The Descendants (20 page)

“I have every right to speak this way, and so do you.”

“Yesterday you were in tears. I know you love her and have more to say.”

“I’m sorry. I don’t. I do, but not right now. I’m mad right now. I can’t help it.”

Alex has lowered her voice and seems sincere. I believe her, or at least I understand her. “It’s not going to get us anywhere,” I say. “Being angry. Fine—so your mom wasn’t satisfied with us. Let’s try and satisfy her now. Think about the good things. The good parts. And I don’t want you to say this stuff in front of Scottie. Don’t ruin her for Scottie.”

“How can you be so calm and forgiving?” Alex asks. I don’t know the answer to that right now. I don’t want to tell her that I’m furious and humiliated and ashamed of my anger toward Joanie. How do I forgive my wife for loving someone else? I think of Brian. I never considered how he must be dealing with this. He can’t see her. He can’t talk to her. He can’t grieve, really. I wonder if Joanie misses him from her coma, if she wishes he could be with her instead of us.

“I can be angry later,” I say. “I just want to understand her, I guess.”

We face Joanie once more.

“Say something nice,” I say.

“I always wanted to be like you,” Alex says to her mother, and then she shakes her head. “I am like you. I’m exactly like you.” She says this as though it has just occurred to her. “That felt so dramatic. That came out wrong.”

“No,” I say. “It’s fine. You are like her, and that’s good.”

“She knows all the other stuff,” she says. “She knows I love her. I just want to say the things she doesn’t know.”

“She knows those things, too,” I say. “You don’t need to say them.”

“I heard you got spanked.” Sid walks into the room with Scottie at his heels. She’s enamored with him. All morning she would take his hat off and run away shrieking as he chased after her. She doesn’t copy me anymore. She copies Sid.

“Hi, Joanie,” he says. He walks to her bed. “I’m Sid, Alex’s friend. I’ve heard all about you. Tough chick like you, I’m thinking you’re going to make it out okay. I’m not a doctor, but that’s just what I think.”

I see Alex and Scottie smiling at him and almost yell,
He’s wrong! She’s not going to make it.

“I’m staying at your house to help Alex. She talks to me. I’m helping her out.”

Alex seems mollified. She walks toward the head of the bed and touches Joanie’s cheek. Scottie presses into me and stares at Alex’s hand on their mother’s cheek.

“Don’t worry,” Sid says. “Your husband’s got me on lockdown at night. He’s holding down the fort. And your pops can pack a mean punch, boy. Look at this.” He moves the right side of his face toward Joanie. “Wow,” he says. “You’re beautiful.”

Scottie walks toward the bed and stands beside Sid. The room is quiet for a while as Sid stands over my wife and looks at her face. I clear my throat, and he walks to the window and lifts the curtain. “Nice day,” he says. “No clouds. Not too hot.”

I look at my wife, almost expecting her to respond. She would like Sid, I’m pretty sure about that.

“Reina just texted me!” Scottie yells. “She’s here. She’s here in the hospital.”

“Dammit, Scottie, I said no. No Reina.”

“You said Thursday she could come, and it’s Thursday. I need her. And I really want her to meet Mom, okay? And Sid—Reina will totally appreciate his personality. And I want her to meet Alex.”

“What about me?”

“You, too,” she says.

“I don’t think it’s right.” When I told her Reina could come, I didn’t know my wife was dying.

“But Dad. Alex gets Sid.”

“Fine,” I say, not wanting to argue or even talk. “If that’s what you need. Then fine.” And of course it’s fine. Whatever helps.

Scottie runs out into the hall.

“Great,” I say. “You guys ready for this?”

MOMENTS LATER, REINA
appears in the doorway with Scottie standing behind her, presenting her to us. Reina looks around as though the room is dirty.

“Dad, this is Reina. Reina, that’s my sister and Sid, and that’s my mom on the bed.”

Reina puts her hand in front of her and wiggles her fingers. She’s wearing a terry-cloth tennis skirt and a hooded terry-cloth sweatshirt. Both are emblazoned with a logo that says
SILVER SPOON
.

“So this is your mother.” She walks to the foot of Joanie’s bed. “I guess it’s true. That’s one down.”

I look at Alex, but she seems just as bewildered as I am. Scottie stands next to her friend and touches her mother’s shoulder.

“Should I shake her hand?” Reina asks.

“If you want,” Scottie says.

“No, thanks,” Reina says.

“This is ridiculous,” Alex mumbles.

I didn’t even know little girls were made this way. Reina doesn’t give us notice. I feel like her servant. Sid looks at her with his brow furrowed as if she’s the most difficult equation he has ever seen.

Reina carries a bag the size of a missile. Scottie walks away from the bed and goes to stand beside Sid. He puts his hand on her head and ruffles her hair. Scottie leans against him, and when Reina turns around, she looks at them and nods. Then she looks at her watch.

“Where’s your mom?” I ask.

“At the salon,” she says.

“She didn’t come here with you? Who’s with you?”

“No one’s with me,” she says. “I mean, my mom’s helper is in the car waiting for me, but no one’s, like,
with me
with me.”

There’s something about Reina’s voice that makes me want to shoot her with a BB gun. If she were to hurt herself and scream in pain at this very moment, I would smile before I sought help.

“Look, girls. Why don’t you talk outside, get an ice cream or something—”

“Too many carbs,” Reina says.

“What?”

“Carbs,” she says.

“Get a piece of lettuce, then, and after that, Reina, you should probably meet your helper—don’t want to keep her waiting—”

“Him waiting. He’s a Samoan with a heart of gold.”

“Okay, him waiting, and Scottie, you’ll come back so we can have our family time together.”

“That’s okay,” Reina says. “I’m done.” She looks at Scottie and waves. “You aren’t a liar after all.”

Scottie darts her eyes among Sid, her sister, and me. I wonder what Reina is talking about.

“Don’t you want to hang out?” Scottie says, pushing herself off of Sid.

“No, I have to choreograph this dance sequence.” Reina reaches into her purse and looks at her text-messaging gadget and rolls her eyes. “Justin is so ree,” she says. “Okay, I’ll see you at the club. Hope your mom gets better. Smooches.”

We all stare after her with our mouths open. After she’s gone, I ask Scottie, “What did she mean by ‘You aren’t a liar after all’? And what’s ‘ree’? What does that mean, ‘Justin is so ree’? Why’d she call you a liar? What is wrong with that girl?”

“She didn’t believe that mom was sleeping and…” Scottie pauses and looks at Sid. Her face takes on a cherry tomato–like hue. “And ‘ree’ is short for retarded.”

“And…” Alex says.

“And that’s all,” Scottie says.

“So you just had to prove to that twat that Mom was in a coma?” Alex asks. “What the fuck is in your skull? A bunch of stupid pills?”

“Shut up, you motherless whore,” Scottie says.

“Whoa,” Sid says. “Easy there.”

“What else did she think you were lying about?” Alex asks.

I think of Scottie cozying up to Sid and the way Reina looked them over.

“Was it about Sid? Did you say something about Sid?”

“No!” she says.

“You don’t need to make things up for that girl,” I say. “She may do things with boys, but that doesn’t mean you do things, too.” I now feel it’s my only duty in life to make sure Scottie doesn’t resemble Reina in any way, because I know the potential is latent within her, quickly surfacing.

“I just told her he was my boyfriend so she’d get off my back,” Scottie says.

“You’re such an idiot,” Alex says.

“Whatever. He told me he’s not your boyfriend. He probably finger-fucks thousands of girls.”

“Scottie!” I yell.

Alex has a wounded look in her eyes. “I don’t care,” she says. “It’s not like we’re together.”

Sid opens his mouth to say something, but then he just shakes his head. I look at Joanie, lying there silent.

“Your phone’s vibrating,” Scottie says. She takes my cell phone out of her pocket, the phone she has stolen from me to text her friend. She doesn’t even care that she has disobeyed. She doesn’t care that she said “finger-fucked” in front of me. It’s as though I’m not a father.

I don’t recognize the number, so I don’t answer. I like to let people leave messages, and then I’ll call back after I rehearse what to say.

“You never answer your phone,” Scottie says. “What if someone needs help?”

“Then they can leave a message and I’ll call right back.”

Alex takes the phone out of my hands. “Hello?” she says.

“What the—? Do I not exist, girls? Do you realize I’m in charge here?”

Scottie whispers, “Who is it?”

“Oh, no,” Alex says. “This is the right number. This is his assistant…Sharon.”

Scottie opens her mouth, delighted. I’ve always been impressed by Alex’s effortless ability to lie.

“That sounds nice,” Alex says, then punches me lightly on the arm. “Where? Great. And for how long? Okay. Well, thanks. Maybe we’ll peek in on Sunday. Thanks so much. Okay.”

She closes the phone.

“Well?”

“That was a
Realtor,
Dad, from
Brian’s
office. She says she’d be happy to show you the house you called about. Well done, Dad. Very clever.”

“Good one, King,” Sid says.

“What about Brian?” I ask. I feel strange talking about this with Joanie in the room. I position myself so that I face away from her.

“He’s on Kauai,” she says.

“For how long?”

“Until the eighteenth.”

“Did you get a number where I can reach him?”

“No. What do you want to say to him?” Alex asks, and again I’m stumped.

“What are you guys talking about?” Scottie weaves in between us.

“Do you think he knows about Mom?” Alex asks.

“Of course,” I say. It occurs to me that he most likely knows she’s in the hospital, but he couldn’t possibly know that these are Joanie’s last weeks or even days to live. I wonder what they did together. My wife and Brian. I think about what Kai said or insinuated: that I drove Joanie to have an affair. That my chilliness or aloofness led her into his arms. I thought we had something special, that she didn’t need as much tending to as other women do.

I look at the macadamia nuts and the pictures of motorcycles and boats Scott taped to the walls. I see gardenias, her favorite flower, and I see a bottle of wine.

“Are we still going to people’s houses to tell them about the party?” Scottie asks.

Alex shrugs, and I feel bad that I’ve made her make up these lies, even though she probably likes doing it.

“No,” I say. “We’re done with that.”

“When is the party?” Scottie asks.

I dust some sand off Scottie’s T-shirt. Where does she get these shirts? I’m going to have to get her some new clothes. The shirt has a picture of an elephant on its back, legs in the air, tongue hanging out of its mouth like a playground slide.
WASTED
, it says, and I notice the beer cans scattered around the desert in the background.

When is the party?
I wonder, and I realize that this would be a good way to tell the rest of the people on my list. I can’t continue on my trail. I’ll make them come to me. Again I’ll have to talk to Dr. Johnston and tell him to hold on. Wait. I want to make sure everyone has the chance to say goodbye. I want to make sure all the right people are here.

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