Page 104 of Error Handling

After the door slams, Mom props her back with her hand again and rests the other on the island. She looks down at the countertop for a moment before crumpling. I run over to catch her.

“What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know. I just...” Her eyes are watering.

I guide her to the kitchen table, pull out a chair, and help her into it. The tears are streaming down her face now.

“Your father.” Her wrinkled lips quiver as she speaks. “They won’t put him on the transplant list. They said he wouldn’t survive the surgery.” She leans an elbow on the table and coversher eyes with her hand. “I just don’t know what I’m going to do without him. I know you don’t like me asking for help, but your father won’t make any decisions. I feel like I have to figure it all out by myself. You’re the obvious choice for the business. Sam has his own. Your sister has the kids.”

Mom’s breath catches in her throat, and she shudders.

“It’s okay, Mom.” I kneel in front of her and rest my hand on her shoulder.

“I know I annoy you. I can see it in your face.”

“I’m not annoyed.”

“Not right now. Whenever I mention the business. But I can’t help but hold on to hope. Your father worked so hard at that business, and he gave us all a good life. I don’t want to see it go to someone else, or to see it dissolve completely.”

“We don’t need to talk about the business right now.”

I stand and grab her a tissue. Mom dabs her eyes with it and then blows her nose.

“Don’t overwork yourself, Mom. I can help prepare the food for Sunday.” I lean against the island.

“Don’t worry about me.”

“Don’t say that. You love it when we worry about you.”

Fresh tears roll from her eyes, and she catches them with the tissue. “You know as well as I do that your dad hasn’t always been the most affectionate. He’s a hard worker. I’ll give him that. But he worked so hard, I think he forgot about his softer side. I always got on him for yelling at you. It was a bad habit of his.”

I don’t argue. When I was growing up, my dad’s fuse was as long as a piece of lint.

“He’s changed lately though. He tells me he loves me. He apologizes for things he did thirty years ago. It makes me happy, but at the same time, I’m scared. It’s like he’s making amends because he knows his time is short.”

I know my dad’s time is short. I accepted it after the heart attack, shed many tears over it, but now isn’t the time to point out the obvious to my mom.

“Anyway.” She pats the tissue against her nose and then presses her hands to her thighs. “I know I can be a pill. Especially when I’m upset. It’s been that way ever since I was a child. Some things never change.”

“You have every right to be upset, Mom.” I walk over to her and give her a hug. I feel guilty about dreading my time with her. She always supported me as a kid, went to every baseball game, convinced my dad to buy me my first table saw.

“I’ll try not to talk business while you’re here.” She sniffs.

“I’ll take care of those bills, okay? Do you know which account the money needs to come out of?”

“The checkbook is in his top drawer. And I have stamps in here somewhere.” She stands and opens every top drawer in the kitchen. “Oh, I don’t know. I’ll find some. If I don’t, I’ll stop by the post office.”

“I’ll figure it out.”

“Thank you, Chris. You’ve always had a good heart. That’s why I miss you so much.” A fresh tear meanders through the wrinkles in her cheek.

I hug her again and assure her everything will be all right. I’m not sure what “all right” will look like, but I will never let my mom suffer alone in this house.

After depositing my suitcase in my old bedroom, I sit down at my dad’s computer and look through the stack of bills. It’s a hefty pile, and many of them are past due. I’m still not sure why my mom couldn’t sit down here and figure it out herself, but I don’t understand what it’s like to have a dying spouse either.

The burden of sorting through thirty years’ worth of business files once my father is gone suddenly weighs on my shoulders. Ipush the prospect out of my mind and work on finding my dad’s checks.

On the off chance that he modernized his business processes, I pull up his Chase Bank account and enter the user ID and password that is clearly written on the Post-it note sticking to the corner of the monitor. The user account is still good, and the password is stored in the computer’s password vault.