Remember When

“Are you sure this is the right decision?” my husband inquired for the fourth time.

                “It’s what she wanted,” I replied evenly.  I fought to blink back tears.  I wanted him there with me more than anything.   

                “Ok.  Call me afterwards.  I love you,” he said quietly.  We hung up. 

                I glanced at the rear-view mirror and quickly reviewed each of my children’s faces.  Jane, the oldest, sat groggily in the very back of the mini-van, face pressed against the glass.  Susie, her little sister, anxiously clicked her tongue with loud, smacking clucks and watched with maternal affection as Anna, the 35-week-old infant, slept soundly.  Tommy, three years Susie’s junior, bounced excitedly in his car seat, chattering endlessly to fill the deafening silence. 

                Finally, the nursing home entrance appeared in the distance.  Butterflies angrily consumed the walls of my stomach while my heartbeat slowed.  Maybe they really weren’t ready for this. 

                “We’re here!” Tommy cried with glee.  “Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, can I unbuckle yet?”

                I felt myself smile at Tommy’s eagerness to see his grandparents, to free himself from the bondage of the car seat and to run at full speed through the halls into their arms. 

                “Not until the car stops moving,” Jane answered coolly.  Tommy stuck his tongue out at her and she playfully ruffled his hair. 

                I parked near the entrance and turned off the engine.  This was it. 

                My husband’s voice entered my head.  Just be honest with them he had instructed.  When I turned to face them, six brown owl-eyes met mine with curious apprehension. 

                “We’re going to see Grammy today,” I heard myself say.  I bit my lip, unsure how to merge into the bitter truth.

                “Is she dying?” Jane asked suddenly.

                “No, she’s not dying!” Tommy giggled.  “She promised to get green Jell-O with me today with extra whipped cream!” He licked his lips and beamed, his smile stretching from ear to ear.  Inside, my heart rippled into a million shreds. 

                “Grammy isn’t feeling well today,” I said gently. 

                “Is today a bad day?” Jane probed.  I nodded.  Jane understood the difference between her Grammy’s good days and her bad days. 

                “What’s dying?” Susie questioned, sucking her thumb. 

                Jane’s hand shot up in the air.  Patiently, she waited for me to call on her, as she had been taught to do in school.  “Can I tell her, Mom?”  She asked with fervor. 

                I nodded.  “Dying’s when you leave earth and go to heaven,” She explained proudly.  “People die when they get sick or crash their cars and stuff like that.  Daddy’s job is to help sick people so that they don’t die before they need to.” 

                “Daddy’s a doctor,” Tommy said with conviction. 

                I unbuckled the seatbelt and stepped into the dark, sinister world.  I quickly wiped my eyes before lifting the baby out of the car seat and into my arms.  I hugged her a bit closer to myself than normal. 

                The five of us walked through the automatic doors and greeted the nurses at the front desk.  Tommy high-fived the security guards, who knew him by name.  We had become regulars there. 

                I breathed in the scent of carpet cleaner and hand sanitizer, an odor that reeked throughout the entire home.  In a strange way, I knew I would grow to miss it.  Our days left with the Shady Hook Manor community were dwindling rapidly. 

                Tommy excitedly skipped through the halls until we reached the seventh wing.  My father stood outside the room at the end of the hall and extended his arms.  Jane, Susie, and Tommy flew down the corridor, throwing themselves around his neck.  He closed his eyes and kissed them. 

                Once I reached them, he gently pressed his lips to baby Anna’s head and returned his attention to the others.  With slow steps, we led them inside. 

                My mother sat in the sun room next to Cora, her longtime nurse.  Vigorously, she twiddled her thumbs as Cora rose to greet the kids. 

                Cora pulled me aside.  “Holler if you need me.  I’ll let you have some time alone with her.”  She lightly patted Anna on the back and then squeezed my hand.  Her smooth, ebony skin sent shivers throughout mine.

                Jane looked at her siblings and then at me.  I nodded my head.

                She stepped forward.  “Hi, Grammy,” She said softly, pecking her on the cheek.  Susie followed after her, planting a quick kiss on her face and then running away to cower behind my legs. 

                “Hey, Ma.  I brought the kids to see you today, just like you wanted,” I said shakily, sitting down next to her. 

                “Daddy couldn’t come today.  He’s doing surgery at the hospital,” Jane explained to her. 

                “Surgery,” her Grammy repeated lifeless.  She stared blankly into space, inhaling and exhaling through the oxygen tube around her nose. 

                Suddenly, Tommy appeared from the other room and sprinted to Grammy’s side.  He plopped down onto her lap and hugged her with all his might. 

                “Is it Jell-O time yet?” He asked her.  She gazed at him in a quizzical stupor.  “Huh, Grammy?  Can we go now?”

                “Who are you?” she mumbled.                

                “Grammy!  It’s Tommy,” He giggled, pleased at the invention of a new game.  “I’m Tommy, you’re Grammy.”

                “Tommy?” she wondered in a slow grumble.  Her eyes met his.  He continued to gleam. 

                “Tommy, just stop it,” Jane pleaded, frustrated.  “She doesn’t know who you are.”

                “Janey, she knows who he is,” her grandpa stated soothingly.  “Sometimes, she just doesn’t remember, that’s all.  But she loves you all very, very much.”  I gaped at him with awe, incredulous at his assuredness. 

                “Grandpa, why did she forget us?” Susie asked dejectedly. 

                He paused.  “Well, she’s just not feeling like herself today.  But she wanted to see you all again, just in case…well, just because she loves you so much,” he finished, his voice tired, heavy.

                “Can Daddy help her?” Susie pondered, tugging on my jacket sleeve.  I ran my hands through her hair, wondering how anyone could ever forget a face so pristine and angelic.

                “No, I don’t think he can, sweetie,” I said softly.  Anger filled my heart as a single tear rolled down her cheek.  “But, maybe he will be able to help other people like her one day.”

                The room echoed with silent thought.  Restless, Tommy shifted his weight back to his grandmother.

“Grammy, remember when you promised to get the cafeteria Jell-O with me?” Tommy inquired, full of hope.

                She skimmed the room, frightened at the presence of so many strangers.  “How did you get in here?” she asked fiercely.  “Who are you?  Why are you touching me like that?  I’ve never even seen you before!” She began to shake violently. 

                Alarmed, Anna awoke from her slumber and shrieked.  I realized then that she would never remember her Grammy.  And her Grammy would never remember her. 

                “Grammy…?” Tommy started.

                “Get him off of me!” she bellowed, and threw him off her lap.  “Get out!  Go!  Scram!”  She heaved harder and harder with every breath.

                “I hate you!” Tommy yelled back, and fled from the room.  A horror-stricken grandpa ran after him.   Petrified, I sat motionless as my mother rocked herself back and forth.

                Cora briskly walked into the sun room and helped my mother onto her feet.  “Alright, I think Grammy is a little tired today…I’m sorry, guys, but maybe Mommy will let you can come back soon?” She looked at me, offering a warm smile.  The girls stared at me with forlorn gazes that penetrated my very soul. 

“Of course,” I lied.  “They’ll be back soon.  Let’s go, kids.  Wave bye-bye to Grammy, now.”  Cora mouthed she was sorry to me before leading my weeping mother into her bedroom. 

As the girls fetched their jackets, I cooed Anna back to sleep.  Hot tears soaked my face, each drop as dense as a waterfall.  I shut the door to the apartment and went to find Tommy so I could lie again and reassure him that he would always be in his Grammy’s heart.  

4:15

After a long summer afternoon’s football practice, I excitedly plopped onto the faded grey couch in the living room and elevated my sore knee upon our lumpy, homemade, potato sack pillow.  Although the training session had ended almost a half an hour prior, I continued to feel my body bracing itself for another round of sprints, my muscles expanding and contracting with every slow, painful breath. 

Coach expected much more from me than from the other boys on the team.  Since I joined the varsity squad freshman year, he dedicated the whole of his career to molding me into a player qualified enough to impress a college scout.  Monetarily, I evidently stood out as the weakest link on the team.  However, Jesus blessed me with an arm equal to that of Unitas in his prime.  When Coach elected me starting quarterback three years ago at the meek, awkward age of fourteen, I resolved then and there to channel every last iota of strength and fervor to the game—the game I desperately needed to save me.

 Just as my eyes began to droop into a well-deserved rest, a slimy, frigid plastic bag filled with ice chips landed square on my throbbing kneecap.  I glanced up with a start only to find a black-eyed, angry-looking Coach staring me down. 

“Twenty minutes on, twenty minutes off.  You know the drill.”

I nodded my head and sighed.  The cold only seemed to worsen the pain.  I slowly shifted the bag as I stifled a moan. 

Coach slapped me hard and quick on the cheek with a swift, surreal motion of his palm. 

“If I had wanted a daughter, we would have adopted,” he growled. “Get yourself together or I’ll have you replaced in the blink of an eye.”

“Yes, sir,” I mumbled feebly. 

We agreed at the beginning of my first season on his high school team that during the football season, our relationship remained strictly professional at all times.  He only issued affection and praise after a well-executed play on the field.  At school, at home, on the field, I only knew him as Coach.  None of my teammates even knew that he had once played a major role in my conception.  For all they knew, I grew up fatherless. 

Mamma creaked open the screen door to the kitchen with a shallow pail of milk in one hand and two eggs in the other.  The animals on our farm acted especially peculiar that summer, only producing a meager amount daily, which hardly served to benefit our farm’s overall production.  Perhaps they failed to yield sufficient amounts of product that season due to the excessive heat known only to those of us here in the great state of Texas—a climate so stifling it caused the average man to lose enough sweat to fill an ocean.

Or, perhaps our farm animals just simply could not overcome the pressure we forced upon them to perform.  Perhaps an inverse correlation existed between my family’s desire to harvest and supply and the barn’s lack of success.

I looked long and hard at mamma.  Her wrinkled, beige apron was streaked with the dust and dirt of the fields.  She seemed dazed and disoriented, troubled and disturbed.

It’s amazing what the heat can do to people.

The next day, I fastened the chin strap on my helmet as I mentally prepared myself for the next and arguably most significant forty-eight minutes of my life.  Fans from all over town lined up around the block to witness our first game of the season, and as their applause reached a crescendo, I knew the time left to ponder in the locker room was ticking down at a rapid pace.  College scouts from Burleson University, UT, Austin, and Rice waited for my big debut somewhere in the stands.  My hands shook uncontrollably as I double-knotted the ties to my cleats.

Suddenly, Coach and his assistants appeared and commanded the team to rise for a brief prayer. 

“Our Father who art in Heaven,” he began as he placed his cap over his heart, “we ask that you give us the strength and focus needed to leave the stadium with a win tonight.  We also request that you watch over us and guide us into a game won not only with smart plays, but also with integrity and fairness.  Amen.”

“Amen,” we replied in unison.  And with that, we huddled for one last team cheer and headed into the illuminated, jam-packed stadium. 

The instant my cleats touched the familiar turf of the field I knew the opportunity of my wildest fantasies had arrived, staring me square in the face.  For three straight quarters I threw impeccable inside and outside run passes, meticulously executed screens, and even successfully implemented two separate quarterback sneaks.  The adrenaline pulsed through my veins with as much force as a deadly hurricane.  Every cell of my being generated energy, every ligament and organ committed to the purpose.  As our score continued to surge, I stole a few glances at Coach, waiting for a signal to pull back on the reins.  With a thirty-seven point lead, Coach could have even afforded to send in the second string offensive line. 

At the five minute mark in the fourth quarter, I looked around as fans from the other teams descended the steps of the bleachers and exited the arena.  I shot Coach a look from the field, urging him to send in the substitutes for the last few minutes.  Without a word, without a signal, without any recollection of the prayers he offered with mindfulness of integrity and fairness, Coach responded with a wide, cock-eyed, ear-to-ear grin. 

For the first time all summer, with 4:15 left on the clock, my father smiled in my direction. 

As the magnitude of his reply reached its peak in my mind, I stopped dead in my tracks.  I finally realized, in the boiling summer night’s heat, that I hated him.  I hated the game that meant everything to me, because he had single-handedly sucked all its joy away like the world’s most effective vacuum. 

With four minutes and fifteen seconds to go, as I received the snap, I ignored the routes established by the running back, the wide receivers, the safety.  I motioned to the opposing team’s linebacker and threw him a gentle underhand pass. 

“Run,” I heard myself say kindly. 

As the linebacker plummeted through the offense, I slowly unclipped my helmet and watched it fall to the ground.  I turned my back on the screams from the sidelines and anxiously scanned the puzzled crowd for a pair of large, lovely, lonely brown eyes. 

Mamma.

For the first time all summer, as I stepped off the field for the last time, Mamma smiled.