Chapter 11

Josh’s turn:

I know the horrible feelings that come from hearing bad news about one’s parents. I’ve gone through it myself too many times, right up until the end. She’s my wife. She’s hurting. I’m hurting with her, desperate to ease her worries. I can imagine one step up from her, though, her mom is faced with losing her husband of almost thirty years.

This is one of those times that I desperately wish Dorable was faster., The Sabb diesel is wide open, all eighteen horses pushing hard, and that gives me eight knots. We’re an hour away from mooring. Gee’s down in the cabin getting things configured for us to leave the place for an indeterminate period.

The marine services outfit said I could have an electrical hookup if I had my own cords. You know me. Of course I have them. That makes me feel much better. The food in the fridge was a concern. Everything else? It’s good for the duration, unless somebody decides to steal me blind.

After a bit of time, she was back up with me in the open wheelhouse. “I think I got it right, baby. I’m sorry to interrupt our trip.”

“It would be an interruption if we had an actual itinerary,” I said. “This is just a side step. We’ll be okay. Still nothing from your mom?”

“No...”

I reached over and squeezed her hand.

“This is hard, baby.”

“I know. I can’t help you much.”

“You’ve been through it.”

“Doesn’t make it easier watching you. Whatever I can do, whatever I can say...”

“Pray. I’m not ready to lose my daddy.”

“I know.” And I said a prayer. I know, death is part of life, but I didn’t particularly want my new wife’s life to have to deal with it right now.

Our mooring was at a commercial dock. The downturn in the oilfield meant that they had a lot more wharfage than they needed, so they let me tie up at the far end of a long creosote-planked wharf. I had bumpers out to protect Dorable‘s not too tender sides and I made generous use of cordage to make sure she didn’t move any further than she might need. And I ran a hundred feet of heavy electrical cord to a receptacle that would provide power in our absence.

Gee shouldered her backpack and headed to the facility office to meet the guy with the rental car while I made one more pass around the boat. I had Pickles in his carrier and a pile of our belongings waiting when Gee showed up with the car. I loaded Pickles into the back seat and put the rest of our stuff into the trunk and off we went.

Gee was driving. I guess that was a good idea. The act of driving occupied a mind that would otherwise be running up and down lists of things to worry about. I had my arms folded.

“Josh,” she said softly.

“Yes, my baby?”

“That thing where you touch my neck? Do that. It makes me feel normal.”

I can do that. I love it, feeling the skin of her graceful neck, the texture of the ends of her hair. It’s a tactile thing. I never realized that she liked it that much. I thought it was something that she tolerated, didn’t mind. I’m learning.

The distance we’d covered in two days of Dorable pooting up the Intracoastal translated to two and a half hours of driving back. We drove to the hospital. I had to leave her there and take Pickles to the house.

“As soon as you know something, call, me,” I told her. “I’ll be right back up here as soon as Pickles is home.” That’s a forty minute round trip. I was five minutes from the house when my phone rang.

“How’s he doing?”

She sighed. “He’s gonna be okay. They’re going to do a bypass in the morning, though. He’s in ICU right now.”

“I’ll be up there in a bit. I’m just turning down our road.”

Pickles gave me a stern look when I opened his carrier. I filled his water and food bowls, dumped a handful of treats out, gave him a couple from my hand, left the rest atop his dry food. “You watch the place, knothead,” I said. “I gotta go take care of our Gee.”

“Mrrrouwww.”

“I know. I’ll tell ‘er you said so.”

I left, rushed back to the hospital, stopped at the information desk, got directions to the ICU. I met Gee and her mom in the waiting room.

“Mizz Bates, I’m so sorry. Is there anything we can do?”

She shook her head. “I’m sorry I ruined your trip.”

“Mom, you didn’t ruin anything. I love you ‘n’ Dad to pieces. Me ‘n’ Josh, we’re doing what families do in times of trouble. We’re supposed to be here.”

“Still...”

“Mizz Bates, Gee’s right. There’s no place else more important than this.”

“How far did you get? In the boat?” Mizz Bates asked.

“Intracoastal City,” Gee answered. “We drove back. Rental car.”

“Y’all made it back before Ron,” she said. “He’s offshore, trying to get a helicopter back.” Ron, Gee’s brother, was an operator at an offshore production platform, in the middle of the ‘on’ cycle of his ‘seven on – seven off’ schedule.

“I thought you said that your dad was doing okay?”

“He is,” Gee said. “Still, this surgery...”

“Folks,” I said, “this stuff’s getting almost a yawner.”

“That’s what the doctor said,” Mizz Bates said. “But he’s my husband and I’m scared, okay? And so’s Ron.”

“And my Gee, too. I’m not saying it’s not serious, but if he makes it into surgery, chances are very good he’ll make it out okay. It’s not like it used to be.”

“That’s good to know.”

“I know it myself,” I said. “Never stopped me from worrying, though.”

We hung around until one of the scheduled visitations. Mister Bates was barely lucid – painkillers, IV, monitors, all the hospital accouterments including the machine that goes PING. He was happy to see us, squeezed Gee’s hand, and apologized for the interruption.

“Don’t be silly, Daddy,” Gee said. That tone caused me to see the flash of her as a happy little girl with a dad who was the center of her world. I knew that feeling myself. I hope she keeps hers around for years to come.

After the visitation period ended, we took Gee’s mom to dinner. We offered her a stay with us at our house but she refused. I understand that sentiment. Gee and I went home.

She sat on the sofa. When she did, Pickles jumped from his perch on a windowsill with a view of the back yard and jumped up on the sofa with her. He laid his big fuzzy head on her thigh, extended a paw and touched her knee.

“He knows something’s wrong,” she said. “He’s trying to help, too.”

“He has his moments as a small furry human.”

“This is more than human,” Gee said softly, stroking his fur.

I slid next to her, put my arm around her shoulders.

“Good. I need this, baby,” she sighed.

Gee’s turn:

“Just try to relax,” he said. “Nothing we can do that will change things. I’m sure that we’ll have good news tomorrow.”

I petted Pickles for a while, absorbed in my own thoughts, relishing being held by Josh.

Finally he said, “I’m gonna get a shower. You?”

“You don’t shower without me,” I said.

The act of getting naked, of washing each other lovingly, for that time the problems receded. I enjoyed the hot water, the lathering, Josh’s strong hands roaming over me, the texture of the terry washcloth, the rinsing, and finally, two bodies wet, slick, held together by mutual attraction.

Post-shower activities were the fun phased in with necessity that I love with him, right up to him brushing my hair for me.

Clothes? Not just yet. They’re in the bedroom, for later.

I used Josh. Apprehension, frustration, impotency (not THAT kind!) disappeared with me using Josh. Yes, I know ... poor guy, having to suffer as I did everything I could think of, I guess subconsciously proving to myself that I was in control of my life. I need to forget those psychology classes from college. Truth is, making love with Josh is a freeing of myself.

The next day we met Mom at the hospital, along with my brother Ron. Ron looked a bit frazzled, but there he was meeting Josh for the first time. We all sat in the waiting room and waited for Dad to get through with his surgery.

Happily for me, Ron and Josh seemed to hit it off, discussing work experiences and such. Mom and I, well, Mom’s a wreck.

Finally a scrubs-clad doctor showed up and announced that Dad’s surgery was completely successful. “He’ll rest tonight in ICU. Tomorrow we’ll start him walking. If everything’s good, he’ll go home the next day, start recovery.”

Mom cried. This time, tears of joy. I joined her.

The next day I saw Dad walking. Slowly, yes, but walking nonetheless. I gave him a very careful hug, mindful of his surgery.

“Don’t write me off yet, Gee,” he said. “I am going to be around to bounce a grandkid on my knee.”

He said that in front of Josh. I glanced to catch Josh’s expression. It wasn’t horror. I look forward to telling my baby ‘One night, deep in the Chacahoula Swamp... ‘

Two days later Dad’s home, getting prodded into walking by Mom, who’s been prodding Dad into doing things as long as I can remember. We rope Ron into driving us to Intracoastal City to re-board Dorable.

Ron got the tour of the boat.

“Dude,” he said to Josh, “this is cool as hell.”

“Thank you,” Josh smiled. “She was cool enough by herself. Adding Gee, it’s a little corner of paradise.”

“I dunno, Josh,” Ron laughed. “She wasn’t YOUR big sister.”

I’d told Josh of some of the sibling warfare, so he knew.

“I was an only child, so I wouldn’t know about that. I can’t believe that as charming as she is, she’d be that bad,” Josh said.

“Sorry, Josh, but you’ve been sold a bill of goods. ‘Charming’ is a front.”

Ron left. I accompanied Josh to meet with the shorebase manager.

“No bill,” the man said. “You used two dollar’s worth of electricity, maybe. I don’t care.”

“Look,” Josh said, “If I tied up at a real marina, it’d be fifty bucks a night. Here’s two hundred bucks. What’s that old black guy who helped us the other day? Had that kid...”

“That kid is my wife’s nephew,” Mister Bivens said. “Trying to give him a job.”

“Yeah, okay,” Josh said. “Take those guys out to lunch’re something. Have a crawfish boil...”

“Now that’s a thought,” Bivens said. “You don’t have to, though...”

“I accept your word on that, but you guys did me a big favor and I want to give you something back.”

“I appreciate it. Don’t get that much anymore.”

“Least I could do,” Josh said.

“Well, thank you. Mizz Gee, how’s your dad?”

“He’s home. He’s recovering. He’ll be okay. Scared the bejesus out of us, though.”

“Aging parents...” Bivens intoned. “We want ‘em around forever.”

“Daddies are indestructible,” I countered. “Until you walk into a hospital room and see all the tubes and monitors...”

“I’ll say a prayer,” Bivens replied. “Anyhow, I got a loading out to attend to. You folks’re free to stop by again any time. You have my card. Call me. I’ll make accommodations.”

Half an hour later we’re nosing Dorable out of the docking basin into the main channel. A long horn blast says we’re entering from a blind turn. Well, we’re not really blind, but the horn is a courtesy. And on the radio – “Motor Vessel Dorable leaving the Braxton basin for the Intracoastal channel, eastbound.”