Grampa Joe
I close my eyes on the plane ride home, to picture what my Grampa Joe’s typical day must be like. I see him lying in his cool dark room, slowly being painted a morning blue with the rising sun. He didn’t sleep, despite being tired, instead spending his night in a suspended consciousness—similar to the one I’m in now.
He feels his mattress sigh and tug with the weight of his rising wife. As he contemplates tackling another day, I feel the hollow beating pain in his shoulder blade, the tightening scar tissue in his throat. He sighs through an opening that seems no bigger than the mouth of a straw.
He rises from his bed, and looks down at his shrinking full-moon belly. He winces at the scar from where a tube used to protrude, winding its way into his lungs, so it could be drained by the nurse who visits the apartment. He pads his way into the living room, on puffy swollen feet.
He retains water the same way I did when I was pregnant. It’s as though you’re swimming in your body, or you’re a frog, left to bloat, dying in a family pool.
He sinks onto the couch, the spot from which he watches most of his days pass by.
“Tea, Joe?” My Grandma Kath asks.
He grimaces, and grumbles out a gruff yes. Gratitude swells in his heart for everything his wife has done to care for him—the endless hospital visits, home appointments, hours spent researching—but her voice is a mere whine over the pain. His breath is laboured. The kettle gurgles in the background.
She places a steaming porcelain cup in front of him, and reminds him it’s time for his pills. He grunts in reply.
-
My Sicilian street-wise Grampa seems like a man life would never fuck with. His
nickname is “Subito”—after his sister’s grumpy old mutt. It’s fitting—he seems to bark at everything. He’s not afraid to give his opinion, nor shy about swearing (it’s almost as if he were raised by sailors and not Catholics). Even in his seventies, he looks like a greying Kenickie from Grease, or when he wears a suit, Marlon Brando straight out of the Godfather.
He’s also one of two men in the entire world I trust to protect me. The other, my maternal Grampa, was taken from me too soon when the brain he used to keep me safe burst on him. Grampa Joe used his brawn, his image, his reputation to fight for my protection.
Growing up, my younger brother and I spent most weekends with Grampa Joe and
Grandma Kath. During one such weekend, he and my Grandma were tucking me into bed. When they brought up that I would be going home the next day, home to my stepdad, their son, I started to tremble, terrified. The tears came, and I begged them to just let me stay with them. It took a lot of poking and prodding, but they finally dragged out the reason I didn’t want to go home.
“He’s hurting me,” I said between childish, heaving sobs. “I’m scared.”
My Grampa Joe told me it was going to be okay. That my stepdad would never hit, push, shake, or throw me again. I couldn’t imagine his son, the monster I lived with, being intimidated by anything or anyone. Grampa Joe kept his word though and, while I’ll never know what he said or did to his son, my stepdad never laid a hand on me again.
-
The searing tea doesn’t go down easy.
Swallowing is tight and difficult, and marred by coughing attacks. He puts his cup down, and stares out the sliding door. He watches the smoke from his wife’s cigarette curl up over the balcony railing. His eyes are heavy. He’s exhausted, but the pain, the lack of breath, makes rest impossible.
He runs a hand through his white hair—a little fluffier but still abundant despite the countless rounds of chemo and radiation. He reaches for the TV remote and channel surfs. Nothing’s on this early in the day. He leaves it on CP24, closes his eyes, and listens to more bad news. The sliding door breathes open and shut.
“Tired, Joe?” His wife asks.
“No, you idiot. I’m trying to count the veins inside my eyelids,” he growls.
“Now, now,” she tuts.
-
My Grampa seems to spare only me from his gruffness. His family, his friends, have all grown used to his occasional verbal assaults. It’s just the way he is. As the cancer creeps through his lymph nodes, though, some of his sourness has started to fade. He was always a reliable partner when it came to my grim interpretation of people, society, the world. Not so much anymore.
During the holidays last month, I made a remark about how human beings are inherently evil. He told me I shouldn’t see the world in such a dark light. It startled me, but I listened.
That night, he thought he accidentally threw out his painkillers. He paced and swore, rustling through drawers and cabinets, convinced they were in the trash.
“Let’s go look for them,” I suggested.
My brother, grandfather, and I marched wordlessly toward the dumpsters at the back of their apartment building. It was an unseasonably warm Christmas Eve—we left our jackets inside. With a flashlight, my Grampa and brother
identified the trash that could be theirs as I, with long limbs and traces of a gymnast’s muscle memory, balanced my pelvis on the lip of the dumpster, and snatched up the bags they pointed to. Grampa Joe ripped into each one, unafraid of the grime.
“Make sure you wash your hands,” my brother reminded him. “The last thing we need is you getting sick.”
“This one’s definitely ours,” Grampa Joe replied fishing out a needle from beneath a pile of coffee grounds. “But no pills.”
Though we were elbow deep in trash, we stayed positive, despite our typical cynical and surly dispositions. His pills weren’t even there—my Grandma Kath found them in the house—but, between the smell of old diapers, rotten food, and spoiled milk, we still managed a few laughs.
-
The TV talks to itself, as his wife gets breakfast started. Pots and pans clang against the counter, bacon pops and sizzles, the sink hisses and sputters. The apartment fills with the delectable scent of grease. His grown grandson emerges from his room.
“Breakfast ready?” His grandson asks.
“Just about,” his wife calls. “Joe you want to come to the table?”
“Sure, Kath.”
Pain shoots into his shoulder as he rises. He leaves the TV on. In front of his grandson, his wife places a plate stacked with sunny side-up eggs, strips of bacon, and golden toast. In front of him, she places a grey-beige bowl of porridge dusted with cinnamon and sugar—all he can manage these days.
The landing announcement interrupts my reverie—the flight was quick—leaving me squinting against the pools of guilt forming in my chest in knowing that, despite the accuracy of my imagination, Grampa Joe is dying, and, though I’m closer than before the flight started, I’m still miles away from him.