Last Call (4 page)

“Just watch how cheap he is.” Hayden proceeds to call into the living room, “Hey Anthony, we were thinkin’ of goin’ over to Vittorio’s in Bensonhurst for some Italian food? Any interest?”

“Thanks Mr. MacBride, but I should really get back to the business.” It further irritated Hayden the way Anthony regularly referred to his job as a floorwalker at Home Depot as “the business,” as if he owns the entire chain.

“That’s too bad. Well, what if the daughter makes us a bite to eat here, some pork chops or rack o’ lamb?”

“Oh, that sounds great!” Anthony yells back from the living room. “I can never turn down Diana’s cooking.”

“Sqiomlaireachd,”
sneers Hayden, knowing Diana will understand the Highland Scottish word for someone in the habit of dropping by at mealtimes.

“Dad,
please
. Now don’t embarrass me.”

“
Me
embarrass you?
He’s
the one who said that Barcaloungers come from Barcelona.” Hayden heads back toward the door. “I’m goin’ over to the hospital supply center.”

“Dad, will you please stop haunting hospital supply stores. You’ve been there almost every day this week. Besides, it’s almost six o’clock. They’re closed.”

“Then I’ll go hospital supply
window shopping
. Maybe they’ve invented a new sofa with an ejector button. I know you’d rather I peruse garden supplies, but unfortunately I do’an’ have that kind of timeline.”

“Suit yourself,” says Diana. She hates her father’s jokes about dying. It makes what’s going to happen unbearably real. “But I don’t want Joey going. He’ll become a mortician if he keeps hanging around with you.”

“The pay is good,” Hayden replies cheerfully. “Besides, you think it’s better that he sits in his room playing solitaire on the computer the whole day long?”

“Better than watching you haggling over coffins?
Yes.
” Why couldn’t Hayden just teach Joey to play chess and take him to the movies like other grandfathers?

“That was the Neptune Society I signed up for, Diana. They take your ashes out to sea. I’ve told you a thousand times that I do’an’ want to be buried. The earth is for the living, not the dusty remains of the dead. Would you
please
read my funeral instructions, it’s quite clear—”

Joey enters the kitchen. “
Mom,
why’d you take down all my baseball posters? I can’t have an asthma attack from just
looking
at sports.”

“No, but you’ll take the paint off the walls with all that tape.” Diana had allowed Joey to put tape on the walls of his old room. But she doesn’t want to act as if Hayden’s home is her own, even though that’s what he keeps insisting they should do.

“So we’ll cover it with more posters,” Hayden comes to the rescue. “Tape away!” He gives Joey a hug of camaraderie.

“Yeah!” Joey hugs him back. “Thanks, Grandpa.”

“Okay,” Diana grudgingly agrees. “But don’t make a mess by changing them around all the time.” She’s determined to maintain some authority by having the last word on the matter. “Once you decide on a place then that’s
it
.”

“I’m hungry.” Joey glances toward the stove and the oven for signs of cooking. “When’s dinner?”

“Ask Ant’ny,” says Hayden in a fake Brooklyn accent. “He’s the charter member of the Clean Plate Club.”

chapter five

A
s Hayden and Joey head for Shea Stadium the following morning, the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway thunders and quakes with end-of-rush-hour traffic. In the distance the skyscrapers of Manhattan rise and melt into a pale gray sky. Hayden squints into the glaring sun, attempting to realign his vision after a few medicinal whiskeys the night before.

“We just need to pay a quick call at the hospital.” He delivers this news to Joey only after turning off the expressway.

“But Grandpa, you
promised
no death today,” complains Joey. Why won’t it just go away, this stupid Cancer Monster attacking his favorite person in the world, this double-crossing disease that doesn’t hurt while it kills.

“Now do’an’ get your skivvies all in a twist. We’re going to a baseball game for real. The Bone Factory is just a pit stop. Cyrus is passing off some special pills to me. And he may not be around much longer, if you know what I mean.”

“Pills? I thought you decided to sit in the car with the garage door closed,” says Joey. Every time he opens the garage door Joey holds his breath, terrified that he’ll find his grandfather’s lifeless body slumped over the steering wheel.

“When did you start law school? Besides, that was last week. Cyrus says pills are better—that I may not have the strength to crawl out to the garage. And if
someone
should find me tryin’, she’d tie me down.” Joey and Hayden both understand exactly who that “someone” would be.

“Cyrus knows what he’s doing. He was a pharmacist.”

“You talk about Cyrus as if he’s already dead.”

“He very well could be by the time we arrive.” Hayden scowls at the slow-moving traffic. There must be an accident up ahead. “Cyrus is going to take the same pills himself. Only the stubborn old goat is determined to stick around long enough to attend his grandson’s bar mitzvah.”

Joey appreciates that Hayden and Cyrus have a lot more in common than just cancer. Not only do the two men both possess sharp business sense, but they share a great enthusiasm for their adopted country. Cyrus had fled a dictator-ruled Romania with his family when he was seven, old enough to remember the poverty and lack of opportunity in his country. After attending the Bronx High School of Science and Fordham University, he’d gone on to earn a pharmacy degree at the University of Buffalo, mostly paid for by scholarships and financial aid. Eventually he’d opened a chain of pharmacies in Brooklyn and Queens and made a small fortune. And who would know better than Hayden, since he’d similarly built a career in America and sold Cyrus plenty of insurance over the years.

The oncology ward is bustling as patients are wheeled past with IVs dangling from metal racks overhead, and clipboard-carrying doctors and nurses efficiently scuttle up and down long corridors and into white rooms with beige rubber molding near the floor. Walking past the open doors the visitors are hit by a series of different smells—the aroma of flowers, sharp disinfectant, and the odd sour smell distinctive to places where people are waiting to die.

Hayden doesn’t ask Joey if he’d like to wait in the lounge. Nor does the boy try to avoid being part of the pilgrimage. If it’s true what his grandfather says, that he is really going to die soon, then Joey wants to be with him every possible minute. So he faithfully traipses after Hayden to the bedside of sixty-two-year-old Cyrus, haggard and wasted, dying of pancreatic cancer. Cyrus’s wife, Hannah, kisses the new arrivals on the cheek and tells them she’s going to use their visit as a chance to get some breakfast. Before leaving she tenderly caresses her dying husband’s forehead.

Despite the hopelessness of his situation Cyrus is delighted to see his old friend. “Did you have any trouble finding the place?” he jokes in a thin raspy voice.

“No, I slipped an orderly a fifty and he took me right to you,” Hayden kids him right back.

Suddenly their banter is interrupted by a ferocious shrieking coming from the next room, followed by the thud of cheap institutional furnishings smashing into the shared wall. Hayden and Joey both flinch and Cyrus covers his ears, as if this is the sound of death itself. When the uproar finally subsides, Cyrus lifts his hands from his ears and shakes his head as if his resolve to ignore the cacophony is wearing thin.

“Nothing to worry about.” Cyrus motions for them to take a seat. “Goes on all day long. Have you ever heard a dying person make so much noise? Talk about a death rattle.” Then he adjusts the cardboard sign hanging around his neck.

“What’s that, Uncle Cyrus?” Joey inquires and points to the big hand-lettered placard spelling out DNR in shaky red block letters.

“
Do Not Resuscitate.
That means they’d better not try to jump-start me once I’m on the train heading downtown. Or I can sue their stethoscopes off.”

“The hospital gave you this?” Hayden skeptically examines the poor penmanship and unevenly torn cardboard.

“No, of course not. I made it myself. The nurse only puts a discreet notation in my chart and a little card on the door. But I don’t want anyone making a mistake in the dark.” He shows them the penlight hanging around his neck that he switches on to illuminate the sign while he sleeps. “Joey, open the night table drawer there and hand your grandpa the orange pill bottle.”

“Are you sure you have enough for yourself?” Hayden examines the half-full bottle. “I wouldn’t want to leave you short, not at a time like this, anyway.”

“Believe me, I have everything I need. And with these, we’re not talking about all that many.” His voice turns serious and drops to a whisper. “I made those pills myself. They’re illegal and they’re death bullets. Once dissolved they can fell a rhino in five minutes.” He glances toward the open door to make sure no one is hovering in the hallway. “You don’t pop them and then change your mind and call nine-one-one, okay? Because you won’t be around to dial the ones. Take all six.”

Hayden nods in understanding and shoves the pill bottle deep into his pocket. As he does so, the prospect of death suddenly seems very real, as if up until now he has only been playing the part of a dying man in a movie. For the first time a sense of dread briefly penetrates the consciousness of Hayden MacBride.

As he studies Cyrus’s ravaged face, Hayden asks, “So, uh, not to be meddlesome, but when are you going to, you know . . .” They’re interrupted by more shouting and what sounds like the crashing of bedpans and metal instruments against the common wall.

“Ugh, who can die with all this commotion,” grouses Cyrus. “Day and night she carries on, screaming about the Lord, priests running out with their hands covering their heads, red Jell-O splattered on their backs like blood. In fact, go over there and put one of these on her door.” Cyrus taps his finger against the DNR sign on his chest.

“Get out!” A shrill female voice can be heard above the commotion. “He has forsaken me! Get out!”

“Sounds like one of those folks being deprogrammed out of a cult,” says Hayden. He’d occasionally received requests from clients who’d been brainwashed into cashing in their life insurance policies and signing them over to the grand wizard. The family would inevitably hire lawyers to try and prevent the financial forkover.

“Go and see if she wants some downers, just enough to give her a good night’s sleep,” says Cyrus, the friendly humor evaporating from his voice. “Send them over with a bottle of champagne and tell her they’re compliments of room four-nineteen. We can’t get in any trouble for dealing drugs, at least not where we’re going we can’t.” He takes an unmarked plastic bottle from his nylon pouch and shakes out a half dozen triangular blue pills.

Hayden wraps them in a tissue, places them in his shirt pocket, and gingerly pats the spot as if caring for a large wad of bills. “I’ll peek in on the way out.” He hesitates, not wanting to confront the finality of their parting. “I guess we’re off to the ball game.”

“If the Mets lose I’m going to kill myself,” jokes Cyrus.

“Aye, me, too,” says Hayden.

“Cut it out, you guys,” says Joey. Why did they always sit around and make jokes instead of searching for a cure? “I hate it when you two talk like that.”

“It’s just like being married,” Hayden says to Cyrus while nodding toward his grandson. “Okay Joe-Joe, let’s get you out o’ this morgue and go find the alkahest.”

“The alkahest?” comments an amused Cyrus. “That’s a word I haven’t heard since college.”

“It turns things into gold,” Joey knowingly informs him. “And holds the secret to eternal life.” Whenever Hayden takes Joey somewhere he doesn’t want Diana to hear about, such as the ice cream parlor before dinner, he announces that they’re off in search of the alkahest. Only Joey secretly harbors the hope that he’ll really find it and save his grandfather’s life. Thus he’s always on the lookout for new books about sorcery and magic.

Hayden shakes hands with his old friend and then leans over and kisses him good-bye. They both look serious for a second but won’t allow themselves to be overcome by emotion.

“The bar mitzvah is tomorrow?” asks Hayden.

“Ten o’clock,” replies Cyrus.

“You’re going to the temple?”

“If it kills me.”

“Then . . . I . . . I guess I’ll see you in a few months,” says Hayden.

“Don’t try and tell me you believe in heaven and hell and all that malarkey.”

“No, of course not. I just thought that maybe you did.” Lately Hayden wishes he could buy into the whole afterlife business so that “good-bye” wasn’t so damned final. It seemed as if it was easier to let go for those who believed they were indeed on their way to a better place.

Just then another crash is heard from next door followed by more angry screams.

“On your way out,” Cyrus tells Hayden, “would you
please
inform her that I’m busy dying over here. And another thing, you’re a slick talker, try and stop Hannah from having me buried. She won’t listen to anything I say, as if being sick automatically makes you senile. And you know what I really want for my send-off.”

When Hayden acknowledges Cyrus’s request with a knowing smile, Joey looks quizzically at his grandfather, who makes a motion with his head to indicate that he’ll tell him later.

As they enter the hallway, three nuns come rushing out of the room next door as if they’re being chased by the devil himself. Cascading after them are a telephone, water pitcher, black leather-bound Bible, and other bedside paraphernalia. A nurse walking down the corridor calmly dodges the barrage as if it’s an hourly occurrence that everyone has become accustomed to working around.

“Mind if I have a look-see?” Hayden says to a nun cowering in the hallway outside the door. But she appears to panic and rushes off down the corridor without replying.

“Wait here a minute, Joe-Joe.” Like an advance scout checking for signs of enemy artillery fire, Hayden warily enters the room.