Beliefs and Bedsores

            It all happened so suddenly. Foam dripping from my father’s mouth, his balance shifting and growing weak beneath him. I remember it all, like a crease in time I simply can’t unfold.

            I turned thirteen weeks before it happened. Despite my age, my free time was almost always spent with my parents. I’ve heard adolescence proves developmentally challenging for many, but I didn’t mind the isolation back then. Intellectuality wasn’t encouraged in my rural town of Fries, Virginia. My parents moved down here from Richmond because of a managerial position for my father in a neighboring town, and Fries happened to have better housing. We still visit Richmond every spring, but I do miss the memories and culture. Despite this, my parents and I went to parks, on walks, and we always philosophized everywhere we went. I was a knowledge-hungry child in a school I didn’t fit into, and my parents were more than happy to encourage my inquisitiveness.

            “Don’t compromise for your peers on your intelligence,” My dad always said stuff like that. I loved to hear him talk, to learn and to listen, to feel heard. He was one of those people that really could’ve changed the world. He was quick with wit, and even as a child I wondered why he’d settled for the humble work he did. In contrast, my mother is a simple lady. She’s intelligent, though highly religious, and absolutely nothing like my father. My father always had a plan, something to fix and some injustice to reason about, while she is content and tolerant. Perhaps that’s why they worked so well together all those years, she being the voice of reason in his internal conflicts.

            It was a dreary, simple Tuesday afternoon; I’d just finished walking home from school, my shoulders slouched from the stress of my bag. I opened our door, threw my things onto the couch and sighed, blowing the long brown hair from my face.
“Hey, Carter.” My mother said sweetly, not looking up from her book.
“Hey, ma. Whatcha readin’?” I replied, turning away from her to grab a drink.
“I don’t think either one of us has ever picked this up from our library. It’s called ‘Johnny Got His Gun’ ByDalton Trumbo.” She held it up for me to look at.
“I haven’t.” I sat next to her, opening my own book and glancing at the pages. It was a long day at school, and I was glad to be in the comfort of my own home. I loved school but being around peers my age always burnt me out. I was glad to sit in silence with Mom.

We sat like that for a while, my mom and I reading, in this comfortable aura of silence. It was unbroken until my dad came home, hugging me from behind and planting a kiss on my mother’s cheek.
“Dad!” I said, smiling and hugging him back. I was such a daddy’s girl, always excited to tell him about something I’d learned or listen to him do the same.
“Carter, darling.” He smiled at me and glanced at the book my mother was reading.
“This, ‘Johnny Got His Gun’. Man, I haven’t read this in years… It’s grim, Car, but I think you’d like it. You’re a fan of thinkin’.” He stood there, stuck in thought, tracing his finger over the intricate designs drawn on the cover. He glanced back at me. I’d pick it up when Mom was done, I thought. We soon settled down, and all three of us fell into that calming, all-consuming silence.

            Only later was it broken by the inhuman croaks that came out of my father’s mouth. At first it didn’t seem real, like he was trying to make some sick joke. “Dad?” I even chuckled a little bit at first. His eyes rolled into the back of his head and his mouth shot open, and as the reality of the situation took hold of everyone in the room, the aura took a much grimmer turn. Drool was trickling down his face now. My mother ran to his side when he collapsed to the carpet in front of our couch. “Charles?! God damn it, get up!” She screamed and clutched him in her arms. I even remember her slamming her fists down into him. But her frantic frenzy could not stop his abrupt pain.




–


            The ambulance showed up shortly after we noticed the signs of his stroke, and the men in their silly outfits were able to escort my father to the hospital. My mother held my hand but shed no tears, only gripping my side with great force. She knew the health issues that ran in her husband’s family, but I’m sure she didn’t expect it to become a reality so early in their lives. I remember it, seeing my dad get carted into that big bright vehicle. Any thoughts I had then were painted with the innocence and confusion of youth, but time has since aged my memory to a one of grief and sorrow. What happened? Why did it happen? Where is he going, mom? Normally, my father would answer my queries – with his elaborate answers, patience, and love, – but now there was only the chill brush of winter and the roaring of sirens to give me my response.

–


            A week after his incident, the neurologist told us the results of his neuro-scan. He had no function in his brain, no possible recognition of me or my mother. The man that I had known was no longer with us.

            Now I am aged by four years, more mature, and still stricken with that childish grief. My mother and I have visited my father every other Sunday after church since the time of the incident. We bring flowers and shower him with love, attempting to comfort the shell that was once a man I loved. And yet, every time we leave, the memory of that day, though years ago, still follows us home.

            I just recently finished my senior year of high school, with a plan to study literature at the University of Virginia. Advancing through high school was a struggle. When people would ask me about my father, I would cut my answer short. I have a dad, but it isn’t the same as having one living or dead. “He’s not around,” I’d tell them. Though he breathes and his heart pumps, has fluids constantly pumping through his fragile veins, he’s kept alive for God, my mom says.


–
            I’m walking. Unlike that day years ago, I’m not directed home to see my father, but to the hospital with my mother. My brown hair bounces outside in the humid summer air.
“Do you have the flowers?” She asks sweetly to me.
“Mm, yeah. They’re in my bag.” I say back. I feel miserable today. I’m sure my mom knows it.
“Good. Make sure not to squish them, Car.” She nudges my shoulder with hers and I fake a smile.
When we arrive to the hospital, we check in and find the room that is my father’s jail-cell. I hate going to see him, but I bear it for my mom.

            It’s always the same sight, when we visit him. Dad’s eyes closed, his face emotionless and stupid. His hands always lay in that same motionless position, heart monitor always clicks to the same rhythm, and his hair is always in that same messy style. I can’t bear to look at him again. I hate him. I turn away from the bed.

            “What’s wrong, sweetie?” Mom asks me, in her still calm and collected voice.
“I don’t want to look at dad right now.” I respond sharply and hand her the flowers I brought, biting my tongue and trying not to snap at her. I felt some sick feeling creeping beneath my words.
“It’s your father, Carter, I know it’s difficult, but-“
“That’s not dad! That’s some shell of a person, and it only hurts me to see him like this! You know it hurts me!” I’m crying now. I can’t recall ever yelling at my mother before now.  We seldom disagree.
My mother sat her purse on the table and stared dead at me. It was terrifying to feel her anger even through her calm composure.
“If God wanted him dead, he would be dead. Marriage is promising someone union through thick and thin; I promised that to your father.” her eyes were watering, but even now she shed no tears.
“And that is never going to change on my end. You can leave. Alone, Carter.”
I’m shocked, but I manage to grab my things. I can’t bear to be here with a mother that chooses her religious convictions over reality.
“He’s not happy, mom,” I say, grabbing my jacket with tears in my eyes. “Would you want this if you were in his skin? He can’t recognize us, he’s gone! How can there be union when one person can’t even breathe on his own? How can you do this to him? Or me? Or God?” I say.

            I grab the door, bracing myself for my exit. She stands there silently, observing my movements.
“I’m done. You keep your husband, go ahead, keep him miserable and mindless, I’m taking no part in it. I’ve shed too many tears over his tragedy, and if neither you nor God can give me closure, I’ll give it to myself.”
“Carter, wait, I-“
“The UVA semester is starting soon, mom. I’ll go home and get my things. I’ll get a hotel.” I do feel bad about yelling at her, but I let it slip into the back of my mind. I must leave, to get out of that house filled with grief and tangled memories, filled with loss and false hope. I must break away.

            In an act of a final farewell, I walk over to the bed and kiss the shell of my father on the forehead. I glance at my mother and walk out of the hospital. Mom said nothing, but she nodded and let me leave, compliant as always. As I walk back home, thoughts float in and out of my mind. Was it wrong of me to leave my mother alone to carry that grief, or is that what she wanted? Is this even going to change anything?

I let all thoughts slip away with an exhale of warm breath.


–




There’s a book that’s hidden away in my room, the one my mother never got more than a few pages into. I remember the night it all happened, and for the first time since everything was normal, I’m not afraid to pick it up. I’ve been saving it for a time like now, a time I wasn’t afraid.
“’Johnny Got His Gun’, maybe I’ll read it after all.” I cram it into my bag without a second thought.
And as I step out into the summer air, I notice that it’s started raining since I finished packing. It’s warm, lush, and feels pleasant on my pale skin.  I slip an umbrella over my head and stare at the sidewalk, lost in thought. The raindrops already convening, forming rivulets and dancing between the cracks of the sidewalk.

Sometimes you do need rain to wake up the lush of the world.

-Evelyn Brown