7:00 p.m.
They didn’t call it that, but I was basically put in a tantrum room. It was a discreet comfort area, with white padded walls and soft chairs and no hard objects, where patients’ grieving loved ones were taken so they could lose their shit. Yes, I said it. SHIT.
This situation was shit.
Christmas was shit.
Everything was shit.
Mrs. Basil E. accompanied me. She was always the only person besides Grandpa who could calm me down, even though she’d been the one to cause my meltdown to begin with, by suggesting we celebrate during this dark holiday.
I shrieked. I screamed. I begged. “Please don’t make him go to the old people’s home! You know he always says the only way he’s leaving his family is in a box.”
Mrs. Basil E. said nothing.
“Say something!” I demanded.
She said nothing.
“Please,” I said quietly. Sincerely.
“This hurts me as much as it will hurt him,” she finally said. “But the family has convened, and everyone is in agreement. The time has come.”
“Grandpa won’t be in agreement.”
“You don’t know Grandpa as well as you think. He can be irascible, but he also wants what’s best for his family. He doesn’t want to be a burden.”
“He’s not a burden! How could you say such a thing?”
“I agree. He’s not a burden. It’s a privilege to walk through this life with him as my big brother. But as his condition continues to deteriorate, he will feel like a burden. It already weighs heavily on his heart, which is why he’d wanted to move to my house to begin with. He’s known this day was coming, despite his resistance.”
I felt so stupid, and selfish, and irresponsible. Grandpa was doomed to a nursing home—his worst fear. Since his heart attack, I’d doted on him, cared for him, practically stopped my life to help him avoid this outcome. For what?
And I’d spent our last holiday season together before he was confined to a home goofing off with my wonderful boyfriend.
My wonderful boyfriend! Whom I’d led on a wild-goose chase all day!
I cried. And Basil E. let me, without pulling me to her for comfort.
“Let it out,” was all she said.
“Why aren’t you crying, too?” I asked her between sniffles.
“Because this is only going to get worse,” she said. “So we must buck up, put on a kind face, and get on with it.”
“Get on with what?”
“Life. In all its bittersweet glory.”
9:00 p.m.
A miracle finally happened.
Snow. It wasn’t a major storm but a light, soft, sweet dusting. As I strolled alone back to Mrs. Basil E.’s so I could walk my dog and feed Grandpa’s cat, then tend to my client dogs before returning to the hospital, the feel of the snow warmed my cold heart. I stuck my tongue out to taste it. Bittersweet, indeed. And a welcome sign of normalcy. But it was the night before the usually most exciting day of the year. Nothing was right. Nothing was normal.
Dash was sitting on Mrs. Basil E.’s stoop when I arrived. Dash! My phone battery had died an hour ago and I’d given up trying to communicate more apologies to him.
He was wearing a tricorne pirate’s hat. Snowflakes dotted his eye patch. Boris sat next to him. I’d never seen a more handsome sight.
“Aaargh,” Dash said, and pulled me to his chest. “Boris has been walked and Grunt has been fed,” he whispered in my ear. “And your client list taken care of for tonight.”
Sorry, I didn’t say.
“I love you so much,” I did say.
We didn’t say more. We just held on. He stroked my hair as I lay my head on his chest, now cloaked in a new galleon coat.
I could feel the ridges of a book pressing through his coat pocket, and I knew it was the Moleskine that had led him on the day’s hollow quests. Of all the people last Christmas who could have found the red notebook peeking through the other millions (and miles) of books in the Strand, Dash had been the one to find it for a reason. I don’t know what will happen between him and me in the future, and I hope I’ll be okay with whatever does, but I know that no matter what, he was drawn to that notebook because he belongs with us.
He’s family.
Thursday, December 25th
Boomer was bummed.
Sofia’s family had insisted on spending Christmas in Spain, so he was solo again. Forlorn, he came over to my mother’s apartment so we could head to Mrs. Basil E.’s party together.
“Don’t worry,” I told him as I locked up and we sallied forth. “It’ll be over in a blink.”
“A blink is a very short amount of time,” Boomer replied. Then he demonstrated a blink. “See?”
I was about to tell him I was accustomed to the general duration of a blink, but then he continued.
“But I guess a blink is a good thing, right? Because if you didn’t do it, you’d be staring all the time. And your eyes would hurt. So maybe a blink is okay, if you’re saying it metaphysically.”