Page 57 of Little Pieces of Light

Xander

Early Saturday morning, I laid out my rented tux for prom on my bed and set the plastic container with Emery’s corsage beside it.

For the hundredth time I checked my phone.

She hadn’t returned any of my texts, and all of the dozen calls I’d made to her in the past two days had gone to voicemail.

Now that I’d walked away from CHA, I couldn’t see her every day, and I missed her.

I miss my wife.

It was a bad idea, to refer to Emery that way, even in my mind, but I couldn’t seem to stop doing it.

Like poking a wound over and over again so that it never heals.

I’d vowed to never use it as an emotional weapon against her, to make her feel pressured or guilty, but I’d also vowed to love her forever, because I did.

Another paradox—I loved my wife but wouldn’t call her that because I loved her.

I shot a text to Harper. Any word from Emery?

The reply came quick. No. Her dad showed up at school two days ago, and I haven’t heard from her since. I’m sorry! I should have texted you ASAP, but I wasn’t thinking.

Her dad. Of course.

It’s okay. I’ll try again.

Hold on.…

I waited a minute and then Harper came back.

Delilah says they’re at the CC setting up for prom. I eased a sigh of relief until she texted again. But she says Em isn’t going???

My heart—this battered, bruised thing in my chest—became heavy with new anxiety.

I texted Harper . Heading over now.

On my way downstairs I checked on my dad in his room.

Though it was early morning, he was awake, the glare of the TV casting a blue glow over his dull features.

He’d lost so much weight, so much light from his eyes.

The dementia that laid waste to his mind revealed itself in the wasting away of his body too.

“I’ll be right back, Dad,” I said. “Don’t go anywhere.”

“Hm? Tell your mother she’s late, and we’re going to start dinner without her.”

“I will.”

And before I left, I double-checked that I’d flipped off the circuit breaker for the oven and that the gas to the stove was shut off. No more 3:00 a.m. breakfasts. No more piano. No more equations…

I jumped in the car, exchanging my concern for my father for a pang of dread for Emery. She’d been working on bringing her vision to life for months. Prom was her dream, and that bastard of a father was somehow stealing that from her too.

I screeched into the country club parking lot a little after nine in the morning and climbed out just in time to see Emery coming out of the front door. She wore jeans and a T-shirt, and her hair was pulled in a messy ponytail. Her eyes were red-rimmed and widened in fear when she saw me.

“Xander?” She glanced around quickly. “What are you doing here?”

“You haven’t answered my calls or texts, and Harper says you’re not going to the prom tonight?”

Emery stiffened. “No, I’m not.”

“Were you going to tell me?”

“Yes…I…I’m sorry. But I have to go. If he sees you here…”

I gritted my teeth. “What happened? What did he do now? What did he tell you?”

“It doesn’t matter,” she said, her eyes filling. “You need to leave.”

“No,” I said. “He can’t do this to you. Whatever it is he told you, it’s a lie.”

“You don’t know him, Xander,” she said brokenly. “You don’t know who he knows and what he can do. Please, just go home.” Emery glanced around fearfully, then lowered her voice. “But your dad, Xander. Get him somewhere safe, okay? I have to go.”

She started past me and I followed, walking with her as she hurried to her car.

“Wait, what about you? Look, I’m sorry I’ve been distant. I’ve been so fucking sad about Dean and stupid with old hurt from my mother leaving. I’ve been thinking in binary, as if there is only you in California and me here because I didn’t think I could survive another hit. But I—”

“I’m not going to California,” she said. “I ruined my teacher’s life. I’m not going to ruin yours too.”

“What? I-I don’t understand. What did he say to you? Emery… what did he say? ”

“It’s too late, Xander!” she cried suddenly, then heaved a breath. “It’s too late,” she repeated, calmer now. Resigned. “I can’t do this anymore.”

I can’t do this anymore. My mother’s parting words.

“So that’s it?” I demanded, a hot, ugly feeling unspooling in my gut. “You’re just going to give in? Walk away? You’re not going to fight for us?”

“Yes.”

“ Why? ”

“Because I’m tired of fighting. I’m so tired of…not being enough. For anyone. You, him, myself…”

“I don’t know what that means,” I said, something like panic rising in me. “Did I do something wrong? I thought you had a plan—”

“Plans change,” she said. “Don’t look at me like that. I can’t, Xander.” She straightened, jutted out her chin. “This is what I want.”

“No, it’s not. I don’t believe that.”

Her eyes flashed. “So now you’re going to tell me how I feel too? Like I don’t have enough of that already?”

“No, that’s not what I meant.” I ran a hand through my hair. “Em…what about us?”

“It just got too difficult,” Emery said, her lip quivering. She glanced around a final time, then threw her arms around me. “I’m sorry,” she breathed into my neck, her tears hot on my skin. “But he’s going to win. He always does.”

Then she got into her car and drove away.

I stood in the parking for a good while, Emery’s absence another black hole opening under my feet. A different version of the same rejection that had wounded me since I was ten years old, compounded by loss and death, until I was numb with it.

With automatic movements, I drove toward home, her words filtering through my breaking heart.

Get him somewhere safe.

Her father must’ve threatened my dad, somehow.

She was trying to save me, maybe, by sacrificing herself.

By sacrificing us. But there had been defeat in Emery’s eyes, too.

And terror. Her father had been making her doubt herself for years, withholding love and affection and only doling it out in little bits, just enough to keep her confused and hoping that one day he’d see her…

And now she’s giving up.

So lost in my thoughts, I almost didn’t see him until it was too late. I slammed on the brakes, narrowly avoiding hitting my father, who was wandering across the street in the wooden seclusion of the Bend.

“No,” I murmured in a cold sweat, my heart pounding. “Not again. Not now.”

My father had stopped to stare at nothing. Behind him, a dozen yards away, was our house. His beloved house that he’d refused to leave. It was in relatively good condition, I thought. Close to the bay, some developer might want it. To tear down and build something bigger.

Get him somewhere safe…

I got out of the car and gently helped my dad, still in his pajamas, into the passenger seat. “Where are we going?” he demanded, loud and suddenly angry.

“We’re going to Boston.”

“Why?” he asked, suspicious. Confused.

I didn’t answer, and in another minute, he forgot he asked.

***

It took an hour and a half to drive to Willow Glen Memory Care in Boston.

My father spent the drive alternating between watching the scenery fly by and sleeping.

Sometimes, he muttered to himself, and I wished with all my heart he’d talk to me about some complex theory, that he’d speak to me in the difficult language of physics, our native tongue.

But by the time I helped him out of the car, I would’ve been happy if he’d just remembered my name.

At reception, I sat him down in a chair and brought him a cup of water, but his hands were trembling too much to hold it.

“Ah, yes, Xander. We spoke on the phone,” the woman behind the desk said. Her name tag read Joanne . “We have the room for him, but there was the matter of Medicare not covering the full annual residency fee.”

“I know, but I’ll have it. I have enough for one year, and I’ll make up the rest after that. I just need the time to sell our house.”

She looked at me sympathetically. “I’m sorry this is so rough for you. But he’ll have excellent care here.”

“Thank you.”

The intake process took hours, and by the time my father was situated in his room, twilight was falling.

I sat at his bedside, surveying the space.

It made me think of a dorm. Besides the bed, it had a TV, dresser, small table and chair, and an adjoining bathroom.

It was neat and tidy and pastel, nothing like our dark, ramshackle—yet cozy—house.

The drive had exhausted him, or maybe it was just the illness working to steal him away.

My father stared blankly at a TV show, then swiveled his head to me.

“What are you still doing here?”

“This is your first night. I don’t want you to be alone.” I swallowed hard. “I can’t leave you, Dad.”

“I’m leaving you.” He nodded, his eyes back on the TV. “It won’t be long now.”

“What do you mean?”

But he didn’t seem to hear me.

“I worry about him,” he said after a minute.

“Who?”

“My son, Xander. He wants to protect me. Or redeem my reputation. Pfft. He doesn’t know that I know, but I know.”

“What do you know?” I asked, barely daring to breathe. This was the most he’d spoken to me in weeks.

He didn’t reply but had gone blank again. I rubbed my aching eyes and thought about getting something from the vending machine. I hadn’t eaten all day—

“Physics is a terrible science,” he said suddenly. “Stephen Hawking tried to warn us. He said if we discover a Theory of Everything, we will know the mind of God. But why would we want to do that?”

“I’m not sure I’m following you, Dad,” I said slowly, carefully, not wanting to lose him again. As if his lucidity was a flighty bird I might scare off.

“Xander studies black holes, but here’s something to understand about that,” Dad stated. “No matter what is pulled inside, it can never die. Do you know that?”

“That could be true,” I said. “If what happens in a black hole follows the Law of Conservation of Energy.”

“Hmph. You sound like my son. All science, no magic.”

I gave a start. “What did you say?”

But again, he didn’t seem to hear me. “Energy cannot be destroyed, only changed from one form to another. Nothing is final. Not even death. But what happens then? That’s the mystery. It’s what makes life worth living. If we solved the mystery, what would be the point?”

“We’d know what was coming,” I said gruffly. “We could be prepared…”

“Nothing prepares you. The joy, the hurt…” He went away again, then came back.

“I’m very proud of him. He’s a good boy, my Xander.

A young man, now. He’s going to be with his love.

Beautiful girl, she is, inside and out. But I have to stay here and wait.

I’m staying right here until she comes back. ”

“Who?”

“My wife.”

“Dad, no—”

“Tell Xander to remember his Goethe,” Dad said, eyes drifting closed, voice heavy with sleep.

“‘You will never know another’s heart unless you are prepared to give yours too.’ He needs to put his heart in that girl’s hands and trust her not to drop it.

She might, and that’ll hurt—but it’s a beautiful hurt, the best kind.

And if she holds it tight and gives hers in return… what’s better than that?”

“I can’t think of anything,” I managed.

“Go to your girl, Xander,” he said.

I whipped my head up; he was speaking right to me.

“Go to her, and love her,” he said with a smile. “And don’t let her go.”