Monsoon Season (16 page)

When she was awake, he had errands. In the afternoons he fed the dog and let her out to pee since no one was home. He picked up lunch. He got roses for her room. He spent a long time in the florist’s, debating between colours and shapes. He called Emily to help him decide.

Bells rang overhead as he passed through the door. Behind the counter, the shopkeeper looked up and Alex nodded, touching the Bluetooth in his ear to signal he was on the phone. ‘Hey, babe, I’m trying to pick out roses for my mom.’

‘How is she?’

‘Better.’

‘Oh, good.’

The shop was small; the walls were lined with the kind of refrigerators you’d find in a convenience store. But instead of sodas they were filled with plastic buckets of flower bunches.

‘Yellow is for friendship, right?’ Alex asked.

‘Um, I think so.’

‘And red is, like, romance or whatever.’

‘Technically. But I don’t know if it really matters,’ she said.

The only flowers Alex could identify were roses, tulips and carnations. And pansies, but they didn’t sell pansies at this type of florist. ‘They have some with different-coloured edges,’ he told her, peering into a bucket of flowers in a back corner.

‘Yeah, those are really pretty.’ Emily hated receiving flowers. She’d told Alex early on in their relationship and he’d been suspicious. He’d even asked Riley if she thought it was a trick. Riley told him to take Emily at her word.

‘Is it better to get them when they’re open already or when they’re still buds?’ Alex asked.

‘Um, somewhere in between, I guess. If they’re too far into bloom, they die sooner. But sometimes the really tight buds never open.’ That was why she didn’t like getting flowers: because they die.

‘I think maybe these yellow ones with peach at the edges,’ he said, lifting them from the white bucket and sliding the refrigerator door closed.

‘That sounds nice. Bright and cheerful. I’m sure she’ll love them.’

Alex put the roses on the counter and reached for his wallet. The cashier wrapped them in a cone of green tissue paper.

‘I really feel like I should be there,’ Emily said.

‘Em, it’s okay. They’ll probably send her home in a couple of days. By the time you got here, I’d probably be leaving anyway.’

‘If you’re sure.’

‘I’m sure,’ Alex said. He nodded and smiled at the cashier as the man handed him the change.

Alex went back to the hospital and found Riley sitting in the waiting room, reading a book. ‘Is Dad in with her?’ he asked.

She closed the book without marking her place. ‘No, he went to mass.’

Alex hadn’t been to mass since Christmas. He spent most of his Sunday mornings in bed with Emily, who wasn’t Catholic, wasn’t anything, and didn’t feel guilty for sleeping in on Sundays.

‘He’ll probably be back soon,’ she said, looking at her watch. ‘Mom’s sleeping.’

‘I’ll just go put these in her room.’

She leaned forward to get a better look at the flowers. ‘They’re pretty. You did good.’ She leaned back and started searching for her page.

He set the flowers by the window, sat down and started counting.

The hospital sheets were only slightly softer than the stiff construction paper I remembered from childhood art projects. I wondered if I could bring sheets from home, the kind that smelt right, the flannel kind with the rosebuds worn blurry from years of washing. I thought about it, but told myself she wasn’t going to be there long enough to notice. Any day now they’d tell us we could take her home.

We took turns sitting by her. It was mostly my father and me, since Alex seemed always to be doing errands. He’d volunteer to go to the house to get things, to let Gracie out, to pick up food. I was grateful. I hated to leave, hated to go home even to sleep. I seemed to wake on the half-hour, with the sort of sensation you get when you think you’ve left the oven on or the door unlocked. It would take so long to fall back to sleep only to feel that jolt again. I’d return to the hospital in the morning, still tired.

She looked older. When she spoke, her lips peeled apart slowly. She didn’t say a lot, those first few days. She pointed. She winced. She stared out of the window at the sky. They’d moved her out of ICU, to the fourth floor.

‘Can I get you anything?’ I asked.

My mom shook her head. ‘I’m just feeling tired,’ she said.

‘Okay. Well, why don’t you take a nap?’

‘I guess.’ She didn’t close her eyes.

‘Would you like me to stay or go?’ I asked.

She sighed. ‘Can you sit with me for a while?’

‘Of course I can. Whatever you want.’

‘Okay.’ She rolled over onto her side, facing away from me. I chewed my thumbnail and listened to her breathing.

Only minutes had passed when she startled awake. She turned over to face me and grabbed my wrist. ‘What’s happening?’ she shouted, looking frightened.

‘You’re in the hospital,’ I told her, for the third time that day. ‘You were in an accident, but you’re going to be fine.’

She looked at me sceptically. ‘Can you go get my mom?’ she asked. That was new. Her mother had died before I was born.

‘Um, no, but I can get your husband if you want,’ I offered.

She scowled. ‘Riley?’

‘Yes, Mom?’

‘I did it again.’ She closed her eyes tightly and pressed her fingers against her eyelids.

‘It’s okay, Mom. It’s getting better.’

‘Really?’

‘Yeah.’

When I was three, I got chickenpox. Alex had it first, caught it at school and passed it along. We had rented a summer cottage for a month on the seacoast of New Hampshire. Alex’s chickenpox started the first day and it didn’t slow him down. He built sand castles, looking like he’d just fallen down, a few pox on his chin, across his tummy. For two weeks, my mother had to chase other families away from us on the beach. Her little children were contagious.

When Alex’s chickenpox was just about finished, mine started. Mine was worse. My spots were everywhere. I had a million tiny pinpricks across my shoulders. They were the size of pennies on my face, all over my face, in my nose. I had one on the inside of my eyelid, scratching the white of my eye until it was red. I screamed bloody murder and stamped my feet.

While my father spent a week away on business, the family dog went into heat and had to be kept indoors, added to our little quarantine as the neighbourhood dogs howled and sniffed at our door. I spiked a fever and went to the emergency room. My mother was sent back to that small cottage with two crabby children and a troublesome dog, shut in the humidity of June, catching small sea breezes from the window. She bathed me in oatmeal while I screeched. The oats seemed to do nothing but make the pox bigger and gooier. I would lie on the bed with my arms and legs flung out, as far away from each other as possible. I refused clothes. My mother would sit beside me for hours, tracing strange patterns along the narrow white lines of flesh between the sores on my body. Her light touch was the only thing that could quiet my shrieks into whimpers, allowing me to sleep.

As soon as they started talking about letting my mom go home, Alex started talking about leaving. ‘I can stay a bit longer if you need me,’ he said to my dad.

‘Nah.’ Dad shook his head. ‘Riley’s here.’

I went home to get her room ready while my dad filled out the paperwork.

We set my mother up in the downstairs bedroom and my dad stayed upstairs. He didn’t want to wake her with his snoring. I moved to the couch.

It was three o’clock when my dad pulled into the driveway. He ran around to the passenger’s side and helped Mom out of the car. He had one arm around her waist and the other arm holding her biceps. She hobbled and he concentrated on the path ahead of them. She was out of breath by the time she finally settled into bed.

‘Want something to drink?’ I asked her.

‘Maybe just some water.’

‘Okay.’

I went to the kitchen and filled a glass with water, three ice cubes and a bendy straw. I held it out, turning the straw to her lips. She took a long sip and I set it on the nightstand.

‘Well, I’ll get going,’ my dad said.

I turned to look at him, not understanding. ‘Going?’

‘Yeah. I really need to check in at the office.’

‘Right now?’

‘I’ll just be an hour or so.’

I looked at my mom. She shrugged.

Dad kissed her on the forehead and left the room.

I was lying in the hammock on the screen porch when my father came through the door. The sun had gone down hours ago and the crickets were chirping. I heard him set down his briefcase and walk to the refrigerator. His dress shoes click-clacked across the hard wood floors. He stood in the doorway, holding a bottle of Sam Adams in one hand, loosening his tie with the other.

‘How’d she do today?’ he asked, stepping onto the porch.

‘Fine. She’s sleeping.’

She had yelled at me when I tried to help her with the bedpan. I told her she was being silly; she told me I was talking to her like she was a child.

‘When did you look in on her last?’

‘A half-hour ago. Opening the door wakes her up, though. If she needs anything, she can press the intercom button on the phone.’

‘Okay. Is there anything for dinner?’

‘She’s still not eating a lot. I made myself a burger.’

‘Well, maybe tomorrow night you could make some spaghetti or something. Set some aside for me.’

I thought that over, squinting through the screen. ‘Maybe.’

A manless canoe floated past our dock. The kids a few houses down never secured their boats.

‘How was your day?’ I asked, as he sat down.

‘Long.’

I nodded.
Mine, too.

A breeze drifted through the screen.

‘Do you like me?’ I asked.

He turned in his chair and made a face. ‘Do I like you? Of course I do.’

‘Why?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘What do you like about me?’

‘I don’t understand. What are you getting at?’

I want you to know me. Do you know me?
I sighed. ‘Nothing.’

He shrugged his shoulders. ‘If you don’t have time to make dinner I guess I can pick up a pizza.’

‘Okay.’

He got up, wandered into the kitchen and started rummaging noisily through the freezer.

Somehow the house seemed even quieter with my parents in it. Dad worked a lot. Mom slept a lot. Gracie spent the day in the back yard so she couldn’t make any noise. I learned to do dishes quietly.

It wasn’t that hard. I left the water running to drown out any clashing of pots and pans. It was kind of soothing. It made me feel useful on a Saturday afternoon. I couldn’t make her better but I could help her sleep.

My dad was outside washing the cars. Maybe it was his version of feeling useful. I was watching him through the window above the kitchen sink. He had a system. It looked kind of like ‘lather, rinse, repeat’. First Mom’s car, then his. He was on the first lathering of soap on his car when someone pulled into the driveway.

It was a bright blue sedan. My dad left the sponge on the hood, dried his hands on his blue jeans and moved forward as Ben stepped out. My scalp tingled and I had to remind myself to breathe as I watched them shake hands. I turned off the faucet and strained to hear what they were saying to each other. All I could hear was my own heartbeat.

I willed myself to the door, opening it before Ben could knock.

‘You can’t come in. My mom’s sleeping.’

He looked at me, puzzled. ‘I flew across the country to talk to you, Riley.’

I could feel my father watching us out of the corner of his eye, pretending to focus on washing the car. I sighed. ‘Let’s go for a walk.’

I smiled at my dad as I passed him; a small smile, no teeth. I walked to the end of the driveway quickly, with Ben about half a step behind. We walked wordlessly until the street curved and we were out of sight and hearing of my father. Then I turned toward him.

I waited for him to speak. He shifted awkwardly, searching my face for a clue into my thoughts. I shrugged. ‘So?’

‘I came here because I want you to tell me to my face that things are over. I don’t think you can do it. That’s why you left the way you did.’ His arms were folded and his jaw was set. He was looking down at me from his six-foot-one vantage-point. I felt like I was being scolded. I set my shoulders back, chin up, feet apart. I wished I could make myself taller. I crossed my arms right back at him.

‘I’m sorry you thought that. You’re wrong. It’s over between us, Ben. I don’t want to be with you any more. Okay?’

We stared each other in the eye for several moments. He cleared his throat and looked away, then forced himself to look back. ‘You don’t mean that,’ he said finally.

‘I don’t?’ I raised my eyebrows. ‘That’s interesting. So you know how I feel better than I do? I’m impressed.’

He sighed, eyes to the ground, digging his toe into the dirt, trying to come up with a new strategy. The conflict between making up and breaking up was a battle to be won or lost with words.

‘Remember all those nights during monsoon season, on the patio?’ he said, in a near-whisper.

Ben’s apartment had a fenced-in cement patio with a patch of dead grass beyond it. We were getting naked in the bedroom one hot July evening the first time he suggested it. He looked me in the eyes and asked if we should take it outside. He smiled. He didn’t quite mean it. It was sort of a joke, unless I took him seriously.