The Light of Hidden Flowers (11 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

JOE

Tough Tuesday again. I sat in the waiting area of Kate’s counselor. On the doctor’s door was a giant poster. “How are you feeling today?” it wanted to know, followed by a hundred different cartoon face illustrations. A circle face with a smile = happy. A circle face with a squiggly-lined mouth = anxious. A circle face with a raised eyebrow = skeptical. A circle face with red cheeks = embarrassed. A circle with hooded eyes = exhausted. A circle with an O-shaped mouth = surprised.

Olivia listened to music through her earbuds. Jake played on his iPad. And I stared into space because today had been a rough one. My guys at the hospital were in a foul mood. On a number of the marine blogs this morning, there’d been a report of a Humvee hitting a mine in Afghanistan. Three confirmed dead, others injured. It hit me hard, too. I should have just sat around with the guys and commiserated, joined in on their “Everything is crap” chorus. Instead, I pulled out goal worksheets and asked the guys to plot out where they wanted to be in a month, six months, a year. Carlos and Andy made an attempt, but Tony and Jerry both scribbled on their pages and then crushed them into balls, tossing them into the trash. “What’s the point?” Tony wanted to know, and I didn’t have a ready answer for him.

And then I picked up the kids. The second I saw Kate’s face—her mouth a tight line, her cheeks flushed red, her eyes as wide as shields—I knew it had been a bad day for her, too. I didn’t need the chart of circle faces to tell me she had been shaken and was ready to blow.

She slid the van door open, hurled in her backpack with more force than was necessary.

“What happened?” I asked.

“Another day in paradise,” Kate said. “Girls laughing at me, no seats at the lunch table, Kelly telling me I couldn’t listen to what she was talking about.”

“What about Ellie?” This girl was a friend of Kate’s. “Where was she?”

“I’ve been exiled by Ellie,” Kate said. “She’s best friends with Claire now. Doesn’t give me the time of day.”

My knuckles whitened on the steering wheel. I steadied my breath and reminded myself that I was only hearing one side of the story. Kate shucked off her sweater, getting it tangled with the seat belt. When she did, I saw that her blouse was on inside out. It must have happened after gym, when she changed back into her clothes.

“Kate,” I said. “Your blouse is on inside out. That’s probably why those girls were giggling behind your back.”

“What?!” She scratched at her shoulder and seized the shirt’s exposed seam.

“See? So, no big deal. It’s not like they were laughing at
you
, per se. They were just being immature.”

“Like it would have killed one person to tell me?” A tear the size of a water balloon sprung from her eye.

Luckily, Olivia and Jake were in the third-row seat with their earbuds in, oblivious to Kate rapping her head against the window. Meanwhile, my head began to throb under the stress of having to shoulder all of these wounds. Battle was entirely worse in a thousand different ways, but this—feeling my daughter’s hurt—was eviscerating. Who knew that I’d be a vessel for her every ache? When she was in agony, I suffered. When she failed, I crumbled inside. When she had a bad day, I had a bad week. How many more years until this knot in my stomach untwisted?

Kate finished her session and the counselor called me in. “Can I talk to your father for a minute?” she asked Kate. Kate joined her brother and sister in the waiting room while I took my turn with the doctor, who reiterated to me that my daughter was suffering a crisis of confidence. She’d asked Kate to write a story, and what she wrote was entitled “The Girl Who Tried Too Hard to Be Liked.”
I’m wrong in every way
, it began. I pressed my arm into my gut, which felt like a cauldron of fire. I asked what we could do.

“Continue to fill her up with the things in her life that have meaning to her,” the counselor said.

When we stopped at Chipotle for dinner, Kate was in a better mood; she always was following counseling. Unburdening herself seemed to provide a lift. I wondered if my guys at the hospital felt better after meeting with me. The kids chattered on, and I stared out the window and thought about my daughter, so smart yet so unsure. I didn’t get it. Kate had always been so quick on her feet, sharp-witted. Why was she letting these girls call all the shots? Why didn’t she just put them in their place?

Jake pulled up a YouTube video on his iPad—cats and dogs dressed in clothes, wearing eyeglasses and hats—and the kids collapsed in hysterics. To see Kate laughing, her real smile, not stressed for a second, almost made me cry.

We were still eating when my phone chimed: an e-mail message from Missy Fletcher. The kids were happily goofing with each other, so I opened it.

Frank, poor Frank. Missy, poor Missy.

She wanted me to know.

Later that night, in my bedroom, I opened my laptop and clicked on to Facebook. I had to write Missy. I had to tell her that my heart was aching alongside hers for the man who cared so deeply for the two of us.

No argument, my day had been pretty rough. The Humvee explosion, the guys at group, Kate and her tears, and then hearing about my buddy Frank Fletcher and the dagger to Missy’s heart. A circle face with an ugly scowl. Really, the day couldn’t have been worse.

But tonight, seeing Kate relaxed, hearing her laugh—a real laugh—and then getting a message from Missy, just feeling that connection with her, however thin it might be, lifted me up. It was a stretch—a desperate stretch, but maybe we had hit rock bottom and were on our way up.

A circle face with wide-open, optimistic eyes.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Late that night, I read a message from Joe:

I’m so sorry to hear about your dad. There are only a handful of guys like Frank Fletcher in this world. I’ve been lucky to know him. I’ll never forget how good he made me feel, like everything I did was groundbreaking, golden. I’ve always wondered where he got his enthusiasm for life.

I laughed out loud and then wiped my eyes because Joe remembered Dad like I knew him, he recalled the joy he transferred onto every person he came in contact with. I read on:

For some reason, I thought back to the time you and I got him a computer. He resisted it, said we couldn’t teach an old dog new tricks. But we set it up for him and then got online and showed him how to use a Google search box. “What are you interested in?” I asked him. When he said Vietnam, I typed in “Vietnam 1965” and tons of pages came up, and Frank nearly fell over. He thought I was magic. “How’d you do that?” he wanted to know. “You’re a genius!” he said, slapping me on the back. That was Frank, the guy who believed enough in me to give me credit for Google’s search engine.

I dabbed at my eyes—tears, happy and sad. I finished up reading:

It’s really great to hear from you, Miss. It’s been too long, and reading your message was like coming home. Please keep me posted on Frank. Maybe a cure’s right around the corner, right? Tell him his old buddy Joe says hey.

A month later, I got a call from Dad’s neighbor. He found Dad in his yard in the middle of the night. He walked him home and put him back to bed, he thought I should know.

The next day, while Dad was at the office, I hired a group of guys from a hospital supply store to safety-proof his house. Childproof latches were put on the cabinets that contained cleaners and drawers that held knives. Sensors were installed on the doors and window locks, so I’d receive a text every time Dad left the house. An automatic shutoff switch was connected to the stove. Area rugs were removed so that he wouldn’t trip on them.

At the office, Dad spent a lot of time talking on the phone with his buddies. They knew about him, and they were here to help. I had Jenny schedule two client meetings per day, first thing in the morning—so far, he hadn’t had a lapse in the morning. I took up the slack in my own way. Dad’s goal each day was to reach out to our clients, to check in on them, reassure them that they were on the right path. I wasn’t comfortable on the phone, but I could whip up a pretty decent piece of correspondence and colorful report. Each day I composed three of these, and had Jenny send them out. A few days later, Jenny called to follow up, to see if the clients had any questions. I talked them through the charts—over the phone, in person. I could tolerate these conversations where there was an objective.
Yes, that’s the yield. That’s the dividend. That’s the alpha and the beta.
When the clients asked about Dad, I explained to them that he was easing off a bit, enjoying more time on the golf course.
He deserves it, they would say. Good old Frank. No one deserves a nice retirement more than he.

The next month, I tried calling Dad, but he didn’t pick up. I hit redial for almost half an hour. Finally, I called the neighbor, Mr. Powell, and asked him to go over and check on Dad.

“I’m worried,” I said.

When Mr. Powell investigated, he found Dad on the bathroom floor, his head bleeding. In the five minutes it took me to get there, the EMTs were already on the scene.

“Dad, what happened?” He was being loaded onto the gurney, and it was clear that he was confused, his eyes darting in every direction, his hands reaching for the gash above his eye.

At the hospital, hours later, Dad regained lucidity. He fell asleep in the tub, he said. It disoriented him, and he rose too quickly. When he stepped out of the tub, he slipped, cracked his head on the porcelain sink.

“Dad,” I cried. “You’re scaring me to death. What are we going to do?”

“It’s not a ‘we,’ Missy; it’s a ‘me.’ I don’t want you involved in taking care of me. I don’t want to be a burden to you.”

“Would you stop!?” I demanded. “I’m
happy
to take care of you. I
want
to take care of you.”

“I know you do,” Dad said. “But it’s not what you should be doing. You should be living your life.”

Even in Dad’s time of need, my desire—my choice—to care for him was somehow a reflection on my weak character. That Missy Fletcher could certainly be a nurse to her father, yes. But could she cultivate her relationship, get married, live a life of her own? Sadly, Dad thought not.

Dad spent three days in the hospital. Seventeen stitches covered the side of his shaved head. I told him it was a good thing he was named Frank. “You look like Frankenstein.”

In the early mornings I sat with him at the hospital. He was lucid and tender and 100 percent the Dad I loved beyond measure. I held his hand and sat with him at breakfast, and when I thought he was as receptive as he was going to get, I broached the subject.

“So,” I said, staring him squarely in the eyes, drilling my best, no-nonsense look into him. “Are you moving in with me? Or am I moving in with you?”

Dad slid the food tray away. “Daughter, I’m fine. Doc’s going to dial up the meds, give me an extra dose of brain juice.”

“Dad,” I said, moving the tray to the side table.

“And no more tubs for the old man,” he said. “Just the shower, with the handicap bar you had installed for me. I can’t get in too much trouble with that, right?”

“Dad.”

“You already turned off my stove, Missy. All I’ve got is my microwave oven. I’m fine.”

“I want to take care of you,” I said.

“I don’t want you to take care of me!” he said, pulling his hand away. “I’m a grown man.”

“This has nothing to do with you being a man, Dad. You’re the strongest man I know! But your brain is playing tricks on you. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

“I have a
life
, Missy,” he said. “A lifestyle I’m used to. An independence I’m used to.”

“I understand that, Dad,” I countered. “But I don’t—”

“—have anything better to do?” he finished.

I shook my head no, brought desperately low by this jab at my stunted life, my spinsterhood. “That’s not what I was going to say. I was going to say that I don’t want you to get hurt.”

“Come here, Missy,” Dad said, his voice as tender as newborn skin. I nestled myself into him as best I could on the narrow hospital bed. “I love you so much. I love that you want to take care of me. But a man’s got his pride, my love.”

I started to cry. “I know, Dad,” I whispered.

“I’m going home to my house, and you’re going home to yours. Case closed.”