay,” I said, “I need
you. We all need you! Please hurry!” I was crying softly and I know
Shay just didn’t know what to say.

  “I love you, princess. I’ll see you
Monday,” he told me and hung up.

  Sunday was Father’s Day. I had bought
a card for Daddy from me, and the kids had all gotten Grandpa
cards.

  I told the kids we could go shopping
and get Daddy a shirt if they wanted. We ran to a few stores and
they picked out a beautiful shirt for Shay and had it
gift-wrapped.

  “Mom,” Kelly said, “I feel so bad that
I am giving Dad a gift and I can’t give one to my grandpa.”

  “I feel the same way,” said Wes sadly.
“But I am glad to have my dad alive and well. I never want to see
him like Grandpa is, Mom.”

  I couldn’t argue with them, I felt
sick to my stomach as we shopped. At a certain point the
realization hit me: I would never again have a daddy to shop for on
Father’s Day. One of those little things you take for granted ’til
they’re gone.

  It was a hard day for Dad. You could
hear his chest gurgling, filling with fluids. He said he was real
hungry and I hoped it wasn’t that ‘death hunger’ I’d heard about,
where a person eats a big meal and then they die that evening. I
hoped my imagination was running amuck. It had been so hard for me
watching Daddy die a little more every day. It was a long process,
like watching a turtle try to crawl out of his shell. The shell
would remain but the turtle would be gone.

  Gone where? Gone to heaven to be with
God. It was the only answer I had and it would have to be
enough.

  Then, like a thief in the night, God
came and sucked the last breath Daddy exhaled into Himself, and
Daddy once again was part of God.

  It was around 10:00 p.m., Father’s Day
night.

  I had two children sobbing
uncontrollably. Martha was there with her husband, Zack. Kelly and
Wes ran out of the front door and down the middle of the street. I
went chasing after them in the dark.

  When I finally caught them we sat down
on the curb awhile and talked and prayed together. They both wanted
Shay, they kept saying, “Oh, Daddy, please come home now.” When we
walked back to Mom’s house we were silent. We couldn’t feel
anything. I finally got them to bed. I didn’t want them up when
they came to take Daddy’s shell away.

  I told Mom I was going to sleep in my
car in front of the funeral home that night so Daddy wouldn’t be
alone; being alone was one of his fears. I think my mother
understood, as she knew me well.

  It had been misting rain all evening,
one of those sweet Nebraska summer mists. I drove to Westover to
get my pillow and blanket. I could have gotten one at Mom’s, but I
just needed some time by myself to drive in silence and remember
Daddy.

  I felt empty; like a shell myself. I’d
spent my life fearing this moment and now it had arrived. Shay, I
told myself, I had Shay. He would be my rock. He would envelop my
body with his and I’d bury my life in his strength. He’d hold me
tight and give me what I needed. ‘Oh Shay, please hurry home,’ I
thought as I drove down the gravel road toward our house.

  To my surprise and overwhelming joy,
Shay’s truck was there. I was so thankful to God for answering my
prayers; my love, my Shay, was home. Then I noticed a strange car
parked by the side of the house. I parked and went to the front
door, turned the doorknob and went inside.

  There, right there on my sofa, was
Shay sitting close to some girl. They were both drinking a beer. I
think I shocked Shay as much as he shocked me. I just stood there a
few seconds, not saying a word. After a little while I climbed the
stairs to our room and got my pillow and a blanket. I heard Shay
coming up the stairs behind me. I didn’t look at him. I was
silent.

  Shay was a wreck, he kept saying,
“Callie, what are you doing? Callie, where are you going?” He
followed me down the stairs. He looked over at the girl and said,
“Get out. Just get out of here; leave!”

  I didn’t even look at her. I walked
out the door with my pillow and blanket. Shay was right behind me
trying to stop me, but I just kept walking. I put the bedding in
the backseat. Shay held my door shut so I couldn’t get into my
car.

  “I’m not letting you leave,” he said.
“You’re not going.”

  I just stood there with my head down.
I never said one word; I never looked at him. I tried to open the
door again. I could tell he was in a panic.

  “Callie, say something. Do something!”
Shay’s voice became wild. “Hit me. Spit in my face! I don’t like
seeing you like this. You’re scaring me. Please, princess, do
something!”

  I just stared at the ground. The
Callie he knew would have had a hissy fit, thrown the woman out,
slapped Shay’s face and called him every name in the book. But this
Callie, she was silent, gaunt, defeated.

  “Callie, she’s nothing,” he was
saying. “I stopped for a beer and she followed me home, so I asked
her in for a beer. It’s nothing, Callie, she means nothing.”

  I just stood there not looking at him,
not saying a word. Shay finally stepped back quietly and opened the
car door so I could get in. He had tears in his eyes. I could see
them reflecting in the yard lights, right along with the mist that
was feathering down. I got into my car and drove away.

  The light misty rain hit my
windshield, my eyes streamed over with tears. I put an eight-track
tape in the player; it was Elvis’ song, “Never Again.” His words
rang true in my heart at that very moment:

  I New Rom hope I never ever love
anyone this much again

 
I can't take it anymore, I’ve been
hurt before

  Never ever quite like this time.

  My life had ended. How could he pick
up a girl and take her into our home, the night when I needed him
most?

  Somehow I made it through a blur of
mist and tears to the funeral home, parked out front and just lay
down on the front seat. I didn’t get my pillow or my blanket. In
one day I had lost the only two men I’d ever loved.

  ***

I don’t remember the funeral. My mind blacked
out the next few days. Somehow I managed to walk through
everything. I do remember that Daddy’s burial plot was beneath the
tallest tree in the cemetery, the exact spot where Kelly had been
conceived. Kelly had been my daddy’s whole life. I thought to
myself, God truly worked that one out. I placed my precious little
red rose necklace that Shay had given me into Daddy’s folded hands.
I wanted my precious gift from Shay to always be near Daddy.

  Shay drove the kids and me in our car
in the funeral procession, and then there was a gathering at my
mother’s house. My parents had two neighbors who I really
appreciated at this point. One was a young man with long hair. He
was a druggie, but he never hid that fact. A Vietnam veteran, he’d
had a hard time readjusting to life at home. Neighbors snubbed him
because of his drug habit. But he always walked across the street
to talk to Daddy. Several times a day during my dad’s last year the
young man would come over and carry Daddy out to the front porch.
He’d put him in a chair and cover him with a blanket. Then about
half an hour later, he’d come back and put Daddy back in bed. He
was just downright kind to all of us, and he asked nothing in
return.

  The other neighbor was a guy named
Harrison who lived with his wife, kitty-corner from my parents’
house. He was my dad’s age and he would come over and sit and visit
with Daddy. Sometimes he brought rolls for all of us. Since I was
there helping Mom, I sat and visited with him several times. It
helped having someone to talk to about Daddy.

  During the dinner after the funeral, I
told Shay I wasn’t going home with him. He was stunned. This wasn’t
his Callie. Shay always knew his Callie would get over other women;
she would never leave him. He knew how much I loved him. He was
silent and he watched my every move as I made the rounds hugging
everyone who had attended. I was grateful for their compassion. I
know I hugged the young man before he left, and I remember giving
Harrison a couple of hugs. Shay finally came over to me and said he
was going to leave for a while. He gave me a hug and said, “I love
you Callie, I’ll let you spend this time with your mother, but I’ll
be back tomorrow morning.”

  I just turned and walked away. After
Shay left, Harrison pulled me aside and said he’d like to talk to
me. How nice, I thought, at least there were people who cared. I
told him I had to see all the guests out and that if he came back
that evening I’d have time to talk to him.

  When everyone was finally gone, Mom
and I looked at each other with empty eyes and hearts. We felt so
alone. I didn’t know what I was doing; I was numb. There was such
emptiness in the house. Martha and her family were staying in a
motel because the kids and I were staying with Mom. ‘Hear my
heart,’ I prayed. ‘Hear it, Shay. Come back here tonight and hold
me.’ If Shay had come back to Mom’s that night I would have fallen
into his arms. But he was a proud man and I had asked him to leave,
so he did.

  Well, the dreaded evening was setting
in. Martha and her family came back to Mom’s and the kids played in
the basement. I had completely forgotten that Harrison had wanted
to talk to me until he knocked on the door. I greeted him with a
hug. He was Daddy’s friend, so I loved him. I got him a cup of
coffee and myself a glass of tea with juice, and went out and sat
on Mom’s front porch with him.

  “Well, now we can talk,” I said,
thinking he wanted to tell me something wonderful about Daddy to
soften my grief.

  “I’ve been watching you the last few
weeks,” Harrison took my hand and looked into my eyes, “and you
turn me on so much. I have a three-carat diamond ring I bought
overseas when I was in the Armed Services. I will give you that
diamond,” he continued, “if you give me a blowjob. I really need
one from you.”

  If I hadn’t been so numb and
brain-dead at that moment, I would have shut him down at “you turn
me on.” I sat there a second, trying to take in what I’d just heard
him say. After it all hit home, I jumped up and threw my tea on
him.

  “You dirty son of a bitch,” I said
loudly. “You fucker! Get the hell off this porch and don’t you ever
come back here, you bastard—or I’ll call the police!”

  I turned and ran into Mom’s house.

  “What’s wrong?” asked Mom.

  Martha looked up. “What happened,
Kathrine?”

  I blurted it out and they gasped,
shocked as I was. Here was an upstanding citizen, a respected man
of the community, asking his recently deceased friend’s daughter
for a blowjob the day of the funeral. The Vietnam druggie was the
one people avoided and spoke badly about, but he was the true,
upstanding character. He had never wanted anything except to help
Daddy. People are a strange lot.

  ***