We were more worried for Adam. He was fifty-three years old and until now, he had been in excellent health. Or so we thought. Hepatitis C had been working on his liver for a long time. But even though otherwise he was pretty strong, a million things could still go wrong. Immune system rejection. Bile duct complications. Internal bleeding. Infection. I knew the risks involved, but it wasn’t like we had a choice. My hand shook as I signed the consent form allowing them to perform the surgery, since I was Adam’s medical proxy. Still under heavy sedation, Adam was wheeled to the operating room to wait for Carl’s liver. I kissed Adam’s forehead before they took him in. I even kissed Carl’s cheek and squeezed his hand, thanking him a thousand times. Eve and I stood together as they rolled our husbands away. We tried to look brave and we smiled, but our insides were gelatin. Well, mine were anyway.
We were all there, gathered in the waiting room, the elders all second-guessing ourselves to death. The kids were fixated by their iPhones, doing Facebook and tweeting or whatever it was that they did these days. I’d finally upgraded from a flip phone last year because Max and Luke told me it was an embarrassment. Now the wrong phone is an embarrassment? I was beyond redemption in all areas of cool, but it didn’t bother me, which was probably another confirmation that I was seriously over the hill. So, to let them know I wasn’t completely out of it, every now and then I’d send them a text. Sometimes with an emoji. Or I’d upload one of their baby pictures on their birthdays and leave a comment with it on their Facebook page, expecting to be unfriended. I thought it was hilarious, and oddly, they didn’t really complain. To me, so-called social media and all that stuff was just a colossal waste of time. I had better things to do. Like worry.
Now Adam was in one operating room and Carl was in another. I was so frightened, I wouldn’t have been surprised if I’d looked in a mirror and saw that my hair had turned white.
Ted said to Eve, “I cannot begin to tell you how grateful—”
“I know that, Ted. We are all so grateful to Carl.”
“Oh, my God, are we ever!” I said.
I looked up to see a hospital volunteer approach. There was an official badge featuring her smiling face hanging from a lanyard around her neck. She was a lovely woman. I would’ve put her age somewhere in the sixty-five area, a little younger than Cookie for sure. She was dressed very stylishly. For whatever reason, she zeroed in on Ted.
“Mr. Stanley?”
“Yes?”
Ted all but jumped to his feet.
“I’m Judy Linder, the head of our patient-family support group here at MUSC.”
“It’s nice to meet you,” he said.
“I just wanted to know if I can bring y’all some coffee or a cold drink? Or today’s paper? Waiting is so hard. We try to make things a little easier for the family.”
It was obvious to me from the way that Mr. Stanley preened that he found Ms. Linder to be quite attractive. Seventy-eight and still preening.
“What can we bring you, Eliza?” Ted said.
“A bottle of cold water would be great. Thanks.” But a bottle of wine and five milligrams of valium would be better, I thought and did not say.
The kids—I call them kids even though they’re all twenty-one—wanted water too.
Eve said, “So would I. Thanks!”
“Cookie?” Ted said and looked at her. She was suddenly visibly annoyed.
“I’d like a bottle of Evian.”
“Everyone is so health conscious today,” Ted said to Judy. “In my day, I drank Cokes by the dozen!”
“Oh! So did I!”
“Why don’t I come with you and help you carry everything back?”
“Why, thank you. That would be so nice! You know, ever since my husband passed away—”
Cookie interrupted. “Everyone’s husband is dead these days.”
“Mother!” Eve said.
Claws in, Cookie, I thought.
Ted and Judy walked away, and as soon as they were out of earshot, Cookie said in a high-pitched whine, “Oh! So did I!”
“Mother! What is wrong with you?” Eve said in nearly a whisper.
“Nothing,” Cookie said.
I remembered the distinguished older gentleman she’d brought to Clarabeth’s memorial dinner. What was his name? Reggie? Reginald?
“Cookie? What happened to that nice man you brought to our dinner at Cypress?” I said.
“Well, nothing, I imagine.”
I said, “Oh, I was just wondering if you saw him again.”
“No, ma’am. It turns out that he wasn’t as available as I was made to believe. Unlike some people, I don’t fool around with married men.”
“That’s enough, Mother!” Eve said.
“Why don’t you kids take a little stroll down the hall?” I said to Max, Luke, and Daphne.
Despite the fact that they were so mesmerized by their phones, they’d all been around Cookie long enough to smell trouble. They got up and walked away.
“Mother? All this talk and innuendo about me and Eliza and Adam and Carl has to stop this minute. We are friends, Mother. Nothing more than friends. But we are friends on a level that you’ve never enjoyed because you’re always saying terrible things about everyone and looking for the worst in people. Think about it.”
“Friends without boundaries! That’s what you all are!”
I had to jump into the fray. She was now gone over the top of incredible rudeness.
“No, Cookie, that is not who we are,” I said. “We are very respectable middle-aged men and women who have known each other for decades. Eve’s husband is in there trying to save my husband’s life. If Carl didn’t hold Adam in very high esteem, do you think he’d undergo this surgery?”
“How should I know how a man thinks?” Cookie said.
I don’t know. Because you’ve had enough of them in your bed to write an encyclopedia on the male species? I thought.
“Well, Cookie, here’s the bottom line. We are responsible adults, not philandering fools. You need to stop this ugly talk right now,” I said, and realized that I was surprised at myself. It was the first time I had ever called down an elder, but what was she going to do? Spank me?
“You’re just projecting your mean-spirited behavior onto us, Mother. The four of us are practically family. You’ve turned into an old crone.”
“Don’t you dare speak to me this way,” Cookie said. “I’m your mother!”
“Yes. You brought me into the world. But I sure don’t like who you’ve become. No matter how badly you’ve behaved—whether it was drugs, alcohol, or just starting trouble—we always showed you respect. It’s time for you to give us the respect we deserve.”
It was like trying to drill some sense into a spoiled, stubborn child. There was no use in it. I got up to rescue the kids. They were just down the hall at the next waiting area. Daphne stood and looked at me.
“My grandmother is not very nice,” Daphne said. “She’s always making up awful things about other people. It’s totally embarrassing. Why does she do that?”
“Well, honey, if I had the answer to that I’d bottle it and sell it and probably be a very rich woman. I think some people are just the glass-is-half-empty kind.”
“I guess. She used to be so sweet when I was little.”
“Well, those were difficult days for her as well.”
“Yeah, like when she tried to nail her drug abuse on me! Who does that to their only granddaughter?”
“Hurt birds,” I said. “But Adam and I and your parents? We all love you to pieces! And you’re awfully nice to be here with all of us today.”
“I’m glad I could come. I figured, God forbid, if something happened to my dad I’d better be here for my mom. Cookie would probably say it was Mom’s fault.”
“You’re right. She might.”
“And I didn’t want Luke and Max to be here without me either. I mean, this is happening to both of our families.”
Luke looked up.