Every Little Thing (26 page)

Lee said, “Oh,” and he looked away from Cohen, staring straight through the windshield at his house. He nodded once and opened the car door.

Oh
, he'd said, and less jovially than Cohen would have liked.

Long seconds ticked by between Lee opening his car door and him stepping out. Following Lee up the steps and into the house at that snail-crawl of a pace, he saw what a challenge a few stairs were to Lee now.

They made it into the kitchen and Cohen caught himself shout-talking to Lee, slowly, like Lee was dumb now, like he might not understand, and Lee looked a little embarrassed about it. “All right. I've got a suitcase and some boxes out in my trunk. Make yourself useful and get some coffee going for us?”

He turned to walk out to his car, and Lee finally spoke. “So you're here to prevent me from diving into another snowbank, so to speak? I don't care if everyone's talking about me. Not in this town.”

“No one's talking about you. Get the coffee on. I'll be right back.”

Cohen left the room without a response and fetched his suitcase and a few boxes of work stuff. A microscope and some pond samples. He laid it all down in the living room where he'd sleep and work until Allie got back in town, sizing up the couch like it might be too short to make a decent makeshift bed.

When he went back into the kitchen, Lee had his head titled up like he was looking where the walls met the ceiling. His chin pointed out. Even with those googly glasses, Lee had to move his head the way an owl does to see anything. It was like there was something wrong with the bones in his neck.

There was a wet disc radiating out from Lee's crotch. He was pissing himself, and Cohen didn't know what to do about it.

ALLIE PHONED AT six. In place of a hello, she said, “Go into another room.”

“What?”

“Go into another room where he can't hear you. Or go outside or something and tell me when you're there.”

So he did. He went outside without putting any shoes on and stepped on a small, sharp rock and screamed about it.

“What?” she said, concerned.

“Nothing, I,”hopping on one foot, “I stepped on a pebble or something.”

She laughed. “A
pebble
? Man up, Cohen. Toughen up a little bit.”

“It was a sharp one. Like a tack!” He got into his car and slammed the door shut. “Okay, I'm out in my car, out of earshot.”

“What'd the doctors say? How is he? How are you two getting along?”

“We're fine, but you're right. He's not Lee anymore. It's sad as hell. He's a fucking prick now, actually.” Cohen laughed so she'd know he meant it in a sad way, not a harsh way. “He's a bore. I don't think he even likes me anymore.”He reclined his chair, leaned back, and put his feet up on the dash.

“Don't take it personally, Cohen. My God, you're smarter than that. We're all just a sack of blood and organs waiting to fail.”

“Jesus! That's a little depressingly pragmatic of you. Don't tell me you're a bore now too? I just want the guy to laugh a little, that's all. Lighten up. He's like hanging out with Frankenstein.”

“I know. Trust me. The doctors, what did they say?”

“Well, that's the thing. I don't know how different he is now compared to last week, before the latest stroke. He's irritable. Bitter. Flat. Nothing's funny anymore. Movement seems like such an effort. When he walks he doesn't even lift his feet. I don't know how he does it. It's like he's moonwalking forward. Is that what it's called, moonwalking? That thing Michael Jackson did, where he slid around without lifting his feet?”

She laughed, “Shut up about Michael Jackson, but yes. Keep going. This is nothing new.”

“Well, he started punching my dashboard out of the blue on the drive home. Scared the shit out of me. I almost hit another car. His eyes are gone, you're right. He, ah, pissed himself, but dealt with it himself, after I got him up the stairs. Is
that
new?”

“Well. No. But. That's a rare one, don't worry.”

“The doctor suggested I set him up on the main floor before he can't do the stairs anymore or before he falls down over them. So I'm going to move all his junk out of the den and move his bed and bedroom furniture down into the den.”

“Wait. Until I get home. I'll…help you. Or you help me or whatever. Can you? Help me? Move the stuff?”

“I…just told you I'd do it, didn't I?”

“Thanks so much.”

“So I'll wait for you to get home and help me?”

“Yeah. I'd get Keith to help, but since you're already there, you know? Lee doesn't stand for it when I take Keith along.”

“Finally: me and Lee still got something in common. I'd rather Keith not come along too.”

“About that. It's a little awkward I called you to help me out here. Keith's not very happy about that.”

“Keith needs to worry a little more about Lee and a little less about who is looking after him?”

“Truthfully, Lee's been the unreasonable one there. He threw a potted plant at Keith last time he came over. And then he threw it at Keith's car—”

Cohen laughed, cutting her off.

“Don't laugh! There was damage, scratches anyway. So, like, just trust me. The situation isn't funny. There's nothing funny anymore when it comes to Lee. You've seen that, right?”

“More or less. I'm still waiting for him to yell
gotcha
and start cracking jokes.”

“Not gonna happen. Now what else did the doctors say happened?”

“I don't know. I've got pamphlets here and places they suggested he be...checked into for proper care.
Long-term care
or whatever. The way I understand it, all the strokes are causing or maybe are caused by—I dunno. It's like a vicious cycle between the strokes and the damage they are causing because the damage causes more strokes. It's called Binswanger Disease. BD. It's Alzheimer's-like, but without the severity of memory loss—”

“Holy shit! He's actually
got
something. I'm coming home. I—I'll call you later. Stay there, okay, like you promised? Stay there?”

He shouted
Allie!
into the phone, but she was gone.

JUST SHY OF midnight,Cohen had finished brushing his teeth and heard evil snickering coming out of Lee's room. He snuck up the stairs like a burglar, tiptoeing, knowing that if he kept quiet, Lee couldn't see him. He watched Lee, on his side in bed, muttering like a character possessed in a horror movie. That jaw wobbling around. It was eerie. Spooky. And Cohen crept away.

He went out to his car with shoes on this time to avoid the angry tack-sharp pebbles. He took out his phone and punched in the number Allie had been calling him from.

“Look. I don't want to scare you. And like I said, I don't know what Lee was like before you left, and the latest stroke, but I think he's worse off than the doctors thought. Mentally, I mean. He eats when I cook something and all that basic shit, but when he's alone. I don't know. He's talking to himself. Or. To someone that's not there. And he talked to the news on the TV earlier, like the anchors could hear him. Like he thought they were listening or being rude for talking over him.”

“I got a ticket already. I'm coming home early.”

“Like I said, I don't know what's
normal
for the man anymore.”

“I'd have lost my mind by now, if you weren't there. You know that, right? And the TV thing. That's nothing new. The doctor said it was harmless and common and not to upset him by making him feel strange about it. I'm gonna figure everything out when I get home. Long-term care, all that. I've been reading up on Binswanger Disease all night.”

“You there alone, in your hotel room?”

She paused, like he'd said something wrong. “Yeah. And I might have to let you go, so I can call room service. I'm looking through the menu right now. What's Cod au Gratin all about anyway. Can you believe I've never had it? Maybe tonight's the night?”

“You wouldn't like it. Trust me. Too many greases for you. Cheese, fish—”

“They've got a pizza here with caramelized grapes and pears on it. Yum.”

“Remember how Lee would always take us out to supper and tell the waitress that
it's my son's birthday
so I'd get a free piece of cake?
One less dessert I have to pay for
, he'd say, and I never had the heart to tell him the bland birthday cake was the last thing I wanted to eat on the dessert menu.”

“Yeah. All I remember is being a little jealous he pretended you were his son, but never that I was his daughter. He liked you right from the start. I remember that. Most women have a dog, and when their dog bonds with a new man, she knows
he's the one
. I had Lee, instead of a German Sheppard, and he took to you
almost
right away.”

“He called me Colin for like, months.”A little giggle on her end.

“Probably on purpose,” she said.

Cohen was fully reclined in the car seat and gripping the steering wheel with his toes. Smiling in a way that made his face warm. “Little Allie Crosbie.”

“Let's…um…not do this nostalgic, memory-lane flirtation thing, okay? I'm engaged, and I'm hungry. I've got room service to order. I'll call you when I get back in town. Maybe you can come pick me up at the airport?”

“Sure.”

“Or. No. Maybe I should get a cab.”

“I don't mind picking you up.”

“No. See you soon and thanks again.”

But neither of them hung up.

“
Hello?
”

“It was nice talking with you. You're an okay guy.”

“You're half-decent too.”

“
Half?
”

“Fully. Fully decent.”

“G'night.”

“K.”

HE HUNG UP the phone, but didn't go back in the house. He thought about how she was always putting on hand lotion. How she'd take a long sniff at her wrist. Honey or vanilla or something like that. It was odd what memories came. They were minor, trivial things. Like the way she ate ice cream right out of the tub with an ice cream scoop and not a spoon. A big ball of ice cream that took ten or eleven bites and licks, and that was the point, she'd said, of eating it with a scoop and not a spoon.
Less double dipping.

FALLING BACK

COHEN EXPLAINED THE situation with Lee to Clarence and asked to work from home for a while to look after him.

“Just while Allie's looking into...
homes
to register Lee with.”

“I don't care where you analyze these samples,” he shouted into the phone, crunching through his daily dose of salt'n'vinegar chips, “just hurry up about it!This project's behind schedule. That Morris kid we had working it was slower than a sloth. About as bright.” He laughed.

“I'll tear through this in under a month.”

“I've missed you in the lab, kid. Cheetah quick, wiser than an owl.” Clarence finished a mouthful of chips. Added, “Ugly as a boar.”

So Monday mornings, Cohen would drive into town to fetch more pond samples to analyze and to punch the previous week's stats and notes into his work computer. Clarence stumbled onto Cohen in the lab one day.

“How'd you make out last week?

“Two weeks' worth of pond samples, processed in one week,
check
.”

“Flash Lightning over here,” Clarence pointed to Cohen as if addressing an imaginary crowd that should be impressed. “But don't let me hear you're getting too attached to the pond samples and roughing up their fathers, hey?”

“I didn't rough anybody up—”

Clarence clawed a hand through the air. “Drop it. Too early to joke about it anyway. I shouldn't be making light of the Zack Janes incident. Just saying, it's behind us. I don't like tension in the workplace.”He tapped the Bob Marley CD case on his desk, said, “All about zee good vibes,mon,”and laughed at himself. “I'm happy to have you back on projects like this anyway. You're so on the ball. Kids these days, man, the ones we're getting from the university. You take away their textbooks and ask them to think for themselves and they're deer in headlights.”

Cohen nodded. “I'm fuckin' brilliant. Einstein with better hair.”

“Hardly, Einstein was too much of a hippie to go around roughing up peoples' fathers.”

“I
talked
to the man, Clarence. That's all.”

“Seriously, enough joking about it. Was what it was, whatever it was.”

“So, how's the new hire working out? My replacement? For the kids?”He didn't mean to sound so sheepish.

“Her name's Jenny Lane.” Clarence looked at Cohen to see how he'd take the news. “She's working out. I even checked her background for violence against single fathers.”

Cohen shook his head, laughed. Clarence said, with raised eyebrows, “I thought you'd be irreplaceable for a while there. Even your precious Zack likes her.”

“That's…good I guess.”

He said it sternly, “You know you're not to even
look
at that kid's father again, right, if, God forbid, you two cross paths in this building? And I'd like you to steer clear of the kid. We don't need Zack going home to Jamie, dropping your name. We've got less than twenty kids in our program. Every loss would count.”Cohen nodded, but Clarence said, “Nod harder. I'm dead serious.”

Cohen's phone rang. So he gave Clarence the solid nod he needed to see and excused himself. He found a chair in the empty staff lunchroom and answered the phone.

“Hey, it's me, Allie Crosbie. Any chance you can come get me at the airport? Save me the cab fare? Keith's in Ottawa until Sunday night.”

“Sure thing. I'm not far from the airport now, actually. I'm at the Avian-Dome—”

“Why aren't you in Grayton...with Lee!”