“She’ll be there, Dad. It won’t be long now.” I hesitated, and looked around at Trae. “Dad, I’d like you to meet a friend of mine. Trae Wilson. He and his brother helped me get here.”
“Then I owe you a debt, young man.”
“There’s no need to feel indebted.” The graveness in Trae’s voice was at odds with the sudden mischievousness in his blue eyes as he looked at me and added, “It was my pleasure. Honestly.”
And mine, I thought with a wry smile. Even if he was sometimes one of the most infuriating men I’d ever met.
I squeezed my dad’s hand, and looked around as a man walked into the room. He was tall, slender, and had a wildness about his eyes that wasn’t quite human. “Doctor Jones?”
He nodded and walked over to the bed, his white coat flapping back and almost looking like wings. He picked up the clipboard at the end of the bed, and scrawled something onto it.
“It’s all been arranged,” he said. “Your dad has been released into your care for the night. I’ll come out after my shift is over and check on him. If death doesn’t come tonight, we’ll extend the home care until it does.”
My vision blurred with tears again. I blinked and looked back at my dad. He was still smiling.
“I’ve called some nurses in, and we’ll get him into a wheelchair for you.” The doctor glanced at Trae. “If you’d like, you can bring the car around to the main doors.”
Trae nodded, touched my back lightly, then left.
“Will anyone question events?”
“There is a private cemetery and crematorium on the grounds, and it is not unusual for the families of residents to make use of the facilities, even if the death occurs during leave. We’ll have a small memorial service. There will be no questions about his death, trust me.”
I did trust him. Like Doc Macy, this man exuded a confidence and a warmth that made it almost impossible to do otherwise.
The nurses came in, and Dad was bundled into a wheelchair. He made no sound, but the pain of his injuries filled the air nevertheless. I had to bite my lip against the urge to tell them to stop, that they were hurting him.
Because everything was hurting him. Even the mere act of breathing.
Once he was settled in the chair and all his tubes and bags were sorted, I stepped forward and wrapped the comforter around his legs. He touched it lightly and his face lit up. “Ah, I remember when you made me this. Took you weeks.”
“Months,” I corrected. “You thought I was doing homework, but I was stitching this.”
He chuckled. “I remember being afraid to wash it.”
“My stitching isn’t that bad.”
“It is, my girl, it is.”
I grinned and bent down, dropping a kiss on his cheek. “I missed you.”
He touched my cheek lightly. “And I you. We are not designed to be solitary creatures, unfortunately.”
“No,” I agreed, and wondered how he’d found the strength to cope all these years. At least I’d had company, and a reason to keep on fighting. My dad only ever had a stubborn belief that we would return.
One of the nurses stepped behind the wheelchair and began rolling my dad toward the door. I walked beside him, my fingers lightly twined in his. As we rolled into the elevator, the trembling in his fingers grew. I knew it was excitement. The knowledge that he would soon be home and free to die as he’d wished. In the open, under the stars, so that the power of dawn would caress his body and guide him on to the afterworld.
And though the thought had tears flooding my eyes again, I could wish for nothing else. It was what he wanted, what he’d been holding on for. After all my years away from him, I could do nothing less than give him his last wishes in his final moments on this earth.
Doctor Jones held open the front door and the nurse wheeled him into the outside air. Dad raised his face to the sky then breathed deep. His pale skin seemed to flood with color and he sighed. It had to be hard for a man of sunshine and heat to be cooped up inside endlessly, unable to even raise a fingertip to the caress of day. It might not be as deadly as being restrained from water and wave was for me, but it couldn’t have been pleasant. And it was something he shouldn’t have had to face.
I bit my lip, and wished I could bite down the guilt as easily.
Trae climbed out of the car and opened the rear door. The doctor and two nurses struggled to get Dad into the car and comfortable. He didn’t complain. Just smiled his happy-to-be-free smile.
Once he was in and buckled up, Doc Jones came over and gave me his best “doctor” smile. “He should be comfortable for the next twelve hours.”
“We both know he won’t last twelve hours.”