The next day is Rosh Hashanah, the beginning of the Jewish New Year. Dad will be alone in the hospital all day. And I cannot visit him. I am two hours away — in temple, feeling guilty. Wishing I had the kind of superpowers that would let me be in two places at once. I would slip out of myself and flow down through the floor of the synagogue. I would do it so quietly no one would notice I was gone. Then, I would swim under the soil from Westbury, Long Island to Hoboken, New Jersey and surface through a sewer cover. I would pull on my invisibility cloak and my stretchy blue cape and fly in through Dad’s window with a Frappuccino and a fat straw. This is what I am thinking about as the rabbi is leading the service. As I am standing up and sitting down and singing praise to Adonai.
The next day, at the hospital, Dad is still crying. The tears come in waves, he tells me — sneaking up on him when he least expects it.
I pull out the deck of Bicycle cards I tucked into my purse as I left the house.
Seeing them, his face brightens. He sits up a little straighter. “Let’s play something,” he says. “What games do you know?”
“Um... How about Go Fish?”
He cracks up. “Go Fish?! Sheesh. Are you my daughter?”
“How about Hearts? Or Gin?”
“Can you play Gin?” he asks, doubtful.
“Well, no.” I laugh. “You’ll have to teach me again.”
Dad can’t hold his cards so I deal out two hands and hold them both up. I try not to cheat. “Take the second card out and lay it face down,” he instructs. “Take the fourth one, too.”
Suddenly, he looks up. “Hey, Amy. How’s Jenny? I mean — how is she? How’s she doing?”
“She’s okay. She’s busy with the baby, with work.”
He sighs. “She’s hard to get close to.”
“Well, she’s quiet — so it takes some effort,” I nod. “But she’s worth it.”
“I know,” he says, choking up again. “I know.” Then: “I miss her,” he says, fresh tears rolling down his cheeks. “I miss her so much.”
This is a scene from The End of Men, a memoir I started years ago. The previous chapter, There’s So Much, is here. If you’re new to the project, read the first chapter here: Keys. The full list of scenes, in order, is here. Want to support the work? Leave a comment. Share a chapter with a friend. To receive the chapters by email, subscribe here. To support the writer (me) and the project, become a paid subscriber. Paid subscribers also get SOSI: The School of (Words and) Images.
