What We Find (27 page)

Cal helped put the groceries away, hugged his mother and promised to be back the next day.

The next morning, after breakfast, they stopped at a store to buy paint and supplies, and returned to the farm. Cal talked Jed into helping him sand and paint the porch and the front of the house, while Maggie spent most of her day with Marissa, getting to know her and seeing the garden, which was only a small patch but impressive. In the second bedroom of their house Marissa had a loom and showed Maggie some of her decorative weaving, something she’d been doing for decades. The other thing she kept in that weaving room was a bookshelf stuffed with books, all of which had been read to death. It reminded Maggie of Cal’s treasured books that he read and read and read again.

“Your family does love books,” Maggie said.

“It always gets us through,” Marissa said.

They all had lunch together but Cal and Maggie left them at dinnertime. On the third day Maggie went to a bookstore and bought Marissa and Jed some new books. She had noticed the books they kept were mostly science, law or literary classics so she bought a nice big stack, including a few large art books, hoping she wasn’t duplicating what they had. Marissa was breathless with excitement and gratitude.

“I notice you don’t have a computer in the house,” Maggie said to Marissa.

Marissa looked at her in shock. “We can’t have a computer,” she said. “Jed wouldn’t be able to get along with it. There are enough voices in his head without the internet. We had a computer for a short time and he didn’t sleep for days.”

“I thought it might keep him busy and help him communicate,” Maggie said.

“He would soon be communicating with aliens from outer space. I’m very careful with what we have on TV.”

“Marissa, has your whole life been like this?” Maggie asked. “Taking care of Jed?”

“My whole life has been loving my husband,” she said. “Jed’s a brilliant, wonderful man.”

Of course every night they talked it to death. Maggie lay in Cal’s arms and they went over the details of the day. Jed would be better on medication except that he refused it. “My mother claims they tried psychiatric help but I honestly don’t remember anything like that ever happening. Maybe it was one of those times we kids stayed here on the farm with Grandpa and Grandma. When my dad was much younger he could conceal his hallucinations and work. And he was a gifted lecturer—when he started talking, people gathered around him. But even then my mother stayed very close to him, coaching him, managing him, making sure he wasn’t acting crazy. Mom and Dad were just day laborers, farm workers, warehouse workers, that sort of thing. He got arrested a couple of times, I can’t even remember what that was about because he’s not one to draw attention to himself by breaking laws. Maybe that’s when someone tried giving him medication. His hallucinations really intensified when I was a teenager. The bottom line appears to be that he’s not aggressive, not dangerous to anyone but himself, and he’s not going to see a doctor. Ever. But he’s been on the farm for twenty years and as long as he stays on the farm, he seems to be safe.”

“There’s a nice little patch of cannabis behind the tomatoes in your mother’s garden,” Maggie told him.

“Oh, I know,” Cal said with a laugh. “Good old Dad has been keeping his voices under control with weed for a long time now.”

“It could be adding to his psychosis,” she said.

“Everything could be adding to his psychosis,” Cal said. “Under any other circumstances, without my mother and the farm, he’d be homeless and wandering the streets.”

“Your poor mother!”

“It’s her choice, Maggie. Not the choice I would have made.”

“What choice would you have made?” Maggie asked.

“As a parent? I’d have drawn a line in the sand—get help for the mental illness or you’re on your own. I know my mother is a loving woman but I’m not sure this devotion is helping him and I know it’s not good for her. She had children to be responsible for. She could’ve been a better role model. Instead, we grew up knowing a woman who devoted her life to her crazy husband. He was her priority, not the whole family.”

“And yet, look at the family. Look at how you turned out. You, your sister, your brother...”

“My mother was a teacher—she taught us. She read to us constantly, until she was hoarse, and the minute we could read even a little bit, she took turns with us reading. And she read from adult literature when we were small, the same books over and over and over.”

“Something about that worked—you’re all so brilliant.”

“But, Sierra...”

“Are you going to find out what’s happening with her?”

“I have the name of the hospital she admitted herself to. I’ll get in touch. But she’s an adult. If she doesn’t want to talk to me or have me know about her condition, that’s her prerogative.”

“So, you don’t approve of the way your parents are handling their lives and your dad’s illness. How does that impact you?”

“I feel a natural obligation to them, but I won’t take it to the lengths my mother has. Sedona and I visit once a year at different times, more often if there’s some kind of crisis. Dakota comes less often—that whole situation is hard for him to take. I come to be sure they’re fed, warm, safe. There’s a family practitioner in town I’ve become friendly with and he’s my mother’s only physician. She’ll go to his office if she has to, but Jed won’t. The doctor is willing to go to the house if Jed’s sick, like with a flu or something of that nature. But Jed, who smokes pot every day, won’t get a shot or take pills of any kind. Really, he should be dead by now. But while they’re alive on that farm, I’ll call regularly and check on them sometimes. That’s all.”

“Was your childhood horrific?” she asked.

“I hated the way I grew up,” he said. “I hated the instability of it, the constant worry, the embarrassment. Some of the best times were when we went back to the farm or lived in a hippy-dippy commune type community where everyone was a little wacky and we didn’t stand out so much. I worked so damn hard to leave that lifestyle behind. You can’t even imagine how hard I worked to appear normal, how driven I was to have stability and security. I worked and studied like a damn dog, achieved considerable success in the practice of law early in my career. I had the house, the car, the money in the bank, the reputation. It was like I was on a treadmill set at high speed and to get off was to die. Then, when it hit a snag, when I lost Lynne and couldn’t stop the pain, what did I do?” He laughed. “I went back to the gypsy roots of my childhood, living loose and lean, trying to find myself all over again.”

“Because you learned that true happiness isn’t material,” she said.

“Everyone knows that, right? But I was pretty damn happy in my material world, being one of the most sought-after young defense attorneys in the state. I didn’t need the lesson, Maggie—I knew money can’t buy love. Love buys love. And hard work is admirable. But loss is inescapable. It’s part of life, and one thing a bank account won’t help you do is get over it faster.” He took a breath. “I shut off the treadmill.”

“Are you happier now than you were a year ago?”

“You know I am. But there’s one thing that remains from my dissatisfaction of my childhood—I feel best when I’m useful and when I’m helping people. Although they don’t talk about it, the same seems to be true for Sedona and Dakota. We knew from early ages that our father is mentally ill and our mother is a flaming codependent and enabler. I think we might’ve overcompensated.”

“Ya think?” Maggie asked with a laugh. “A lawyer, a psychologist, a decorated war hero?”

“I really think you had to see that,” Cal said. “Now if you want to talk about the future, you can do that knowing I come from a family with some very obvious cracks in the porcelain.”

“Cal, it will never be like that with me,” she said. “I’ve seen a hundred men like Jed, delusional and afraid. Most of the time they have nowhere to go, won’t take their meds when they have them, don’t have the means to get help even if it’s available. If he didn’t have your mother, he’d probably be homeless or dead. In fact, I’m sorry to say I think your mother stands in the way of Jed getting help by protecting him and taking care of him as she is. I’m sure she’s doing the best she can with what she has to work with.”

“Well, you should know up front, I’ll always look after them, but there will always be definite boundaries. My mother has no boundaries where my father is concerned—he has her full attention. Sedona has very smart boundaries—if there’s some kind of crisis, she comes alone and never stays at the farmhouse. If they don’t appear to be in crisis, she has brought her kids to visit them a few times, but the kids are well educated on the problems their grandparents live with. Sedona brought them as a kindness to our mother.”

“Makes sense, I guess.”

“I don’t think my parents have ever been on a plane so there’s no danger of them visiting. I think.”

“You think?” she asked.

“I always brace myself for the day he goes off on a wild hare and decides it’s time to pile in that old minivan and get on the road again...”

“God help us all,” she said. “What do you do in a case like that? Call the highway patrol?”

“Hell if I know,” he said. “You know, you were amazing with them both.”

“Cal, he’s ill. It’s not his fault. He shouldn’t be punished for it. But you have to remember—it’s
his
illness. I’m sure there have been multiple times there were options other than a reefer a day. Between your mom and dad they’ve decided to deal with it this way. If there are consequences, they belong to them, as well. He wouldn’t be the first patient I’ve ever had to refuse medical treatment.” She shrugged. “Happens every day.”

“The day will probably come when the thing he fears the most will become his reality. When my mother can no longer care for him, he’ll be committed. It’s all Sedona and I can do. We decided that a long time ago.”

“Understandable,” she said.

“Does it give you the cold willies?” he asked her.

“No,” she said with a smile. “I don’t know that your dad would be all that much better off in a group home, except that he’d be on regulated meds and get some therapy. Might have a better quality of life. Your mother definitely would have better quality of life. But as far as I could tell, you’re right—they’re safe and warm and have food to eat. Even their neighbors seem very understanding—they greeted Marissa in the grocery store and asked after Jed.”

“I think they’re as happy as two people with those circumstances can be,” he said. “Or want to be.”

“Well, I intend to be happier,” Maggie said. “Do you have a mission statement yet?”

“Almost,” he said. “Before we get to that, I’ll find out what’s up with Sierra, but if we keep moving in this direction, I think we should consider genetic counseling. Maybe donor insemination.”

She just smiled at him. “First, your statement of intent. Your mission statement.”

“It needs a little tweaking. Want to hear it so far?”

She sat up straighter. “Lay it on me, Calvert!”

“I want to build a healthy, balanced family life in a beautiful place with the woman I love.”

“Awww, I like that very much,” she said. “What are you going to tweak?”

“Well, I think I know how I can help keep that life afloat. Since we’re not independently wealthy and I don’t want to live out my life in a rumpus room, work would be good. It appears there’s a local need for a multitalented attorney. I have to work in order to feel competent. I’m just waiting to see where you’re headed.”

“I’m not entirely sure yet,” she said. “I might do some part-time teaching.”

“Is that where you feel the most actualized?” he asked. “The most authentic?”

“Why do you have to ask me hard questions? We’ve almost got this nailed down. I think we’ll be happy every day.”

“I think we’ll be happy every day for six months and then you’re going to realize there’s a little something missing, that something that makes you your best self. It doesn’t have to be sixty hours a week as a neurosurgeon, but you do have to know what makes you happy.”

“Besides you? I might be my best self just loving you.”

He leaned close to her and whispered, “That’s what my mother’s doing.”

* * *

Maggie hated to admit Cal might be right. She had the slightest problem with needing to be right. But it was true, she’d been thinking about earning some money and when she wrapped her head around teaching med students it filled her with about as much excitement as watching a tree grow. She tried thinking in terms of fertilizing their nubile young minds with the exhilaration of making good medicine, academically, and there it was again—watching the tree grow. She did like feeling the excitement of thinking about work, however.

She’d been in the operating room a few times in the past few weeks, but she’d been assisting in pretty tame cases. When she even thought about emergency work it sent shivers up her spine. She couldn’t imagine another ordeal like that horrific MVA that took three young lives.

But there was one thing. Just scrubbing in got her a little jazzed. The nurses and techs were so happy to see her and kept asking when she was going to be back in the loop.

How Cal knew what he knew was a mystery. It was probably something his wife had taught him—he said she was an excellent attorney who had gone her own way, not seduced by the same things that drove him.